The Explanation

[Nasheera]

Hi everyone!

I'm looking to put together a handful of videos and helpful articles explaining the furry fandom in a simple yet effective way.

I'd like to show someone that means a lot to me that the fandom isn't based purely on sexual activities and such.
I'd like to convey the message that this community is more like a really big family and that it has helped many people overcome difficulties in their lives.

ANY articles and videos are more than welcome, just throw them here. I'll sift through them and put together a slideshow once I have access to WiFi. If things go as planned, I'll even upload it here in the new year.

Thanks a ton you guys xx

[Galahad]

Hello, Nasheera.

Here are three potential resources I have dug out that you might show to or draw information from for someone curious about the fandom:

"Learn about Furries", on AnthroCulture
This is an in-depth analysis of the furry fandom at large, written from a South African perspective. It is specifically aimed at newcomers who may or may not have bias against the fandom.

"A Story of the Furry Fandom in South Africa" is a presentation by Rakuen that was given at Eurofurence 2016.
This one is somewhat more specific, but it relates the history of the South African furry community, and may be useful for those wondering how it emerged here in SA.

"What the hell is a furry, really?", a thread here on ZAFur.
This is not a single resource, but the posts and replies there offer thoughts from the community about what a furry is.

[Nasheera]

Thank you so much, Galahad! I'm sure this will prove to be of great help.

[Rakuen Growlithe]

Understanding Furry: Defining a Fandom
My talk from Eurofurence 21 giving a quick run down of the history of the furry fandom, an overview of current and past definitions of furry, a better definition of furry and then a case study of how the term furry is used in terms of music.

Opinion: Redefining furry
My 2011 Flayrah article outlining a better way of defining furry. Also a lot of good discussion in the comments by some fairly important figures.

What is furry music?
More recent essay on Flayrah that I wrote specifically about the confused way the term furry music is used but which is also important for understanding how to use the adjective furry.

Origin and significance of the term "yiff"
An essay written by me and Christiaan Ferret about one of most famous furry words. Goes into history of it and why we feel it is important.

Opinion: I'd trade my man card for a furry conbadge
If you want to know about the helping aspect then this response to one fandom critic mentions a number of those events and why the furry mindset can be better than the traditional masculine mindset.

Retrospective: An Illustrated Chronology of Furry Fandom, 1966–1996
Fred Patten's chronology is a great resource that covers nearly every major and minor influence on the early furry fandom and is written by one of the oldest members of the fandom.

The Furry History Project
Perri Rhoades' Furry History Project is similar to Fred's chronology but offers different personal insights and covers influences on the fandom as well as examples of anthropomorphism in human culture going back 1000s of years. Her work and Fred's are probably the best sources of furry history and were the major resources that I used when preparing my summary of furry history.

FurScience
The website of a Canadian-led scientific study of the furry fandom which includes a summary of 5 years of research into the furry fandom.

[adjective][species] also has a number of essays, data visualisations and stuff but I can't recall any particularly comprehensive piece off hand. They had the furry survey which is quite nice and is still useful but in some ways is now surpassed by the FurScience work.

"Learn about Furries", on AnthroCulture
This is an in-depth analysis of the furry fandom at large, written from a South African perspective. It is specifically aimed at newcomers who may or may not have bias against the fandom.

Not quite the best source. There are many very vague statements and some which are completely false (even the Wikifur article they link to disagrees with them). It's also not in depth when compared to sources like Fred Patten and Perri Rhoades.

[Nasheera]

Thank you for all that wonderful info, Rakuen!
I was hoping you'd come through. You've been a great help!

[Valerion]

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/kitchener ... -1.3885048

http://www.cbc.ca/beta/news/world/good- ... -1.3888045 (2nd article)

There's all the money gathered at cons, like EF and AC for charity or animal causes.

@WolfpupTK on Twitter regularly runs charity gaming and other streams for extra-life.org

On my phone so can't add too much of a description or format nicely.

[Nasheera]

Super cool, Valerion! I'm glad you've brought up the subject of fundraising. I completely forgot about that part of the community! Thanks a million.

[Valerion]

What I suggest (now that I have a PC again), is to do the following (though it may become too long or you may not have enough material ... it's your project, so this is just a suggestion):

• What is the fandom?
• What is the fandom not?
• Misconceptions (remove perhaps?)
• What does the community mean to each other? Why do we join? Here you can talk about internal acceptance
• What does the community mean to society at large? Examples: Charity, the Syrian refuge one, etc.

As for the sexual side, you can look at the two following links. BOTH ARE NSFW, SO BE WARNED. Not making them clickable.

• www.ohjoysextoy.com/furry/
• www.ohjoysextoy.com/fursuits-grey-white/

[Animew]

why is this thread in both the furry chat AND the regular discussion sections!? and why does it keep saying rakuen made the last comment on the discussion sections version? i keep falling for it man!
tiz a most eeevol troll tactic!

also...

explaining the furry fandom in a simple yet effective way.

a group of people who all have some degree of interest in the characteristics of animals and incorporate them into the media they produce?

a really big family and that it has helped many people overcome difficulties in their lives.

Nununu! don’t confuse community with fandom. you get some cool communities IN the fandom that are like that but you also get lotsa A class douchebags that are just init for the yiff... i would know since i am one of those class A douchebags just in it for the yiff... and yiffy furs also have communities of their own and within those communities can dwell some downright dangerous people so in the interest of you and your friend's safety, please don’t think of the fandom as all flowers and hugs. the communities within the fandom you interact with generally define your furry experience so rather explain that to your friend instead of making him believe we are all good people full of love and peace, simply misunderstood by mainstream media. <w< because we’re naaaawt.

[Valerion]

why is this thread in both the furry chat AND the regular discussion sections!? and why does it keep saying rakuen made the last comment on the discussion sections version? i keep falling for it man!
tiz a most eeevol troll tactic!

Because he moved the thread to another forum, but kept a link in the old forum for people looking for it. You can tell by the arrow on the left, which indicates a moved topic. Normal topics have discussion bubbles.

[Nasheera]

What I suggest (now that I have a PC again), is to do the following (though it may become too long or you may not have enough material ... it's your project, so this is just a suggestion):

• What is the fandom?
• What is the fandom not?
• Misconceptions (remove perhaps?)
• What does the community mean to each other? Why do we join? Here you can talk about internal acceptance
• What does the community mean to society at large? Examples: Charity, the Syrian refuge one, etc.

As for the sexual side, you can look at the two following links. BOTH ARE NSFW, SO BE WARNED. Not making them clickable.

• www.ohjoysextoy.com/furry/
• www.ohjoysextoy.com/fursuits-grey-white/

Thanks again, Valerion! Ugh you guys are all so helpful. It's awesome!
I've already planned it out but I love the format you brought up. All this information is fantastic!

Nununu! don’t confuse community with fandom. you get some cool communities IN the fandom that are like that but you also get lotsa A class douchebags that are just init for the yiff... i would know since i am one of those class A douchebags just in it for the yiff... and yiffy furs also have communities of their own and within those communities can dwell some downright dangerous people so in the interest of you and your friend's safety, please don’t think of the fandom as all flowers and hugs. the communities within the fandom you interact with generally define your furry experience so rather explain that to your friend instead of making him believe we are all good people full of love and peace, simply misunderstood by mainstream media. <w< because we’re naaaawt.

I guess there is no way to avoid the slightly naughtier side of the fandom because that's what makes up a vast majority of it. It will most definitely be mentioned in my presentation but I'll also be explaining that it's not the one and only thing that fandom revolves around ^w^

[Animew]

Because he moved the thread to another forum, but kept a link in the old forum for people looking for it. You can tell by the arrow on the left, which indicates a moved topic. Normal topics have discussion bubbles.

Owo but why move a thread about defining the furry fandom out of the furry chat section?
... or was it moved IN to the... <///< well, that's embarrassing. ^W^" i'm intoxicated with chicken ok! stop judging me, lol.

I guess there is no way to avoid the slightly naughtier side of the fandom because that's what makes up a vast majority of it. It will most definitely be mentioned in my presentation but I'll also be explaining that it's not the one and only thing that fandom revolves around ^w^

it’s not really a case of "vast majority" it just depends on what furs you hang out with. the fandom isn’t one big thing, tiz lotsa groups of people... so by simply defining it as "the fandom" can often be confusing and you run the risk of over represent certain groups of furs while under representing others.

[Nasheera]

it’s not really a case of "vast majority" it just depends on what furs you hang out with. the fandom isn’t one big thing, tiz lotsa groups of people... so by simply defining it as "the fandom" can often be confusing and you run the risk of over represent certain groups of furs while under representing others.

I see! Okay, so how does breaking down the whole fandom into groups into my presentation and covering them separately sound?
I could go over each. I'd have a section covering fursuiting, a section covering the yiffy side and so on? Breaking things down to make things easier to understand and define.

[Animew]

that might make it really complicated, you get sub groups within subgroups. perhaps its better just to stick with stuff like fursuiters artists and consumers. each of these have a yiffy side and a non yiffy side (fursuiters/sph'd party suiters) (SFW artists/NSFW artists) (social furs/ horny furs) most furs seem to loosely fall into those 3 categories so if you explain both sides of each, it should be fairly easy to understand what furries generally do without overemphasizing one thing or the other.

[Nasheera]

that might make it really complicated, you get sub groups within subgroups. perhaps its better just to stick with stuff like fursuiters artists and consumers. each of these have a yiffy side and a non yiffy side (fursuiters/sph'd party suiters) (SFW artists/NSFW artists) (social furs/ horny furs) most furs seem to loosely fall into those 3 categories so if you explain both sides of each, it should be fairly easy to understand what furries generally do without overemphasizing one thing or the other.

Yeah, I figured. Hmm, I like what you're getting at though. It adds some good structure along with Valerion's format idea. Less is more!
Thanks for the advice man!

[Animew]

^w^ tiz my pleasure Nash. best of luck in this labor man.

[Rakuen Growlithe]

For what it's worth I just saw there's another documentary on Furries that was released a few months ago, the review and links are on Flayrah.
Review: 'Furries: A Documentary', by Eric Risher

It's probably then also worth mentioning that there's the other Documentary about furries called Fursonas which won a prize at the Slamdance Film Festival. It was covered a few times on flayrah.
Opinion: 'Fursonas' is the film we need
Interview: 'Fursonas' documentary director Dominic Rodriguez (Video the Wolf)
A conversation piece about furries: 'Fursonas'

These are also both documentary projects made by furries and might already say everything you wanted to say. I must admit that I haven't watched either of them yet. I should look into ordering them.

[Valerion]

This is probably a bit late, and an old article, but I recently re-discovered it in my "to-read" articles list.

https://www.theguardian.com/fashion/201 ... are_btn_tw

They do discuss some of the negative coverage as well.

[Nasheera]

Thanks again, Rakuen and Valerion! Any information is helpful and I'll be sure to look through it and add it to the presentation.

[Franky]

At least a thousand furries are doing exactly this on youtube. Explaing what furry is in their opinion.

The more I watch the less furry I am.

[Rakuen Growlithe]

That's because most that do it don't try to explain what furry is, they try to explain the furry community and even then they do so with large biases that favour the aspects of the community that they like. At it's most hypocritical end, you get people like Kage who don't like defining furry in the first place because "they are furry if they identify as furry" but quick to say that people like Boomer or furs with certain sexual interests are not furry.

[Franky]

Persons like boomer ruin the perception by going public with their own weird lifestyles and associating that with furry fandom.

I'd sometimes rather be part of a sexually perverted cult or something than associate with the cringe most of these youtubers come up with.

[Splicer-Fox]

Furries are a religion of piece

[Cape_F0X]

Furries are a religion of piece

Is that a divided joke or a error?

[Fluke]

Furries are a religion of piece

Is that a divided joke or a error?

Lol

[Ryall]

Furries are a religion of piece

Is that a divided joke or a error?

It is, "...or an error," Cape Fox.

[Sev]

Furries are a religion of piece

Is that a divided joke or a error?

It is, "...or an error," Cape Fox.

[Cape_F0X]

To err is human, to forgive is divine.

[Splicer-Fox]

I meant *peace*

[Cape_F0X]

You are forgiven