Zoophilia is well documented in psychological literature, and some possible causes are even put forth (those who practice it have trouble connecting to people, etc.) Plushophilia is somewhat well known, and often conflated or confused with being a furry. Yet, “a 1998 survey of 360 members of the furry community suggested less than one percent attested to being plushophiles.”* Being a plushophile and being a furry aren’t the same things. Being a furry is having an affinity or sexual attraction** to anthropomorphized animals, like Disney’s Robin Hood or Sonic the Hedgehog. Subfetishes exist in this category, such as vore (being eaten) and unbirth (being swallowed by a vagina and gestating in the woman’s uterus). I have two questions here:
What is/are some possible causes for being a furry and/or having these different fetishes that sometimes go along with that?
How well known or well documented is the furry fandom/fetish community among the psychological community? Do they tend to lump zoophiles along with plushophiles and furries?
And please, please don’t start furry-bashing in this thread. I know they’re a popular target, but this is a civil, intelligent community and we can do better.
http://www.visi.com/~phantos/furrysoc.html
** A lot of furries appreciate the art and the community aspect of the furry fandom while not being interested in the sexual aspects. For the purpose of clarity, I used “furries” in the sexual sense in my OP, since that’s what I had questions about.
Third try at an “intelligent community” response. Caveat: I am not a psychologist and I have little to no interest in explanations for what other consenting adults do in private.
Why? Why do you believe that someone else’s sexual fantasies need to be explained by psychologists?
I wonder to what extent furry fetishists are more broadly cartooniphiles, since I’ve never seen any examples of photoshopped attempts to create “real” looking anthropomorphized animals.
Er, because it’s interesting? Everything has an explanation, even if it can’t be found, even if the explanation is just random chance.
And let’s face it, furries are ridiculous deviants. It should never be illegal to be a furry and people shouldn’t be persecuted for it, and perhaps an argument could be made not to laugh at furries (I’m undecided on the issue) but it is definitely right to laugh at the fetish itself. And cause the fetish is so silly talking about it is quite good fun.
Silly to you, perhaps. And I am certain my fantasy prediliction for curvy red-headed women could cause amusement among some people.
But from what I have seen over the past forty-some-odd years is that the next step from having a psychologist try to explain something is to have some quacks try to cure it.
I’ve found I tend to enjoy cartoon porn more than regular porn. Most regular porn looks so ridiculous. I suppose a psychologist would say it’s because I have a hard time dealing with real people. That’s more or less true, but is that the real reason I like cartoon/furry porn? IMHO some things simply can’t be explained.
Being a Furry is just like any other fetish. You’re welcome to think it’s disgusting, but I probably think your fetish is just as disgusting.
BTW if you’re a fan of Bugs Bunny or Mickey Mouse or Sonic The Hedgehog you are a furry.
I’ve always wondered if it wasn’t sort of tied into the whole sympathetic magic/Cro Magnon cave painting thing. You know, people want the characteristics of animals - strength, power, beauty, freedom from human worries - and try to take on those characteristics in a variety of ways.
Being a furry is not having a sexual attraction to animals. Being a furry means having an interest in animals, the same as any other fandom or hobby. The fetishist furries are a (vocal) minority in the furry community.
I don’t understand much of this, but I think I could take a much better stab at explaining furries than plushies. Fantasy depictions of werewolves and cat people and such are common. Then there’s more left field things like were turtles. Then it’s not hard to extend to an aesthetic/sometime sexual direction. Sexually it’s not a far jump from hentai, either.
Plushies seem to be: know what’s cooler than a stuffed Winnie the Pooh? Winnie with a dildo strapped to him.
Furries I think are less weird than those girls who try to make themselves look like anime characters… <runs screaming into the uncanny valley>
Actually, upon some reflection this made me actively search for examples of “real looking” furries. My conclusion is that they’re much rarer than drawn versions because it’s a lot harder to do well. 90+% of all photoshopped furry graphics are a human torso overlaid with an animal texture and then either a human head with a few superficial alterations (ears, nose, horns) or else a full animal head grafted on like an Egyptian god. A fully mixed level of form integration (bipedal but with animal legs for example) would be a lot more demanding.
I’ve seen one or two attempts that worked pretty well. I think the limitation may still be in the technology. It’s extremely difficult to find a good fur pattern to use as a “skin” in modeling.
Heck, look at the 3-D pr0n modeling of real people. They still look like wax mannequins, not like people. They’re getting better…but have a way to go…
I think this is one big part of it. It may be somewhat fallacious – the life of an animal in the wild is not as majestic and noble as we would like to think – but as an icon, as a mythic image, it is very powerful and very alluring.
I wouldn’t want to be, say, a mountain goat in real life. No medical care? Not knowing if there’ll be any food next winter? Having to fight to hold my territory?
But as a wish-fulfillment fantasy, it is attractive. All but compelling!
Another way in which furry art is iconic is in the use of species/breeds as shortcuts to personalities. The bulldog is tough and gruff; the otter is playful; the cat is mischievous, etc. It is, to be honest, a somewhat lazy short-cut to characterization, but it works.
That is absolutely not an invalid point, Dr Fidelius, but it’s a modern problem with all sorts of things (see DSM 5 furore), not just sexual fetishes. No reason not to investigate things; maybe a reason to re-evaluate medical priorities.
The OP says that even people who have “an affinity” to Disney’s Robin Hood are furries. I think it’s ridiculous to say those people are ridiculous deviants. I love the fox that plays Robin Hood. I don’t love him because he’s a fox, I love him because he’s dashing, and funny, and witty, and always gets the girl. I don’t want to have sex with him (if anything, I’d rather be him.) I think we need to further quantify what we mean by furries before we start slinging around names.
Are furries
People who just think talking anthropormorphic animals are kind of cool?
People who think said talking animals are better than their human counterparts?
People who once or twice may have fantasized sexually about said talking animals?
People who only fantasize sexually about said talking animals?
People who dress up in fursuits for fun on their time off?
People who cosplay?
People who dress up in fursuits and have sex?
People who can only get off when dressed up in fursuits?
People who have an alternate animal persona for fun, maybe on the Internet?
People who have an alternate animal persona and insist you refer to them?
And are they all ridiculous deviants? Cause I don’t know anyone of my age group who didn’t think the Disney Robin Hood was super cool.
The definition of furries can encapsulate all these things. I specified in the OP that I was asking specifically about those who engage in the sexual aspects of the fandom. I’ve known plenty of people who cosplayed (the last con I went to had a half-dozen My Little Pony cosplayers) and enjoyed drawing this anthropomorphic style; I don’t find anything strange about them. I don’t find anything that strange about “furverts”; if two people are enjoying themselves as consenting adults, I don’t care if they fuck while slathered in peanut butter. I was just curious as to the cause of said fetish. I kind of wonder if it’s related to zoophilia in any way.
Someone would have to do a serious study, but I am pretty sure it’s just a variant. It’s a kind of xenophilia. It’s an interest in something different.
A well-known furry once said that, while he enjoys imagining having sex with an anthropomorphic fox, having sex with a real fox would be horrible. For one thing, they nip… For another thing, he has allergies: the musk would stifle him!
I think the appeal is more along the lines of the kind of imagination that led the Egyptians to put animal heads on some of their gods, or led the Greeks to imagine the Centaur and Faun.
