Very good analysis of Furry from the outside, nicely done 👍 Some thoughts I had as I watched it:

• Most of the pearl-clutching about Furries seems to come from Puritan countries, esp. USA & UK. Other countries? Quite the opposite. Examples off the top of my head:

  • Orangina citrus soda (French ad agency FFL Paris)
  • German beer Füchschen (literally, “Foxy”)
  • Mexican baseball mascot lapdancing in the crowd

• Notions of “children”'s mascots almost never occur to any of us Furs, except for the obvious Rule 34 moments. It more feels like, without consciously thinking about it, my childhood interests grew up with me. Does nostalgia play a role? Perhaps some unstated rebellion against squeaky-clean Puritan and Corpo media?

• Xenophilia & neophilia are probably the strongest drivers, conscious or not. Every day in this fandom, someone comes up with something both strange and wonderful.

• Accordingly, Furry art is a wondrous baptism-by-fire of Queer acceptance (also conscious or not), especially regarding body-positivity. As one gets used to seeing an 8-foot fox with 3 pairs of watermelon-size breasts & multiple tentacle dicks, the discomfort of trans and intersex bodies falls away. (I admit to my shame that transmen once made me uncomfortable; Furry art slowly slapped me out of it.)

• It’s both flattering and amusing to have “deeper meaning” / “deep sense of self” ascribed to our silly cartoon animals. Most days it feels like Furry simply is, no hidden depths needed. Is all art like this?   “Just shat out this portrait of some lady over the weekend, it’s whatever” ~Leonardo da Vinci, probably

Tangentially related, The Real History of Rule 34.

A very nice and interesting video essay :3

I really like the comparison of traditional and furry porn because that’s one of the reasons I prefer the latter, at least “intellectually.” What I mean is that traditional porn, as in, human porn, has some ethical issues, some of which this video highlights. There’s usually no emotional bond or even a visible lack of attraction that can lead to the objectification of the actors, the porn industry can be very shady, and while home-made porn reduces the risk of actors being defrauded, you can rarely guarantee that it’s not abuse or revenge porn (even if most of it isn’t, I can never stop thinking “but what if this clip is?”). That doesn’t mean that watching human porn doesn’t turn me on, so there’s still that primal or whatever urge that competes with the “intellectual” part that sees the ethical complications of a lot of human porn.

Of course, not all human porn is bad, though I don’t have any statistics. I know one production company that I’m, like, 95% sure is legit and treats their actors well, but you need to put in so much effort to find that out (and you need to go beyond the banner on their website saying it’s all fine and dandy). For me, finding porn I like and trying to figure out how the actors are treated is just so much work that I’d rather not watch human porn at all.

And on top of that, there are all the other reasons mentioned in this video: emotions are depicted more clearly (or at all), there are additional ways to convey how characters feel (like a wagging tail when a character is tied up), and (this brings me back to the above paragraphs) it’s obviously not real. There’s nobody who could get hurt or abused, even in the wildest, riskiest scenarios. Sure, some clients might try to avoid paying artists, maybe that’s an avenue for abuse, but afaik there are “industry standards” to prevent that from happening nowadays.