Good. I’ll care for you, then. We may start by saying that your post is two thousand, eight hundred, and eighty-five bytes of incorrectness.
For what it’s worth the average age in the survey I conducted was slightly above twenty-four. So what exactly is the ‘~5 year old culture’ that you’re talking about? The age of the phenomenon itself? Furriness as a subculture has existed since at least the early 1980s; although the increasing ubiquitousness of the Internet has contributed to its growth in the last ten years or so, it’s decidedly an older movement.
I’ve been talking with different people, formulating different reasons for the evolution of the furry fandom. There are competing theories but most put the catalytic event as taking place in the 1960s or 70s. So again: ‘~5 year old culture’?
Are you talking suitability for different ages? When I was conducting research for my book last year, I conducted a random sample of several hundred pieces of art at a fairly representative artwork repository, and as far as I know the largest (VCL, for the record–which does not censor, unlike Yerf). My result: fifteen percent of the artwork was of an adult nature–meaning explicit sexual themes, violence, what have you. Now I didn’t divide past that, but what sort of ‘granularity’ would you prefer–considering that the difference, for instance, between ‘G’ and ‘PG’ rated movies and the like in the United States tends towards ambiguity as well.
Incidentally are you suggesting that furries are more likely to be interested in ‘worrisome’ things, that they’re more likely to become interested in these things, or what?
**for some reason furries rarely admit that connection. **
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They don’t admit it because it’s not there.
In fact, let me restate that so we’re clear on the issue:
Furriness != bestiality.
Although probably only the second most prevalent misconception, it’s by far both the most dangerous and the most stupid. The better that I nip it in the bud.
I’ve been researching furriness for the better part of two years now. My independent research, coupled with the psychological phenomenon of zoophilia and bestiality, has led me to the conclusion I stated above. They stem from different underlying generative causes, and there is no specific reason to believe that there should be a connexion.
We may also introduce the results of a limited survey I’m conducting, showing a zoophilic prevalence rate of 8.16 percent (Margin of error, unfortunately, is an atrocious 14.3 percent–the sample base is improving, but slowly). You’ll note however that this prevalence rate is below the rates commonly cited (for example, from the Kinsey report, or from Alvarez and Freinhar). At any rate it’s generally unreasonable to reject the null hypothesis in this case, and it’s very dangerous to pretend as though a connexion exists.
The numbers I’ve seen quoted range between thirty and fifty thousand. How exactly these were arrived at I can’t be sure. One website quoted Alt.Fan.Furry’s readership at something like twenty-nine thousand, but I must’ve been reading this wrong.
This is an understatement of great magnitude.
Now… I have to admit I don’t look around a lot, but I’ve never found it very difficult.
But this brings us to the biggest logical fallacy, which we may phrase as ‘furriness = sex’. It doesn’t. The two surveys of art and literature in the fandom that I conducted indicated that only between fifteen and twenty-seven percent of art and literature respectively have adult themes; moreover the furries I’ve talked to do not focus especially on sex.
We’ll bring up my survey again. It would be best to take the results with a grain of salt, or maybe twenty, but they’re still intriguing. I’m still considering the inherent biases, but for the moment–while I’m still in discussion with the co-author–I’m confident that they’re fairly representative.
- In response to the question ‘To what degree does sex play a part in your furry life?’:
Fifty percent answered ‘an extremely small degree’ or ‘a small degree.’ Thirty-five percent answered that it was a ‘medium degree.’ Only two and a half percent responded that it played a ‘large degree’; no-one ranked sex as being more important than this. The remainder provided no answer.
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Interestingly, in response to the question ‘to what degree does sex play a part in the lives of other furries?’ the responses were more centred. Fifty-two and a half percent said that it played a ‘medium degree’; twenty percent said large. Fifteen percent said ‘small’ or ‘extremely small.’ Once again there were no ‘extremely large degree’ answers.
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Even more interestingly, in response to the question ‘to what degree does the public assume sex is important to furries,’ the results were unambiguously skewed:
Only ten percent of respondants answered that the public assumed it was a medium or smaller degree. Thirty-seven and a half responded that the public assumed it played a ‘large degree,’ and half said that the public believed it played an extremely large part.
Furries are almost unanimous in believing that the public grossly misrepresents the importance of sex to the fandom. This is amply born out by the qualitative response of the community. It’s also hardly surprising, given that the majority of news coverage–from MTV to Vanity Fair to local area pieces–focus on furriness as a fetish. It’s not. More on this in a second.
It’s worth returning to considering ties between bestiality and furriness for a moment.
In response to a question asking respondants to rate their response to zoophilia, there was a heavy skew towards the negative. While seven and a half percent of respondants said that they had a ‘slightly positive’ or ‘extremely positive’ response to zoophilia, twelve point five said that they had a slightly negative response, and thirty-five said that their response was extremely negative. Only about twenty-three percent responded as being ambivalent (the rest declined to answer the question).
For the record ‘plushophilia’–sexual relations (such as they are) with stuffed animals is also generally percieved to be on the negative side, although not nearly so much as zoophilia.
Now we should address the question of whether or not furriness is a fetish. To be very succinct:
No.
To draw this conclusion we have to look at the commonly-accepted origins of furriness, even discounting the results of the survey. It is generally held to be an outgrowth of currents of science-fiction and fantasy genres of literature and artwork. However, while graphic art still plays a major part in defining the ‘furry fandom,’ it can’t be denied that it’s moved away from these roots into a different subculture, one that tends more towards a spiritual, almost totemist belief system. Here we can find those people who say that they ‘identify strongly’ as animals. But even in the most extreme cases (think lycanthropy) we’re still not talking fetishising. And it should be noted that I’m not really aware of how many people view furriness as an artistic movement, and how many as more of a religion. It may almost be an even split–this from what I gather from my furry friends.
Are there elements that can be fetishised? Yes. Plushophilia strikes me as being likely the most common, although fursuits are also out there. Is it fair to say that they are intrinsic to the fandom? Personally, I will say yes–keep in mind that this view is not shared by all. But. Can we say that furriness itself is a fetish? No. Not all furries are ‘plushies,’ no matter how many people try to conflate the two terms as being synonymous. Humans who are not furries have many fetishes, a great deal of them disturbing to me personally. But would I say that humanity is a fetish? Unless I was feeling particularly philosophical (or high), I do not think I would.
I’ll sum this post then, with a few other points:
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The SA folks are wrong. It’s difficult to stress this enough. Their views, while comedic (and don’t get me wrong–I’m a big fan) are not centred in what we would conventionally describe as reality. Presumably they don’t jokingly imply that, for instance, homosexuals are all child molesters because there are more of them (homosexuals that is).
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Furriness is not, at it’s core, a sexual phenomenon. Although it can appear that way at times, my thought is that this has much more to do with the portrayal in the media than anything else. I’ve seen some furry pages that are sexual, I’ve seen some that are not. It’s worth noting that there was at some point a group specifically devoted to being non-sexual, although the last that I knew of they were defunct.
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Of course, this being said, it’s difficult to pin down what furriness is in any sort of definition a dictionary would accept. I’ve been working on this quandary for two years and I’ll probably be working on it two years from now as well.
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I mentioned the media. The popular media has–more than anything else–introduced furriness into the popular culture. Unfortunately they’ve done so by focusing on the most outrageous and bizarre groups within the fandom–notwithstanding that these are hardly the norm. There’s a great deal of animosity towards the media among many furries, because they seem incapable of providing an objective view. So take what you see on the six o’clock news with a bit of reservation.
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Hi everyone. This is somewhat in reverse order from the way things are usually done, but, well, we do what we can. I felt the need to address some other issues first. I’ve been considering registering here for a long while; finally got around to it.
Alright. That being said: take care, folks, and have a wonderful night.
-Baikal
