"Furry Lifestyle" (Was the Gallery tread)
Tamar
I just can't figure out how someone could have a "furry lifestyle". I mean,
what does that mean exactly. I now I asked that question before, but how
does one live like a furry? What, walk around in a fur coat all day, with
very strong aroma's coming from you (hey, a real furry would be very, well,
smelly since they'd depend on scent communication alot). I've heard somesay
that 'furry lifestylers' don't necessarily collect anthro comics, art, and
what not, so just what is their 'furriness' based on that makes it qualified
to be called a lifestyle?
The longer and longer I become involved and observe certain things in this
fandom, the cornier in RL terms things seem to get when you really stop to
think about it.
--
Tamar the Ebony Leopard
http://www.extinctioners.com
http://www.geocities.com/xenif/extinctioners.html
http://www.yerf.com/howashaw
"Dr. Cat" <c...@sullivan.realtime.net> wrote in message
news:3cb9...@giga.realtime.net...
> Charles Melville <cp...@zipcon.com> wrote:
> :> >> Oh, yes, there exist self-professed "furry lifestylers" who want to
> :> >> avoid the fandom altogether, fearing how nasty it is known to be,
and
> :> >> they do so. You've never met one.
> :> >
> :> > Actually, I've met quite a few.
> :>
> :> If they're avoiding fandom how did they even get near you?
>
> : Problem is that they still show up. The cons do not prohibit anyone
from
> : coming to the conventions (with the exception of troublesome
individuals).
>
> How do you justify calling them "people who are avoiding the fandom" if
they're
> coming to cons? Are these folks who are just really, really bad at
avoiding
> things?
>
> "Hey Joebob Lifestyler, how can you and me and Bubba Lifestyler avoid that
> thar 'furry fandom' this weekend?"
>
> "I know, Billybob Lifestyler. Let's all hop in the pickup truck and head
> on over to that thang they call 'Further Confusion'. Since that's a place
> whar it says the furry fans is all Confused, we can probably hide from 'em
> in the confusion real easy like!"
>
>
*-------------------------------------------**-----------------------------*
> Dr. Cat / Dragon's Eye Productions || Free alpha test:
> *-------------------------------------------** http://www.furcadia.com
> Furcadia - a graphic mud for PCs! || Let your imagination soar!
>
*-------------------------------------------**-----------------------------*
>
> (Disclaimer: Actually he said "who want to avoid the fandom". So I guess
> what it really is, we're talking people who are really poor at getting
> themselves to do what they want, rather than doing things they don't want.
> So they're like "Damn, I think I'll make reservations to go to a couple
> more furry cons this year even though I'd rather avoid them. I hate when
> I do that!" Maybe they're all from Bizarro World and am do what not want
> rather than do what Bizarro Lifestyler am WANT to do.)
Tamar
Michael Campbell
news:ubj7anf...@corp.supernews.com:
> (I don't know what you guys are talking about in this tread,
> honestly), but I just can't figure out how someone could have a "furry
> lifestyle". I mean, what does that mean exactly. I now I asked that
> question before, but how does one live like a furry? What, walk around
> in a fur coat all day, with very strong aroma's coming from you (hey,
> a real furry would be very, well, smelly since they'd depend on scent
> communication alot). I've heard somesay that 'furry lifestylers' don't
> necessarily collect anthro comics, art, and what not, so just what is
> their 'furriness' based on that makes it qualified to be called a
> lifestyle?
(as mp3s by The Aquabats and The Arrogant Worms play in the background)
This is a question that I've been asking for years, and have never gotten
a legitimate answer, mainly because there is one thing missing from the
argument, and that is a concise definition of just what a 'lifestyle' is.
So, in the interest of presenting my views in an intelligent fashion, I
am now going to explain my definition of 'lifestyle': A 'lifestyle' is a
series of behaviors that an individual engages in to acheive sucess in a
given field. One leads the 'athelete' lifestyle (training, excercise,
diet, etc.) to acheive better health of improved athletic performance. In
the same manner one leads the 'businessman' lifestyle to acheive business
success. It could even be sucessfully argued that the addict leads the
'addict' lifestyle, as living it allows the specific addict to feed their
need with greater ease, whatever that need may be.
The problem with 'furry lifestylers' if we follow this definition of
'lifestyle' is that they have no requirements for success. the whole
thing is essentially a sort of 'Everyone who participates is a winner'
philosiphy. With no clear definition of the requirements for success, let
alone the paramaters for leading the 'furry lifestyle' the whole deal
collapses in a morass of "I am one because I SAY SO!" In truth, this is
little more than what the author Douglas Copeland referred to as 'me-
ism': An attempt to develop a personal philosiphy in the lack of a
conventional philisophical grounding, usually revolving around the
veneration of the self.
And you know what? That's all cool. The problems start when a handful of
people out ther who have these beliefs starrt asserting that you can't
'really' be furry (personally, I wouldn't really want to really be furry:
tailoring pants for tails would get expensive, I would lose my job at the
meatpacking plant, and shedding season would be just icky) unless you
jump through the same philisophical hoops that they do.
> The longer and longer I become involved and observe certain things in
> this fandom, the cornier in RL terms things seem to get when you
> really stop to think about it.
In times like these, I turn to one of the great comic-book philosiphers:
"We have to sell to the fans in Fudge, Nebraska."
Silver Phoenyx Furs
news:ubj7anf...@corp.supernews.com:
> (I don't know what you guys are talking about in this tread,
Is it just my host, or are other people seeing eleventy-seven copies of
Tamar's posts?
--
<URL: http://silver.phoenyx.net/fur/ > Nifty tails, ears, and whatnot
Current FurBid auctions: Realistic fox ears, tail, and ears commission
<URL: http://furrybid.transform.to/cgi-bin/auction.pl?justdisp&Phoenyx>
Chris Beilby
> Is it just my host, or are other people seeing eleventy-seven copies of
> Tamar's posts?
I'm getting four identical copies of each of his posts.
Cerulean
>This is a question that I've been asking for years, and have never gotten
>a legitimate answer, mainly because there is one thing missing from the
>argument, and that is a concise definition of just what a 'lifestyle' is.
>
>So, in the interest of presenting my views in an intelligent fashion, I
>am now going to explain my definition of 'lifestyle': A 'lifestyle' is a
>series of behaviors that an individual engages in to acheive sucess in a
>given field. One leads the 'athelete' lifestyle (training, excercise,
>diet, etc.) to acheive better health of improved athletic performance. In
>the same manner one leads the 'businessman' lifestyle to acheive business
>success. It could even be sucessfully argued that the addict leads the
>'addict' lifestyle, as living it allows the specific addict to feed their
>need with greater ease, whatever that need may be.
The goal-oriented facet seems an unnecessary embellishment of the
definition of lifestyle. Lifestyle simply means the way you live your
life, successfully or not.
Furry lifestyle stuff is subtle; that is, it's not so much "I have a
furry lifestyle" (because how _could_ such things actively consume the
entirety of one's time?) but, rather, "furry is an _aspect_ of my
lifestyle." And, to be frank, the word probably wouldn't even be used
for this if not for the attempt to fit a newsgroup into the existing
Usenet hierarchy. Alt.fan.dragons developed in much the same way long
before, giving rise to "draconity" and all it implies. If you asked
most subscribers to these sorts of philosophies who haven't been
exposed to all this rhetoric, they would probably pick the word
"identity," not "lifestyle," to describe how they feel. And, again, in
most cases, it's just an _aspect_ of one's identity, although often a
strong one.
--
___vvz /( Cerulean = Kevin Pease http://cerulean.st/
<__,` Z / ( DC2.~D GmAL~W-R+++Ac~J+S+Fr++IH$M-V+++Cbl,spu
`~~~) )Z) ( FDDmp4adwsA+++$C+D+HM+P-RT+++WZSm#
/ (7 ( 77epueJ - ,,iS37q33M awos +o6 I,,
Tamar
--
Tamar the Ebony Leopard
http://www.extinctioners.com
http://www.geocities.com/xenif/extinctioners.html
http://www.yerf.com/howashaw
"Silver Phoenyx Furs" <silve...@phoenyx.net> wrote in message
news:Xns91F0964E...@130.133.1.4...
Onyx Dreamer
reading it. It really clearly sets up the position of the founders of
that group. I don't agree with some of what I read but hey - it is a
free web. As for my own thoughts and ideas.
First a REAL definition: lifestyle : the typical way of life of an
individual, group, or culture (-www.websters.com this day/date link
at end) FYI: Christianity is also a lifestyle. (Success is not a
factor in this definition.) The only feeling I have about the name is
that it doesn't apply. Many lifestylers have lots of things in common
but not so much as to make it a defined lifestyle - but I am the first
to admit that I still don't know enough on that score.
What does furry and furry lifestylers have to do with each other. A
whole lot and nothing. The first thing that you really need to
understand is that it is both theoretically and practically possible
that a person can be a furry lifestlyer and not a furry anything else.
They may not like the 'sexy' stuff or the 'cute' stuff and only like
to see animals as they are in the forms they currently posses. Thus
anything about furry art, stories and RPGs is fairly irrelevant to
them (if not scorned by them). The fact is that this can be true but
isn't very hugely likely to be true as the definition of a furry
itself tends to be broad (depending on who you ask). The link is not
in the art or the character but in the philosophical/spiritual/mental
mask. Follow me on this quick mental trip.
Fox.
Now most of you have an idea of what I am talking about. The more
visual and artistic almost have a the critter drawn out. The more
critical among you are thinking that I am going to talk about casual
sex. Some would see the canine running and pouncing on some meal. Many
are thinking that the creature is male just because I didn't say
vixen. If I say this to a lifestyler they would likely also respond
with additional ideas- spiritual and sometimes symbolic qualities of
the creature. Some would even feel the very essence of the creature at
a spiritual or cognitive (not intellectual) level. It is this latter
part that lifestlyers concentrate on. Artists concentrate on fox
picture. Writers do fox stories. Lifestlyers focus on that basic
spirituality and apply it to themselves. Another way of putting it is
that instead of merging aspects of human and animal in form, they are
doing the intersection human and animal spirit. It is a simple and
very loose (almost too loose) a definition for a member of this
group is that of shaman.
That is my take on it. Right wrong and indifferent. I'll change it
only when I find a better view with my own eyes. Surprise me and make
this a better world by actually not flaming or acting like Vanity Fair
and MTV. Ask them. You know where they hang out. They are nice persons
and they don't bite.
Link for Definition:
http://www.webster.com/cgi-bin/dictionary
Mike, please don't wait for an answer that you like to call it
legitimate. It is really impossible to prove my existence to you
beyond certain augments. If you think those augments are invalid, I
won't go away - I'll just have to believe in the both of us until you
can believe for yourself. I ask that you most of all speak with them
and come to understand them. We can never expect others to respect our
passions, if we choose to prevent and scorn others from following
their higher angels.
Silver Phoenyx Furs
> Sorry, isp hickup.
Hmm. Would it help if we scared it?
Karl Xydexx Jorgensen
>The problem with 'furry lifestylers' if we follow this definition of
>'lifestyle' is that they have no requirements for success. the whole
>thing is essentially a sort of 'Everyone who participates is a winner'
>philosiphy. With no clear definition of the requirements for success, let
>alone the paramaters for leading the 'furry lifestyle' the whole deal
>collapses in a morass of "I am one because I SAY SO!"
Lifestyle = A way of life.
Everyone is different and has different ways of living their lives. Nobody is
saying there is One Right Furry Way To Live. (Well, lifestylers aren't, at
least...)
Of course, I don't look at it as "furry lifestyle" but "lifestyle, furry". No
problem there.
--
_________________________________________________
Karl Xydexx Jorgensen / Xydexx Squeakypony, KSC
Anthrofurry Infocenter:
http://www.xydexx.com/anthrofurry
Ken Pick
> Michael Campbell wrote:
> >The problem with 'furry lifestylers' if we follow this definition of
> >'lifestyle' is that they have no requirements for success. the whole
> >thing is essentially a sort of 'Everyone who participates is a winner'
> >philosiphy. With no clear definition of the requirements for success, let
> >alone the paramaters for leading the 'furry lifestyle' the whole deal
> >collapses in a morass of "I am one because I SAY SO!"
>
> Lifestyle = A way of life.
Unfortunately (and I'm not talking specifically about the fandom),
"lifestyle" as acquired a lot of secondary meaning as "sexually
kinky". I mean, whenever you hear the word "alternative lifestyle",
there's usually something kinky involved.
I came up from Southern California furry fandom; there "furry
lifestyle" has always had to carry (usually gay) sexual baggage, to
the point that the two meanings of the word are hard to separate.
This reached its peak locally with CF8, and has been having
reprecussions since.
In his latest Gallery editorial/rant, Rich Chandler (the latest
Antichrist of the fandom) compared furry fandom to a cult. I think he
was onto something with the analogy; for instance, cult behavior
usually involves an offbeat belief system that involves all of the
member's life and insulation from anyone outside the cult.
Tim Gadd
>Unfortunately (and I'm not talking specifically about the fandom),
>"lifestyle" as acquired a lot of secondary meaning as "sexually
>kinky". I mean, whenever you hear the word "alternative lifestyle",
>there's usually something kinky involved.
That must be an American thing. In Australia it usually means people living
out in the bush, eating organic food and various other such stereotypes.
>I came up from Southern California furry fandom; there "furry
>lifestyle" has always had to carry (usually gay) sexual baggage, to
>the point that the two meanings of the word are hard to separate.
>This reached its peak locally with CF8, and has been having
>reprecussions since.
I think that the reason the term 'furry lifestyle' has sexual conotations
has more to do with the already existing connotations of the 'furry' part
than the 'lifestyle' part.
>In his latest Gallery editorial/rant, Rich Chandler (the latest
>Antichrist of the fandom) compared furry fandom to a cult. I think he
>was onto something with the analogy; for instance, cult behavior
>usually involves an offbeat belief system that involves all of the
>member's life and insulation from anyone outside the cult.
You've just jumped from furry lifestyle to furry fandom there. I just
wondered if you were aware you'd done it.
I haven't read the editorial and don't intend to, but on the surface of it,
the comparison seems silly. I don't think either furry fandom or furry
lifestylers or furries in general have any particular organised belief
system. The latter part of the allegation could, looked at another way, be
expressed by the harmless expression 'birds of a feather flock together'. I
don't think many people would call gays or Amiga users 'cultists'.
Ok, maybe Amiga users.
--
Tim Gadd | fluke .com.au
Hobart, Tasmania | @southcom
http://www.fortunecity.com/victorian/university/222/
"The more crap you believe in,
the better off you are."
Charles Bukowski
Tim Gadd
<mecamp...@tds.net> wrote:
>"Tamar" <ta...@hotmail.com> wrote in
>news:ubj7anf...@corp.supernews.com:
>
>> (I don't know what you guys are talking about in this tread,
>> honestly), but I just can't figure out how someone could have a "furry
>> lifestyle". I mean, what does that mean exactly. I now I asked that
>> question before, but how does one live like a furry? What, walk around
>> in a fur coat all day, with very strong aroma's coming from you (hey,
>> a real furry would be very, well, smelly since they'd depend on scent
>> communication alot). I've heard somesay that 'furry lifestylers' don't
>> necessarily collect anthro comics, art, and what not, so just what is
>> their 'furriness' based on that makes it qualified to be called a
>> lifestyle?
>
>(as mp3s by The Aquabats and The Arrogant Worms play in the background)
>
>This is a question that I've been asking for years, and have never gotten
>a legitimate answer, mainly because there is one thing missing from the
>argument, and that is a concise definition of just what a 'lifestyle' is.
Funny I should be hear answering this question, nearly 6 years after I
started the 'In support of a furry lifestyle' thread on this newsgroup.
Ok, the first thing is that, as Cerulean as pointed out, we never had our
hearts set on the word 'lifestyle'. We wanted to fit the group into a
pre-exisitng usenet hierarchy, and that seemed the most applicable one.
I've never been enitrely happy with the lifestyle word, particularly as it
gave rise to the 'phrase lifestyler' (spawned on aff if I remember),
suggesting there is some nescessary uniformity amongst people who post to
alt.lifestyle.furry.
The reason that no concise definition exists of what a furry lifestyle
would be, is that we very deliberately avoided ever creating one. This was
because one of the most central principles of ALF was that the definition
should be 100% up to the individual. And the reason for THAT was because we
didn't want any basis on which anybody could try to EXCLUDE anyone from ALF
based on them not conforming to some idea about how furry lifestylers
should behave. In other words, we didn't want the same thing to happen on
ALF as happened here, which caused the formation of ALF in the first place.
Gabriel Gentile
> In his latest Gallery editorial/rant, Rich Chandler (the latest
> Antichrist of the fandom) compared furry fandom to a cult.
Where can I find this editorial?
Karl Xydexx Jorgensen
>In his latest Gallery editorial/rant, Rich Chandler (the latest
>Antichrist of the fandom) compared furry fandom to a cult.
Hey, Rich Chandler has been wrong before. I'm sure his sour-grapes editorial
is no exception. At least he's consistent, right?
>I think he was onto something with the analogy; for instance, cult
>behavior usually involves an offbeat belief system that involves all
>of the member's life and insulation from anyone outside the cult.
I'm a furry lifestyler myself, and the analogy seems pretty farfetched. For
one thing, my offbeat belief system comes from _me_, not furry fandom. Also,
furry fandom is a part of my life, not the whole thing. (In fact, I spent the
past weekend researching the town of Mount Pleasant. Just thought I'd mention
it so folks can accuse me of linking furry fandom to blacksmith shops and
sawmills that don't exist anymore.) Nor does furry fandom insulate me from
anyone outside the "cult", at least no more than any other group of people with
a shared interest in something would.
Actually, if anyone had cultlike to devotion to something I'd think it'd be
Rich Chandler, seeing how he was always insisting people shouldn't talk about
their other interests at conventions. That's always been the big Catch-22,
though: If someone's only interested in furry fandom you'll say they need to
get a life, and if someone has other interests in addition to furry fandom
you'll say they're "linking" them to it.
Atara
<9efdce3a.02041...@posting.google.com>:
>Unfortunately (and I'm not talking specifically about the fandom),
>"lifestyle" as acquired a lot of secondary meaning as "sexually
>kinky". I mean, whenever you hear the word "alternative lifestyle",
>there's usually something kinky involved.
Really? I've heard it used to describe lots of different things, including
living simply by growing your own food, eschewing any transportation that
uses fossil fuels, or just living communally (and non-sexually) with a
large group of other people. Basically, anything other than the typical
western style of living (which includes diet, spending habits, living
arrangements, and environmental awareness.)
The only place I've *ever* heard use lifestyle in a sexual sense is by
fundamentalist Christians, as in "gay lifestyle." Maybe I just listen to
the wrong AM stations.
--
Atara
"Draco Dormiens Nunquam Titillandus."
http://www.FurNation.com/Atara/
***What doesn't fit in my email addy? NADA.***
Tamar
Though, if 'furry' lifestylers don't base their lifestyle off of well what
the original associated term of furry was, e.i. the art, comics, movies,
toons, and writing then just what are they basing it on? I mean, why not
just call it a 'natural or nature, or animal lifestyle'?
--
Tamar the Ebony Leopard
http://www.extinctioners.com
http://www.geocities.com/xenif/extinctioners.html
http://www.yerf.com/howashaw
"Onyx Dreamer" <ebbpa...@aol.com> wrote in message
news:5195598a.02041...@posting.google.com...
Tamar
undying support of an dying system. :)
(runs and hids before Eric reads this).
--
Tamar the Ebony Leopard
http://www.extinctioners.com
http://www.geocities.com/xenif/extinctioners.html
http://www.yerf.com/howashaw
"Tim Gadd" <nota...@addy.com> wrote in message
news:8ie7PLzL7IH27M...@4ax.com...
> X-Trace: tiger.chameleon.net 1018898631 26119 203.55.103.98 (15 Apr 2002
19:23:51 GMT)
> X-Complaints-To: use...@tiger.chameleon.net
> NNTP-Posting-Date: Mon, 15 Apr 2002 19:23:51 +0000 (UTC)
> X-Newsreader: Forte Agent 1.6/32.525
> Xref: sn-us alt.fan.furry:232299
Tamar
"fundamentalist Christian" to have heard the term lifestyle be associated
with homosexuality. Heck, I've seen on tv and news where they use the term
themselves to discribe what they do.
--
Tamar the Ebony Leopard
http://www.extinctioners.com
http://www.geocities.com/xenif/extinctioners.html
http://www.yerf.com/howashaw
"Atara" <at...@mb.sympatico.caNADA> wrote in message
news:91F1CBCFEa...@66.120.4.171...
Tamar
case, personally I think its silly anyway to get all worked up over
something that, when you get down to it, only exists because of cartoon
animals that create a particular asthetic appeal to its viewers, who lately
happen to be adults. But then I still got a lot of mundan still left in me
to take 'furry politics' seriously.
--
Tamar the Ebony Leopard
http://www.extinctioners.com
http://www.geocities.com/xenif/extinctioners.html
http://www.yerf.com/howashaw
"Tim Gadd" <nota...@addy.com> wrote in message
news:Cyq7PP=cu9ZKbOP8W...@4ax.com...
Allen Kitchen
Tamar wrote:
>
> Hey, that's unfair. You don't have to live on the West coast or be a
> "fundamentalist Christian" to have heard the term lifestyle be associated
> with homosexuality. Heck, I've seen on tv and news where they use the term
> themselves to discribe what they do.
Tamar, you asked me before what 'furry lifestyle' was all about. I thought
I'd answered your questions honestly and fairly. Perhaps I wasn't clear
enough. *shrugs.*
You are welcome to email me more questions anytime you like. And although
I'm no spokesman for others, I'll do my best to answer your queries better
this time. I can't give details on the sexual kinks some say are everywhere
because, quite frankly, I'm not into that and I don't know but a handful of
people who are.
Allen Kitchen (shockwave)
http://www.blkbox.com/~osprey/
Martin Skunk
"Tamar" <ta...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:ubn1rc7...@corp.supernews.com...
> You know, though, when you say 'we' it does sound like a group. But in any
> case, personally I think its silly anyway to get all worked up over
> something that, when you get down to it, only exists because of cartoon
> animals that create a particular asthetic appeal to its viewers, who
lately
> happen to be adults. But then I still got a lot of mundan still left in me
> to take 'furry politics' seriously.
>
Don't forget that "furry" doesn't have an official definition, as
everyone has its own, particular one. Since "furry lifestylism" is a part of
the furry fandom, it's obvious that they won't neither have a definition.
furrydom works (?) that way.
---Martin Skunk
Brad Austin
> You know, though, when you say 'we' it does sound like a group.
Tim is talking about the ALF newgroup/FAQ committee. It was
a specific group of approximately a dozen people, chaired by
Tim, which created the newsgroup alt.lifestyle.furry and wrote
its charter and FAQ. In the course of doing so, we wrote a
definition (actually a non-definition) for the term "furry
lifestyle" in the specific context of that newsgroup and what
was considered on-topic for it. This is sometimes pointed to
as being *the* definition of "furry lifestyle", however it
really has no applicability to anything beyond the context of
that particular newsgroup, and anyway it really isn't a
definition at all.
Tim is just taking one of many possible interpretations of your
question about what it means to have a "furry lifestyle".
(And probably the easiest one.) In the context of what's on-
topic for ALF, as Tim said, "furry lifestyle" means whatever a
person posting about his "furry lifestyle" wants it to mean.
In the context in which Chuck Melville uses the term, "furry
lifestyle" is a euphemism for bestiality, and "furry
lifestylers" a label for an imaginary horde of people who rape
animals, have no interest in furry comics or any of the other
things that Furry Fandom revolves around, and still show up at
furry cons for some reason. There are many other possible
contexts for the question, and correspondingly many different
possible answers.
> But in any
> case, personally I think its silly anyway to get all worked up over
> something that, when you get down to it, only exists because of cartoon
> animals that create a particular asthetic appeal to its viewers, who lately
> happen to be adults.
There are many things that the term "furry" applies to that
don't match that description. Anthropomorphic animals
appear in many other artistic contexts besides cartoons,
and for many other reasons besides simple aesthetic appeal.
a here.c | Brad Austin
r t o |
tax@ne m | Oceanside, CA USA
Cerulean
>So furry lifestyle is a sorta cultish religious "one with nature" thingie?
A cult is an organization that follows a leader. Most people find the
community long after developing their own thoughts and feelings about
identifying with a particular animal into a personal philosophy. They
go on for a while thinking they're the only one, and then they stumble
upon all these other people with similar ideas and naturally want to
talk to them. Because there _is_ no cult and no dogma, they can do so
without having to change their beliefs to fit somebody else's
standard.
>Though, if 'furry' lifestylers don't base their lifestyle off of well what
>the original associated term of furry was, e.i. the art, comics, movies,
>toons, and writing then just what are they basing it on? I mean, why not
>just call it a 'natural or nature, or animal lifestyle'?
Because no matter how much we identify as other animals, we are all
living human lives. With this in mind, the most obvious way to
acknowledge all attributes, human and otherwise, is with an
anthropomorphic self-image. Many even drew their own anthro art
independently, before knowing of any of furrydom; the sort of art that
is linked very closely to one's own feelings.
The "back to nature" thing isn't at all universal either. There are
those who consider themselves city cats, civilized dragons, etc.
Brad Austin
> You know, though, when you say 'we' it does sound like a group.
Tim is talking about the ALF newgroup/FAQ committee. It was
a specific group of approximately a dozen people, chaired by
Tim, which created the newsgroup alt.lifestyle.furry and wrote
its charter and FAQ. In the course of doing so, we wrote a
definition (actually a non-definition) for the term "furry
lifestyle" in the specific context of that newsgroup and what
was considered on-topic for it. This is sometimes pointed to
as being *the* definition of "furry lifestyle", however it
really has no applicability to anything beyond the context of
that particular newsgroup, and anyway it really isn't a
definition at all.
Tim is just taking one of many possible interpretations of your
question about what it means to have a "furry lifestyle".
(And probably the easiest one.) In the context of what's on-
topic for ALF, as Tim said, "furry lifestyle" means whatever a
person posting about his "furry lifestyle" wants it to mean.
In the context in which Chuck Melville uses the term, "furry
lifestyle" is a euphemism for bestiality, and "furry
lifestylers" a label for an imaginary horde of people who rape
animals, have no interest in furry comics or any of the other
things that Furry Fandom revolves around, and still show up at
furry cons for some reason. There are many other possible
contexts for the question, and correspondingly many different
possible answers.
> But in any
> case, personally I think its silly anyway to get all worked up over
> something that, when you get down to it, only exists because of cartoon
> animals that create a particular asthetic appeal to its viewers, who lately
> happen to be adults.
There are many things that the term "furry" applies to that
don't match that description. Anthropomorphic animals
appear in many other artistic contexts besides cartoons,
as well as in contexts that aren't artistic at all. And
both inside and outside an artistic context, they are
often used for other reasons besides simple aesthetic
Brad Austin
> Though, if 'furry' lifestylers don't base their lifestyle off of well what
> the original associated term of furry was, e.i. the art, comics, movies,
> toons, and writing
I would disagree with your premise that that's what the term
"furry" was originally associated with. By all available
evidence, the term "furry" was coined by Mark Merlino circa
1985 or 86, and originally applied to a series of room
parties held by him at various sci-fi conventions. "Furry"
originally meant the vaguely defined constellation of
interests shared by Mark and the people he hosted these
parties in order to socialize with. These included art,
comics, toons, etc., certainly, but they weren't limited to
things of an artistic nature. It was essentially everything
that Mark, from his rather biased and ideosyncratic
perspective, personally considered to be intertwined with
an interest in anthropomorphic animals. And that included
big doses of role-playing (Mark is well known for inventing
a furry alien race called the Skiltaires for the RPG "Other
Suns"); animal alter-egos (Mark has one himself named
Sylis Sable); and alternate sexuality (Mark is infamous for
certain remarks he's made at sci-fi con panel discussions
regarding this topic and it's special significance to Furry
Fandom).
"Lifestyle" topics have been associated with the term "furry"
since day one. They may or may not have been associated with
whatever various people consider to be the origins of the
entity now known as "Furry Fandom", but from the first day
that the term "furry" was used in reference to it, they were
already there.
Michael Campbell
news:a9gf90$7l9$1...@tiger.chameleon.net:
> Tamar wrote:
>
>> Though, if 'furry' lifestylers don't base their lifestyle off of well
>> what the original associated term of furry was, e.i. the art, comics,
>> movies, toons, and writing
>
> I would disagree with your premise that that's what the term
> "furry" was originally associated with. By all available
> evidence, the term "furry" was coined by Mark Merlino circa
> 1985 or 86, and originally applied to a series of room
> parties held by him at various sci-fi conventions.
And I'm sure that Mister Merlino would like you to think that's true.
Click here:
http://www.arclight.net/~yarf/YARF_Chronology.html
And get the REAL story.
Ken Pick
> > In his latest Gallery editorial/rant, Rich Chandler (the latest
> > Antichrist of the fandom) compared furry fandom to a cult.
>
> Where can I find this editorial?
Gallery. Winter 2002 issue (the latest). The last page of Chandler's
editorial section at the front. (Most of the section is about his
Battlebots participation; the actual "cult" essay is at the end,
before the main art contributions start.)
As for how to get hold of the current copy of Gallery, that I don't
know.
Or you could email Chandler and ask for a copy of the editorial/rant.
Ken Pick
>I don't think many people would call gays or Amiga users 'cultists'.
>
> Ok, maybe Amiga users.
And Mac users. While Microsoft caught up with them with each redesign
of Windows, Apple rested on its laurels until Redmond got all the
market share; at which point Apple responded by turning Mac into a
*religion*.
Mac Witnessing I have known:
Statement that "Mac will completely drive Microsoft into bankruptcy by
the Year 2000!" (When objected to as not quite a realistic
expectation, the response was "DIE, HERETIC!")
Endless mantras about how "Mac is the Superior System... Mac is the
Superior System... Mac is the Superior System..."
And nasty snyde digs about Pentium chips, Intel, Microsoft, Linux,
*anything* non-Mac; never passing up an opportunity to rip into them.
(The only thing I have to compare them to is one local televangelist
who hated Star Wars for some reason and in his sermons did anything
and everything to rip into Star Wars.)
Brad Austin
> Brad Austin <dont-repl...@address.com> wrote in
> news:a9gf90$7l9$1...@tiger.chameleon.net:
>
>> "furry" was originally associated with. By all available
>> evidence, the term "furry" was coined by Mark Merlino circa
>> 1985 or 86, and originally applied to a series of room
>> parties held by him at various sci-fi conventions.
>
> And I'm sure that Mister Merlino would like you to think that's true.
>
> Click here:
> http://www.arclight.net/~yarf/YARF_Chronology.html
>
> And get the REAL story.
Please point out where in Patten's chronology there is anything to
contradict Mark Merlino being the originator of the term "furry",
or anything else I said in that post. I'm not seeing it. Whereas
I *am* seeing:
] July 1986: After about a year of holding informal open parties at
] SF and comics conventions, Mark Merlino and Rod O'Riley hold the
] first "official" Furry Party at Westercon 39 in San Diego. This
] starts the tradition of publicizing the presence of 'morph fans at
] conventions by posting "furry party" flyers featuring funny-animal
] pin-up art. The furry party name leads to the characterization of
] these fans as "furry fandom" by the late 1980s.
Baloo Ursidae
> Are you kidding, Amiga users are in a cult. How else could you explain their
> undying support of an dying system. :)
Oh, just wait for the "Amiga Persecution Complex" posts...
--
Baloo
Tamar
96, and was first introduced to the net, I tried thinking up the most
generic term I could to describe the art I did cause I wanted to see if the
information highway had others on it that drew similar things. I guess furry
was it cause it generated thousands of sites..
--
Tamar the Ebony Leopard
http://www.extinctioners.com
http://www.geocities.com/xenif/extinctioners.html
http://www.yerf.com/howashaw
"Brad Austin" <dont-repl...@address.com> wrote in message
news:a9hrd3$kq2$1...@tiger.chameleon.net...
Charles Melville
Cerulean wrote:
> Quoth Tamar:
>
> >So furry lifestyle is a sorta cultish religious "one with nature" thingie?
>
> A cult is an organization that follows a leader.
Not by definition. Not all cults have leaders, per se, or follow leaders
as such. They follow the -belief- that the cult espouses. Most religions
began as cults, and some are still considered as such. They -may- have
leaders, but in some cases the leader can be replaced, especially if he's not
living up to the expectations of the cult's belief system.
--
-Chuck Melville-
http://www.zipcon.net/~cpam/index.htm
Charles Melville
Brad Austin wrote:
>
> In the context in which Chuck Melville uses the term, "furry
> lifestyle" is a euphemism for bestiality,
No, I take it as a term for people whose interests espouse other than what
the fandom is about, bestiality included.
> and "furry
> lifestylers" a label for an imaginary horde of people who rape
> animals, have no interest in furry comics or any of the other
> things that Furry Fandom revolves around, and still show up at
> furry cons for some reason.
There you go.
Brad Austin
> No, I take it as a term for people whose interests espouse other than what
> the fandom is about, bestiality included.
That definition would apply to pretty much 100% of the world's
population.
Brad Austin
> But in any case I never denied that ALF was a group.
I do deny ALF is a group.
Something is a group if, for any given person P, there is an
unambiguous (though possibly unknown) answer to the question
whether person P is a member of it, which doesn't depend too
much on the context in which the question is asked to be
meaningful. "The set of all people who have posted at least
once in their lives to ALF" is a group. "The set of all
people who have read at least 50% of the messages posted to
ALF in the past week is a group. "ALF" is not a group.
There is no meaningful criteria for saying whether any given
person is a "member of ALF".
Sorry if this sounds pedantic, but a large portion of the
arguments that get endlessly debated here would be
unnecessary if only people kept this straight.
Ben Raccoon
"Charles Melville" <cp...@zipcon.com> wrote
> > A cult is an organization that follows a leader.
>
> Not by definition. Not all cults have leaders, per se, or follow
leaders
> as such. They follow the -belief- that the cult espouses. Most religions
> began as cults, and some are still considered as such. They -may- have
> leaders, but in some cases the leader can be replaced, especially if he's
not
> living up to the expectations of the cult's belief system.
More accurately, a cult is a group of people who try to emulate the leader,
be it their ideas, mode of dress, or personality. The Rocky Horror Picture
Show enthusiasts are a cult, for example..
--
http://www.furnation.com/ben_raccoon
Stone's Law: One man's "simple" is another man's "huh?"
Baloo Ursidae
>> No, I take it as a term for people whose interests espouse other than what
>> the fandom is about, bestiality included.
>
> That definition would apply to pretty much 100% of the world's
> population.
I think Melville's intent was to say dragging elements that clearly
having nothing to do with furry in and calling it furry as well.
--
Baloo
Baloo Ursidae
> I do deny ALF is a group.
Interesting. Kinda like denying the existance of currency. How do you
accept something as ill-defined as the dollar? It's value is completely
arbitrary and fluctuates and it's only definition is against other
currencies, which suffer the same problems as the dollar as far as
definitions go. Yet, somehow we all grok the imaginary concept of a
dollar to the point where we will do things and give people our
posessions for a sufficient number or fraction of dollars.
ALF not a difficult concept to grok, it's a newsgroup, and we have a
hard definition for that (unlike our dollar, for example). Its
existance is evidenced by viewing the active file on any news swerver
that exchanges with the outside world, it's membership's existance is
evidenced that there's actually a (moderately large[1]) number of
articles posted. While I have no way of knowing how many people are
reading, if number of posts and variety of posters is any indication,
ALF is the larger group in recent months, usually coming in with more
articles by a couple dozen daily and from a greater variety of posters.
If you remove the flamewars from both groups (which generally consist of
four or five posters anyway), the numbers look definately more in favor
of ALF. Existance of ALF as a newsgroup firmly supported. Support in
favor of ALF as a group of people below.
Disclaimer: This is just by eyeballing article counts when I start
rtin, which only collects a reasonable sample when I'm asleep, ~7AM-3PM
Pacific Wed-Sat, give or take those up to about 12 hours on my off
days[2]. If anybody's got a program that'll count up newsgroup articles
as far back as it can see, sort it by thread (so we can compare with and
without flamewars) and break it down by month, I'd be happy to
demonstrate this with hard numbers.
> Something is a group if, for any given person P, there is an
> unambiguous (though possibly unknown) answer to the question
> whether person P is a member of it, which doesn't depend too
> much on the context in which the question is asked to be
> meaningful.
This would require furry to be a much more solidly defined word to begin
with before you could even start defining the rest readily. Part of the
context problem is furry means many different things, and how each of
those things is defined from person to person. And there's not exactly
a whole lot of presidence or sane resolutions for fixing a word with too
many meanings. Science ran into this problem finding names for
everything. Then they started using and making up words in Latin. Pick
your insanity.
> "The set of all people who have posted at least
> once in their lives to ALF" is a group.
This doesn't count. Spammers and trolls are obvious, but there's also
interested observers[4] and lurkers who are a part of ALF that we just
don't see much of at all.
> "The set of all
> people who have read at least 50% of the messages posted to
> ALF in the past week is a group.
I wouldn't qualify, yet last time they were taken, I was one of the top
ten posters (2?) to the group (based on byte count excluding quoted
material, headers and sig). David Konig's got the details on how he
used to do those counts.
> "ALF" is not a group.
> There is no meaningful criteria for saying whether any given
> person is a "member of ALF".
I'd say it is pretty clear: Are you an active reader of ALF? That is,
is it a group you subscribe to and actively follow, understand, at
relate to the people posting there?
> Sorry if this sounds pedantic, but a large portion of the
> arguments that get endlessly debated here would be
> unnecessary if only people kept this straight.
Not to sound accusatory, but I think you were the one who missed the
point, not everyone else.
[1] ~170 or so posts a day, large compared to the hundreds of empty
groups that bring down the average, small compared to groups that are
practically considered compulsory reading for any admin like
news.admin.net-abuse* or alt.sysadmin.recovery. 8:o)
[2] I switch to a day schedule for my weekends when it's hot out so I
get some good sleep sessions in. Stupid sun, always making it too hot
when I'm trying to sleep. I've always thought Oregon needed more
rain[3], now I have a good excuse.
[3] Really drifting here, but what is the major malfunction of people
with umbrellas in the rain? <rant>It's not sunny out, so you don't need
shade; you end up carrying a nasty wet object around with you; you end
up creating a nasty, hard to spot in time eye hazard, especially at
train stations, bus stops and anywhere in downtown; they get lost;
considered harmful in the wind (and around here, where there's rain,
there's wind); and you *still* don't stay as dry as you do with a decent
rain jacket. They come in a wide variety, people. No excuse about
keeping your legs dry or looking good, if you wanted that, you wouldn't
be using an umbrella to begin with as if you walk, your umbrella's
useless especially for lower body, and unless you're in a musical, you
look like a dumbass with it anyway (unless you're in the northwest and
probably other areas, in which you're additionally assumed to be a
tourist by the locals). Umbrellas are for the beach, at least
with a beach umbrella you get some shade and your cooler stays
cold longer under one...</rant>
[4] ie, those who have been reading the group for a while and have
decided to ask a question before returning to lurk mode.
--
Baloo
Brad Austin
>>> No, I take it as a term for people whose interests espouse other than what
>>> the fandom is about, bestiality included.
>>
>> That definition would apply to pretty much 100% of the world's
>> population.
>
> I think Melville's intent was to say dragging elements that clearly
> having nothing to do with furry in and calling it furry as well.
I have no doubt Chuck meant to say something other than what
he actually did say. However I'm not going to assume any
particular modification to his statement is the correct one
necessary to derive what he really meant, unless he actually
says it himself. Firstly, exactly what the correct
modification is is not at all obvious to me. Secondly, I
don't think even *he* knows what it is, or is capable of
articulating it in a way that isn't just as obviously flawed
and inadequate as his first attempt. And I want to see him
try.
Your proposed modification fails for several reasons.
Firstly, "dragging elements..." is an action. Chuck was
defining a group of people. A definition describing an action
is not a valid substitute for a definition describing a group
of people. Besides which, what Chuck was *supposed* to be
defining in the first place was "furry lifestyle", which is
neither an action nor a group of people.
Secondly, "dragging elements in" to what? Furry Fandom? If
so, then your modification makes sense only within the context
of Furry Fandom, and implies either that "furry lifestyle" is
something that only exists within the context of Furry Fandom,
or else whatever group of people Chuck was trying to describe
are necessarily members of Furry Fandom. Does Chuck think
"furry lifestyle" means something that only exists within
Furry Fandom, or does he think it means something that only
exists *outside* Furry Fandom, or does he think it means
something that exists both inside and outside Furry Fandom?
I don't want to assume an answer to that question.
Thirdly, your modification contains the phrase "calling it
furry". Who is doing the calling, and does Chuck's
definition of "furry lifestyle" depend on what things people
other than Chuck do or do not call furry, or does Chuck's
definition of "furry lifestyle" have an absolute meaning that
doesn't depend on what other people call things? I don't
want to assume an answer to that either.
And I'm totally bypassing for the moment the fact that,
despite what Chuck said, he very often *does* use "furry
lifestyle" as if it were a euphemism for bestiality whenever
it's convenient for him to do so in the various arguments he
engages in.
Brad Austin
> Brad Austin <dont-repl...@address.com> wrote:
>
>> I do deny ALF is a group.
>
> Interesting. Kinda like denying the existance of currency.
No, it's not really like that at all.
> How do you
> accept something as ill-defined as the dollar? It's value is completely
> arbitrary and fluctuates and it's only definition is against other
> currencies, which suffer the same problems as the dollar as far as
> definitions go. Yet, somehow we all grok the imaginary concept of a
> dollar to the point where we will do things and give people our
> posessions for a sufficient number or fraction of dollars.
People don't really trade dollars, and individual dollars don't
really exist.
When people exchange money for goods and services, what they are
really exchanging is debt. Debts exist. "Dollars" are just the
units that debts are measured in. The concept of a dollar exists
in the same way that the concept of an inch or a kilogram exists,
but individual dollars don't exist any more than individual inches
or kilograms exist.
If you own money, all that really means is that someone owes you
a debt. If the money is in a bank account, then it's the bank that
owes it to you. If you have a banknote in your pocket, that just
means the government owes you a debt equal to the number of dollars
printed on the note.
That's why the government is able to print notes (and destroy old,
worn-out ones). If the government owns a banknote, then the
government owes the money to itself. And a debt owed by any entity
to itself is null and void. Banknotes aren't "money" until they
pass out of the government's possession (by being loaned to a bank),
and they cease to be "money" anymore as soon as they pass back into
it (by a bank re-paying that loan).
> ALF not a difficult concept to grok, it's a newsgroup, and we have a
> hard definition for that (unlike our dollar, for example). Its
> existance is evidenced by viewing the active file on any news swerver
> that exchanges with the outside world
I'm not denying that ALF exists. I'm not denying *anything*
in particular exists. I'm talking about the way we describe
reality. Reality is whatever it is, regardless of how we
describe it. We don't ever really describe reality with
words. All we can describe with words are *models* for
reality. We can either use models that are a close enough
match to reality for whatever our purposes are at the time,
or else we can use models that are inadequate, and thus have
any discussion we try to have about them decend into chaos
and futility.
>> Something is a group if, for any given person P, there is an
>> unambiguous (though possibly unknown) answer to the question
>> whether person P is a member of it, which doesn't depend too
>> much on the context in which the question is asked to be
>> meaningful.
>
> This would require furry to be a much more solidly defined word to begin
> with before you could even start defining the rest readily.
That passage had nothing to do with "furry". It's a general
principle that applies to any discussion about groups of
people.
>> "The set of all people who have posted at least
>> once in their lives to ALF" is a group.
>
> This doesn't count.
Doesn't count for what? All I said was that that was a group, which
it is.
>> "The set of all
>> people who have read at least 50% of the messages posted to
>> ALF in the past week is a group.
>
> I wouldn't qualify
So you're not in that particular group. So what?
>> "ALF" is not a group.
>> There is no meaningful criteria for saying whether any given
>> person is a "member of ALF".
>
> I'd say it is pretty clear: Are you an active reader of ALF? That is,
> is it a group you subscribe to and actively follow, understand, at
> relate to the people posting there?
"Subscribe to" is a concept that only has meaning within
certain newsreading programs. There are methods of reading
ALF that don't involve subscribing to anything.
And "active" is ambiguous. Active on what timescale? I've
barely read a single ALF post in months, and it's been years
since I've done more than skim it. Am I still an "active
reader"? Does someone who goes on vacation for a month cease
to be considered an "active reader"?
And "understand" and "relate to" are even more vague.
And anyway why are those things automatically the criteria?
Gabriel Gentile
is a pretty tension-inducing situation. Personally I can't wait until it
finally reaches the point of exploding. I'm sure it will be quite
entertaining.
Karl Xydexx Jorgensen
>Brad Austin wrote:
>>Chuck Melville wrote:
>>>No, I take it as a term for people whose interests espouse other
>>>than what the fandom is about, bestiality included.
>>
>> That definition would apply to pretty much 100% of the world's
>> population.
>
>I think Melville's intent was to say dragging elements that clearly
>having nothing to do with furry in and calling it furry as well.
That may very well be his intent, but it has never been reflected in his
actions. According to him, the only people with a legitimate interest in furry
fandom are those who are interested in anthropomorphic animal
art/writing/comics, &c. and nothing else. He has been one of the foremost
promoters of the idea that if someone has other interests in addition to furry
fandom, they're using furry fandom to "legitimize" their other interests.
--
_________________________________________________
Karl Xydexx Jorgensen / Xydexx Squeakypony, KSC
Anthrofurry Infocenter:
http://www.xydexx.com/anthrofurry
Charles Melville
Karl Xydexx Jorgensen wrote:
> Baloo Ursidae wrote:
> >I think Melville's intent was to say dragging elements that clearly
> >having nothing to do with furry in and calling it furry as well.
>
> That may very well be his intent, but it has never been reflected in his
> actions. According to him, the only people with a legitimate interest in furry
> fandom are those who are interested in anthropomorphic animal
> art/writing/comics, &c. and nothing else. He has been one of the foremost
> promoters of the idea that if someone has other interests in addition to furry
> fandom, they're using furry fandom to "legitimize" their other interests.
You know, I've read this post a dozen times, and I just can't see the
contradiction between Baloo's observation and your statement. Was there supposed
to have been a disagreement there?
Karl Xydexx Jorgensen
Oppose furry fans who have any other interest that has nothing to do with
furry, and claim it is part of the fandom.
Your practice:
Oppose furry fans who have any other interest that has nothing to do with
furry, who DO NOT claim it is part of the fandom.
You keep saying there's nothing wrong with furry fans having other interests,
but whenever they do you accuse them of linking said interests to the fandom.
This is a point you've been waffling on for years now. Either you think it's
okay for furry fans to have interests outside furry fandom, or it isn't. Which
is it?
Brad Austin
> I think we're just using different definitions of what a group is. ALF is a
> newsgroup for a start, and in part I simply meant that much.
The "group" in the word "newsgroup" is a historical anachronism.
Originally, newsgroups started as an extension of the concept
of an email-based mailing list. Mailing lists do have well-
defined membership lists, and thus can be reasonably thought
of as groups of people. (In fact that's not even strictly
True. The membership list of a mailing list is a list of
email addresses, not people, and there isn't always a one-to-
one relationship between people and email addresses. Another
example of a model breaking down when you examine it closely
enough.)
Newsgroups were originally introduced simply as a bandwidth
optimization. Mailing lists consume a total network bandwidth
proportional to the number of messages times the number of
subscribers. This is inefficient for large, highly active
lists. Newsgroups, OTOH, use a flooding algorithm which
consumes bandwidth proportional to the number of messages
times the number of newsservers in the network. Beyond a
certain list size this is always more efficient.
It wasn't an intentional design feature that newsgroups
should behave any differently from mailing lists as they
appear from the user's perspective, only that the internal
implementation be different. However it was a side effect
of switching to a flooding algorithm that the concept of
subscriber lists was discarded. But since it was just a
side effect, and not an intentional design feature, that
fact didn't get reflected in the terminology. The things
that were being created to replace large mailing lists were
named "newsgroups", as if they were groups of people in the
same sense that mailing lists are, despite the fact that,
unlike mailing lists, they didn't actually have any
subscriber lists.
Today the only thing it makes sense to think of newsgroups
being groups of is groups of messages.
> Apart from
> that you seem to be just using the word 'set' the same way I was using
> 'group' in that context.
Not entirely. The concept of a set of people is more
formal than that of a group of people. It still makes
sense to talk about "groups" of people in some situations
that are too ambiguous or context-sensitive to use the
word "set". However when the situation is so ambiguous
or context-sensitive that using the word "group" is more
misleading than helpful (as this one is), then it should
be avoided as well.
(In fact "set" is a very precise mathematical concept.
Long after mathemeticians thought they knew what a set
was, about a hundred years ago, Russell's Paradox nearly
brought the entire field of mathematics to its knees by
proving that they didn't.)
> To me ALF, whether you call it a
> group or a set, is something which has readers, users, but not 'members'.
I wasn't calling ALF a set either. It's even less a set
of people than it is a group of people.
ferret
>
>
> You keep saying there's nothing wrong with furry fans having other interests,
> but whenever they do you accuse them of linking said interests to the fandom.
> This is a point you've been waffling on for years now. Either you think it's
> okay for furry fans to have interests outside furry fandom, or it isn't. Which
> is it?
I think it comes down to his opposing those who have outside interests he
personally finds distastefull regardless of whether or not they do anything to
link it to the fandom. Those with outside interests he approves of are, of course,
cut a lot more slack. I'd have a lot more respect for him if he'd come out and
simply admit that rather than trying to sidestep around his obvious double
standard anytime somebody calls him on it. I won't be holding by breath waiting
though.
David Formosa (aka ? the Platypus)
> You know, though, when you say 'we' it does sound like a group.
Well in this case Tim is talking about the founders of ALF.
--
Please excuse my spelling as I suffer from agraphia. See
http://dformosa.zeta.org.au/~dformosa/Spelling.html to find out more.
Free the Memes.
Karl Xydexx Jorgensen
>I think it comes down to his opposing those who have outside interests
>he personally finds distastefull regardless of whether or not they do
>anything to link it to the fandom. Those with outside interests he
>approves of are, of course, cut a lot more slack.
No no, remember... he said his personal prejudices have nothing to with this.
Having any other interest outside the fandom is verboten across the board.
That means one cannot be an audiophile and a furry fan, because that would be
"linking" audiophilia to furry fandom. The God's Creatures Mailing List is a
threat to furry fandom because it "legitimizes" Christianity. An artist
drawing furries in old Russian soldier uniforms should be prevented at all
costs from doing so because it gives people outside the fandom the impression
that we're some kind of Communist plot. See?
>I'd have a lot more respect for him if he'd come out and simply admit
>that rather than trying to sidestep around his obvious double standard
>anytime somebody calls him on it. I won't be holding by breath waiting
>though.
I'm still waiting for him to acknowledge that all these folks showing up at
furry conventions who, according to him, have no interest in furry fandom (due
to their interest in audiophilia, Christianity, or snappy Russian soldier
uniforms) are completely imaginary... -:)
Brad Austin
>>Today the only thing it makes sense to think of newsgroups
>>being groups of is groups of messages.
>
> people in the same tenuous sense that email addresses on a mailing list
> can. The major difference being that being on a mailing list implies or
> involves more of a sense of permanency than posting to a newsgroup does.
There are several major differences.
First, messages and authors have a many-to-one relationship
rather than the (roughly) one-to-one relationship email
address have to people.
Second, the posting of a message to a newsgroup is an
instantaneous event. It occurs at a discrete point in time,
rather than over a span of time. A person is a subscriber to
a mailing list over a span of time. There is a precise point
in time at which he joins, and another at which he leaves.
Between those two points in time he is always a member.
Outside that span of time he is never a member. For any
given point in time, there is an unambiguous answer to the
question whether he was a member at that point. That's not
true for newsgroups.
Third, basing the membership of a newsgroup on message
authors necessitates taking a view that is biased in favor of
who posts messages rather than who reads messages. With a
mailing list, you don't have to post to be a subscriber. In
fact you don't even have to *read* messages to be a subscriber.
There is a significant, meaningful difference between a
subscriber to a mailing list who never posts nor even reads
messages, and a person who isn't subscribed to that mailing
list at all. With newsgroups, there is no such difference.
If you've never read nor posted to a newsgroup, you can't
possibly be a member of it.
> Realisitcally though, someone who has posted 5,000 times to a newsgroup has
> demonstrated more in the way of 'belonging' than someone who passively
> recieves messages from a mailing list without responding to them.
Sure, but it's all shades of grey. A person who posts 20 times
a week can be reasonably said to be twice as active as someone
who posts 10 times. Thinking in terms of group membership
necessitates taking a very black-and-white view of reality.
One person can't be twice as much a member of a group as another
person. You either are a member of the group, or you aren't.
Shades-of-grey situations should be described using words that
accommodate shades of grey.
> Well do you accept the idea of a newsgroup consisting of messages, which
> are group members, even if their authors aren't?
To a point, yes. As long as the newsgroup is so well propogated
that every newsserver has essentially the same view of what
messages it contains, then it can be viewed as a single container
of messages.
Dr. Cat
: So furry lifestyle is a sorta cultish religious "one with nature" thingie?
No, this is a misconception willfully spread by a few certain people.
A "furry lifestyler" is anyone in a loosely connected set of categories of
people whose tastes were sufficiently "unacceptable" to a handful of loud
rude people on alt.fan.furry who kept complaining about them and flaming
them so much that they decided it would be a good idea to start another
newsgroup where the policy was officially "You can talk about all this stuff
or any other stuff, and everyone's supposed to be accepting and tolerant and
not flame anyone for what they want to talk about".
These interests "chased out" of here by the bitter and cynical furry
pornographers include but are not limited to: animal totemism, various
specific sexual fetishes that are less acceptable to the aforementioned
pornographers as their own sexual fetishes are, thinking you really are
an animal trapped in a human body, liking the fandom "too much" and not
having enough of a "life outside furry stuff"... Or just simply the
common crime of "not denouncing those furry fetishes disapproved by the
pornographers and generally tolerating them even though you're not into
them yourself", or "not believing said fetishes are destroying the
fandom and saying the hobby is still fun in spite of whatever problems
it has, or generally saying those problems are minor", or "being willing
to say that your hobby is a 'lifestyle' of some sort and not just a
hobby".
Most of the people in the "chased over to a new newsgroup" category are
also "furry fans", people who participated in this newsgroup and/or
various other furry fandom activities before the creation of the other
newsgroup, and still do participate. Which of course led to a few of
the triumphant furry pornographers to declare "See? Those people aren't
involved in furry fandom at all, they're a seperate group of people
with nothing in common with us". Even though most of the "lifestylers"
like furry art, for instance, which is one of the main and most popular
interests in the fandom.
Go figure. :X)
*-------------------------------------------**-----------------------------*
Dr. Cat / Dragon's Eye Productions || Free alpha test:
*-------------------------------------------** http://www.furcadia.com
Furcadia - a graphic mud for PCs! || Let your imagination soar!
*-------------------------------------------**-----------------------------*
(Disclaimer: My furry lifestyle involves sticking bananas in my ears, but
most people don't so don't condemn them on that basis or stereotype them as
banana-stickers either. Also please don't condemn them for being willing
to tolerate my sticking-bananas-in-the-ears fetish!)
(Disclaimer disclaimer: I'm not saying whether I've stuck bananas anywhere
else. That'd be none of your business if I had, not to mention maybe
disgusting or something. (Especially if I put them in my mouth! Bananas
aren't for EATING, you pervos! They're for ears only, at least except
for the privacy of your own hotel room! Geez, if you're into eating
bananas no wonder your fandom has a bad reputation and you feel the need
to stereotype werewolf dudes to try to get the attention of YOU and your
damned EATING BANANAS FETISH! I say "fooey" on you. Fooey!))
Dr. Cat
:> have no interest in furry comics or any of the other
:> things that Furry Fandom revolves around, and still show up at
:> furry cons for some reason.
: There you go.
You know, I have yet to strike up a conversation with anyone at a furry
con who didn't have an interest in all sortsa furry fandom stuff. Or
overhear a conversation in the hallway from someone who seemd to not be
interested in furry fandom stuff.
I have heard lots of rumors that one specific year at Confurence there
were a bunch of people present who had no interest in furry fandom. But
they weren't "furry lifestylers" either, they were from some other group
that apparently got advertised to about the con. I haven't heard any
reports that this sort of thing was repeated at any other furry con besides
that one time, either.
I also recall that there was an informal survey done on the lifestyle
newsgroup, and that the vast majority of respondents said that they
liked one or more things generally considered parts of furry fandom.
This whole notion thta there are hordes of "furry lifestylers" who
come to the furry cons who have no interest in furry fiction, furry
art, furry animation, furry costuming, etc. etc. is a "convenient
fiction" that Mr. Melville has been attempting to legitimize for
years now, without offering the least shred of proof that there's
such a contingent of folks present in sizable numbers at the cons,
or indeed even in numbers as high as "one". Occam's Razor would
lead one to suggest that people showing up at furry fandom cons are
likely there because they do, in fact, have an interest in the
stuff there. Le duh.
Melville, stop "using the fandom as a platform" to "legitimize
your interest in spreading myths about people disinterested in
a hobby nonetheless attending conventions dedicated to that
hobby". This fetish of yours makes us look bad. The press might
report on the fandom as being all about indulging in this false
belief, and then people will point and jeer at me in public,
saying "Oh, you're one of those *furries*, right? You're all
freaks who believe that people who aren't interested in your
fandom come to your cons anyway so you can get off on saying so,
I mock you for your pathetic sexual fetish of spreading weird
lies about your own hobby!"
If you want to indulge in your kinky belief-system in the privacy
of your own hotel room at a con, Chuckles, go right ahead, but
don't get ME tarred by the broad brush of bigots by being
indiscreet with your disgusting habit. I think we should cater
to those broad-brush-tarring bigots more than being tolerant of
you - or of anyone, being tolerant is really disgusting and icky.
Except when it means being tolerant of furry spooge comics and
prints, that's the one time when it's ok. Unless they fall into
one of the 7 categories of "unacceptable fetishes". Tentacles
and hermaphrodites and bondage are ok though. I think.
*-------------------------------------------**-----------------------------*
Dr. Cat / Dragon's Eye Productions || Free alpha test:
*-------------------------------------------** http://www.furcadia.com
Furcadia - a graphic mud for PCs! || Let your imagination soar!
*-------------------------------------------**-----------------------------*
(Disclaimer: Actually I think Charles Melville considers "furry costuming"
to be one of those marginal things that maybe isn't considered to be
adequately "part of furry fandom" to prove that someone has an interest
in some of our stuff if that's their only or their main interest. Because
some lifestylers like it way too much, or some furry fans even like it way
too much, or maybe some fans have had sex in a fursuit at one time or another.
Remember the proper approved fandom sexual position is sitting or lying by
yourself in front of a furry comic, propped open to your favorite pages.)
(Disclaimer disclaimer: I'm hardly one to talk, as the REAL threat to furry
fandom, while Mr. Melville has distracted everyone with this hoax about
"people who don't like furry art or stories swarming into our cons", the
true danger is actually Furcadia fans, big crowds of people who in many
cases only like furry stuff to a modest healthy degree and maintain a wide
variety of healthy outside socially acceptable interests. And most of
them don't fit the generic "fandom" stereotype of being overweight and
unwashed losers who live in mom's basement, either! I mean, just take a
LOOK at some of these people, on http://hof.greydawn.net/ - they look
way too normal, some of them are even attractive, or in *gasp* monogamous
heterosexual relationships! These people are going to spoil our fandom
by not buying comics like Wild Kingdom or fetish zines like Gallery, not
participating in big flamewars on alt.fan.furry, not obsessing over the
idea that furry fandom is no fun because its overrun with pervert, and
swarming around enjoying meeting each other in real life at cons, chatting,
going out for chinese food, buying a little art, dressing up in a few
costumes, and having too much goddamn fun! So in conclusion I must say
thank you Chuck for distracting everyone with your fake problem conspiracy
to they didn't notice my REAL conspiracy until it was too late and we're
bigger than the fandom now and will overwhelm it with nice reasonably
polite people with lives having fun MUAHAHAHAHAHA! You are my unwitting
accomplice through your nutty obsession!)
(Disclaimer disclaimer disclaimer: Does Melville have me in his killfile
now? He just can't take people pointing out he's wrong, can he? Actually
it's the "making fun of things" part he really can't stand. Humor is ok
as long as you don't belittle the HUGE problems that make furry fandom
uncomfortable for a few of the furry pornographers!! Oy!)
Brad Austin
> A "furry lifestyler" is ...
Close but not quite.
What you just gave is a remarkably good and accurate
characterization of a typical ALF reader/poster circa 1997.
However "furry lifestyler" means something different from
that.
"Furry lifestyler" is a bullshit word. There's basically only
two kinds of people who use the term "lifestyler". The first
is people like Chuck Melville, who use it as a slur, and have
no more comprehension of what they're talking about than Eric
Cartman does when he uses the word "hippie". The second group
consists of a small subset of the people who more-or-less meet
the description you gave, but who also have the added
characteristic that they suffer from the Furry Fan Disease, of
always having to turn the fact of having shared interests with
someone into affiliation with some organized entity. There are
lots of people who meet the description you gave, who reject
the label "furry lifestyler" just as forcefully as they reject
the label "Furry Fan".
Dr. Cat
: You keep saying there's nothing wrong with furry fans having other interests,
: This is a point you've been waffling on for years now. Either you think it's
: okay for furry fans to have interests outside furry fandom, or it isn't. Which
: is it?
Don't oversimplify the man. His beliefs on life and furry fandom are more
complex and rich than that.
If your outside interest is something "icky", like bestiality, then you will
use furry fandom to "attempt to legitimize it". You simply can't help doing
so, and in practice nobody avoids doing so. Nor could they, it would violate
all known laws of physics.
If your outside interest is something "non-icky", like stamp collecting, then
you won't ever be trying to use furry fandom to gain more legitimacy for it.
You'll just be "happening to do it or talk about it while at a furry con".
It all depends on whether it's icky or not.
*-------------------------------------------**-----------------------------*
Dr. Cat / Dragon's Eye Productions || Free alpha test:
*-------------------------------------------** http://www.furcadia.com
Furcadia - a graphic mud for PCs! || Let your imagination soar!
*-------------------------------------------**-----------------------------*
(Disclaimer: Dr. Cat is trying to legitimize the talking about of the practice
of sticking bananas in his ears on Usenet newsgroups. So don't trust him!)
Karl Xydexx Jorgensen
>It all depends on whether it's icky or not.
That can't be it, though, because he said it has nothing at all to do with his
personal prejudices. Certainly he's above passing off his personal prejudices
as fact, or perhaps underground... below the Disputed Terminology Squabbling
Territory, where the giant moles make mountains out of Melvilles...
Cerulean
>That can't be it, though, because he said it has nothing at all to do with his
>personal prejudices. Certainly he's above passing off his personal prejudices
>as fact,
Why would you think so? Practically everybody thinks of their own
prejudices as not being prejudices. What kind of prejudice isn't
considered The Unchangeable Truth by its owner? I think you'd find the
scope of what he considers factual rather mind-boggling if you could
quantify it.
--
___vvz /( Cerulean = Kevin Pease http://cerulean.st/
<__,` Z / ( DC2.~D GmAL~W-R+++Ac~J+S+Fr++IH$M-V+++Cbl,spu
`~~~) )Z) ( FDDmp4adwsA+++$C+D+HM+P-RT+++WZSm#
/ (7 ( 77epueJ - ,,iS37q33M awos +o6 I,,
Karl Xydexx Jorgensen
>Quoth Karl Xydexx Jorgensen:
>>That can't be it, though, because he said it has nothing at all to do
>>with his personal prejudices. Certainly he's above passing off his
>>personal prejudices as fact,
>
>Why would you think so?