You know, RexDart, for someone who insists that furries are “freaks” and “bizarre”, you sure know an awful lot about them.
“God, this furry website is disgusting! What kind of a weirdo gets off on this sort of thing! Look at all these pictures! Freaks! This is so wrong. And most of their links are broken, too!”
As opposed, I guess, to making the same supposition while knowing nothing about them.
Haj
I have to say that fruitbat has a point.
I am truly ignorant of furries. Is it a common component of furridom to be sexually attracted to the anthropomorphic characters? Because that to me would be unusual. And frutibat is right–there’s a difference between being attracted to the french maid or Japanese school girl and the fox-girl or wolf-girl.
But then again–a lot of women had the major hots for Ron Perlman’s character (Vincent) in Beauty and the Beast, so maybe it’s not that odd after all in some cases. But I think a lot of people were surprised by their attraction to Vincent, and it took a lot of character development for people to think that Vincent was a cool guy (even if he had that kind of cat face thing going on). So Vincent had to be “sold” to the public. It wasn’t automatically assumed that everyone would think Vincent was a hottie in his cat suit, because that’s not how most people are wired.
However, I am entirely unclear as to how important sexual attraction is in furriness. I think I just assumed that a lot of fans liked the little critters, the way I kind of like dragons, or some people like wolves. No sexual attraction, just an admiration for the beast.
I like the Anne McCaffrey Pern books, and have done a few dragon mugs and dragon watercolors in my day. I’m a “fan,” though a pretty tame one. If there are “furry” fans that are as “tame” as I am about dragons, then that to me does not very out of the ordinary. Suffice it to say, I have no desire to have sex with dragons any time soon, and I would consider such an urge to be … well, really odd.
Some furries merely happen to like anthromorphic animals and drawings in a non-sexual context. This isn’t that unusual; most people (not myself; I dislike most anthromorphic animals; they just bother me in some strange way.) like the old Bugs Bunny cartoons, and the non-sexual furries just take it a little more seriously; I don’t consider them any worse than say Star Wars geeks who dress up as stormtroopers.
But the ones who are sexually attracted to anthromorophic animals, well they creep me out. They are not as bad as say, pedophiles, necrophiliacs, or actual bestiality, but they rate pretty close in my book. Of course, since sexual furries don’t actually harm anyone, my ethics don’t allow me to do anything to them besides reccomending they get conseling.
One where I know that “furry” and “plushophile/erotic fursuiter” are not synonyms, perhaps?
And actually, one more point. Yes, a lot of people just like antho animals. The way someone likes dragons, or stormtroopers, or what have you.
And okay, you want to deny the schoolgirl. How about the kittygirl that’s sold in mainstream adultwear catalogues? You know, the clip on tail and the ears on a headband. Is that freakish? If yes, why so and why is it still so incredibly mainstream? If not, why is an anthro catgirl, since that’s what most of them are?
and RexDart, you get more fucking stupid every time you open your mouth. that you are too willfully ignorant to recogize what a word actually means doesn’t mean it’s reasonable to expect the people who created it to stop using it. you don’t get to define a term based on what you want it to mean when it has an actual meaning. you can try, but you sound like a moron when you do.
“Pardon him, Theodotus: he is a barbarian, and thinks that the customs of his tribe and island are the laws of nature.”
George Bernard Shaw Caesar and Cleopatra, Act II
Fenris
Great line, fruitbat. Thanks for the laugh.
What I want to know is this-is it worse to be turned on by the mascot, or the guy wearing the clerical garb?
Daikona we seem to be talking past each other. You are absolutely right that I didn’t know there was a distinction between ‘furry’ and ‘erotic fursuiter’ (I remain dumbfounded that such a term even exists). This is why I made great pains to distinguish the sexualized aspects from the non-sexualized.
You know the difference because, at the very least, you are interested in anthropomorphic animals. I am not. I collect and deal rare books. I would not throw a hissy fit if you didn’t know the difference between a printing and an edition. Yet you seem to expect me to know all the terms to define the precise psychological bent of members of a less than mainstream group.
I find a sexual attraction to cartoon animals or to people dressed as animals to be odd (freaky being a synonym). I am not seeking to limit anyone’s behavior. People can do whatever turns them on. I wouldn’t dream of stopping them.
I wasn’t aware that this was popular, although I can see the attraction. In that case, again, it is the tights and tight clothing, that I would assume would be associated with the costume, that I would find to be a turn on. The more cat like the woman becomes, and the less human, the less attractive. That is the difference. I would find the costume attractive because of the parts of the woman that are accentuated. A ‘furry’ would be attracted by the aspects of the animal that are accentuated.
What a coincidence to see this thread after I recently read Fables: Animal Farm.
Because not knowing the technical aspects of a specialised field is COMPLETELY the same as not knowing the subtleties of a specialised feild, admitting the same, and then going on to claim that it doesn’t matter that there’s a difference, they’re all the same anyway.
Which would explain why kitty costumes (or naughty nurse, or catholic schoolgirl) costumes cost so much more than simple tight/skimpy clothing/underthings.
No, those cost more because they fulfill a fantasy. Catholic schoolboys grow up looking at hot schoolgirls. People who have been around hospitals get crushes on attractive nurses. Hell, parishoners get crushes on their priests. These are all attractions to people. Extending those fantasies to cartoon animals is a bit off kilter.
I am repeatedly told I have it all wrong about ‘furries’. That is probably true. Given that, can someone please explain what the ‘average’ furry is in to. My employer owns this computer and I am not about to go searching the dubious sites I’m sure Googling will bring up.
Is someone who collects beanie babies a de facto furry? What if you collect Goofy figurines. Is sex or sexual attraction a necessary corollary to being a furry? Please, I am begging to have my ignorance eradicated, instead I’m just getting bitched at over semantics.
(Doych), where do I even start?
If you don’t know the details of a subculture, then fucking admit you don’t rather than declaring that all of them are whatever. You don’t know a damn thing about furries? That’s
fine. But by talking about how they’re all freaks you’re implying that you at least think you know something about them.
If you had said “people who have sex with stuffed animals and/or have group orgies while dressed in highly detailed costumes designed to make them resemble small mammals”, we wouldn’t be having this discussion. You didn’t. You said furries. So no, you did not in fact take great pains to make sure you were talking only about the sexual aspects, nor was it incredibly clear you were doing so.
You’re right, I know the difference because I have some interest in theangle of it that doesn’t involve stuffed animals and giant fluffy suits everyone likes to pretend doesn’t exist. It is, however, possible to know there exists a mainstream angle without being into it. I’ll let you in on this little secret. It involves reading say, the already existing stating of it in the thread RexDart got pitted over. Or, say, any of the other times it’s been posted on this board. Or even just figuring out what the fuck is being discussed before
you go around spouting opinions about the character and behavior of people involved. An amazing number of people like to do none of that, and instead revel in the stufuckingpidity of forming opinions and insulting people based on what they heard from someone who heard from someone who saw it on something awful.
I’m not “throwing a hissy fit” because you don’t know the difference. I’m pissed off because you, despite not knowing the difference, presume to talk like there isn’t one. Imagine there are people who have sex with book bindings. Now imagine that the majority of the population assumes you’re one of them, because after all, you like books. Can you start to grasp why people get defensive about this?
This is even assuming your comparison is valid. It isn’t. Not knowing the details of a technical field isn’t the same thing as not grasping the contents of a subculture, and as such assuming that everyone in it is of the group you’ve heard someone talk about seeing something about somewhere. (I still think it’s funny that people are basing comments on that level of information. No where else on this board would “someone said they saw someone say this somewhere, with nothing to back up the accuracy of the statement” be an acceptable source of information. But bar the windows mama, this is them furries! We all know what they’re like!)
Freaky isn’t a synonym for “odd”, as a side note. Nor are “cartoon animals” (assuming we’re talking animal animals) the same thing as anthros. And there’s a hell of a lot of range in anthros, for that matter. Would you consider there to be no difference between say, a dog on its hind legs, and something that’s human in all ways save for a tail and ears? I’m curious where you stand on elves, too. Since they’re far less human in behavior than most anthros, and as far from human in appearance as the most human of them.
And you know? I never said you were trying to directly limit someone’s behavior. No one ever is, after all. Not that that makes any of the incessant shit that spews forth about furries less ignorant, or less rude. And not that not trying to directly stop someone makes it your business what they get turned on by. I’ve never understood, really, why this one fetish gets singled out, even when people are bright enough to grasp that it’s a small subgroup. Where are the threads talking about what damn freaks infantilists are, or how they’re obviously pedophiles and really want to fuck babies?
I’d assume the kittygirl was popular, it’s in most of the catalogues. Most stores don’t sell items that there’s no demand for. And if you can see the attraction, then where do you get off talking about how the attraction to anthropomorphic animals is so freakish? If you weren’t aware that didn’t just mean an animal on its hind legs, okay. But the “catgirl” whose only non-human features consist entirely of what’s in that costume is an anthro too. Does that change the standing of it, or is it only okay to see appeal in a human girl dressed in a cat tail and ears, not one they’re attatched to?
Because I sincerely hope you aren’t as naive as it makes you look to claim that the only appeal in any sex toy costumes is that they’re tight and skimpy. If that was all it was about, they wouldn’t bother with anything but standard lingerie. They don’t make the “naughty nun” because it’s just tight and short, it’s because there are people who get off on that specific idea.
And you know, you’re talking out your ass again. In the same post you just got through admitting that you didn’t know a damn thing about the topic at hand. That’s really impressive. You don’t know anything about it, but you still know somehow what a furry thinks. Not to mention that the way you phrase it, it sounds amazingly like the standard “bestiality light” tripe. Unless you also think the catholic schoolgirl is about accentuating the underaged thing, and want to make hints about it being pedophiliac…
Okay. Added on preview:
They cost more because they’re fetishes. Yes. That was the point. The kittygirl thing is a not entirely uncommon fetish. It’s not just about it being short and skimpy. A cat ears and tail is not a fucking cartoon animal.
And you’ve at no point in this thread appeared to be "begging to have your ignorance eradicated. You seemed pretty content to sit there and spew it out. Which is what you’re getting bitched at about. Not semantics, carrying on under false assumptions as though you knew them to be true.
If you seriously want information, here you go:
Sexual attraction is not an inherant part of being a furry. Sexual attraction to a stuffed toy or a human in a full body high detail suit certainly isn’t. The only complete common denominator is really just the part about enjoying, in some form, anthropomorphic animals.
I don’t doubt that some level of sexual attraction is common. It is, however, usually directed in my experience at highly anthropomorphized versions of things. Things that could be human if you removed a few tacked on features are pretty common. So are things that, while more animal than that in appearance, stand, walk, talk, dress, and in all ways act human.
Perhaps if you’d stopped carrying on as though you knew for a fact what you were carrying on about were true, you would have gotten bitched at less. Not that you aren’t still doing it in this post.
Maybe the cat girl or whatever-the appeal is that it’s exotic and different? Out of the ordinary?
C’mon, look at Star Wars, and the popularity of Twi’lek chicks. How many guys watch ROTJ in slow-mo so they can try and catch a glimpse of Oola’s top falling off when she’s dropped into the rancor pit?
My Og man, I never dreamt I had tapped into a hitherto unknown oppressed minority. You act like I had attacked the very essence of your being. I sense a “Wretched of the Earth” of the furry movement forthcoming.
The sum total of all my previous posts was the following - “Well I must agree that from what I know of this phenomenon it sounds freaky, I can’t blame Rex Dart for making light-hearted fun of this.” Yet I get accused of
I never said anything more than the above. I never said (as others have) that I wouldn’t want them as my neighbors, or that I equated the practice with bestiality or pedophilia. I would love to see a quote, rather than your hysterical paraphrasing, of what exactly you have found so offensive.
Now this I find hilarious
Please let me introduce you to my first post where I said
How much clearer could I make myself?
I am apparently expected to know that I am offending a hitherto unknown group, subgroup, or some damn thing of a secret society of furries. I just can’t believe anyone could take their eccentricities, sexual or not, so seriously. I am frankly amazed that I am being attacked for not knowing the minute details of this subculture. Let me recreate the train of events leading to my posting in this thread.
This is all I know and all I needed to know. You may think the intricacies of the furry fandom are so fascinating and earth shattering that I should spend my free time surfing the furry forums before I should dare open my mouth. Well tough. It really doesn’t interest me as far as sexual peccadillos go. I stepped in here to defend a poster who was being jumped on for having the same thoughts I was having.
Look at it this way. Let’s say, as you suggested earlier, that this was infantilism we were talking about. Guys in diapers with pacifiers looking for someone to clean them with a wet nap. (note to community also freaky) Would the people who collected Anne Geddes baby pictures jump in to claim they were also part of the infantilist community? Somehow I doubt it. I think most reasonable people can make the distinction between a sexual practice and a past time. I was clearly referencing the sexual practice.
Rex was right. You folks do take this stuff incredibly seriously. At the end of the day I can’t possibly argue any more, I really don’t care that much.
what. the. fuck.
They probably wouldn’t. But let me repeat something you seem to have missed way the fuck back that will clarify why that’s not all that relevant to this.
FURSUITERS ARE NOT THE ENTIRITY OF FURRIES. FURRY DOES NOT, NO MATTER WHAT YOU WANT TO THINK, INHERANTLY MEAN FURSUITER.
This isn’t a complicated complex. Group A is part of group B is not the logical equivilent to Group A is the entirity of group B.
This is analagous to if you declared infantilism fetishists to be the entirity of “people who like babies” and couldn’t grasp why people who liked Anne Geddes were insulted.
You’re trying to redefine furry here into just the extreme fetish end of it, and then act like it’s incomprehensible that anyone who actually knows what the word is differ on it. And you do this in the same breath you “beg” for people to enlighten you. And when I try to actually explain the concept, you ignore every word of it, and continue the implication that the weird sex in mascot suits is the entirity of furry. You’re still talking about the entire thing as sexual, right after a response that attempted to explain that it wasn’t.
How much clearer could you make yourself? You’ve made your point loud and clear. You either lack basic reading comprehension, or you have so little concern for what reality is when it interferes with your bitching that you really ahve no business on a board like this. Willful ignorance is not cool. Neither is repeating it over and over while claiming you want the real information.
You haven’t done a bit of arguing, either. You’ve done the text equivilent of standing there with your fingers in your ears going “la la la I can’t hear you”.
And actually, not that someone like you would give a shit, what I take seriously is people who run around spewing bullshit and refusing to listen to factual information no matter what the subject. The fact that it makes me fucking sick here is in no way unique.
Fruitbat, consider changing your name to fruitcake. It’s a generous description of you.
Of course when you talk about Infantalism, people who like Anne Geddes’ dreck don’t get up in arms - because that’s not Infantilism, you fucking twit.
Infantilism, unlike Furries, is entirely a sexual fetish/deviation. Anne Geddes’ fans didn’t coin the word to describe themselves, then have it hijacked by ignorant morons who insist on using it to mean a deviation, which already had a more descriptive name.
If, however, you started calling Infantilists ‘Anne Geddes Enthusiasts’, then the Anne Geddes Enthusiasts would certainly, and rightly be up in arms about it.
And that’s pretty much what you’re attempting to do here. ‘Furry’ Does Not Equal ‘Plushophile’. ‘Furry’ existed as a term long before Vanity Faire did that ridiculous article which got it turned into a synonym for Plushiphile. Or even before the popular press picked up on it aproximately a decade ago - and started isolating it to 'Suiters and Lifestylers. Which, WOW, still isn’t Plushophiles.
And if I was able to credit you and Rex with the intelligence to do it deliberately, I’d be pissed at you for attempting to pull this ‘If you defend yourself, you prove me right’ bullshit. As it is, I’m just laughing myself sick that you actually think that’s a valid argument.
Ah. It’s “Hackers and Crackers” in fuzzy suits, then.
“Mass Media vs According to Hoyle, 1986”
It’s not that you defend yourself, feel free to define yourself as an individual with whatever interests you please. It’s that the “furry community”, so to speak, takes such grave offense and acts like any slight to the label is a holocaust against them that makes them funny.
You know, you guys would have a pretty good argument if I’d raised the spectre of beastiality. But I didn’t. I no more correlate beastiality with furry-dom than I do pedophilia with infantilism.
Let’s face it, furries take their fandom waaaaaaaaaay too seriously. Why go to such lengths to clarify it’s nuances like you all have (even after I myself tried to do the same in the original CS thread), unless you have a critical interest in it? Heck, I saw one furry lament that his life “was over” and we ought to “kill [him] now” after the CSI episode, he was so distraught over the portrayal of his fandom. Sorry, but if a fandom is taking such an extreme role in your life, you are fucked up plain and simple.
Talk about blowing something out of proportion. If I made a slight against infantilists supposing them all to be scat fetishists, even with that being completely wrong-headed you wouldn’t see them rising up to take arms against me. They just don’t seem to have the organized internet community that furries do, to take arms against any minor slight against them and accuse those who find them creepy of being bigoted jerks.
Again, I don’t care if you dress up in a fursuit or not, the anthropomorphic animal fixation is just creepy, and the amount of time devoted to it by obsessive fans is silly, and I get a good laugh out of it. Do what you want to do, but realize that people observing it from afar will think it odd and even be creeped out by it. Just realize that for 99% of the population, that scene in The Shining is repulsive rather than arousing. Have some perspective and admit that your obsession is at society’s margins.