A moment of peculiar anger

[chipotle]

The other day I read Postvixen's journal entry which said, in part, "I have terrible nostalgia for Albedo and for furry comics and fanzines from that era. In my subconscious mind, they're something far, far greater than their parts. Maybe someday I can express what it was about their nature that made furry seem so appealing to me, then. [...] Carla Speed McNeil's Finder is closer to the perfect expression of what drew me to furry fandom -- which is a damn shame, because it's not really furry. Let's face it, furry never really produced its Sandman, much less its Invisibles, and it's looking less and less likely that it will."

This floated in about the time I'd adopted an air I guess I'd described as resigned amusement to things like the recent C.S.I. episode, and somewhat less amusement toward things like the "Eat All Furries" LiveJournal group, which, like most such things, occasionally goes out of its way collectively to assure readers that they don't hate what they mock, then goes on, also collectively, to assert things about "most" furries that make the occasional embarrassing mainstream coverage seem positively flattering. (Did you know that most of us are aging pedophiles constantly cruising chat rooms for sex with teenage boys? Shocked me, since I've been involved with the fandom for going on fifteen years now and have yet to meet a single one. But it must be true, right? I read it on the internet!)

So, these thoughts struck with an odd combination of melancholia and determination. Furry was about art and writing and reading and creating with animal characters, telling stories for adults and for children and all ages in between. That's the core. Furry stories get their power by standing mimesis on its head. Just as science fiction is often the best genre to explore questions of spirituality, non-human characters are often the best to explore questions of what being human means.

And there's no reason why it has to be "was" instead of "is." I'm tired of worrying that I'm going to be lumped in with a largely mythical fetish group that has sex in mascot outfits, or that people are going to come across sordid artwork with cartoon animals and lump my writing in with that. (If they decide my writing is sordid on its own merits, that's another matter.) It's not a religion and it's not a fetish and it's not a lifestyle and people may bring all sorts of their own baggage to it just like they do to any endeavor, and because any group of people with common interests will form a loose confederation, it's saddled with the advantages and blessed with the disadvantages of any subculture. The community, such as it is, of furry fans isn't much different than the community of goths or geeks or ravers or the high school chess club.

I'm not the comic fan I once was; I suppose I'm waiting for the furry answer to The Stars My Destination or Neuromancer, a Charles De Lint, a John Crowley, a Hemingway, a Faulkner. Part of me wonders whether it's too late; part of me wonders if it's more likely to happen now than a decade ago--there's more writing in the fandom going on, and more paying markets specifically focused on anthropomorphic animal stories and novels, than at any time before. Part of me wonders if I'm just way behind schedule on writing it.

But I suppose I'm left with a parallel question to Postvixen's. Put into words, my feelings sound like a cry to take back furry fandom, but take it back from who, exactly?

Comments

[haikujaguar.livejournal.com]

I don't know if the question is "who to take it back from" but "who will take it back" and "how." Fandom hasn't really reacted well--or at least, not consistently--to any efforts made by people to do something more serious or literary with it. And there are plenty of people outside the fandom who are creating serious work with anthropomorphic characters that are completely discounted by people in the fandom.

Isn't Maus a good candidate for our Sandman, for instance?

[wingywoof.livejournal.com]

I attended Furloween last weekend and much to my surprise there were a number of folks that I spoke with who did not call themselves furry.... despite wearing tails and ears.. Fine. Ok. Whatever.

The reasoning behind their lack of identification with the fandom centers around the points you've just mentioned. Furries catch crap from people who are ignorant or simply just don't know anything besides what the media has told them.

Four people I can name uttered something to the effect of, "I'm not furry, but all my friends are." That's reasonable and understandable because I'm sure that's a common situation. It's good to know that others find the fandom through their friends.

What disturbed me was that each one of them also cited various media spectacles such as MTV or CSI or The Daily Show while they justified their feelings and actions to me.

Instead of associating themselves with something that they might have to explain or run the risk of being misinterpreted, they would rather have nothing to do with it. This is what I have a problem with.

I'll be the first to say it, I'm furry.

I would like to think that when people make the distinction and call me on my affilation, instead of denying it in order to save what little face I have, I would let them know where I stand and let them decide where they are, instead of discounting my own feelings and beliefs just so I might not look like a freak or a loser.

Instead of folks saying, "Hey Brant, you're into that furry stuff eh? You must be weird like all the off beat reports I have heard", I would like to think that after knowing me for awhile people would instead say, "Hey Brant, I've known you for awhile and if *you're* into furry, maybe it isn't so bad after all."

[rancourt.livejournal.com]

My belief is that you want it taken back from the detractors, who say 'Furry fandom is just a bunch of aging fat pederasts in fox costumes rubbing off on one another.' The problem the fandom has, I think, is that its only answer to that outcry is 'Um...no, it's not. It's about...um...well...no. No, it's not.'

You want someone to do something that screams 'THIS is what furry fandom is about!' so that when you mean those detractors, you can say, 'That's the psycho fringe element -- THIS is what *I* mean when I say I'm a furry fan.'

You want there to be something clearly 'furry' that's so good, the mainstream has to recognize and acknowledge it.

I hear ya.

Don't Believe Everything You See On TV.

[xydexx.livejournal.com]

Furry was about art and writing and reading and creating with animal characters, telling stories for adults and for children and all ages in between.

I disagree. Furry still is about art and writing and reading and creating with animal characters, telling stories for adults and for children and all ages in between.

The problem with attempts to "take back the fandom" is that they tried to take it back from people who have every right to be here. I've seen them repeat the same mistake over the past decade: They tried to kick these folks out, and then acted surprised when these folks kicked right back.

Honestly, what did they expect was going to happen?

[doodlesthegreat.livejournal.com]

I don't know if you've read it already, but try "When We Were Real" by William Barton. It sounds like the sort of hard SF novel with furries that you might find interesting, though it's not furry-specific.

As for who to take back the fandom from, I'm as lost as you. Rosicrucians maybe? Shriners? Lithuanian carpet merchants?