i'm going to be fully transparent that this journal was inspired by seeing someone on the internet say something that i thought was very stupid, & then i realized i had a lot more to say about it than i thought. this internet stranger, in a dialogue about jett fillmore from the new GOAT movie, said something along the lines of "she's a woman. why not look at least a little like one?" we're going to breeze past the subtly transphobic implications of this (which became far less subtle when i looked at what he was reposting, but that's a story for another time) & instead talk a little bit about femininity & gender presentation in anthro media, from the perspective of a very unfeminine woman who loves animal people.

jett fillmore is one of a few standout characters who represent a recent change in how female anthro characters are represented (& to clarify, i don't just mean animal people--i'm also talking about aliens, fantasy creatures, robots/cyborgs, etc). up until recently, a lot of anthro women were explicitly feminine, with obvious visual cues to distinguish them from their male counterparts. the men could be any shape, build, color, body type etc with any kind of face, while women were relegated to being small & dainty, or busty & curvy, or with heavy make-up, or straight-up wearing a dress. this is such an overdone trope that it's become an internet meme (here are a few examples). often the only time male characters' gender presentations are similarly exaggerated is when there's an obnoxious jock-type character that we're meant to hate (tank evans from surf's up for instance). otherwise, they're usually allowed to look like a relatively neutral cartoon animal, perhaps with a bit broader shoulders or a harder jawline, depending on their archetype. the only early, popular exceptions of this i can think of are terk from tarzan (who i thought was a boy when i first watched it), shenzi from the lion king, & dory from finding nemo (who of course is a literal fish); almost every other example is explicitly feminine.

this has enforced a sort of male-by-default visual language in cartoon animals, a subtle bias that still exists today. fursuits without breasts or curves are often assumed to be men. if you want to be assumed female, you have to go out of your way to signal your womanhood via padding, clothing, color palette, or those cute sparkly removable eyelids with thick lashes i've been seeing around. it's similar with fursonas; a lot of female fursonas are even assumed to be femboys in some artworks. masculine, androgynous, & even some subtly feminine characters are all assumed to be men by default. it's a divergence from the assumed norm when a furry is a woman.

is this like, a massive problem that deserves everyone's attention & needs to be fixed ASAP? no, at worst it's just annoying in certain contexts, & is one of those things you should probably examine on your own time if you haven't already. but it's an interesting phenomenon born from bias made all the more interesting by the recent emergence of popular female anthros who are designed to be androgynous. a few recent ones that come to mind are kitty katt from the bad guys 2, officer hoggbottom from zootopia 2, & of course, jett fillmore from GOAT. i was surprised to see an example of this in zootopia 2, a movie with much more conventional tropes when it comes to anthropomorphism, & with a character who was explicitly very butch--so much so that i wasn't sure if she was male or female for most of the movie; i appreciated seeing an older, masculine woman being represented without constantly being the butt of a joke, even if she was playing a more villainous role. kitty & jett are both large, muscular cats. they're both voiced by women, but otherwise don't have overtly feminine visual cues. the thing that sets jett apart from kitty kat is that she's a protagonist. she's a woman who's not presented or expected to be overtly feminine & she also gets to be one of the heroes of the story, with her own fulfilling character arc. jett's story (minor spoilers) is that she's a famous pro sports athlete who's past her prime, & over the course of the film, she has to contend with the realities of her aging body & make peace with passing the torch. it's a great story, & while many people make comments about her age, no one remarks on her appearance, how she dresses, or that she looks "manly." it's not questioned or implied whether or not she'll have children someday, & there's not even a hint at a hastily-thrown-in romance in the film.

it also makes sense from a design perspective for her to be more androgynous. not very many female pro basketball players look super feminine while they're on the court, being tall & athletic & sweaty & wearing loose jerseys. jett doesn't have hair, she has no reason to wear make-up, & her having breasts would serve no other function than to signal that she's a woman. i also appreciate that she gets to express some of her femininity off the field, in a way that's not typical; she has multiple graceful & elegant outfits she wears to fancy events/appearances, & since she has no visible breasts, she can get away with wearing plunging necklines or accentuating her silhouette in other unconventional ways.

i'm not saying that female anthros shouldn't be feminine at all anymore; like many of you, i still love lola bunny, maid marian, rita, nala, diane foxington, etc etc etc. but it makes me very happy, as a woman who dresses & presents very masculine, to see the male-by-default design tropes challenged more often, & in more diverse & interesting ways. i hope to see many more.

anyway, go see GOAT if you haven't already.