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submitted by many_cuffs
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Is there a Skype (text chat) group for those planning to attend FurCon? If a more generalized San Francisco Bay Area group is used for that purpose, that would count as well. I just wasn't sure what to search/ask for exactly.

submitted by ctoan0
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(Albiet very slow)

For those of you who are unfamiliar with Viv's work, she did a couple of animatics with some characters of hers. One of the most notable is her animated music video of Ke$ha's song, Die Young, which you might already be familiar with.

Zoophobia

The plot revolves around the main character being deceived and thrown into a world full of anthropomorphs, and her coming to terms with her predicament.

I've made it a couple of chapters in, and it's one of the cutest things I've ever read. It's worth your time.

submitted by ryartran
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submitted by skrodladodd
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submitted by OzarkMau5
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submitted by pornographicnihilism
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submitted by fa_mirror
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submitted by Tapefixesthings
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Papabear, 

I am in middle school and they don't allow tails; they will be taken away. My question is: how can I find another way of showing my love of being a furry?

Sincerely,
Vixen Fox (age 12, Colorado)

* * *

Dear Vixen Fox,

Your very short letter hits on a very touchy subject in Papabear’s eyes: school dress codes. Hope you don’t mind a long reply that gets a little off topic at times.

The purpose of dress codes is to assert authority, uniformity, and control among students in a school. The Education Commission of the States says: “Student appearance ... can be regulated if it is vulgar, indecent, obscene, insulting or if it carries a message that encourages inappropriate behavior." Therefore, it has been seen as reasonable when a school bans clothing that reveals too much skin or promotes violence, drugs, or alcohol use. In a way, I do support this attitude because you are at school to learn, but I think schools go way too far in enforcing it.

Many school districts extend this guideline to mean anything they perceive as potentially disruptive. Because of this, there have been a lot of ridiculous cases where school districts have gone nuts, in my opinion. For example, at one school a girl was suspended for shaving her head in support of cancer patients; another school banned bracelets that said “I [heart] Boobies” in support of breast cancer research. A girl who wore rosary beads because she is Catholic was suspended because gang members in her school also wore them. Absurd. Even more stupid, a school in Oklahoma told one kid he had to turn his shirt inside out because it supported a Michigan university and only shirts promoting Oklahoma schools were allowed.

Oh! I almost forgot: I once had a furry write to me that at her school she wore a furry outfit during a day when the school asked everyone to wear a costume that expressed who they felt they really were. Well, guess what? When she wore her fursuit she was immediately taken to the school counselor’s office and they told her parents she was crazy. In other words, “Wear something that expresses who you truly are, but only if that is a state-approved identity.”

Over the past 20 years or so, parents have been complaining more to schools and school superintendents about these rules, especially when their kids have done nothing wrong. Sometimes this has actually had the effect of changing school policy. Do your parents support your being a furry? If so, you might ask them to go to your school principal and support your wearing a tail. Has your wearing a tail ever caused a “disruption” in school? For instance, did other students start harassing you because of the tail and causing a commotion in the hallways? If so, the principal might argue that the tail is a disruption and that’s why it was banned. Unfortunately, he would probably be backed up by a judge if this went as far as a courtroom. But, if not, and if your parents support you, you might have a chance to get the principal to change his or her mind. If you feel strongly about wearing a tail, this might be worth a shot. To beef up your argument for wearing a tail, you might even say that you are wearing it in support of animal rights or wildlife conservation and that the ban is violating your First Amendment Rights of free speech.

Your being 12, though, it might be a bit much to expect you to make a state or federal case about this. But I would like to pause here and say something to you that you should always keep in mind: education is important, but you must always be conscious of the fact that you are going to a government-run school. Public (and even private) schools are designed for one thing: to turn little children like you into good little citizens, patriots, conformists, and worker bees. Therefore, everything you are being taught is designed to make you believe what you are supposed to believe so that you won’t “rock the boat” or cause trouble for those who run the country and have the power. You can’t just leave school, either. Under the law, you have to attend until you are at least 16. My suggestion to you, therefore, is to explore the world of books outside of school and spend some time educating yourself outside the “approved curriculum” that is shoved down your throat at school. Dress codes are one part of the brain-washing you are currently undergoing. You are also being told to memorize things and then write down those same things on the test, so that you will pass (although I hear no one fails in school now; it’s not allowed), graduate, get a job, pay taxes, and be a good little consumer.

The other thing you learn at school, though, is socialization. This is an important subject to learn because, throughout your life, you will have to deal with other people. So, Papabear further advises you to study your fellow students’ behavior and learn how to interact with them. You will be a happier grown-up if you can socialize well with others, as long as you remember that those others have, for the most part, swallowed the Alice in Wonderland candy and believe that everything they are told is true, even though much of it is actually crazy.

Question everything. EVERYTHING.

That’s why Papabear is proud of you for being a furry at the age of 12. It shows that you can think for yourself by following a path even though most people don’t like the same things you do.

Well, I hope I didn’t bore you with that. Let’s get back to your question :-) which is how to show your love for furry without wearing a tail, and, I assume, ears or anything else like that. Have you tried a furry shirt? Make sure it is one that doesn’t have any signs of sexuality about it. You could, to be safe, wear a shirt from a favorite movie that has furry characters on it, such as Robin Hood, Finding Nemo, or Kung Fu Panda. These are all very furry movies and can help you express yourself in a way that the schools would be clueless about (“Oh, that shirt is okay because it is produced by a multi-million dollar corporation that supports the American way of consumerism”). LOL, sorry if I sound like a communist.

Meanwhile, at home, I hope you are free to express who you are and your parents don’t mind. If that’s the case, I’m very happy for you and I think you should be 200% furry at home (and, yes, I realize that it is impossible to be more than 100% anything). 

Again, my apologies for using your question to get some things off of my chest. Thank you so much for writing, and I hope this helps you.

Hugs,

Papabear

I'd love to offer my skills for this valentine's day. If you want a sappy poem, or a very short story(less than a page) feel free to PM me. I'll be happy to send it anonymously to someone over reddit as well. Have a good valentine's y'all, and happy singles appreciation day to all you independent furs.

submitted by heughcumber
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submitted by InnocentPony
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submitted by Zoelizart
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Submitted by Fred Patten, Furry’s favorite historian and reviewer. Downunderground, by Craig Hilton. Illustrated. Collie, Western Australia, Collie Mail Printing, February 1996, paperback AUS$5.95 (32 pages). Don’t try to buy this. You can’t. Craig Hilton sent me a copy when it was published in 1996. It was long out of print when I had a […]

submitted by DrAwhole
[link] [38 comments]

Behind Red Stone Walls

by Renee Carter Hall

 

Many readers’ experiences with Brian Jacques’ Redwall books began in childhood. I was in my senior year of high school when I first discovered the books, but as with all of my reading, age never mattered, whether it was my age or the intended audience of the books.

At that time, since I didn’t have a good bookstore close to home, I picked up a lot of my casual reading from the book and magazine sections of local grocery stores. One day I found Martin the Warrior on those racks alongside thrillers and romances, and from the first glance at the cover, I was hooked.

It was a while before I realized the book was technically children’s fiction. This paperback edition was mass-market size, not the larger format I was used to for middle-grade fiction, and the bookstore where I bought the later works shelved all of them in the science fiction and fantasy section. To me it just felt like fantasy, with a childlike sense of wonder and its cast of animal characters — some friendly, some fierce — that appealed to me instantly. I’d never read anything quite like it, and as soon as I could, I started tracking down the other books.

Throughout my life, there have been various authors — only one or two at a time — from whom I’m willing to purchase hardcovers without having read the book first. Brian Jacques occupied that honored position for several years. While I quickly caught on to the formula of his plots, I loved inhabiting the world of fairy-tale valor he’d created.

By the time Marlfox was published in 1998, I had recently married and was living in San Diego. While there, I’d had the opportunity to meet more than one of my favorite authors, and I kept hoping for Jacques to visit. I finally got my chance when he came to a children’s bookstore in Riverside, California, in February 1999, while on tour for Marlfox. Because he’d injured his hand at a previous stop, he wasn’t able to personalize books, just sign them, but it was still a chance to say hello — though I think I was the oldest fan there, unless you count the bookstore’s staff.

I’d only ever owned a paperback copy of Redwall, so I bought the hardcover anniversary edition for him to sign. At some point when he was signing the book, either I or my husband mentioned that I’d written a children’s book as well (a middle-grade portal fantasy that remains unpublished and probably always will). He said well, someday he would have to come stand in line for my book. I babbled something inane along the lines of how he wouldn’t read it, though, because I’d heard that he never read other children’s authors. I admit I don’t remember most of the talk he gave that day, but I do remember how much I loved hearing him, how wonderful he was with the children who sat at his feet, and (as I noted in my journal afterward) that “he reminded me of the kind of uncle that all the children look forward to seeing, with stories to tell them and treats hidden in pockets.”

My husband and I left San Diego not long after that, moving back to my home state of Virginia, to an apartment near Dulles Airport. There were planes flying over almost constantly, their contrails marking the daytime skies. And then came a September morning in 2001 when there were suddenly no planes in the sky at all.

Living and working so close to Washington, D.C. in the days immediately following September 11 created an unfamiliar and unsettling atmosphere of tension, and the fact that my sister had joined the Army reserves earlier that year didn’t help. When that next Redwall book came out, I felt an odd sense of relief along with the usual excitement. There was such a wonderful comfort in it, in the familiarity of it. Here was a place where nothing had changed, when so much seemed so horribly strange and uncertain. Here was a place where clear lines were drawn between good and evil, where friend and foe were obvious, where those who died were remembered with love and honor. All at once I understood the appeal of that formula I’d begun to feel dissatisfied with.

I don’t know whether it’s quite true to say that I outgrew the Redwall books. As I said before, age really had nothing to do with it. In time, I tired of reading the same story over and over with interchangeable characters. I kept hoping for a good stoat or an evil badger, something to acknowledge the shades of gray both in my life and in the world, but it never quite happened. As much as I now understood why — Redwall and its sequels are very much romances, in the literary sense — the books gradually stopped satisfying me as they once had. As years passed, though I still had fond memories of Redwall (and still re-read Martin the Warrior from time to time), I stopped buying the new books. The last Redwall book I purchased was Triss.

Sometimes we don’t realize our influences until we see them reflected plainly back to us in our own work. In 2005, I embarked on a new challenge as a writer: my first year of NaNoWriMo. The advice of NaNoWriMo is to write what you love, to basically be a kid in a candy store and put in everything you love to write and read. I’d had a story in mind I thought would work, a medieval fantasy about a unicorn prince fighting to regain his throne, something where I could have fun throwing in all the elements I loved — the wise healer, the female warrior, a world of taverns and cottages and castles. Along the way, sure enough, I wound up with warrior squirrels, and a female badger, and a magic sword, and a castle I called Whitestone. I realized then how much I owed to Jacques’ work, how much of it had seeped into my heart and my imagination and remained there despite the faults I’d later found. I still sometimes refer to By Sword and Star as “Redwall for grownups” — though when I say that, I certainly don’t mean to imply that Redwall isn’t still a good read for any age.

In the years since Jacques’ passing, I’ve tried to read some of the Redwall books that were published after I stopped keeping up with them. Try as I might, I can’t seem to get interested in them anymore. The door of Redwall Abbey seems to have been shut behind me, and sadly I can’t re-open it and be the reader I was then. Still, perhaps someday I’ll be able to go back, and if I do, I know there’ll be a warm welcome for me, with a place set at that long table heaped with nutbread, Abbey trifles, hotroot soup, and deeper ‘n ever pie.

I’ve heard offhand that Jacques’ opinion of furry was not a positive one, and if that’s true, I’m sorry for it. I like to think a better and wider introduction to the fandom, beyond the realm of Rule 34, might have led to a better relationship, and to an understanding that many of his adult readers in the fandom were reading for the same adventure and the same feelings of security and comfort and courage that his younger readers enjoyed.

For myself, I raise a glass of October ale in memory and honor, to an author I loved and met but never quite got to thank properly for being a part of my life, for helping give shape to my own creations, and most of all, for giving me shelter when I needed it, behind those strong walls of red stone, where all of good heart were welcome.

 

submitted by Denaro
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