Not a furry either but I really appreciate just the sheer amount of effort these people put into the costumes. must take a lot of time and money to do but these people love what they do and go to these conventions where they have tons of fun. props to them!! 👍
I’m going to get a lot of hate for this, but for the majority of furries, their fandom is at least party sexual in nature with over 70% of furries reporting they they view furry porn. Personally, I find that disgusting and I feel that the furry community’s constant need for validation detracts from the seriousness of LGBT issues at large. I may be wrong in my judgements, but the claim that furries are just people with a hobby is an attempt to sweep an inconvenient truth under the rug.
I may be wrong in my judgements
The issue is that you’re conflating “furry sexuality” with beastiality when they come from very different places with very different outcomes and moral implications.
The short story is that humans at ~10yrs old start learning and coding for what features they find sexually attractive which happens to co-incide with the target audience for many anthropomorphic films/cartoons/etc. and so some small percentage start developing an aesthetic and/or sexual preference for animorphism which then creates a subculture that feeds back onto itself.
It’s not “beastiality” it’s “mickey mouse-iality”. It’s not a sexual attraction to animals, it does not result in harm to animals, it does not result in rape or consent violations from those unable to give consent. It’s as close to beastiality as anime girls are.
I understand the mechanics of it. I’m not conflating furry sexuality with bestiality. I am still repulsed by the attraction to anthropomorphic animals just as much as I am to the attraction to real animals - especially the furry art featuring non-human genitals. It’s gross, it’s weird, and it’s a perversion of childhood themes that I would prefer not to be so public.
https://www.addictionhelp.com/porn/statistics/
Online use: Approximately 69% of American men and 40% of American women view online porn each year.
Other people view porn too. Do you now find everyone disgusting? Also, what’s the source of you claim that over 70% of furries view furry porn? And how does it matter? They’re individuals, and can make choices on their own.
The only way it’s only 69% of men is if 31% of them have no Internet access, lol.
I remember a decade or so ago reading about an attempt to do a study on porn consumption for men, but they literally were unable to cobble together a control group because they all watch porn.
Other people view porn too. Do you now find everyone disgusting?
No. I don’t find porn in general disgusting. I find furry porn disgusting because it borders on bestiality. You obviously know that’s what I meant. Don’t be obtuse.
Also, what’s the source of you claim that over 70% of furries view furry porn?
https://furscience.com/research-findings/sex-relationships-pornography/5-4-frequency-of-porn-use/
And how does it matter? They’re individuals, and can make choices on their own.
They are individuals and can make choices on their own. However, I have already expressed why I think it matters. I personally believe the furry community is harmful toward the LGBT movement. Regardless, it matters simply because it’s the truth and there is a major misconception that being a furry isn’t a kink because it isn’t inherently sexual, despite the fact that it is a kink for the majority of furries.
I find furry porn disgusting because it borders on bestiality.
The only reason bestiality is really a problem in the real world is because of the intelligence/sapience difference between humans and animals.
That doesn’t exist in the fantasy worlds of furries, where the human-animal hybrids all have human-level intelligence.
You’re using the same logic that made Australian authorities ban women with A-cup breasts from being porn actresses: 'female children don’t have large breasts either, therefore porn of a flat-chested woman ‘borders on pedophilia’.
Ridiculous.
No. It’s clearly not the same logic. I have no problem with anyone’s body shape. If an actress were to act out the role of a child in an adult film, then I would have a problem. Since you want to take it there, then I’ll point out that you are using the same logic as the people who claim certain art is not pedophilic because the child’s body is canonically inhabited by a thousand year old soul. Is that context readily apparent? Is that context entirely relevant? I would argue it is not.
Personally, I find that disgusting and I feel that the furry community’s constant need for validation detracts from the seriousness of LGBT issues at large.
And the overt sexual displays in public places at Pride events don’t? That is objectively much more damaging to the attempts by the queer population to not be seen as deviant sex freaks by the general population.
The irony is that most people who wear fursuits don’t perform sex acts with them, while you won’t be able to find a single person at pride wearing bondage gear who will tell you that what they’re wearing is never ‘utilized’ in their bedroom.
Singling out furries in this way makes no sense, you’re just personally squicked by it and trying to rationalize that feeling.
P.S. Is a Star Trek fan not a ‘legitimate’ fan if they lust over Seven of Nine or any of the other characters?
furries tend to be gay men for some reason, I rarely see women in suits? they’re like rare birds
I have lots of friends who are furries. I just tell them I’m too old and don’t get it, but have fun.
I don’t care for furries, but I actually dislike the common art style that Western furries use. They always have this aesthetic that make them look like knock-off DreamWorks characters. Not sure if they count as furries but I find animal-based characters in anime much cuter. Also, I’m not a huge fan of their R-18 stuff popping up on my feed.
Its one of those niche communities that makes me smile - a lot of creativity there. They’re my kind of critters (absolute geeks and nerds).
Same I’ve been to so many furcons and it’s a fandom full of geeks and nerds. The creativity of the community is awesome and it’s something you don’t see in any other fandoms. Them fursuits do be crazy expensive too and it’s really just a form of cosplay which is what people don’t understand.
Did meet disgusting furries too that painted my view in a not-so bright light. Oh well, I’m now just more cautious all-around.
There are horrible people in every group. Unfortunately, it tends to be the worst offenders that stand out and define the rest.
To be clear: I harbor no resentment against furries. They have a right to do their thing, I just don’t want to be involved.
If furry porn didn’t exist, then I might have less of a prejudice against furries and furry content. But as it stands, I will actively avoid anything with the furry aesthetic, because the porn is too weird for me to stomach. You will never be able to remove that association; the damage is done. When I see video games that I might otherwise like, but the art is furry art, I think, “ah, that’s a shame. Won’t be playing that.”
Imagine refusing to play Tunic because of this.
Tunic has a very different art style from furry art IMO.
Idk, I can enjoy a good set of bunny ears or tail
I still have an old comment on my computer from Kongregate where I disliked a game just for having a wolf character.
I now hang out with furries more than other types of people.
i’m not a furry
i don’t f/w spaces if i don’t see furries around & welcomed
for one i want to know its a place people don’t have to pass to feel safe
I can respect that they deserve to be treated a humans and still find it gross. because it’s gross.
Gross? What’s gross about it?
Mostly the related art. The amount of yiff communities I had to block to keep their porn out of my feed was surprising. I don’t begrudge them their lifestyle. You want to put on something and have sex with somebody, go for it. I’m not into even 1%. The amount of erotic art that exists is beyond astounding to me. Meanwhile, I struggle to find active communities about Halloween, Lego, and various games I play. Granted, I haven’t looked lately for new ones, but the ones I subscribed to previously aren’t very active.
That might be an instance issue, honestly. I have never seen porn of any kind cross my feed unless I specifically go looking for it. Your instance might just be federated with a bunch of furry porn communities.
My feed is basically exclusively 196, politics, Linux, Star Trek, and related meme subs to those - and I just set my feed to top 24 hours or sort by active on the all feed. But I also think a lot of communities outside of those are rather underrepresented on Lemmy.
From my understanding of federated instances, wouldn’t that mean your instance disconnected from whatever instance where those communities were hosted? Additionally, my instance either hosts those communities or is still connected with them, yes? I’m trying to explain Lemmy to friends. So, I’m making sure my understanding is accurate.
Yeah, that’s right. You’re on .world, right? Which I believe is federated with just about everything. There are all kinds of instances out there, and some are more selective of which instances they’re federated with to filter out communities like that.
That’s correct. I’m fine filtering them out manually, I was just very surprised at how much content I was seeing.
Fur suits and furry porn are two different things.
Sure, but nearly all of the furry art I’ve seen has been porn. I get that there are lifestyles and activities that are not porn-related. Either way if you’re into it, you do your thing. I’m probably not going to be commenting on their creativity because I find the whole thing a little creepy, but I also wouldn’t limit someone’s ability to live that way.
nearly all of the furry art I’ve seen has been porn
That’s a you problem, the majority of furry art is not porn, and it’s trivially easy on pretty much every site online where furry art is compiled, to filter out explicit material.
You said you find fur suits gross though, those aren’t inherently sexual.
That was someone else. I’m not the original commenter on this comment chain.
When they asked them what they thought was gross you answered, so I would assume you share that opinion. Do you not?
Y’all smell under that suit.
thats a plus for some
Uh, read their username
I, unfortunately, do not have a suit 😭
had a strange discussion a couple years ago with someone who insisted their fursona / fur suit outfit should be protected like LGBTQ rights have been enshrined. I took exception to that and still do because I do not want to see this as a lever to justify excluding / persecuting LGBTQ folk who have fought for a century for their rights. The way they put it was that ‘stonewall’ was for furry rights as much as LGBTQ rights and my mind said: yeah but they did the fighting, they’ve been in the struggle, you just showed up with a fox suit with crotch zippers… my dawg…
I’m not advocating for their persecution, nor do I believe ‘we have enough diversity and should close the door’… but I still don’t see it as an equivalent.
edit: and so instead of explaining, someone just downvotes. this isn’t going to help your premise.
I do not want to see this as a lever to justify excluding / persecuting LGBTQ folk
You are the one pushing the lever of exclusion by arguing to remove ‘just a bit’ of the Q from LGBTQ.
Re-read this thread replacing ‘furry’ with any other form of queer and tell me that there’s no struggle, fighting, persecution, etc. An equivalent of what you just said would be:
The way they put it was that ‘stonewall’ was for drag rights as much as LGBTQ rights and my mind said: yeah but they did the fighting, they’ve been in the struggle, you just showed up in clown makeup wearing a dress… my dawg…
So I agree with your result but not with the path you took to get there. If we find out tomorrow that there’s some other part of gender or sexuality and people start identifying as that because now their life makes sense with this new label then they should be allowed in even though they didn’t fight or struggle.
But furries aren’t a sexuality or gender, they’re a hobby. It’s just a fun suit and roleplay. That can be enough to base a life around, but it’s a learned hobby like video games or d&d. Not something they’re born with that would cause persecution along with gay and trans rights
Not something they’re born with
Sexuality and gender are a complex interaction of nature and nurture, the belief that homosexuality is exclusively a ‘nature’ thing is predicated on eugenics with the goal of eliminating it. The ‘something they’re born with’ counterargument comes from Alfred Kinsey, et al’s work which showed it’s something everyone carries and so it can’t be eliminated that way.
Traumas, experiences, medications, etc. can all cause changes to an individuals sexuality and gender often in unpredictable ways.
Would you be this exclusive of someone who self-identifies as lesbian after an abusive heterosexual marriage?
Not something they’re born with that would cause persecution along with gay and trans rights
yep.
Went to pride march recently. We obviously saw some absolutely wild costumes, lots of skin on show etc, but the furries took it to an extreme level. Like couldn’t you just tone it down a little bit in public so you’re not traumatising children.
so we have pride parades that are all out full nudity here heh. PNW. But it’s easier to explain for me. They might see some tiny shriveled dinkies. That’s the majesty of human forms kids. It’s not the skin that would bother me, it’s the mixing of adult and kid stuff that you get with furries. A valid counter-argument is, we sexualize motherhood as well - hell the Venus of Willendorf is some people’s ideal - and that’s not seen as taboo.
It’ll be interesting to see how this all develops in the next few decades.
Furries are an important indicator species for online spaces. They are a sign of a healthy platform.
Look, you want the guy I know to fix your computer? Maybe deal with the wolf costume?
“Cool” is taking it a bit far.
why? i think they’re cool, is there smth i don’t know?
Nope
The furry community is one of the most accepting and open minded communities because they understand what it’s like to be treated as outcasts and to be chastised for liking something that’s completely harmless just because it’s out of the norm. Most of the time it’s not even a sexual thing for them, it’s just something they like or something that makes them feel more comfortable out in public. It’s a way to make their exterior to be exactly what they want it to be. So in that way I think they’re pretty cool as a whole.
In general that may be true, but not all furries are benevolent. Every community to have ever existed in history eventually gets some bad apples and gatekeepers when it gets to a certain size.
https://www.avclub.com/the-insane-story-of-a-furry-convention-undone-by-its-de-1798264086
My guy, you’ve literally just described the human race. “Not all of [insert community here] is benevolent” rings true everywhere, not just furries.
That’s why is weird to start with the assumption that anyone is cool. Or really start with any assumption at all.
There’s no assumption in saying “furries are cool”, much in the same way one can say “anime is cool” and “robots are cool”. It is a statement of opinion, not fact.
If you don’t find it cool, just say you’re not into it, but don’t try to gatekeep someone’s enjoyment of something by somehow refuting their opinion that something they enjoy “is cool”.
I’m not trying to gatekeep anything. I don’t care what you think is cool. Furries aren’t some form of media or object, they’re people. I don’t assume people are cool based on their hobbies.
That’s quite pedantic. I didn’t mean that as in “all furries are cool, including Nazis, fascists and other assholes”, I meant more “I like the furry fandom”.
Furries aren’t done form of media or object, they’re people.
“Furries” can refer either to people who are part of the furry fandom, or to the furry characters themselves.
It’s kinda weird that that’s the case, since usually, in furry spaces, the characters are referred to as “anthros” which is short for “anthropomorphic animals”.
Yeah and Blaire White & Caitlin Jenner exist as trans people but most of us are pretty chill. What’s your point?
Obviously, there are bad people in everything everywhere. That’s why I said as a whole not ALL of them EVERYWHERE, like come on man, no offense meant, but use some context clues
I was kinda upset to find out that a furry blogger I used to read and listen to back in high school, Two the Ranting Gryphon, turned out to be a pedophile and went to prison for CP. They also turned into a neo-nazi. 😔
He was associated with the guy who was basically the reason there was no Califur in 2018.
Please don’t be a fire caused by intense yiffing…
Honestly, it’s the exact opposite. Furries are pretty hot.
Yanno, because of all the fur.
I’m perfectly comfortable with taking it as far as “so long as it’s all consenting adults, it’s none of my fucking business, and I wish them all well.”
If it’s not my thing, no big deal. Some people like feet, and it’s not my thing, so no big deal.
Even if I find it personally gross, again, consenting adults, no big deal. Some people are into watersports, but hey, so long as they’re not leaving a mess or hurting each other, no big deal.
We’ve got enough trouble in the world without also trying to police what adults are doing in their goddamn personal lives. I yearn for a day in which more people could accept the “it’s none of my fucking business” ethos.
Yeah, I agree with all that. Doesn’t make anyone “cool” based on their sexual preference.
It’s not a sexual preference, it’s an artistic style and subject preference.
My hard line is at the sexualizing animals, no matter how disguised, but whatever. It’s fantasy. There are far worse role playing scenarios.
sexualizing animals
Anthropomorphized creatures with a blend of animal and human form/anatomy, and, crucially, human-level intelligence/sapience, are not the same as the real world’s “animals”.
No one at a furry convention is chatting with others about how sexy someone’s pet cat is, lol.
If you flip it around to giving animal features to people, is that fine?
It’s fine either way, add long as they can give consent. I’m just not attracted to animals, whether it’s a pig head on a human body, or an intelligent pig.
Huh?
“I do not like a certain subset of humanity because they are different than me and I feel safe punching down at them”
“I don’t think this particular hobby is cool” is not “I do not like a certain subset of humanity” and you are a clown for attempting such. If you’ve ever wondered why someone dislikes you, it is probably because of this behavior.
Unfortunately, that’s not what they meant.
Woah, you put a lot of words in my mouth. I don’t mind them at all. I just wouldn’t say they’re cool. Thinking about it now, it’s weird to think anyone is cool because of their sexual preference.
Turns out it was the bog standard “furries are sexual deviants” stereotype that’s existed since the early days of the internet.🥱
Still nothing about being a deviant, go cry about strawmen tho
Except it’s not a straw man though, because the furry=fetish stereotype has a verifiable source of when it entered the mainstream culture from a pair of TV episodes in the 90s and 00s - the famous CSI episode and one from a similar show that I can’t remember the name of. These two painted furry conventions as basically sex dens filled with orgies of people in animal costumes, and that was the first time most people outside of niche parts of the internet had even heard of furries.
Before furries, it happened to Trekkies. People said that people only liked Star Trek for the sexy green alien women. But it isn’t often that a fandom is treated like this and for this long. Anime had a similar but not quite the same stereotype, but that’s largely relegated to the really bad parts of the anime fandom.
And it’s very similar to the pathologization of trans women as men who get off on the idea of seeing themselves as women.
I’m not saying that they think that furries are sexual predators or something. I’m saying that the idea of furries being a fetish is a stereotype born from a malicious place that painted an entire minority as a bunch of sexual deviants for viewership on TV, and that they’re perpetuating that stereotype.
Woah, you put a lot of words in my mouth. I don’t mind them at all. I just wouldn’t say they’re cool. Thinking about it now, it’s weird to think anyone is cool because of their sexual preference.
Being a furry isn’t inherently sexual
Why is there this weird prudish subset of the internet that seeks to over-sexualize benign activities that make them uncomfortable.
Furries are, at most, a place where a minority find it easier to express sexuality (such as homo-, bi-, pan-sexuality amongst others). This isn’t because it’s inherently sexual, but because they feel comfort and lack of judgment from their peers.
It’s a shame that you find that kind of acceptance to be uncomfortable
It’s a shame that you find that kind of acceptance to be uncomfortable
What the fuck are you talking about? I never said anything is the sort.
Nah you were just ostensibly judgy about a specific subset of cosplay enthusiasts. They put a lot of effort into the show. It’s a huge trigger.
If, for instance, you were a large-hat enthusiast, you might be put out if someone decided you fucked kids because of your sombrero.
Except, I didn’t do that.
Its not punching down to be uncomfortable with people sexualising animals
Dude, are werewolves the same as wolf-wolves to you? Because they are really not the same at all. It’s like saying a lemur is the same as a human. It is cognitively and anatomically very different.
Sure, but I’ve also seen plenty of content that is along the lines of “dog level of intelligence in caked up human body” (see: that slimy fucking “dog girlfriend” comic the one person posts to the comics community about once a week) and content that is “lets leave the anthro aspects on the shelf today” (Let me check my tag blacklist… pretty sure it’s tagged as “feral” on boorus).
Maybe this guy is talking about anthro stuff, or even catgirls, and is just pearl clutching. But there are also some quite concerning subgroups under the furry umbrella (much like many large groups). Just saying.
Yea I obviously agree that when the ‘feral’ category is sexualized, it is unimaginably gross, at that point you are really just making gross zoophilic art and invading furry spaces with it. But normal ‘feral’ art is just about cuteness and the intellegence is often scaled to be on-par with humans (think like Fox and The Hound). Do you beleive that version of ‘feral’ is bad?
It is when you generalize an entire subculture based on an episode of CSI from 1999
Yeah those fursuits look really hot to wear
Yeah, I think it should be really warm in such costumes
deleted by creator
Dedication and creativity
Those outfits look really impressive upclose.
A certified furry classic uwu
