Jump to content

Furry fandom

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Rejax (talk | contribs) at 22:42, 9 May 2006 (→Information: Added link). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

File:Shanda12.JPG
Shanda the Panda #12, an example of a furry comic

Furry fandom is a subculture that originated from the science fiction and fantasy fandoms. Members of the furry fandom, known as furry fans or simply furries, particularly enjoy media that involves anthropomorphic animals: that is, fictional animals with human traits (such as walking on two feet, talking, wearing clothes, living in houses, etc.). Such media includes popular animated cartoons, comic books, and stories and novels.

Since the mid-1980s, furry fans have referred to any such anthropomorphic animal character as a furry. Other terms for these types of characters are funny animal and talking animal, or kemono in Japan. Furry characters are usually portrayed as humanoids wearing clothing, talking, and acting like humans rather than animals. However, some fans consider any talking animal, humanoid or not, to be a furry. Some fans also believe that non-animalistic fantasy creatures such as dragons, orcs, and elves should also be considered furry. [citation needed]

The furry fandom, as an umbrella subculture for various interests, has grown rapidly with the advent of the Internet. Content created by furry fans (visual art, stories, music, games, etc.) on the World Wide Web covers a wide range of interests including fantasies, philosophy, recipes, sex, politics, religion, and even personal lifestyle and identity.

History and Inspiration

File:Uybook11.jpg
Cover for Usagi Yojimbo, book 11

Furry fandom originated as a fusion of science fiction, fantasy, comic book, and animation fandoms during the 1980s and has grown with the advent of the World Wide Web and Internet.

The term "furry" originally came into existence at a science fiction convention in the late 1970s. Then, the term was used to describe one specific genre of fantasy art. As these "furry fans" became more organized, they began using e-mail and MUCKs to communicate. Notably, one of the oldest and largest MUCKs in existence is FurryMUCK.

Since the 1980s, furry fandom has focused largely on animal characters from cartoons (e.g., Roger Rabbit, The Angry Beavers, Rocko's Modern Life, Bugs Bunny, Mickey Mouse and Wile E. Coyote), animated feature films (e.g., Disney's Robin Hood, My Neighbor Totoro), TV shows (e.g., Father of the Pride), comics (e.g., Usagi Yojimbo, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Omaha the Cat Dancer), novels (e.g., Richard Adams' Watership Down, Andre Norton's Breed to Come, Brian Jacques' Redwall series, Steven Boyett's The Architect of Sleep, S. Andrew Swann's Moreau series), games (e.g., RuneQuest, EverQuest, the Star Fox series and Sonic the Hedgehog series) graphic novels (e.g., Maus) and webcomics (e.g., Newshounds, Boomer Express, The Suburban Jungle, and Kevin and Kell). Each has been cited as a source of inspiration by those who create works within the furry fandom.

Many members of the fandom have also cited as inspiration the historical usage of anthropomorphism in world mythology, including but not limited to Greek, Egyptian, Japanese and Native American.

Although many of the non-furry creators of such material are aware that some of their audience consists of furry fans, the most common term used by cartoonists to describe anthropomorphic animals is "funny animal," regardless of whether the animals are used in a funny way or not. Additionally, in Japan there is a genre called kemono, a tangentially related but independent genre with different cultural associations.

There are dozens of webcomics based on animal characters, such as Kevin and Kell, Sabrina Online, Newshounds, and The Suburban Jungle. Many are created by furry fans and, as such, are referred to as "furry comics." "Kevin and Kell," by contrast, was created by non-furry illustrator and cartoonist, Bill Holbrook.

Fan creations

Furry fans are eager for more material than is available from mainstream publishers. The demand is filled by fellow fans—amateur to professional artists, writers, and publishers who produce drawings, paintings, stories, independent comic books, fanzines, websites, and even small press books. Fans with craft skills put together their own plush furry toys, sometimes referred to as plushies, or build elaborate costumes called fursuits and wear them for fun or to participate in convention masquerades, dances, or fund-raising charity events (as entertainers). While many fursuits look like sports mascots, some fursuits go beyond that and include moving jaw mechanisms, animatronics, prosthetic makeup, or other frills.

Art and writing

File:Watcher in the woods.Dark Natasha.jpg
An example of furry artwork (by Dark Natasha)

Many furry fans participate in the arts, becoming amateur—and sometimes professional—illustrators, comic strip authors, painters, sculptors, writers, musicians, and craft artists. Primarily, the fandom produces visual art works although there are many three-dimensional sculptures, fabric pieces, stories, filk music pieces, and even photographs.

While the bulk of these fan-created pieces of art are distributed through unprofessional mediums such as personal web sites and via email, some publish their works in anthologies, Amateur Press Associations, or APAzines. A few have mainstream, professional credits to their names.

Role playing characters ("Fursonas")

Some furry fans on the web create anthropomorphic animal characters in order to engage in role-playing sessions on the many furry-themed MUDs on the Internet. The oldest furry role-playing environment is FurryMUCK although predating it was the GE-run BBS, The Beastie Board in which conversation sometimes led to role-play. Another popular online furry social game is called Furcadia, created by Dragon's Eye Productions, which has become significantly more popular than FurryMUCK. There are also several furry-themed areas and communities in the Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game Second Life.

Furry fans' personal characters (sometimes referred to by furries as "fursonas" or "personal furries") are usually based on their creators' personality or even a whimsical or sexual fantasy. They may become an online handle by which the fan will present themselves to other furries. Due to the isolation of the web, when furry fans meet one another in person, they may be more familiar with one another's online personas than with their real identities.

Furry fans often have strong feelings towards their animal personas or feel that they share a spiritual bond with the animal that their fursona is based upon. These feelings usually spur them on to create or commission artwork, stories, or fursuits featuring them.

Conventions

Group of fursuiters posing with an admirer during WorldCon 2002.

Sufficient membership and interest has allowed for the creation of many annual furry conventions in North America and Europe, the largest being Anthrocon in Pittsburgh each June or July. Further Confusion, held in San Jose each January, is almost as large. The total number of people attending furry conventions exceeded 9130 in 2005, a growth of 13% over the previous year. In 2005, 18 such conventions took place around the world. The first known furry convention, ConFurence, is no longer held. (Califur has replaced it, since both conventions were/are based in southern California.)

Many conventions feature an auction or fundraising event with the proceeds often going to an animal-related charity. For example, Further Confusion has raised more than $44,000 for various charitable beneficiaries over its seven year history, and Anthrocon has raised more than $56,000 for animal-related charities since 1997.

Sex and furry fandom

Because funny animal characters are often used in children's entertainment, furry fandom has faced an issue about the place of erotica in the subculture. A number of furry fans are adults who enjoy themes that are considered unsuitable for children. Of these, many artists in the furry fandom produce pornographic artwork and stories, which in furry slang may be referred to as yiffy or spoogy (from spooge, slang for semen). These works are often posted on public forums, personal web sites, and online art archives.

Furry fans may also engage in cybersex, such as on MUCKs, MUSHs, MUDs and other online roleplay environments. Such environments frequently have age-restricted areas for this kind of activity, though some MUD-style furry games are restricted in their entirety to "adults only", such as Tapestries MUCK.

The news and entertainment media have frequently focused on aspects of furry sexuality; mainstream media sources may portray furry fandom as a fetish-based subculture. For example, articles and columns in Vanity Fair [1] and Loaded magazines, the syndicated sex column Savage Love, and dramatized fiction or documentaries portrayed on television shows like ER, CSI: Crime Scene Investigation (CSI: Episode 406: Fur and Loathing), The Drew Carey Show, and MTV's Sex2K [2] have focused on the sexual aspects of furry fandom. Some articles link the furry fandom to other fetishes, such as bestiality and plushophilia, but many furry fans do not participate in or approve of such fetishes, nor do all agree with the characterization. A common counter-point is that furry characters are thinking, reasoning beings who are as capable of giving informed consent as any human. The comparison of the famous sex appeal of the Star Trek character Spock is often given as an example of a non-controversial variant, since he is at least technically no more human than a typical humanoid furry character.

Whether fans themselves engage in these behaviours as the media presents or not, adult furry material is available. To some it is an idealistic creed; to others it is not. The prevalence of erotic furry content has not gone unnoticed by the furry fans, either. Some fans embrace the adult material, considering it to be an inextricable part of the fandom, often considering censorship to be a breach of freedom of expression. People who find cartoon animals sexually attractive are sometimes known as toonophiles.

Other furries claim that furry fandom has a bad reputation as being overly sexualized to the exclusion of most, or anything, else. This argument would appear to be largely borne out by non-furries who complain that their first encounter with the fandom was sexually oriented. Today, however, all furry conventions have established guidelines and standards of conduct which restrict sexually explicit material and behavior to appropriate areas and situations. Others have created furry art archives, such as Yerf, which are free of sexual content. This results in the individual being able to take responsibility for their own actions and use their judgement as to what sort of material they wish to see.

See also

WikiFur
WikiFur
 For more information on the furry fandom, please see the Wikia project WikiFur. (info)

For a slightly different perspective on the Fandom:

Further reading

  • Craig Hilton: Furry Fandom — An Insider's View from the Outside, parts 1 & 2, South Fur Lands #2 & #3, 1995, 1996

Information

Art

  • Yerf — A furry art archive with restrictions on quality and mature subject matter
  • VCL — A mostly-unrestricted archive of furry art and fiction
  • Transfur — A filterable transformation artwork site including furry themes
  • deviantART Traditional Media Drawings (Anthros) — An anthropomorphic art subsection of the enormous deviantART repository; also see the corresponding section in Digital Art
  • Fur Affinity — A deviantART style website for anthromorphic art, music, and literature

Other

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Furry_fandom&oldid=52390055"