Furries why

Sharon Roberts, Dr. Stephen Reysen, and Dr. Kathy Gerbasi. Crafting a fursona involves picking an animal — real or mythical — to represent yourself as, or, less commonly, designing a new mythical animal for yourself.

Fursonas typically have names and are often the inspiration for artwork or fiction, but the degree of investment in them can vary. Of course! In addition to visual artists and fiction writers, many furries are accomplished musicians who create work with furry themes or otherwise blend their musical interests into their fandom. Here's Bucktown Tiger, a furry pianist, performing a movement of Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata at Anthrocon, the world's largest furry convention held in Pittsburgh every year, in You can divide furry fan activities into online fandom and furry conventions.

In each case, the analogy to science fiction and comic book fandoms is strong. Fan art is an important part of furry fandom, just as it is for comic book fans. A synthesis from the Anthropomorphic Research Project, looking at several surveys conducted online and in various conventions, found that the vast majority of the most popular furry sites are art-related. Many of those sites — like FurAffinity and SoFurry — also host furry-related fiction and music, and provide forums for fan discussion and community-building.

Conventions — which Plante says about half of furries attend on an annual or semiannual basis — create an in-real-life space for furries, many if not most of whom have met online, to hang out, and they also provide a way to talk to artists who are popular within the fandom.

This is similar to how events like Comic Con let people talk to favorite movie directors and actors and comic artists. But for others, meeting JJ Abrams or meeting the voice actors from your favorite show is very meaningful.

Like fans in other communities, furries often report being bullied or ostracized in the past. No, but they're not totally disconnected either. Bronies share one basic commonality with furries: they're interested in anthropomorphized representations of animals.

The survey synthesis found that nearly a quarter This wasn't the result of a brony "invasion" of furrydom, the results suggest, but rather a development of interest in the show by pre-existing furries. About half of furries consider bronies a subgroup of furrydom; another 28 percent say they're related but not a subset, and 22 percent say there's no connection at all.

There's a substantial degree of enmity toward bronies among furries as a whole, with 38 percent expressing negative views toward them compared to 36 percent reporting positive feelings and 26 percent reporting indifference. Interestingly, there were very few demographic differences between the furry and brony fandoms.

Fur-suiters before a rehearsal of the musical Furry Tales , the night before Anthrocon Surveys suggest that furries are overwhelmingly male and white, are disproportionately likely to be gay, bi, or trans, and skew younger, with an average age in the mids. The survey synthesis estimated that A majority were atheist Convention attendees were a bit older 24 to Perhaps reflecting that, only 3.

Furries don't make significantly more or less money than the general US public and tend to be significantly more left-leaning politically. And they're much likelier than the public at large to report a non-straight sexual orientation, with well under 30 percent reporting exclusive heterosexuality:.

A later study, conducted in early July at Anthrocon , found that almost 90 percent of respondents identified as white. Conventions seem to be growing, too.

Our Photographers are working their hardest to deliver the Fursuit Group Photo as soon as possible! Facebook Twitter RSS. Search for:. Retweet on Twitter Furscience! Epic Panda! Reply on Twitter Retweet on Twitter 2 Like on Twitter 14 Twitter Reply on Twitter Retweet on Twitter 10 Like on Twitter 52 Twitter It was great to have Dr.

Nuka from furscience with us once again! Reply on Twitter Retweet on Twitter 1 Like on Twitter 5 Twitter In the s, Stansfield and his partner Mark Merlino — during visits to science fiction conventions — realized the furry fandom was becoming a bigger thing of its own. By they organized an "experiment" they called ConFurence Zero at a Holiday Inn in Garden Grove, California: the first known "furry convention and seminar. Although only 65 people showed up, including only two or three in costume, ConFurence Zero started a movement of sorts.

It gave momentum to the fandom, later resulting in similar conventions such as Califur, Canada's VancouFur , Australia's ConFurgence , Eurofurence and Anthrocon, which is now held yearly in Pittsburgh. Last summer's Anthrocon, one of the biggest, drew about 8, people, including nearly 2, in costumes, according to the event website. We just came up with a goofy new way for fans to talk to each other — actually meeting, face to face. People took that and ran with it.

Three decades later the fury fandom is much bigger, using the power of the internet to reach out, organize, engage with each other and share — via videos, podcasts and art. Pocari Roo , Barton Fox and Stormi Folf are just a few of many furries who host video channels on YouTube discussing fursonas, affordable fursuits and other topics. Many furry fans create and share art depicting animal characters with human traits. Furry lingo. It's a subculture just like any other — including unique terminology.

For example, a "greymuzzle" is an older member of the furry fandom. A "therian" is someone who feels an intense spiritual identification with a nonhuman animal. A "babyfur" is interested in age play and young or childlike characters. Milfurs are furries who are current or past members of the military. Here's one more: Furries who are into costumes are called fursuiters.

And yes, FursuitFriday is a real hashtag on social media. The fandom has grown big enough to get the attention of academia. A group of scholars has established a continuing research project at furscience. They tend to be sort of middle class and they tend to be what you think of as nerds," says MacEwan University instructor Dr.

Sixty percent of furries who answered surveys reported part-time or full-time enrollment in postsecondary education.

Dancing is also big among fursuiters. In addition to costume dance events at conventions, nightspots have been getting involved. For more than a year now the Eagle Bolt Bar in Minneapolis has been hosting "Suit Up Saturday," where fursuiters, show up every week, the bar says. A female artist in the community who calls herself InkTiger says the mostly male fandom hasn't been a big problem for her.