Furries: The Subcultures

It is true, not everyone wearing cat ears on their heads has the same reasons or identification with being a Furry. Although in general, a furry is an anthropomorphic animal.

They aren’t just mammals (or feline for that matter)…although the “Fur” term encompasses them all as an umbrella term  They can be reptilian, avian, aquatic, and mythical aka scalies, featheries, cetaceans, herps and taurs respectively.

There are also hybrids, crossbreeds, and mixes, and the community has their own feelings towards the Sqir-griff-fox-orc-ians (I just made that creature up). The people under the avatars are either looking to be creative or try to give each quirk/animal they identify with a physical characteristic.  Think… Dragoear.  A cross I just made up that is part dragon, part bear. Strong, tough, breathes fire, territorial, can fly but loves to cuddle, sleep and rub on things.  Actually, do you remember the TV show the Wuzzels?; they crossed animals too.

Much of the misunderstanding stems from lack of education and how the subcultures are broken up.  As far as I can tell, these are the major groups of Furries:

1. Fursuiters Those who like to dress up. I’ll equate them to Fasionistas of the BDSM world. There is a big possibility that they don’t even like BDSM, but they like the costumes and materials.  OR They can be very much into the entire scene. They are most often found in the mascot costumes or have the most elaborate make-ups. But still, this is the only time I suppose I can say just because it quacks like a duck, walks like a duck, looks like a duck… it isn’t a duck.
2. Otherkin Those who believe that they aren’t human in spirit. Think “tribe animal” or “totem animal” if it helps you.  They often have dreams and a very deep spiritual connection to a specific animal.
3. Furries Those who like to roleplay, draw, or write stories about furries.  They can have multiple avatars, or just one. This is the largest group I feel.  They go to the conventions and play the mmorpgs, they nuzzle and use a lot of emoticons, ::pounce::, and make animal noises.  When you think “furry” aside from the mascot costumes, these are the people you meet.  In here you can find the classifications of fursonas like avian vs fur and crossbreeds etc.
4. Furverts (Or: Furry Fetishists.) This, in turn, can be divided into many more subcultures, all grouped by specific fetishes, like feet, macros, and other fetishes.  They like specific pieces of the Furridom, not the entire pod.

I’m going to take a stab and say that a few of these furries give the others a bad name, like on CSI. They highly sexualize/pervert the mostly innocent fun of being a furry (I’ll explain this more).  But every radical group has their own enemies, a group called Burned Furs and their spin offs are their right wing adversaries. They were opposed to sexual activity in the community and at conventions. aka No Yiffing.
5. Trans-species Those who physically alter their body to resemble their respective animal’s. There have been only been a few, the most famous I feel is SeeDennis Avner.  He has had multiple surgeries, hours of tattooing, and even put lip piercing implants in to attach whiskers so he can transform himself into his totem animal; a Tiger named Stalking Cat.

 

This post is part of a series, use Furry in the search bar or look at the related posts to find more.

 

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