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Furry Fetish Fury!

"We are normal and we want our freedom"

Letters A snide reference to the Furry cult - it's not a fetish, as we'll discover- has prompted two letters to El Reg.

Dear Mr. Orlowski,

Is it true? Have we finally become large enough of a subculture as to not
only mocked for shock value in MTV and Vanity Fair pieces, but actually in
random references by the media?

If so, I say, "Huzzah!" Thank you for making my day.

Also, I must complement you on a well written article. I will stick with my
Mac, though, as uncool as Apple may attempt to make it.

Sincerely,
Sean Rabbitt

--
Sincerely,
Sean Rabbitt, President, RABCO Publishing Inc.

Rabbit Valley - THE Source for Furry
Visit our Vast Catalog of Other Good Stuff at http://www.rabbitvalley.com/


And an important clarification.


Mr. Orlowski,

I recently read your article, "Monday night at the Single's
Club? Apple's Real People", and found it to be rather entertaining and
well written. There is one problem that I have with an otherwise fine
article:

-----Quoted Text-----
"I think we'll have another little iBook in the family soon!"
she concludes, revealing a fetish every bit as bizarre as Furries.
-----End Quote-----

As a fur, I found this to be very insulting. It's apparent that
you are mis-informed about the furry community. This is not surprising,
because the media has decided to single out some of the worst of our
culture and use that to stereotype the rest of us. Please allow me to
give you some brief information about the true furry community.

If you have any further questions, please feel free to contact me at
any of the email addresses listed at the end of this email, or for a
much broader response, post a message to the alt.lifestyle.furry
newsgroup. (Access to newsgroups / Usenet should be available through
your Inernet Service Provider. If they do not carry the
alt.lifestyle.furry newsgroup, ask them to. I'm sure they will be happy
to help.)

Though I have tried to come up with my own interpretation of what
being 'furry' is, I have found that the alt.lifestyle.furry FAQ
document handles this quite well:

-----Quoted Text-----
1.1) What is a furry?

Furry is a word which has probably been asked to do a little
too much work. It has numerous meanings, and it's not particularly
easy to find two people who agree on the precise definition for any of
them. The original two definitions we supplied in the first version of
the FAQ are:

1. an anthropomorphic animal character. i.e. an animal with human
characteristics.

2. a human who relates strongly, in whatever way, to the idea of the
characters outlined in the previous definition. This may involve
anything from a person who simply enjoys viewing furry fanzines or
films, to someone who actually desires to be a 'real' furry, or
believe that they are literally a non-human trapped within a human
form.

But not all ALF regulars are interested in anthropomorphics.
Some are largely unaware of the 'furry fandom,' or are simply
uninterested in it for a variety of reasons. Most of us who created
ALF were 'fans' of one kind or another, and this coloured our view-
point perhaps more than we realised.

So, after much discussion, we'd like to add a third
definition, one that tries to include everyone who has made ALF a
home.

3. a person with an important emotional/spiritual connection with an
animal or animals, real, fictional or symbolic.
-----End Quote-----

As you can see, there is no mention of sexual fetishes or fantasies of
any kind. While it IS true that there are those who use the furry
community as a vehicle for their sexuality, a large majority lead
relatively normal lives. The problem that has occurred, and one that
the community is very concerned about, is that the news media has
decided to single out those with furry-related fetishes and used them
to portray the group as a whole.

Your description of furries as a 'fetish' is most likely a result of
this poor journalism, and because of this I forgive you. Everybody
makes mistakes, and, as you know, the television media especially has
a tendency to promote the most outrageous for the sake of ratings,
regardless of the consequences it has on others. All that I desire from
you is that, if possible, you edit your article to reflect this. The
entire community is suffering a great deal of stress due to this
negative and false stereotype, and even a short comment like yours will
perpetuate the problem.

-Jonathan D. Miller

Point taken. OK. Correspondence closed. Does anyone know when the war starts? The one with Iraq? The one with guns and bombs and shooting, and stuff? ®

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