Myth: Other fandoms get more respect than furry fans.
Any time any kind of fandom is represented in the mass media, it's for comic relief. The Emmy-award winning show Fraiser had a science-fiction convention episode where they portrayed the attendees as sexually-repressed and socially-challenged, and a big-time author as suffering from psychotic delusions. Kevin Smith has made an entire career out of this stereotype, up to and including appearing on The Tonight Show with the specific purpose of mocking the attendees. Even the infamous "furry" episode of CSI was followed by an episode portraying goths in a worse light.Myth: Other fandoms do not have the reputation for sexual perversity that furries do.
Harry Potter slash has gotten major news coverage. And many folks have boycotted DragonCon, one of the biggest sci-fi cons, because of charges of child molestation levied against the con's founder.Myth: News stories portray furry in the worst possible light.
On this, I'm going to agree with![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif?v=92.1){kind=small}
chipotle's point that people only remember the worst bits. The worst part about the Vanity Fair article is that it interviewed real people; the people who come off the worst are the "furry-haters". Just like how role-playing games have gone from Satanism to a joke on Spongebob Squarepants ... just like how goth has gone from, er, Satanism to kid's entertainment icons like on Danny Phantom and Disney's Fillmore ... furry culture is going to blow over. (If it already hasn't.) Myth: The media only want to show us in the worst possible light.
While there are some reporters who do, others are genuinely curious. And the current attitude of locking the doors and not talking to anyone only exacerbates the situation -- it makes what goes on sound far more exciting than what is going on. When Discovery Channel interviewed furries for their TV show, the phrase, "Cameras aren't allowed inside the convention" sounds far more salacious than what was really going on.Myth: Avoiding media at all costs, and getting completely hysterical when any news comes out which has anything negative, is the only way to keep furry fandom safe.
Safe from what, exactly? Puritanism aside, the news media have always had a reputation for aggrandizing the negative. More than ever, we live in an era where television, radio, and internet portals exist for the primary purpose of reinforcing hateful stereotypes. Unfortunately, getting hot and bothered about those fora is counter-productive -- they exist for the purpose of inciting controversy. The decade of the 2000s has shown the maxim of, "If you're explaining, you're losing." The proper way to fight media negativity is with media positivity. (I'm especially proud of venues like Anthrocon where they're getting icons of entertainment such as Peter Laird to show up and lend legitimacy.)Myth: All furries are skunk-fucking bestiality-fetishists.
This mythi is reducto ad absurdum. Not everyone who played Grant Theft Auto turned into a career felon. Not everyone who read Anne Rice became a goth homosexual. Not everyone who read Harry Potter became a pedophile. Not everyone who listened to rock music committed suicide. Not everyone who went to church grew up Christian. Once again with "explaining and losing", anyone who makes such a claim isn't going to let any silly thing like facts and reason dissuade them, so arguing with them is a waste of time.Myth: all furries wear costumes.
I didn't realize this one at first, but it's becoming increasingly clear that a lot of folks think "furry" = "fursuiter". The fursuiter is the most photogenic of the con-goers; after all, people in t-shirts and jeans aren't very exciting to look at. Television's portrayal of furries always includes them, not to mention cheap jabs in comics always have someone in a costume. I suspect a large part of this is that the prime movers of furrydom --- the writers and artists -- don't get a lot of face time in the media. For example, I don't think people believe that Peter Laird wears a turtle suit all the time.Myth: ___'s not "furry".
No, ____ is furry. Furry is a tag, not a box. And some things are more furry than others.Myth: Sex is bad.
Sadly, I live in the United States where even sex education is scary and controversial. In SeanBaby's article on the ten worst fandoms, even he had to admit that at least furries get some, and on a regular basis.The most wonderful thing about furry culture is how it emphasizes social grouping and interaction more than any other fandom. It's not about collecting, speculation, and commercialism; it's not about determinist fantasies of how life should exist; it's not about blind worship of corporate intellectual properties; it's about people who think furries are neat. And that's awesome.
June 6 2006, 14:47:46 UTC 5 years ago
Does it really? I think it's more directly concerned with issues of identity, but I don't percieve it to be more about social grouping and interaction than other things. I mean, just because 'serious furries' get together and go to conventions and whatever doesn't mean that 'serious collectors' and 'serious fans' don't do the same thing. I'd say that roleplaying is far more directly about social grouping and interaction, seeing as how it's completely impossible without that, whereas furriness is possible in isolation (if I understand it correctly).
June 6 2006, 14:57:37 UTC 5 years ago
I used to think the #1 reason furries went to cons was to meet the creators of the stuff and to get more stuff. After ten years, I've seen attendance go up but not a proportional rise in sales dollars, either in the art show or on the convention floor, so they're not going there to buy stuff. And considering that most folks don't even know who the Guests of Honor are, it's certainly not for that. The only thing I can come up with is that folks are going there to meet each other.
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June 6 2006, 16:16:54 UTC 5 years ago
I think you're cherry-picking. Two can play that game.
Japanese Imports - a recent 3-page feature article on Katsucon in DC from the Washington Post. Nary a negatory tone.
Furries have never gotten that level of respect in the media.
Myth: Other fandoms do not have the reputation for sexual perversity that furries do.
Do a Technorati search on "furries". Count how many people in the past week reference furries as people who have sex in animal costumes. Now repeat that with "Harry Potter" or "trekkies" or pretty much anything else and let me know when you find one that beats our score for equivalent references. For bonus points, count the number that make that reference negatively.
The worst part about the Vanity Fair article is that it interviewed real people
The worst part of the VF article is that they interviewed real people - and then cherry-picked the most extremist of them and threw in crush fetishists and the author of a book called "Deviant Desires" which includes a cover picture of someone having baked beans poured down their asscrack.
June 6 2006, 16:59:43 UTC 5 years ago
I stand by it. The top-rated Viacom show Fairly Odd Parents has repeated the joke about comic books being written by 40-year-old men who live with their moms so often, one episode actually features a live-action segment of Patton Oswalt -- one of the "Comedians of Comedy" who goes on tour in the persona of a 40-year-old man who lives with his mom -- as a 40-year-old man who lives with his mom who writes comic books. Millions of people saw that episode, most of them pre-teenage children who aren't allowed on the internet without parental supervision.
Comic-book fans are portrayed as worse than furry fans. However, comic-book fans have gotten over it. In fact, they've so gotten over it, it's now a cliched joke.
Do a technorati search on 'furry'.
On MSN.com, after 'furry', the first sex hit is "FREE CARTOON SEX! HENTAI, HEROES, DIZNEY, FURRIES, BONDAGE, TEENS ... " on www.freecartoonsex.com. Wow, furry is listed after anime, comic books, and Disney. ^.^
SA fora driving up the hit count artifically aside ... the internet is a vast cauldron of hate. Nickelodeon is educating children that comic books are for social pariahs. Doesn't that bother you?
The worst part of the VF article is that they interviewed real people - and then cherry-picked the most extremist of them and threw in crush fetishists and the author of a book called "Deviant Desires" which includes a cover picture of someone having baked beans poured down their asscrack.
Yeah, sex is bad. For shame that Vanity Fair interviewed a sex expert who said that furry fetishism was just another fetish. (They probably should've talked more about the vore art that was up for sale in the art show?)
Conventions are for imperfect people as well as perfect people, and imperfect people are more interesting. The lesson of the Burned Furs is that if you want 2,000 people to come to your party, they're not all going to be 2,000 people you're gonna like ... and constantly shouting how you're not one of those people is a losing argument.
I'll repeat that I look forward to more conventions with more interesting, interviewable people.
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June 6 2006, 18:20:15 UTC 5 years ago
I mean, most of that article was boilerplate filler I've read in a hundred other places.
Furries can't even agree what the furry fandom is about.
We're also a 'new' fandom and still testing the waters, so people don't quite have their sea-legs when it comes to dealing with stuff. Nevermind that on the whole, furries are pretty damn insecure outside 'their people'.
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June 7 2006, 00:04:13 UTC 5 years ago
Or maybe they have. Here's where I make the obligatory mention of Invasion Of The Furries—probably the best media coverage the fandom has gotten and nary a negative tone, either.
We have gotten positive press in the past; we can do it again.
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June 6 2006, 16:23:12 UTC 5 years ago
Good debunking. ^^ I agree with your points, and generally wish people would just chill out about the whole thing. Lots of people know I'm a fur, and not a one of them cares. Contra-wise, the people who might freak out don't know, namely because they've never asked.
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June 6 2006, 17:14:41 UTC 5 years ago
Squeaky wheels need to be greased.
The "over-reaction" myth has been played up for comic effect. Furry fora remain a popular target for trolls because there are many young, easily-impressionable, defensive folks with internet connections. To quote Bart Simpson, "making teenagers depressed is like shooting fish in a barrel."I've seen this abuse in the comic fandom, I've seen it in the goth fandom, I've seen in the gaming fandom. Furries think they're unique in being "fursecuted", somehow. I'm constantly boggled by folks who tell me that Clerks or Jay & Silent Bob are "funny" yet have no sense of humor about furry stuff.
I suspect a lot of it has the "excluded middle" fallacy. For example, there's the stereotype that one is either exclusively heterosexual, upright, and "normal" ... or flamingly homosexual, perverse, and "weird". Bisexuality is such an alien concept that we're still seeing TV shows and movies using the "Three's Company" plotline of "guy pretends to be gay so woman will divulge secrets", thirty years later. So if someone's a "furry", they've got to be into bestiality and plushophilia and fursuits -- all of them!
I also see a growing age divide in furrydom. Disney's Robin Hood, Tiny Toons, Omaha, Critters, and Albedo were all around before many of these new furries were even born. The new folks coming in are interested in Pokemon, Fruits Basket, Naruto, Sonic, Jak & Daxter, etc. Heck, some of them are in it because of the second-generation internet porn -- denying that furry is "about porn" is denying why these people are even on the stage to begin with. Saying "furry isn't about sex" is difficult, if not impossible, to prove. Furry isn't just about sex.
That brings me to the recurring point: somehow, sex is thought to be bad. Really, if adults aren't going to these furry cons to buy, trade, or sell pr0n, why are they there? Many of them don't even know the names of the Guests of Honor, much less who they are. Google searches on furry turn up hordes of adult images -- and not all the same ones!
Even if the argument was "won" ... then you have a bunch of adults getting together because they think cartoon animals are "neat". To mainstream people, that's even more pathetic that ogling Wonder Woman or She-Hulk.
And you're right about "work". If it's not all about angst and pr0n, I'd like to see more celebration of what there is.
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June 6 2006, 17:23:32 UTC 5 years ago
Overindulged white males with body-image issues and disposable incomes feel persecuted beyond all reason, considering themselves higher on the cross of suffering than actual oppressed minorities!
In other news, water is wet..
June 6 2006, 18:35:06 UTC 5 years ago
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June 6 2006, 17:53:56 UTC 5 years ago
I disagree. Furry IS a box. It's just invisible, people don't see it, especially furry artists. And this box starts and ends within the furry fandom. Furry art is first and foremost furry, that's why they call it that, not "art with furries in it". Same thing with fiction, film, animation, etc.
June 6 2006, 18:34:25 UTC 5 years ago
Furry is a box the way goth is a box. You won't find the word "goth" in an Poppy Z. Brite novel, a White Wolf game, in an Underworld trailer, the instructions of Devil May Cry 3, or in the Cradle of Filth liner notes.
Speaking as a salesman of furry products, you can sell furry to non-furries. You just have to think outside the box.
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June 6 2006, 18:07:14 UTC 5 years ago
Also, it appeals to my love of a free market -- because the fandom has very little intentional influence from books, movies, television, and other mass media consumer goods, the fandom creates and distributes most ot it's own entertainment in one form or another. As such, it's very easy for people in the fandom to achive 'rockstar' status. Certainly we need publishers for such things, but they either have little to no knowledge or care (just another customer) of the furry fandom, or it was created specifically for that need. Other fandoms don't have that at the same levels furries do.
I think for myth no.1, the reason this is percieved is that furry is younger/smaller than other fandoms, so other nerds poke fun at furries. That's where the perception comes from. The occational media coverage is the exception rather than the rule, and it's percieved as part of this larger but less well known nerd pissing contest for some reason.
On myth no.2, no.6, and no.8 -- well, sexuality is more openly accepted than in a lot of other places. Sure, there's elf babes in chainmail and scantily clad saucer-eyed robot pilots running around, but furry is the only place you'll hear about how the vixen in the bikini is totally hawt. Or how the burly wolf in the speedo with her is too, for that mater. Our country was founded by a bunch of puritians and that kinda stuck to our cultural identity. Sex is scary and bad, and if you like it outside of the 'man-on-top-lady-on-bottom-unf-unf-unf!'
And as far as furry stuff goes, that's pretty vanilla.
No.7: yes, I totally agree. I remember a while ago on Penny Arcade's forum someone who claimed that Starfox, a railshooter/adventure game series with a complete cast of anthropomorphic animals, was 'furry' was flamed to hell and back. Jesus, it's not like he said 'that game gave me aids' or anything. It's like people think that when something is claimed to be one thing, someone has stuck a flag in it like some conquestador with thick glasses and bad hygiene.
What consitiutes 'anthromorphic animals' is a really broad spectrum of things. Animals that walk on four legs, talk, are shown with a human level of intelligence but live in a forest. Animals that swing glowsticks around to slammin' techno and have baggy bondage pants. There's 'genre furry' I guess, which is stuff that shows animal people doing things. This is still pretty damn broad though, and ranges from stuff like 'Maus' and 'Blacksad' to the afformentioned sexy pictures of a skunk in a maid outfit.
And the media myths. Ugh. I don't think that this will ever be solved in a nice way that can deal with the fragile ego of the nerd -- like you said, Sci-fi nerds (which have 60+ years on just about everything else in 20th century geek social groups) are still the butt of jokes based on stereotype. You're completely right that the only way to deal with that is to put forth positive examples of what the fandom is doing, because the bad ones will stick with it for a long time.
June 6 2006, 19:56:37 UTC 5 years ago
What you are seeing as a lower expectation of quality is actually a manifestation of what you mention later, that the "fandom creates and distributes most of its entertainment". There is no real hierarchy, and the line between "fan" and "creator" is a pencil, a sketchbook and a scanner away (unless you're a writer, in which case all you need is a net connection, a word processor and a lot of patience). Because it is so easy to slip across that line, and because we don't have an armed coterie deciding what is "good enough to see the light of day", you will see a lot of less-than-stellar work. But because there isn't a finite number of creator spots, you don't have the backstabbing and elitism as much as elsewhere. Another good artist in furrydom is a new colleague, not a potential competitor for your spot at an animation house. So people are more willing to offer help with substance. Yes, if all you have to go by is FurAffinity comment threads, it looks like all the "criticism" is just ego stroking and fanboying, but when you consider the regular art nights, art trades between artists of different calibers, and the general friendly critiquing that goes on, it's a different story.
In short, we grow our own artists, and while there's a lot of scrawny looking ugly seedlings just beginning to peek into the light of the sun, more of them will grow vibrant and beautiful in our fields than in most of the others.
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June 6 2006, 18:54:37 UTC 5 years ago
June 6 2006, 19:37:48 UTC 5 years ago
Yes, you can't fight negative examples by fighting the media, nor by fighting the people you perceive as being a negative example. When it comes down to it, all you can do is be the best example of what you want people to see in you, and hope someone notices.
Myth: All furries are skunk-fucking bestiality-fetishists.
It's always the quiet ones anyway. ;-)
Which, incidentally, makes it easier for them to present a better face than the showy noisy ones.
June 6 2006, 19:38:37 UTC 5 years ago
June 6 2006, 20:39:38 UTC 5 years ago
Fans are slans
I came in on the tail-end of the scifi fan being mentally superior and more literate. Such a concept was derided heavily in McCrumb's "mysteries". These days, scifi is largely seen as the repository of fannish escapism and corporate intellectual property ... probably resulting from Roddenberry and Lucas' mercenary marketing coupled with comic-book collectorism.We should heed the lessons of the slans.
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June 7 2006, 02:16:53 UTC 5 years ago
Wow, people on the internet sure like to argue. I was on pins and needles waiting for _____'s rebuttal. I don't watch Oprah anymore, and I my estrogen fix from someoone.
Here's the problem: Debate is dead. We killed it in the 1990's along with good haircuts and proper punk-rock. I get no information from the mainstream media. NONE. And the independant media is highly suspect and bi-parisan as all Hell.
The result is that EVERYTHING has become an emotional argument important enough for people to take their day of work to march to whatever maor city is having whatever protest in the name of Jeezum Crowe.
"Furry Freedom" (I gag!) is the most emotional argument of all because it's players are made entirely up of variations on Comic book guy, Napoleon Dynamite and Ally Sheedy's character from the breakfast club.
So I've gotta ask why a Rat so brilliant as you chooses an arena like this and a topic this without foreseeable resolution. Are you just that bored?
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