I found a piece written about furries and the furry lifestylers that I have heard talked about with so much dislike on forums across the internet.

I thought I would share with you one or two things the article said. I think it is interesting. I hope you do too.

Hmm. I see similarities in myself here.

Yes again. There are times when I feel that my body should be able to run and climb, and have a soft coat and velvet nose. I developed the skill for climbing, trees, rocks, buildings at an early age and love to sit as high as I can get in a tree, just to think and be.

I do not consider myself fully furry, as I do not dress up, and I do not attend conventions and social events physically as my kintype.
Nor would I ever consider having plastic surgery to make myself more like my kintype. This now is my human existence. I chose to be human at this time, and so to pretend to be anything else would be counter productive.
However having seen Zilchy with his lovely fangs I have to wonder if his love of them means he is a bit of a closet furry?

The full article that I took these quotes from can be found here
http://www.therianthropes.com/furries.htm

I've only ever known furries to be people who enjoy dressing up as antro animal characters. Usually they're not associating to the animal as much as they are the cartoon-ish character that they have created. None of the ones i've met believe that they are not in the right body. I guess in the way it's just a type of live action roleplay.

They're a nice enough bunch from what i've seen. I probably indulge in the culture more than I'd like to admit to because I do tend to draw 'furry art' sometimes. But I don't consider myself to be a furry either. If I was though I would definetly not dress up as my kin type- I'd hate to stick wings on myself that I couldn't use and an awkward tail that I couldn't move, it would just frustrate me. I'd probably come up with a 'fursona' which would be a totally different animal.

Just an interesting side-note although it's true that being a furry isn't about having explicit animal actions I have talked to a furry costume artist who confirmed to me that almost all the furry costumes she makes have been requested as durable for reasons that aren't entirely pg-13. So the controvery surrounding that part of furries has some truth to it.

Oh big YUK for the non pg13 comment Dragonslorefury.

I must admit that the furriness that Darkness described did not match up to the things I had heard about Furries and their beliefs, lifestyle choices and behaviour patterns. I always understood that one of the main things about being Furry was that you dressed up and acted out the behaviour of your 'fursona' (I love that word! lol)
However all beliefs seem to come in a very broad spectrum of seperate shades. Some believers will be the white end of the scale and some will be the dark end of the scale but most will have found their own personal niche somewhere in the middle. It suits them, and they're comfortable there. It is what they believe about themselves, and really how can you argue with them? Who knows them better than they do?

So Furry is as Furry does, and some obviously do Furry in more extreme ways than others, but I do not think it could be the lifestyle for me. Confidentially, I have never looked good in fur no matter how tastefully done.

Lady C.

Oh, I saw a television programme on Furries once.
The description you quoted wasn't at all like they were shown to be Darkness. It doesn't make them sound all that different from you and many other Therians and Weres. But this programme would have given you a different story.
I'm fairly sure that these people were not actually representative of all the Furry population. Even though I did think the programme makers wanted it to look like they were I bet there were some people watching it who consider themselves Furry, at least up to a point, who were screaming at the screen and saying that they would never do the kinds of things these people were shown doing. But I am also fairly sure that the people shown were not the most extreme examples of their type either. For everyone strange you see, you can be sure there is someone even more strange waiting around the corner just out of view!
They appeared to be very usual people in every other way, who just felt an undeniable urge to dress and act as an animal. Though they didn't seem to have the urge to be a particular type of animal, unlike a Therian or a Were it appeared to be a (borrow a word from the programme) 'fursona' of choice as it were.
It didn't look like a totem thing, or an essence problem, and the programme didn't actually try to find out why they felt the urge to dress up etc.
Unfortunately it didn't stop at dressing up, and once things began to get blatantly sexual I changed the channel. I have no interest in watching two actual raccoons mating, and certainly have no interest in... Well I'm sure you can see where this is going and so I won't go any further with this in print.

You used the same word as the people in the programme Dragonslorefury, 'fursona', did you see it too or is it just a word that lots of them use?

Generally, furries feel a connection to an animal on an external level and as such dress up like one. That's not to say that all furries don't have shamanistic/totemic beliefs or that none of them are therians. There are some therians who are also furries just as some furries do indeed practice totemism and shamanism. Same goes for therians. Not all of us practice shamanism, etc. and some of us are indeed furries. Just saying that the general distinction between a therian and a furry is thus: furries have an external connection and dress up like an animal while therians have an internal, fundamental, connection to an animal and not all therians dress up as that animal.

I agree with Lady C

Which I think is also pretty much what you just said Byakko.

I had never heard of them before I saw the programme I mentioned, and I have never heard anything about them since until this thread. So the programme is the only knowledge I have. But my common sense tells me that each person approaches each situation in an entirely personal way. So every experience is different for everyone who experiences it.
Which is more or less what Lady C said, but she put it much better. lol

Names amuse me.
Furries are proud to be that which certain people sneer at, Otherkin is a name we wear with pride, that others laugh at, Therian is another name popular with some and a derogatory term for others. As soon as you give yourself a title then you open yourself to the possible unkind scrutiny of others.
Once more it all comes down to being proud of who and what you are, and being honest with yourself. If you can look at your reflection with pride, then what does the opinion of another matter?

Furry/Therian/Were/Vampire/Elf/Non-Kin/Otherkin/Whatever. Know what they all have in common?
They are all alive right now, and they will all do their very best to be able to say that again tomorrow.
They live the best they know how, and it may not be the way we would do it, but it works for them, and that's what counts.
Of course there are some in every race that take things too far, allowing their personal power to take them to a bad place, but they are still the minority, and I hope that is always the case.

Some Furries lead an unusual and fascinating private lifestyle, some just bumble around making mistakes, and messing up, some lead useful public lives, contributing to their community and setting a good example, and some break the law, and make bad life choices. What does that make them? It makes them just like all of us!
Imperfect, and doing their best to live around it.

You can't argue with that.

There are aspects of furriness that apply to us without us even realising it.
The use of avatars for instance is a form of outward expression, so is wearing a t shirt with a picture on it (obviously of your kind of being) for me flame t shirts and even a striped T shirt I bought recently that has all my colours in it.
Then there are the necklaces and tattoos.....any one wanted wings tattooed on their backs recently.... I would love to have the money to have a series of tattoos done on my arm.
Any outward expression of Kin-ness would really fall into the ranks of an act of furriness.
I don't think I would like to be found sitting in judgement of some one who was a furry rather than Otherkin seeing as when I think about it I have quite a few of the "attributes" associated with furriness too.

How about you all, when you think about it again ...just how furry are you?

Zygo

Heres an article I found interesting.
~* Little warning*~
This does have a few explicit ideas in it so for those who are sensitive maybe it's worth giving it a miss. Especially strong in the 'Fur and Loathing' section.

{{THIS WHOLE POST HAS BEEN CENSORED FOR ADULT CONTENT by Lady C}} There is no more unsuitable content in this post as I have removed it, anyone who wishes to read the article in it's entirety can follow the link at the bottom of the page.
Dragonslorefury, leaving a disclaimer does not exempt the post from censorship, this is a mixed age forum, and such references will always be removed. In order to make this action unnecessary please refrain from posting things like this on my forum in future. Thankyou.
Lady C.
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Super Furries
Bizarre goes feral with the folks who role-play as animals.

Text: Alix Fox / Photos: Joe Plimmer June 2008

It’s 1 o’clock on a Saturday afternoon, and I’m in a basement bar beside St Paul’s cathedral.

To my left, a fluffy blue squirrel in red boots plays cards with a pantomime horse, while to my right an arctic wolf, a puma, a leopard in a cape and kitten wearing a corset crowd around a laptop. Red Rum is sipping Strongbow, the big cats have eschewed Tiger beer in favour of a bottle of plonk, and most of the larger-than-life animals are well on their way to becoming tiddly. I treat myself to a G&T, and toast the fact that I’ve managed to gain the trust of the London Furries – members of a famously private group of enthusiasts.

FUR AND LOATHING

The Furry Fandom, or Furries for short, are justifiably wary of the media. By definition, they’re people who ‘enjoy the concept of blending animal with human characteristics’, and celebrate related art, literature and entertainment. Many also develop their own anthropomorphic animal aliases, or ‘fursonas’, who they can dress as during role-playing sessions.

As a consequence of bad press, role-playing forums are being spammed with aggressive taunts from bully websites like Godhatesfurries.com.

I want to write an accurate piece about these super furry animals; to hang out with them for a few days and report back on what Furry Fandom is really about. That means fully immersing myself in the culture by dressing as a cartoon fox – in fur a penny, in fur a pound. Unfortunately, the mascot outfit I’ve ordered from China doesn’t arrive in time for the thrice-weekly Fur Meet I’m attending in the capital, hence why I find myself enduring two train trips and a rail replacement bus ride, squeezed into a hastily-acquired faux fur hooded waistcoat designed for 3-8 year-olds and sporting a face full of Snazaroo body paint. Although I’m a fancy dress fanatic and quite at home in artful attire, on this occasion I look more like exotic roadkill than anything approaching Jimi Hendrix’s description of ‘Foxy’. So when I arrive, I’m glad to take the edge off things with another form of Hendricks and tonic.

TAILS OF THE UNEXPECTED

No Dutch courage is required when it comes to meeting and greeting my fellow Furries, however; satisfied that I’ve made an effort to look the part, and I’m not some hack determined to deviously depict them as deviants, the 100-strong group give me a welcome warmer than a sauna full of Breville toastie makers. Which, my new friend Tom – a.k.a TigerFire – informs me, is also the approximate temperature inside the oversized feline head he’s wearing.

“Some advanced fursuits have fans inside their cheeks or muzzles, but it’s still important to make sure you keep hydrated so you don’t overheat,” TigerFire advises. “You’ll sweat buckets in any case, so whatever species your fursona is, a can of Lynx is essential!”

B.O. that could K.O. a buffalo isn’t the only hazard; TigerFire’s legs are criss-crossed with scratches, the result of slips with the scalpel after donning long johns, wrapping them tightly with gaffer tape, then cutting them off to create a purr-fectly fitting body cast around which he’s building a new tiger suit, with electroluminescent wire woven into the stripes to make them gleam like embers.

Amazingly, this exceptional level of detail and craftsmanship is not unusual. An incredibly realistic wolf, dapper in a Victoriana steampunk jacket, shows me blueprints for a praying mantis outfit he’s designing that incorporates metal stilts; Michelle, a.k.a. OutKast and TigerFire’s girlfriend, has painted the paws of her “demon from space” so they glow in the dark, and is working on a mock jetpack; one of the group leaders brings up photos on his Macbook of him in a latex frog suit. “If you’re going to play-act that you’re an animated amphibian, why not imagine you’re a different gender too?”, he reasons, going on to state that he’s recently commissioned a fully inflatable rubber slug suit (although this has been met mixed reactions from some staunchly traditional Furries who believe slick materials like latex aren’t ‘furry’ enough – I guess they’ll have to slug it out).

Kitting yourself out as a bear, beaver or bunny can really burrow into your bank balance; wannabe wolves have to squirrel away thousands of pounds before they can afford to order a custom-made suit, while creating your own critter using internet tutorials can still demand fabric costing £80 per metre. Partly for this reason, as well as personal choice, some furries wear a ‘partial’ costume – head, paws and a tail – while others just sport a fox’s brush or dog’s ears.

Shirik, a ‘draguinea’ – “an odd hybrid between a guinea pig and a dragon” – assures me that giving a convincing performance is more important than appearance anyway. “In roleplay, I’m loveable and naïve,” she explains. “I’ve gained a fair bit of popularity due to Shirik’s adorable appearance and cute squeaking noises I make rather than speaking. It's generally considered out of place to talk while wearing a suit if the jaw has no movement.” OutKast agrees: “I find a furry that can really ‘perform’ in a suit to be the most impressive. In fact, it’s creepy seeing someone in an animal costume just standing there and not interacting or playing their fursona.”

Fursonas can be developed from a favourite existing character, such as Sonic The Hedgehog, but often reflect some aspects of the Furry’s real life personality; many of the cats I speak to feel they have naturally feline qualities, while monster OutKast represents Michelle’s angry side.

While researching this feature I heard rumours about Furries who believed they were animals stuck inside human bodies, or at times became inhabited by the spirit of a particular species. “I knew someone who was an ‘extreme’ furry,” warns OutKast. “She’d eat only the food her ‘inner animal’ ate. She’d hop about rooms, refuse to participate in activities because that’s not what her inner animal liked, and she didn’t like to clean or ‘groom’. In the end, it got a bit scary.” Thankfully, no-one I encounter takes the link between themselves and their hirsuit fursuit alter ego too far, and beneath their fuzzy felt, puppy dog eyes, their heads seem firmly fixed on.


As for the Furry Fandom being a huggy culture, after a few hours I find myself actively asking people if I can embrace them, hopping about like a kid in Disneyland and loudly exclaiming how everyone is “cute as a button” (attraction to haberdashery – now that’s weird). The urge to give a giant doe-eyed doggy a bear hug is immaturely instinctive. I only go for the full suiters, though; partly because of the tactile appeal, but more because when there’s fur between my body and theirs things feel less personal. If I can’t feel their skin, or make out the outline of their true form, I feel less awkward that I’m throwing my arms round a stranger and more able to enjoy holding and being held.

When my mascot suit finally arrives and I don it to frolic at a furry picnic in Sutton (if only I’d ordered a sheep – then I could have been in Sutton dressed as lamb…), this effect is intensified; inside the head, sound is muffled, I can’t smell anyone, and my peripheral vision is so limited that during a hug I can only see the sky. I feel cocooned and protected – both liberated and private – and I understand why some of the Furries I’ve interviewed say they feel more relaxed about expressing themselves in costume. I wonder whether some members join the Fandom to indulge in giving and receiving affection in a way that’s both physically and metaphorically cushioned, although I’m sure there are a good proportion who simply enjoy the amateur dramatics of acting in character.


Some studies suggest that the Furry Fandom has a notably high number of gay and bisexual members, a trend supported by statistics provided by Furry dating site Pounced.org. Chatting about this with OutKast, she remarks that, “the Fandom has always been open-minded, and it can be more accepted here to be gay or bi than in the ‘real world’ where people may struggle with coming out.” So does she think that bi and gay people approach the Fandom because it’s a safe environment, or that, once inside the Fandom, those who thought they were heterosexual are prompted to reconsider? “If you’re open-minded enough to be a Furry, then I guess you can be open-minded about your sexuality. "

GET OUT CLAWS

Everyone is chummy without being overfriendly, and meets are mostly spent larking about in character – playfighting, blowing bacon- and catnip-scented bubbles sourced from pet shops, and delighting in the jaw-to-the-floor reactions of passing children during the much-anticipated walk around London. There’s a lot of computer-based chat; perhaps due to a strong Furry presence in online role-playing games, many anthro amigos enthuse as much about bytes as they do barks. And as an artist – the other main faction of the furry community – Shirik admits that “there are a lot of programming in-jokes in Furry humour and I find it hard to understand some of the geeky humour that goes on at times”.


Furries strike me as a highly creative and warmhearted bunch, and it’s a shame that so many misguided people seem to want to dock their tails and neuter their apparently harmless fun. They may be breaking away from the herd, but having seen things from the inside, I’m inclined to say that the world might be a chirpier place if a few more sheep dared dress in wolves’ clothing.

The origin is here.
http://www.bizarremag.com/weird_world/news...er_furries.html

I have met a few, the scene is very popular in London as the reporter in your quoted post stated.
But it isn't as though they wanted to mix with the crowd I moved with, so we never really connected.
I know nothing of their personal practices, but since I assume none of you would want to discuss your own sexual preferences here, I see no reason to make an exception in their case.

And of course even if you did I would not allow such a discussion anyway as it would be inappropriate.

I have actually been to a furry convention and felt really out of place cause i didnt feel like dressing up like every1 else so every1 just stared at me. I saw some interesting things going on they even had a climbing con-*test*-('") which was funny to watch with all the people in their costumes

How on earth did you end up there?
It's a shame you felt out of place because you weren't in costume, but they sound to have had a lot of fun.
I can imagine a certain person giving them a run for their money in the climbing competition even with a suit on.

I was just wondering around the city and show all these people in costumes going into a convention center so i was interested lol

Hmm, curiosity is not always a good thing.

I have heard quite a bit about furries, but I have never met one that I am aware of. I shouldn't think I would find them very much different from any other group. Some great, some not so great, and some to be avoided.
Their lifestyle must suit them, and since, (unless like Wolfie your curiosity overcame you), you would never normally be introduced to their way of life unless you shared it, then I can't see what harm there is in them living however they please.
It is after all no-one else's business what consenting adults do as long as it is within the law and happens in private.

I'd love to meet one and be able to ask questions.
Not rude questions, just curious ones. I mean I wouldn't want to hurt their feelings because I don't understand why what they consider themselves to be should be a reason to do that but I've got to admit I'd love to know more about it. Obviously the kind of information that comes from a furry, not from someone poking fun at them by writing a derogatory article.

edited to correct my terrible spelling. lol