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submitted by chaos386
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Hey everyone. I stumbled upon this thread by hitting the random button. I've heard of Furries before, I knew someone who "was one" (is that correct to say?). Anyways he told me a lot about his character (also unsure of the term) but didn't really answer any questions about what this is actually all about.

What does being a Furry mean? It seems to be very artistic, but it is bigger than that? Is it sexual- like a fetish? Is this like role playing? Do you just want to know what it's like to be an animal?

I'm so sorry if any of this is offensive. I promise I'm just asking out of curiosity, I just wanna learn :)

Thanks!

EDIT: Thanks everyone! I didn't expect to get so many answers :) Glad none of you saw me as being judgmental or condescending. Just wanted to learn a little bit and you guys definitely helped!

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submitted by Cornbread_v2
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Hi folks, Makyo here.  As mentioned, I’m taking a week off to get caught up on some stuff.  This week’s article comes courtesy of Calamari. Enjoy!

As a reader of this article, you may or may not have seen a recent mini-documentary on the furry fandom, filmed by National Geographic. Although I’m not a subscriber to this fine organisation, I’ve read many of their articles. Time and time again they produce splendid pieces on interesting aspects of history, the environment, and culture. So my first thought upon hearing that they’d chosen furries to be the subject of one of their small documentaries, was confusion. Why had they let their standards slip this time?

Don’t get me wrong. I love being a part of this fandom. Despite the various oddballs and undesirables, there are a number of absolutely fantastic people within this little group. The artwork can be fantastic, and the process of thinking up a character is more fun than you’d like to admit. But the reason that the public has never properly welcomed us with open arms, attacked us with pitchforks or even acknowledged us is because we aren’t all that interesting. Apart from the fact that we all like anthropomorphic animals in some way (and that we maybe have a tendency to be a bit nerdy) we aren’t one collective body that thinks and does the same thing.

If you watch another documentary or read another article from National Geographic, you’ll know what I mean. A well written piece about gang culture in Peru has more going for it than a bunch of nerds that dress up like anthropomorphic animals. Because that’s really what we are.

When I first saw this mini-documentary, it was posted on a forum for furs from the United Kingdom. I was at a friend’s house at the time, who also happens to be a fur. I pointed at the screen with a grin, and she sighed. While the documentary was unintentionally entertaining, it was also extremely predictable and more than slightly embarrassing.

The main problem with these films is that they all seem to have a similar layout. First we are introduced to an individual, who is supposedly usually ‘shy and reserved’ but is ‘happy and playful’ when it comes to wearing a fursuit or roleplaying as their character. I always find this part rather annoying. If these people want to portray us as likeable, interesting individuals, they aren’t doing well by describing themselves as semi-autistic.

As someone who is fairly heavily involved in fandom, I don’t need to take on an alternative persona to socialize with people. Most of us are very capable of doing it ourselves. I mean no malice towards people who have difficulty interacting with others, but it does seem that we are too often portrayed as shoe-gazers that need to pretend to be an animal in order to cope with reality.

And so we come to, wait for it, deep breath everybody, the Sexual Side of the fandom. In a number of furry related documentaries, everyone always quips without hesitation, “There is a porn aspect, but it isn’t really that strong!”

This was interesting coming from people like ‘The Ranting Gryphon’, who has a whole skit dedicated to roleplaying online sex with furry characters. When we talk about the sexual side of the fandom, it is nothing less than stupid to deny that porn is not a big part of furry culture.

I have no idea if FurAffinity is the most used furry site. I do know, however, that it is very much up there in terms of the number of furries that use it. Refreshing the front page with the filter off, it is very rare to not see a single piece of ‘adult’ artwork on the front page. Doing a Google search of furry with mature content doesn’t give a particularly clean result, either. I’m not going to deny that there are people in the fandom not interested in the sexual element. I do feel sorry for them. But even they acknowledge the fandom’s ‘darker side’.

All in all, I’d prefer it if there were no more documentaries, films, or TV programmes based on the furry fandom. With that said, if someone ever shoves a camera in my face, asking if I’d like to give my opinion on the fandom, I’ll put down my drink, I’ll sigh, and I’ll look straight into the lens.

“We’re all a bunch of porn obsessed freaks”.

Calamari is a 3rd year Journalism student from Scotland that enjoys drinking excessively and writing when he gets around to it. He pretends he is an anthropomorphic dog and lives in a flat with two fridges. One of them doesn’t work.

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Hi Papabear,

I’ve been apart of the furry community for a while now, but I never met a furry until I moved here about 3 months ago. I was searching to try and meet furries, and soon I found some and was integrated into a nice little furry circle of friends. I love it and they are all awesome. But other furries that are part of the official group and aren’t in our circle of friends are for some odd reason bringing up drama from the past and it’s gotten to the point where I may now be unwillingly involved and threatened to involve another furry friend of mine, scaring her to the point of leaving all of the fur groups and blocking everyone on FB who was a furry until this blew over.

The stuff that’s happening is being blown way out of proportion and I want nothing to do with this other little group of troublemakers. All of this drama apparently started before I had joined and as much as my group of friends just want’s nothing to do with it and back off, the other group has one individual that continues to harass us.

Me and my friends were debating dropping out of the current group and creating a new group just for us and people we invite to communicate and have fun without the drama and just forget about their harassment. But they were able to obtain things like my phone number and where I live when I don’t store things like that on the internet. I also have the feeling that all they really want to do anyway is stir up drama. What should I do?

Thanks,

Troubled Fur

* * *

Dear Troubled Fur,

This is a little difficult for Papabear to answer as your letter does not give a lot of details, so it is hard to know exactly what is going on.  If I have this straight, you joined a group of furries that, apparently, had experienced a bit of drama with another “official” group of furries (not sure what makes their group more official than yours, but whatever) before you joined the group, and now this other group of furries won’t let it go, even though you have tried to put distance between you. It sounds, too, as if one furry in particular is causing most of the headaches.

It’s not clear to Papabear why they are targeting you, apparently, when you had nothing to do with the original issue. From what I can tell in your letter, it sounds like another case in which an irrational person wants to hurt other people in order to make him/herself feel better about his/her own life. In other words: a bully.

There are several ways of dealing with a bully. The best way, as you have already tried, is to ignore him or her until they get tired of trying to (unsuccessfully) annoy you and go away. Bullies thrive on attention, and they dry up and blow away like old dog feces in the desert sun when they are ignored.

Now, you don’t say that any of this has become physically threatening, so I will assume it hasn’t. On the other hand, it is very disturbing that, even though you did not make your contact information readily available online, this person has sought it out, found it out, and now has located you again and is again, apparently, bullying you.

Your next option is to confront the bully. Have you been able to talk to this person and try to straighten out the issue? Nine times out of ten, “drama” happens because of a misunderstanding. Effective communication can cause the other person to realize that he/she was all wrong and there was really nothing to be angry about.

Let’s say, next, that you either have tried to talk to this person and nothing was resolved, or you were unable to get them to talk to you. Now you are at the point where you need to double your efforts to cut this person out of your existence so you can get on with your life and have fun with your furiends.

The first thing you need to do is stop them from calling you. I’m sure you have already blocked them from contacting you online; now you can do the same thing with your phone. There are several apps you can download on your phone, including “Mr. Number” and “Call Block” that you can use to block someone from calling you from a particular number. These two are free, and there are also some that charge a small fee.  For your land line, if you have one, you need to contact your phone company, give them the offending number, and tell them to block it.

Now, if this person is actually coming to your HOME and harassing you, you have the law on your side (actually, you also have the law on your side in the case of phone and Internet bullying, too!). You can contact your local police and tell them you believe you are being stalked. You can even, in extreme cases, get a restraining order. You might, too, find out what your local cyberbullying and cyberharassing laws are. Recent tragedies have led lawmakers to beef up these laws to protect people who have reason to believe they are in serious danger. These laws vary from state to state, so you need to find out what they are in your location.

I’m not sure if this is the case with you—and I hope it isn’t!—but it can be your final resort.

An important step in making your case against being harassed is to document everything. Whenever this person calls you, write down the number, date, and time of the call and what transpired. If they send you emails or IMs, save them.  If they are writing you letters, save them.  If they come to your door, take pictures of them or record them on video, and if they ask you what you are doing, tell them you are keeping a record of what they are doing.

I really hope that the problems you are having with this bully are not that extreme and can be resolved with rational dialog, but I am trying to cover all the bases here, since I don’t know for sure what is going on.

If you can’t make this person go away by ignoring them, then do what Papabear does: get your grrr on! Stick up for yourself and defend your territory, which, in this case, is you and your friends having the right to enjoy being furries without fear of being harassed by petty people.

Good luck! Let Papabear know how it works out!

Bear Hugs,

Papabear

Disclaimer
Opinions and advice expressed in the “Ask Papabear” column are not necessarily those of the Furry News Network, its staff, sponsors, or advertisers. Papabear is not a trained therapist, physician, or social worker, and the author of “Ask Papabear” will refer readers to licensed professionals in cases where such recommendations seem in order.

You have a question for Papabear? Ask right here!

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Hellur My furfriends!

Most of you do already know this, but for those who dont, Yes, i am bi-sexual. And i just wanted to throw this out here and wish you all some love, especially my amazing mate Ryudo <3

submitted by vlt412
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I’ve seen a lot of anime toons in the my time, but this one makes the cut as official furry. My friend gave me the pic and when I looked it up I can not find the episode with him in it, but his name is “Wolfrun” and the name of the show is “Smile!Precure” . I think it’s something worth checking out if your a anime fan or not. Also for a wolf he kinda is sexy looking if you ask me.

I have recently found myself in a position of cash, and I am seeking a ref sheet to finally be able to give to people so they don't screw up my colors. So I humbly ask your help. Seeing as how generally avians aren't drawn very often, I was wondering if any of you by chance knew of someone who has open ref sheets that can draw avians to a decent degree.

submitted by sojahawk
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I got grounded for being a furry. My mom found out I'm a furry because I left my sketch book out after I was done with my art homework. I have everything taken away, including my Intuous 4 tablet, my computer, tv, friends, art supplies, and I don't get to hang out with my boyfriend. The only thing I have is my iPod because I paid for it myself. It's been like this for a few weeks already. Has anyone else been in this situation, and how did you guys deal with it? :/

submitted by silverfennec
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These three vignettes offered here show lyrical visions, different glimpses of the aspects of love. Happy Valentine’s Day.

"Animal Attractions" by Nancy Cook

Read by Peter Katt

Music cues by Infinity Squared

AD Flash 022 - Animal Attractions - These three vignettes offered here show lyrical visions, different glimpses of the aspects of love. Happy Valentine’s Day. "Animal Attractions" by Nancy Cook Read by Music cues by

This week on KnotCast, we don't have a topic, we're not political, and we might be pretty darn uncontroversial. Whats with that? This weeks song is "Loyalty" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aaojFmFnNKE The Hills Have Eggs… http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tl_TTTUd_y0 Use our coupon code 'knot' for a great deal at AdamEve.com Episode 166 - Don't Worry It's Not Political

submitted by RainyDayMissy
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submitted by slyweazal
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submitted by satinboy90
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This week we try a little old-fashioned apologetics and explain how to rebute some of accusations we’ve heard against Christianity in the fandom. Ever had someone make a claim about your Faith you not know how to respond to? This episode is for you!

Metadata and Credits WagzTail Podcast 2.0 Episode 8
Runtime: 30m
Cast: Levi, Kail, Wolfin, SpenSer
Format: 128kbps ABR split-stereo MP3
Copyright: © 2012 WagzTail.com. Some Rights Reserved. This podcast is released by WagzTail.com as CC BY-ND 3.0. If distributed with a facility that has an existing agreement in place with a Professional Rights Organisation (PRO), file a cue sheet for 30:00 to Fabien Renoult (BMI) 1.67%, Josquin des Pres (BMI) 1.67%, WagzTail.com 96.67%. Rights have been acquired to all content for national and international broadcast and web release with no royalties due. Special thanks to Sanja Gjenero for the Podcast thumbnail for this episode, used by permission. Episode 8 - This week we try a little old-fashioned apologetics and explain how to rebute some of accusations we’ve heard against Christianity in the fandom. Ever had someone make a claim about your Faith you not know how to respond to? This episode is for you!

submitted by HappyWulf
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