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In which the author describes the meaning of life.
We furries are a creative bunch. A large majority of us regularly engage in some sort of creative activity.
Looking at data from the 2012 furry survey:
- 46% of us are visual artists;
- 39% of us are writers;
- 24% of us are musical artists, and;
- 17% of us are fursuiters.
Assuming that few of the responders are creating exclusively in non-furry spaces, this means that a large majority of furries are actively adding content to our community. (I’m doing my part right now, writing this article on a sunny winter’s morning for [adjective][species].) Very few of us are pure consumers.
There is nothing wrong with being a consumer. All furries are consumers of furry art, from illustration to performance, because it is art that defines our culture. Without this furry-created art—without furry-specific language, without drawn furry avatars, without fursuiters, without conventions—we wouldn’t be able to express our furriness. At risk of being a bit postmodern, the act of consumption gives meaning to the art.
This is what makes our community different from sci-fi fandoms and the like: fandoms are based around pre-existing art, whereas furry is not. If you’re a brony, then you like My Little Pony, and the social aspects of MLP fandom are a nice bonus. Furries have no such common element, which makes our culture dynamic and exciting, if difficult to pin down.
(Here at [adjective][species], with a handful of different writers and over one hundred articles, we’re mostly just exploring the question: what is furry? Or, maybe: what is a furry? Anyone with interesting ideas should visit our Contributing page and make their pitch to our fearless leader, Makyo.)
Furry creatives are collectively putting a lot of time and effort into the community. In the overwhelming majority of cases, that time and effort is donated with no expectation of monetary gain or even wide recognition.
To look at a few examples:
- Kyell Gold and Phil Geusz, who are probably furry’s two highest-profile and most successful writers (as well as being contributors to [adjective][species]). Both are doing well, but the time spent learning their craft and writing their first few books needed to be rewarding in its own right. They are the vanguard of an army of furry authors, most of whom are self-publishing in the morass of Sofurry, enjoying their time in front of the keyboard and appreciating the few readers they are able to find. Phil, who writes for [a][s] as Rabbit, has contributed many articles since joining us last year: he has done so for the same reasons as our anonymous Sofurry hordes, because he wants to contribute to the furry community.
- Potoroo, furry musician and friend of [a][s], runs a regular furry music podcast, Fuzzy Notes (fuzzynotes.podomatic.com). He collates and advocates music created by furries, for a furry audience. Music isn’t really furry in the way that a drawing can be furry, at least outside of the likes of Kurrel the Raven (stop reading and go listen to his Commission Song right now if you haven’t heard it). Yet Potoroo has an endless stream of quality music, by-furries for-furries. For our furry musicians, limiting their primary audience to furries comes at the benefit of contributing to the community as a whole.
- Oz Kangaroo is a fursuit performer, fursuit maker (www.crittercountry.com.au), and organiser of the Furry Down Under convention. Like Kyell and Phil, Oz didn’t start with the expectation of success. His skills have been learned over time, and his early contributions to the furry community were largely anonymous, motivated by the enjoyment of the process.
Furry’s creators—a group which, dear reader, probably includes you—are rarely motivated by personal gain. There is value in contributing to the greater whole, helping define the culture of the furry community. It’s not selfless (and therefore not an act of charity), but it is immensely generous.
Furry, with its cartoon animals and imaginary worlds, is easy to interpret as a childish pastime. But this is missing the point: furry is about internal exploration of identity, something which niftily translates into an external world of intimate human friendships. This external world is something which we create ourselves. Our apparently childish pastime enriches our culture and informs our tight-knit community.
And it’s the community aspects of furry that make it really special. A broad, interesting community isn’t an easy thing to find in the twenty-first century. Today, people tend to exist in urban environments or online, where it is easy to find people who share niche interests. We group ourselves with people who are similar, and often define ourselves based on these delineations: we spend time with people of similar age, or education, or obsession, or professions, or even something as fundamentally unreal (if important) as money. Once you tar yourself with such an brush, it can be difficult to grow as a person, and explore the world outside of your niche.
Furry is a group without such limited horizons. Our community is the product of the things we create. Our decentralized nature means that our creations grow informally, like a meme: ideas become widespread as they are adopted by the separate, overlapping subgroups within furry. And even unsuccessful ideas have value: they are consumed and appreciated by an immediate audience of friends and similarly-minded furries. The furry culture is one that respects the act of creation, regardless of perceived quality.
We creators are serving the community. Our acts of service help build our world, and being a part of this communal effort provides meaning to life. Time spent in the act of creation, the act of service, can be internally rewarding and be appreciated by those we share our lives with. We contribute to our own environment, we build a culture that we can enjoy, and this adds to the feeling of inclusion within our community.
We furries are lucky. Other communities are often not as tolerant or welcoming, a point which leads me to a final story:
D. Michael Quinn is a Mormon historian. His research and publications put him at odds with the Mormon church leadership, who didn’t accept his findings on past actions within the church that were at odds with the church’s current moral stance. (Further reading here.)
As a scholar with a belief in truth and evidence, Quinn continued to publish before his eventual exile and formal excommunication from the church. Stripped of his career, at age 63 he was reduced to sleeping on a sofabed in his mother’s one-bedroom condominium.
Just before his excommunication, Quinn was given an opportunity to testify before the church. He expressed his gratitude to the church for providing, throughout his life, a vehicle for service. The Mormon church, he said, drew him out of his largely monastic life and compelled him to help the men and women he saw every Sunday.
As far as I can tell, that’s a life with meaning.
Papabear Asks Readers for Help with This Ignored Furry
I need your help. I used to be social and talkative but now nobody well talk to me. I try to be friendly and show interest in others but I don’t get it back. I feel like I’m being ignored in a community I’ve been apart of for years. Other furs seem so much more interested in my mate and I just don’t know how he does it. (Sorry for any spelling errors. I have APD [note: Papabear often corrects spelling and grammar to make letters easier for people to read]).
Thank you
-ignored fox
* * *
Hi, Ignored,
A little more detail would be helpful to me before I reply. You say that you to be "social and talkative" but now you feel left out of the community. At what point did this happen? What happened between the time you were more sociable and the time when things changed and you were no longer part of the group as much? Did it happen when your mate came into the picture? Some other event?
Thanks for your help.
Papabear
* * *
This started happing about 3 years ago when people started switching to Facebook from MySpace and I lost contacted from some of my best fur friends on it. I don’t know what happened but people just stopped replying to me and I try to talk to others and I just got ignored. I even tried talking to random furs to help me be more social but I just keep getting ignored. After each failed attempt at trying to talk to furs I start getting a little more depressed and discouraged from trying to talk to others. I’m natural super shy and it just makes things worse it takes a lot from me to try to talk to a stranger. I just feel like I’m back in school again because of the popular kids ignoring and making fun of me.
Ignored
* * *
Okay, just to be sure: this might not be happening because of some software program or browser error, could it? Could there be a technical reason why you aren't getting replies? Just as a thought....
Papabear
* * *
Sadly no everything gets sent.
* * *
Hi, Ignored,
This is indeed a puzzling situation. If you were being ignored by people who had been your friends currently, I would guess that some kind of clique had formed and that it didn’t include you, OR that when you switched from MySpace to Facebook, somehow, people thought you were snubbing them and decided to block you (such miscommunications and drama are common). The problem with these theories is that you are also being ignored by new people you just met, which makes no sense. Adding to the riddle is that you once had no problem talking with people online and now you do; also, as far as I know from your letter, nothing happened in between those times that might have caused drama.
Papabear is genuinely puzzled by this one. One disturbing possibility is that someone out there has put the word out online to ignore you, and that this message has somehow effectively been read by every single person you try to communicate with. Again, though, this seems very unlikely. Another possibility is that you aren’t telling me something, such as you have a tendency to be mean to everyone you talk to, but, again, that doesn’t seem the case and, also, at one point you had no issues with online chat.
On the other paw, your mate seems to be having no problems with socializing. At this frustrating point, if I were you, I would ask for his help in getting you back into the social scene, even if that means piggybacking on his popularity. If he’s a good mate, he should be happy to help.
For the first time since starting this column, Papabear is quite perplexed. I’m going to also put a call out to my readers for help. Anyone have any thoughts about Ignored’s problem? Maybe, you could even befriend this poor furry?
Papabear
Episode 75 – Trashed
Looking for a furry artist who can do pixelart.
Review: "Bronies: The Extremely Unexpected Adult Fans of My Little Pony"
I first heard about MLP-FiM from a feature on the "Know Your Meme" website. And after I saw the first two episodes I thought: "This show could be BIG in the Furry Fandom." Three seasons later not only has the show become popular with many Furries but surprisingly the show spawned its own fandom: "Bronies".
There's been a lot of talk about Bronies in the Furry fandom, unfortunately mostly negative. Older adult Furs think of them as annoying hyperactive teenage and college fanboys. Other Furs just don't like the show so they blast them or any Furry who loves the show. And with the reputation we Furs have gotten from the mainstream media since the early 2000's most Bronies don't think of Furries highly either. They believe the same Furry "sex freaks" stereotypes that Anime, Sci-Fi fans and internet trolls believe, and also blame our fandom for giving their fandom a bad reputation.
Yet despite all the dislike and misunderstanding there's plenty of crossover between fandoms. Furries such as Dustykatt and MandoPony (formerly known as MandoAndy) became popular Bronies via their videos and songs on YouTube. And there's many artists and others who were once Furries who became tired of the drama or reputation of our fandom and "Joined the Herd".
What impressed me most about the Brony fandom is how fast it grew from its beginnings on 4chan. In a just a few months image and news sites like Equestria Daily appeared along with the announcements of the first Brony conventions. The Furry Fandom took decades to grow to the size of the Brony fandom because Furs didn't have the technological advances of broadband internet, cellphones with Twitter, Skype and instant streaming YouTube video to promote it in its early years.
My observation is the Brony Fandom has become a interesting crossbreed of Anime "otaku" fan culture with the personalization (customized ponies similar to our "Fursonas") and the "Love and Tolerate" close-knit community of the Furry Fandom. It may be the first time that Anime fans and Furries have worked together to create a new fandom.
So why did I spend $12.99 to download a (DRM-Free) Mp4 copy? Well besides being interested in their Fandom for a few years now and trying to gain a better understanding of it, I was also curious how well Bronies could create their own documentary.
"Bronies: The Extremely Unexpected Adult Fans of My Little Pony" originally begin as a kickstarter project budgeted at $60,000. But thanks to very generous donators wound up with a $322,022 total (whoa!).
The creators used the extra cash well to travel around the world (Israel, UK, Germany and the USA) to interview Bronies and to film at several Brony conventions. They also managed to rope in MLP:FiM creator Lauren Faust, voice actress Tara Strong (voice of Twilight Sparkle) and John de Lancie (voice of the villain Discord and "Q" on Star Trek:The Next Generation) as executive producers. It also features very entertaining and funny original animation created by JanAnimation, with John de Lancie serving as narrator. It's not perfect. The pacing tends to drag a little in spots, spending too much time on an individual and the cinematography ranges from professional to sloppy (shaky and out of focus shots) during the convention scenes.
The documentary features interviews with Faust, Strong and de Lance, along with short interviews with several well known Bronies. But the main focus of this documentary is on several teenaged Bronies as they are first interviewed along with friends and (bewildered) parents, and later as they travel to conventions. One Brony is very young who brings his father to BronyCon in New York. Another is dealing with Asperger syndrome. Others are artists and performers who have never attended a Brony convention before and wondering what's going to happen and how they'll be accepted.
There isn't many "squick" moments besides a quick and funny mention of "clopping" (aka "pawing" in our fandom) and a interview with the founder of BronyCon, "Purple Tinker" a transgender person/woman. From what I dug up on Google she has caused some serious drama in the Brony Fandom with her outspokenness and threats to competing Brony conventions. And she may have been a furry at one time (no surprise!).
To corral this up "Bronies: The Extremely Unexpected Adult Fans of My Little Pony" does an fine and entertaining job of portraying a very positive and exciting image of the Brony Fandom. I wish the Furry Fandom had the time, people, resources and especially the cash to create a documentary this well made and entertaining.
(Comments are welcome - but please no bashing!)
Happy Holidays
Episode 75 – Trashed - It’s Episode 75 of Fuzzy Logic, starring three Istanbuls and the gonch of the Yukon! Yeah, this episode is kinda like that. We even finish our music break with a game of Tetris this time, in ways only Fuzzy Logic could [...]
It’s Episode 75 of Fuzzy Logic, starring three Istanbuls and the gonch of the Yukon! Yeah, this episode is kinda like that. We even finish our music break with a game of Tetris this time, in ways only Fuzzy Logic could play! Before we get started on our e-mails, Halfwit shares her word of the week and her story about the prom, we have a new Cultural Sandwich quote, Istanbul rants about people who don’t understand their own opinions, Kyo talks all about Sharon Needles and how well she’s doing on the charts, and the entire cast riffs on the recent situation in which an Applebee’s waitress was fired, with diverse opinions shared by all!
Once e-mails begin, we get a listener’s advice on Ryo’s home situation – keep in mind, we don’t mind if you offer advice too! – and another message on wasteful regrets, along with the irritant that is TL;DR. There’s mention of work-generated waste, human and otherwise, and how hotel conventions differ from others, along with advice on RP techniques and explanations of previously-mentioned bands. We’ve got a great mix of on and off topic e-mails this week, needless to say! Marcus Noble gives us a job update, there’s a bit of concern about lie detectors being used in hiring practices, and we talk about the work-to-live, live-to-work mentality and why it’s your choice how you see things!
Next week’s topic is all about pets! You know, those creatures you take care of. Or, maybe it’s about ‘pets’? You know, those creatures you take care of. Whichever one you choose to write in about, or even if you have something else to discuss, drop us a line!
Also, REMEMBER! We need your e-mails about addiction – or anything else you want read there – for our live show at Furry Fiesta! Remember to mark your e-mails with “LIVE SHOW” or something to that effect so that we don’t accidentally read them beforehand! Speaking of ‘beforehand’, our next recording will be on Thursday, February 7th…and the one after that will be on Friday, February 22nd. There will be no recording on the week of Valentine’s Day, as we’ll all be scrambling like mad trying to get our last-minute business done for the convention!
Music: Of Blood and Holy Water from Castlevania from OC Remix: Tha Sauce
Twitter: fuzzylogiccast
FA: fuzzylogicpodcast
E-mail: fuzzy.logic.podcast@gmail.com
iTunes: Fuzzy Logic Podcast
Download:
Episode 75 – Trashed
File modified February 3, 2013 – 74.4 MB – downloaded 364 times so far
You might have seen me in the Artist Alley at various cons. If you want to know my process for making your badge, check out this album I put together! (dragon badge)
It was so simple and small, and yet one of the very coolest things they've ever set up at a fur con (MFF2012)
![[link]](http://i.imgur.com/1y4Bq.jpg){kind=link}
"It disgusts me"
I can't seem to post furry porn on my tumblr, because it freaks my friend out.
"Are you a furry?" "Yes." "Maybe you can explain it to me then." "Maybe I'll keep you confused." "It disgusts me."
Not all furry is porn. Unfortunately that's a big stereotype we have.
But yeah, hearing your friend say she is disgusted by a subculture you're a part of really sucks...
I already feel bad enough because I'm the only furry I know in person. I'm alone enough as it is.
submitted by MoonCub[link] [comment]
Flayrah’s top stories in 2012
Skype Furries
There has been the lack of skype post on r/furry. (last real one was about 6 months ago) So I'll make a new one. You can reply to this and share your skype. Or you can reply to this saying something like "pm me for my skype" If you want to add me on skype you can PM me asking for it.
submitted by MagicCan[link] [39 comments]
"Thank you" comments: polite or annoying?
Curious question here. (In regards to FA, deviantart, etc.) Do you guys enjoy it when you get a "new comment" notification that turns out to say "thanks :3" or "thanks for the watch/fav"?? Or does it bug you??
I tend to not do this because it feels annoying, (not to shoot down polite people but I enjoy comments more when they are personal) But is it rude not to thank people who say something nice about your drawing or who watch or favorite you?
submitted by imgonnagoforawalk[link] [11 comments]
The Annie Winners!
The Annie Awards are often referred to as The Oscars of Animation. Presented each year by ASIFA-Hollywood (a division of the International Animated Film Society), the Annies celebrate the best in animated films and television as voted on by members of the animation industry from around the world. Needless to say, every year several anthropomorphic works are represented among the nominees — and sometimes even among the winners! On Saturday, February 2nd the Annie Awards for 2012 were presented at a gala ceremony at Royce Hall on the campus of the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA). Unlike in previous years, this year’s ceremony didn’t really have a “host”: Each presenter basically introduced the next presenter. In the feature film category the night largely belonged to Disney Animation’s film Wreck It Ralph, which won for Music, Writing, Voice Acting (for Alan Tudyk as King Candy), Directing (Rich Moore), and of course Best Animated Feature. Disney/Pixar’s Brave was also represented, bringing home wins for Feature Editing and Feature Production Design. Dreamworks’ Rise of the Guardians also took home awards in two technical categories, Feature Storyboarding and Effects Animation. Over in the TV categories, the biggest winner of the night was Dreamworks’ Dragons: Riders of Berk. In addition to a win for Best TV Production for Children, Dragons won for Storyboarding, Music, and Directing. Dreamworks’ Kung Fu Panda: Legends of Awesomeness won in a single category, TV Editing. In a surprise event, voice actor and animation legend June Foray (who started the Annie Awards herself back in 1973) was honored with the Texas Avery Animation Award — named after animation legend Tex Avery of course, and presented by REEL FX every year at the Dallas International Film Festival. You can find out more about the Annie Awards — and other activities for animation fans — at the ASIFA-Hollywood web site.
image c. 2012 Walt Disney Animation