Dr. Marianne Dekoven
The Question of The Animal
December 10, 2013
Furries
There is much discourse and dialogue about the relations and parallels between humans and animals. Many literary works investigate the boundary between humans and other species. Although not many affirmative statements can be made about the prototypical representation of animals in literature, the liminality of the boundary between humans and nonhumans is addressed, by literature and scientific research, in a predominantly anthropocentric fashion. Zoomorphism, the reciprocal of anthropomorphism, finds its home in a much different walk of life: the "furry" subculture, internally known as the "Furry Fandom". This paper will address the demographics of the furry fandom as preliminary overview, then delve into a review of what the significance of the furry fandom may be, as well as the meaning of how furry artwork and literature use animals and their characteristics to portray characters.To introduce the topic, it is necessary to expand upon some necessary contextual information and pertinent terminology. The term "furry" is used in a plethora of ways and is incredibly ill-defined, but it is generally used to refer to one of two things. A "furry" sometimes refers to a fictitious character who is an anthropomorphic animal, generally with the shape and posture of a human but the skin and prototypical characteristics of nonhuman species. "Furry" is also a self-ascribed label for a person who feels some special attachment to such characters, or who produces or peruses creative works centered around furry characters. Both forms of the noun are also used as adjectives.
It could certainly be construed that furries, as I define them above, have had a place in fiction, mythology, and art for much of human history. The furry fandom proper, though, has only been conceived as an independent group relatively recently: "There is no single specific date or event that can lay claim to being the birth of furry fandom. However, there is general agreement that it was around late 1983 or early 1984 that furry fans coalesced out of SF fandom and comics fandom and began an independent identity" (Patten, web). After its conception, it became a community of shared interest in works that portrayed furries, which already existed in animation from various cultures. Some noteworthy works that served to influence the early evolution of this fandom include Osamu Tezuka's Kimba the White Lion in 1966, Japanese anime The Amazing Three in 1967, Robert Crumb's Fritz the Cat in 1968, Dan O'Neill's Air Pirates in 1971, Richard Adams' Watership Down in 1972, a 1973 animation of Star Trek that portrays a feline crew member, and Disney's Robin Hood in 1973 (Patten, web). As the fandom grew towards its current place in our culture, it asynchronously incorporated different elements that now define it. It is hard to pinpoint such sociological developments because of their fluid and private nature, but it can be said that the first furry convention, ConFurence, took place in 1984 (Patten, web). From then on, other conferences arose throughout the United States, and subsequently other places around the globe.
It is relatively common for people in a given geographic area to hold their own more casual meet-ups, called "furmeets". Gatherings that grow large enough in scale are re-conceived as public furry conventions. Such conventions act as social havens for furries and put their own spin on many staples of the modern fandom convention, which includes events like the display and commerce of original artwork, wearing costumes, and panels on topics that cross over with the various interests of the con-goers. Furry conventions are no different.
In time, the furry fandom began to develop its own characteristic spin on the fandom convention. One key custom that came to define the modern furry convention in a very salient way is the style of costume, endearingly called "fursuits". A fursuit is a costume of a furry character, akin to the mascot outfits of sports teams, but far more personal and far more elaborate (see Figure 1). Fursuits are the physical manifestations of a person's "fursona", which is a personal avatar that a furry creates for themselves (Horwath 1). They represent an enormous investment, and are either made for one's self or by somebody who specializes in fursuit production. One such production studio, Savage Turtle Studios, will make accessories and fursuit pieces in the range of a pair of ears, which start at $30, to full suits, which run upwards of $1750 ("Fursuits", web). Fursuits are commonly worn at conventions and furmeets, and provide a point of commonality and social interaction, as well as critical discussion. Perhaps an expressive form of art, and at least a sophisticated craft, crafting fursuits is a cultural phenomenon that proves entertaining to onlookers and allows inclined individuals to express themselves in a way that they might not be able to accomplish by other means.
As another means of expressing an unconventional view of species, roleplaying is a substantial component of the furry fandom. People roleplay in the furry fandom in perhaps a very different way than elsewhere, and individuals have many different reasons for roleplaying. One blogger who specializes in analyzing the furry subculture from a sociological perspective frames an important difference between general and furry-specific roleplaying: "Furries don’t necessarily role play outside themselves. [...] We weren’t just pretending to be cat- and dog-people, and we weren’t just chatting about work, we were cat- and dog-people chatting about work" (Makyo, "Character Versus Self", Web). This distinction is interesting, because it suggests that people roleplay as furries not to be furries, but because there is something about inhabiting that identity that resonates with them.
"Our characters are intangible, non-spatiotemporal; they aren’t something that can be touched or felt, and are closer to an idea than anything real. However, they form an integral part of our concept of self, whether or not we would actually like to be our anthropomorphic fox character in real life. They inform our view of the world around us, as well, and not just in some vaguely foxish or wolfish way" (Makyo, "Character Versus Self", Web).
I should point out that nonfiction like Makyo's is difficult to find, partly because of the modernity of the furry fandom and potentially because its nature has not yet interested academic circles. There's a small but increasing amount of information about the websites, celebrities, communities, and memes that make up the fandom. For instance, the website WikiFur functions as an accessible, encyclopedic wiki that provides information to people within the fandom, and is framed in a general enough way for any audience to understand its contents without background knowledge. Most observation of the furry fandom is necessarily firsthand, and little is academically vetted. As a result, much of the information I use in this paper is necessarily less credible than those in a standard journal, or is found on wikis which update frequently, have many anonymous authors, and are difficult to archive. Much other information comes from independent investigation of the websites and resources mentioned.
One of the few systematic sets of observations made about the furry fandom is a survey of attendees of the world's largest furry convention, AnthroCon, compared against a control group of community college students enrolled in psychology classes. This study by Gerbasi et al attempted many psychological assays, and found some minor success in a few areas. It was, as the authors claim, groundbreaking, but I can say with experience reading scientific papers that this is not the most scientifically rigorous paper I have ever read. Consequently, I will present an attenuated version of their findings, omitting conclusions and interpretations that I don't believe are fully qualified by the data.
Gerbasi et al propose a typology of furries in their report: a two-dimensional analysis based on distortion and attainedness. 'Distortion' refers, here, to whether a person perceives themselves as 100% human or otherwise, and 'attainedness' refers to whether a person would, if given the opportunity, become 0% human. Respondents who affirmed that they would choose to be inhuman were categorized as 'unattained'. The authors did indeed find a correlation between the answers to these questions and other, more specific questions that were posed in regards to the participants' affinity for animals and resonance with their fursonas. "Homosexuals were over-represented in distorted unattained type; heterosexuals were over-represented in undistorted attained type. There is also a tendency for female furries to be under-represented in the distorted unattained group and male furries to be over-represented in that group... This may represent a confounding of sexual orientation, sex of furry, and furry type." (Gerbasi 217).
Although mainstream culture pays little attention to this subculture, that little attention can apparently carry extremely negative connotations and stereotypes. Stereotypes of furries seem to exist memetically on the Internet among people who know about the fandom but do not associate with it. It might be noted that additional stereotypes exist within the fandom that people have about each other, but many of those are largely propagated internally as in-jokes (Makyo, "The Default Furry").
In addition to their other research, Gerbasi et al conducted a statistical analysis of these stereotypes. Their analysis revealed that most stereotypes are not supported by statistically sound evidence, but others were confirmed. Statistically confirmed stereotypes include that furries are predominantly male, they are fonder of cartoons as children than others, and they like science fiction more than others. The stereotypes that they found to be somewhat consistent are that common furry species are the wold and fox, furries are employed in computer or science fields, they wear fursuits, and they specific connections to certain species. They debunked the following comon stereotypes: that male furries have beards and glasses more than non-furries, that most furries are gay, and that furries have behavioral traits that are common to personality disorders (Gerbasi et al 204). In fact, furries were less likely to be perceived as exhibiting traits of personality disorders than typical college students. And although it's false that most furries are homosexual, the relative proportion of queer sexual identities is vastly higher than in the typical population (Gerbasi 220).
A survey of the artwork that exists on a furry art repository suggests that nearly all of the artwork is exlusively of nonhumans. The least uncommon counterexamples involve human characters who are only marginally zoomorphic, or human characters portrayed alongside more prototypical furries. Almost all furries have facial features and skin that more closely resemble animals. Although no formal investigation has been done on why these particular features are standard characteristics of furries, I imagine that this fact has significance. Facial features are essentially the way we define people. Depictions of furries take advantage of human body language; the size of the eyes is exaggerated, and they display human facial expressions. But expressions are transient, and although the pattern of a person's facial expressions speak to their personality, they are not altogether enough to qualify a physical identity. When the static features of a human face are removed from the portrait of a furry, the form of the character is distinctly a nonhuman person.
Perhaps there are sociological reasons for a furry's affinity towards these nonhuman people, or maybe the inclination towards nonhuman forms is an innate characteristic in some people. From my own study of online interactions between furries in comments to artwork, I almost never came across any statements made by furries that were indicative of a symbolic interpretation of zoomorphic attributes. Comments about the physical characteristics of characters seemed to be purely aesthetic, or strictly based on arbitrary preference. I present this argument in conjunction with the observation that there do, in fact, exist fetishes for animal attributes in sexual roleplay, especially in the BDSM community. Some such acts of zoomorphism include wearing collars and leashes to telegraph submission, "pony play", and cultural therianthropy (Wikipedia, "Animal Roleplay").
There is undeniably a noteworthy intersection between furries and zoophiles. The two groups are defined by distinct characteristics, and zoophilia as an issue is extremely galvanizing within the furry fandom (See Figure 2, sample forum posts on Fur Affinity Forums). Older, small-scale surveys (n=360) estimated the frequency of zoophilia to be somewhere around 2% in furries (Rust, web), but newer and larger surveys place the results at a much higher number. A comprehensive 2012 survey, run annually by a furry who uses the pseudonym Klisoura, asked respondents whether considered themselves zoophiles, and 488 out of 3267 (14.9%) respondents self-identified as such (Osaki, web). This increase in the proportion of zoophiles who responded could be explained as well by sample bias as by an evolution of the demographic breakdown. It could be that the furry fandom was conceived by non-zoophiles and zoophiles discovered the fandom as time went on. In any case, it appears that there is at least a heightened appreciation for nonhumans in the furry fandom in comparison to the general population. This is likely a genuine affection and respect: at Fur Affinity's official annual convention last summer, convention-goers raised $10,516 for the New Jersey Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals ("FAU", Web). So for some people, their interaction with the furry fandom is directly related to sexual identity. And considering the respect that members of the community have demonstrated to have for animals by their charity towards animal welfare organizations, it is obvious that there are other reasons people find themselves in this subculture. It is simultaneously necessary to mention that, for many people, the furry fandom is entirely unrelated to sexual identity, even with respect to anthropomorphic animals that are distinctly more "person" than "animal".
Demographic information about furries has been gathered by a handful of surveys, the most notable of which is succinctly called "The Furry Poll" or "The Furry Survey" and is "offered yearly since 2008 by Alex Osaki on Klisoura.com" (Makyo, "The Furry Poll"). Perhaps most fascinating to note is that, independent of the sex and gender slant towards biological men and males, minority sexual orientations (with respect to gender specifically) are hugely overrepresented. 3214 survey respondents answered the question about sexual orientation. The question used the Kinsey scale from 0 to 6, and included responses for asexuality and pansexuality. Strikingly, only 21.5% were "completely heterosexual", and only 15.9% were "mostly heterosexual". 10.5% were bisexual leaning heterosexual, 10.6% were equally bisexual, 8.2% were bisexual leaning homosexual, 9.8% were "mostly homosexual", 10.7% were "completely homosexual", 8.2% were pansexual, and 4.7% were asexual (see Figure 4, from Osaki). Compare these numbers to the average breakdown in the United States where an average of 1.8% of people are bisexual and 1.7% are homosexual (Gates 1).
Klisoura's study found much overlap with other demographics, such as musical artists (24.3%), animal rights advocates (26.2% of respondents), people who are active online (39.3%), fans of anime (49.3%), fans of RPG games (56.4%), authors (39.4%), and visual artists (46.16%). A look at the bar graphs reveals that gender of furries strongly defies a binary spectrum, as well as that they're socially liberal and economically moderate. When asked to rate how important sex was to their interaction with the furry fandom, responses leaned towards unimportant. Respondents predicted other furries' response to the same question to be slightly higher. Respondents overwhelmingly believed that the public opinion was that sex was the most important aspect of the furry fandom (Osaki, web).
With half of the furry subculture's constituents considering themselves to be visual artists, it makes sense that the furry subculture is heavily centered on visual artwork. Consistent with the differences in furries' perspectives about what in the fandom is worth focusing on, there exist various common repositories for artwork, with their own characteristic communities, guidelines, and standards. For example, deviantART is a popular art repository for all kinds of subject matter but has a large section of anthropomorphic artwork (abbreviated "anthro"). Fur Affinity would seem to be the most popular online furry community and comprises almost exclusively furry subject matter in the form of writing, music, and visual art ("Fur Affinity", web). SoFurry is another large website that has a relatively greater focus on community and socialization. Sofawolf Press, according to their homepage on November 14, 2013, "is an independent publisher dedicated to storytelling that focuses on anthropomorphic animals of all sorts" (Sofawolf Press, web).
It does so happen that, despite the differing views about what furries even are, there is a large amount of material of an erotic nature. There is internal controversy in the furry fandom about the extent to which such art should exist and how it should be regulated. Most websites have a prominent maturity filter so that their users can adjust the type of content that they see. For instance, Fur Affinity requires artists to properly assign their submissions advisory warnings by "general audience", "mature", or "adult". On July 7, 2011, the administrator of Fur Affinity released statistics for website submissions, measuring the relative amount of art at each level of maturity, as well as the likelihood of art in each maturity level to be favorited by site users. At that time, there had been 3493114 general submissions being favorited 11.7 times on average, 532859 mature submissions with an average of 51.2 favorites, and 486858 adult submissions with an average of 26.9 favorites (Piche post 1). Although there are surely confounding factors that partially explain why "mature" artwork is most popular, there is no questioning that the difference is significant. While most artists produce art that is safe for work, it would seem that the furry fandom's audience for visual art is predominantly seeking works of an erotic, but not pornographic, nature.
One researcher of sexual minorities, Katherine Gates, observes that sexuality may not be the primary appeal of artwork for even the people who do associate with the sexual components of the fandom: " 'It's just their lifestyle and sex is part of a lifestyle and, so, because you're a Fur, the fur is sexy,' Gates says. 'It's not a fetish necessarily, it's just part of a complete lifestyle and point of view about the world' " (Horwath 3). Mature artwork in this context refers to non-pornographic erotic artwork, which is sensual, but not necessarily sexual. Through the same interpretation that Gates applies, the popularity of non-pornographic erotic artwork may be explained by the desire to have a fuller interaction with zoomorphic humans or anthropomorphic animals, which is accentuated by, but is also broader than, a sexuality.
As a result of the early proliferation of pornographic content, subsets of the furry fandom have receded from primary communities to domains that better fit their interests. Such differences in sexual preference are understandable, and consistent with the notion that furries are diverse in their preferences and degree of affinity for animal-like characters. One particular inflammatory group, Burned Furs, was founded in 1998 and railed against the propagation of content they believed to be distasteful and misrepresentative of the fandom ("Burned Furs"). This type of debate is a cause of tension within the community, but their website is no longer operational and it would seem that at least this faction has withered.
In addition to personal sensitivity, moral and legal issues come into question when artists depict acts that have commonalities with mainstream Western taboos. For instance, "cub porn", which is essentially the fictional, furry version of child pornography, was banned from Fur Affinity, as a result of threats from their payment processor, AlertPay, to cancel the site's account, which was used to accept donations towards the $1650/month running costs. The decision was not made explicitly to regain the account, but more to enable them to have a set of acceptable content guidelines that would enable them to sustain consistent relationships with hosting providers and future payment services (Parry, Web). Cub porn remains on sites such as Inkbunny and other art-hosting platforms, and is a defining feature of other sites like WildCritters.
Although few scholars have yet broached the topic of furries and compared its development with other aspects of human culture, and almost none have treated it in a broader historical, anthropological, or sociological context, it has been done. In one paper that compares furries of today to ancient human spirituality, Barbora Půtová from the Czech Republic hypothesizes that "The furry phenomenon in postmodern culture can be considered as return to original spiritual freedom of tribal societies... The indefiniteness of cyberspace is near to transcendence that cannot be exactly defined, classified" (Půtová 247). This theme is certainly consistent with the descriptions that furries have for themselves; that is, the members of this fandom would agree that there is liberation in the ability to express one's self as a character that is not completely human.
Dr. Fiona Probyn-Rapsey, an expert in human-animal studies, critical race studies, and postcolonialism, brings up the question of what humanity really means is brought up in conjunction with Gerbasi's aforementioned findings. From the perspective of one who wrote her doctorate, she follows up on Gerbasi's article by earnestly comparing her proposed "species identity disorder" to gender identity disorder, and considers the implications of such a comparison. She argues that if the discomfort, and potentially dysphoria, that people feel for their identity as a human were diagnosed as a psychological condition, then such subjects might run the risk of therapy that has a negative impact on individuals. Probyn-Rapsey does, though, raise the alternative point that psychologists might use an analogue to the "queer-positive" approach, pioneered by E. E. P. Benestad, focusing on “those who are being disturbed; namely parents, siblings, other family members, teachers, fellow pupils, friends and health professionals. These individuals are gathered and offered local seminars on the subjects of gender and sexual orientations. This in order to leave them more at ease with atypical gender development ” (Probyn-Rapsey 5). One final important point that I see as relevant is her suggestion that the discomfort is accentuated by a false dichotomy between animal and human. This might contribute to people "queering" the boundaries and portraying characters that occupy the liminal position between human and animal (Ferreday 222).
The furry fandom comprises a diverse menagerie of artistic expression. There are many facets to the identities of the people involved, and it could be argued that the conventional ways of talking about the furry fandom are becoming outdated. While there is overlap with other communities that are more mainstream, an accurate description of furries must include characteristics that are not common to other subcultures, such as the division of zoo- and anthropomorphic characteristics in paradigmatic furry characters. Some furries experience what can be described vaguely as species dysporia, and others are content to be completely human. The furry fandom is queer, in its breakdown of sexual orientation and in its noncomformity to norms of human-nonhuman distinctions. Having a community to express this queerness in is liberating for individuals who identify as furries, and these communities are growing more prominent and defining their own customs as knowledge about it expands, and the growth of the Internet in general is providing a burgeoning well of resources for individuals with these interests to find healthy social interactions with like-minded people. There is some interaction between furries' affinity for zoomorphic humans and their affectionf or animals, as evidenced by the aforementioned proclivity of furries to be animal rights advocates. The effect that furries may eventually have on human-nonhuman relations remains to be seen. With the increasing power of social media and online interaction, it seems poossible that they may one day play a part in rediscovering humanity's place in the world through the power of artistic expression.
Figure 1
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| Picture taken by Ffex |
Figure 2
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Figure 3
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| From the same thread as Figure 2 |
Figure 4
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| From Osaki |
Works Cited
"Burned Furs." WikiFur, the Furry Encyclopedia. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Nov. 2013.
"FAU." FA United. Web. 10 Dec. 2013.
"Fur Affinity." WikiFur, the Furry Encyclopedia. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Nov. 2013.
"Fursuits." Savage Turtle Studios. N.p., 9 Dec. 2012. Web. 14 Nov. 2013.
Gates, Gary J., Williams Distinguished Scholar. "How Many People Are Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender?" (2011): n. pag. The Williams Institute, Apr. 2011. Web. 10 Dec. 2013.
Gerbasi, Kathleen C., et al. "Furries from A to Z (Anthropomorphism to Zoomorphism)." Society and Animals 16.3 (2008): 197-222.
"Homepage." Sofawolf Press Home. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Nov. 2013.
Horwath, Justin. "Fluff Piece." Santa Fe Reporter. N.p., 10 Oct. 2007. Web. 14 Nov. 2013
Makyo. "Character versus Self." [adjective][species]. N.p., 23 Nov. 2011. Web. 10 Dec. 2013.
Makyo. "The Default Furry." [adjective][species]. N.p., 9 Nov. 2011. Web. 14 Nov. 2013.
Makyo. "The Furry Poll." The 2013 Furry Poll. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Nov. 2013.
Osaki, Alex. Klisoura 2012 Furry Survey. 27 Dec. 2012. Raw data. (alt link)
Parry, Laurence. "Fur Affinity Loses AlertPay Account, Bans Cub Porn." Flayrah. N.p., 24 Nov. 2010. Web. 10 Dec. 2013.
Patten, Fred. "Retrospective: An Illustrated Chronology of Furry Fandom, 1966–1996."Flayrah. N.p., 15 July 2012. Web. 14 Nov. 2013.
Piche, Sean. Fur Affinity Submission Stats. 14 July 2011. Raw data. Fur Affinity Forums.
Probyn-Rapsey, Fiona. "Furries and the Limits of Species Identity Disorder: A Response to Gerbasi et al." Society and Animals 19.3 (2011): 294-301.
Půtová, Barbora. "Prehistoric sorcerers and postmodern furries: Anthropological point of view." International Journal of Sociology and Anthropology 5.7 (2013): 243-248.
Rust, David J. "The Sociology of Furry Fandom." The Darken Hollow. N.p., 2002. Web. 10 Dec. 2013.
Works Consulted
Benesh-Liu, Patrick R. "The Animal Outside Us All: Fursuiting And The Furry Culture." Ornament 33.5 (2010): 46-53. OmniFile Full Text Mega (H.W. Wilson). Web. 14 Nov. 2013.
Carlson, Marla. "Furry Cartography: Performing Species." Theatre Journal 63.2 (2011): 191-208. Project MUSE. Web. 14 Nov. 2013.
Evans, Kyle. 2008. “The Furry Sociology Survey.” The Furry Sociological Survey. Retrieved March 2, 2012 (http://www.furrysociology.net/).
Ferreday, Debra. "Becoming deer: Nonhuman drag and online utopias." Feminist Theory 12.2 (2011): 219-225.
Gerbasi, Kathleen C., et al. "Why So Furious? Rebuttal Of Dr. Fiona Probyn-Rapsey's Response To Gerbasi Et Al.'S Furries From A To Z (Anthropomorphism To Zoomorphism)'." Society & Animals 19.3 (2011): 302-304. Academic Search Premier. Web. 14 Nov. 2013.
Jeansonne, Sherry A. "Breaking Down Stereotypes: A Look at the Performance of Self-Identity Within the Furry Community." Thesis. Texas State University, San Marcos, 2012. Online.
JM. "Why Zoophilia Is a Furry Issue." [adjective][species]. N.p., 14 Jan. 2013. Web. 10 Dec. 2013.
Nast, Heidi J. "Loving…. Whatever: Alienation, Neoliberalism and Pet-Love in the Twenty-First Century." ACME: An International E-Journal for Critical Geographies 5.2 (2006): 300-327.
Scrimno. Myths and Stereotypes of the Furry Subculture. SoFurry. N.p., 19 Oct. 2009. Web. 10 Dec. 2013.
Shoemaker, Kellie. "Web Sites For Young Adults And Their Librarians: Invasion Of The Fanzones; Fandom On The Internet." Voice Of Youth Advocates 22.6 (2000): 396-397. OmniFile Full Text Mega (H.W. Wilson). Web. 14 Nov. 2013.
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