I think you're crazy.

Well that's an undisputed fact. xD But, anyway, care to elaborate?

A lot of people in the fandom are either in it for the porn, or to make up for the fact that they have no social skills whatsoever, so they leech off of other people who basically socialize for them, or so that they can hide behind an online persona that directly reflects their ideal image.

I'm in it for the free beer.

So, basically I'm crazy, even though you just made the point that's been bugging me for a while. xD That among all of the stuff I just dumped on that Kusakara that commented below you.

And furries don't seem to have much beer. It's either weed or sex that they're addicted to. :U

Well, is that so bad?

Look, you know I love you, and your real friends stick with ya. The rest only want something from you. That's something you have to learn, that the fandom is beautiful garbage. Beautiful in many ways, garbage in a few more.

It's nothing something I have to learn, because I learned it a long time ago. I've been in the fandom for almost seven years, and I'll tell you that its shortcomings became evident pretty early on. xD

But, meh. I know it's going to sound somewhat dramatic, but I've been feeling pretty friendless lately. >~>

It's a baseless notion. Stop it.

It's not baseless, it's just more an internal thing than an external thing. I know I have friends, I'm just keeping myself at a distance because of my own crap.

Well, you're going to have a hard time keeping your distance with your friends always kept so close.

The invisible option on MSN actually works pretty well in the staying distant department. >3>

Ummm, I resemble that remark.
I grew up living with my mom who still lived with her rather evil parents. This truly was a bad situation that in turn screwed up nearly all of my social skills with others my age. ( I lived in a mommy dearest family situation)
I had initially found the furry fandom to be non-jugemental for the most part, as long as you weren't wanting to be the center of attention within the group. I was quite happy staying unnoticed, but never really felt that I fitted into any of the furry cliques. As fate would have it I eventually discovered the babful side of the fandom, which closely had parells to an interest I had long before I heard the term: furries.

No social skills...
Were you sugesting that my shortcomings in my life are to be met with scorn, simply because I do not have an outgoing personality, or feel comfortable talking in a group situation?

O.o @ Jeffy... I'm not sure if he was being kinna' a jerk about that or if he was being friendly. LOL!

In my opinion though, the only thing about the fandom you have to learn is exactly, what do you want from the fandom? Seriously, if you don't know what you want from the fandom, you'll get whatever it decides to toss at you.

The fandom is generally just a bunch of people with diverse interests indulging in a fantasy world where they can see themselves as whomever or whatever they wish to be, generally because they're looked upon poorly by the environment around them or by themselves. Or because they have inner conflicts they don't want to confront directly, so they use a vice, aka fursona. If you ask me, that's why the furry fandom is so sexual. It's not that the people behind the furs are that sexual all the time, but that they are curious but have little to no way to safely experiment due to their appearance, self esteem, or gender.

Anyways, as I said earlier though, the question isn't (What's the point of the fandom?), it's (What do I want from the fandom?). Once you can answer that, you'll find yourself getting a lot less drama, because you're not searching for something in the fandom. Trust me, when you search for something in the fandom, all you'll get is drama.

The reason furs are so dramatic in my opinion, is because they're so worried about their image. In the fandom, we create our fursonas in the image we think is most appealing. So, take a fur who's already self conscious about his image irl and say something about his fursona, he'll get defensive. If you question his views on things, he'll get defensive. So forth and so on. lol

Oh, sorry for the rant. :O

This is accurate.

Was trying to better understand why he phrased his comment the way he did. Apologies to all, if my earlier post sounded sour.

I dunno, maybe I am subconsciously worried about my image where as I shouldn't.

Aww, it's ok hun. I see so much drama and such anymore, I cant tell when someone's being genuine sometimes or trying to be a bit well.... you know. Anyways, I was just wanting to make sure I wasn't misreadn' anything before I said something bad... I don't like gettn' into arguments or for that matter, making people upset. So there's no need to apologize, in fact, I do for any negative feelings my comment might have brought. :o

No, those are the ones who take the fandom for granted. For some, they really can't help it and the fandom really helps them sort of come out of their shell and blossom. For others, they come into the fandom, but refuse to come out of their shell, they don't accept any new ideas and they cause problems for others because of this. I don't mean to scorn your social shortcomings, I mean that some people use the fandom as a tool to promote themselves socially or artistically rather than helping to lift others up.

This was probably a bad journal to be snarky in '~'

Oh hush, stop being defensive. He's allowed to voice his opinion, and he did so in a relatively innocent manner, so you have nothing to stew about.

It was the comment "leaching off the fandom" as stated in the journals 3rd reply. It just rubbed me the wrong way. In my case I'm just comming out of my shell only to hear that. I just wanna hide under my blankie again.

I don't want to be blunt, but there are people who have social anxiety that do leech off of the fandom and expect people to operate within the parameters or their social disorder. It's not up to anyone to operate within your parameters either, so if someone says something that rubs you the wrong way, it's your choice to let it bother you.

I guess it depends on the person, i see it more as socializing, sharing of creative works, it can also be a lifeline, theres been many times that with some issues i'll turn to my online friends and they help solve the situation better than my real life friends/ family could, but like i said, every person has their own views in this subject matter o.o

I dunno, my difficulty at this point is that I don't really want to log into my messenger anymore because I either have to deal with someone else's problems, or someone is fishing around for sex. Both of the above have wore on me so much that I barely even have a desire to pop online outside of checking email updates. With creative works, well, the creativity in the fandom has dipped. The creativity of an expressive fandom has turned into who can make the picture with the cutest eyes or who can make the picture with the largest penis. It's like, there are some artists who's style I adore, but it's ruined often times by the fact that they drawn nothing but pornography. It's like the fandom has taken something taboo like sex and rehashed it so many times that it's like a freaking Zelda game where you feel like you're just playing the same game that you've played a hundred times before.

...x.x Sorry for the rant.

Its okay, i understand, ive helped many that were thinking of suicide, and what it seems is i take their depressions aura and drop in to me removing it from them, i can usually handle the one thing i notice happens a lot here is what kills me, after you had helped some person they stab you in the back and ignore (recently happened to me) now transfering to the sex, yes, that also gets irritating the guy that stabbed me in the back, i got on msn one day say im depressed and he says in so many words "wanna yiff, i say no but he rps it anyway, so i understand what you mean with both of what you brought up, thats why i was off ims for close to 2 months

Oh god I hate people like that. xD "My mother just died." "Hurr, dat gets me horny, wanna yiff/"

-.-; It's those kinds of people that give furries the image that they have.

Yeah ._.

I've always said that (most) furries use the fandom as a shield to get away with things they otherwise couldn't or (not as bad) to help them meet new people when they have sort of low self esteem. I've got other views and such but I have to leave for work in 2 minutes or I'll be late :P

I know that it has its uses for individual people, but as a whole we're definitely not exactly what we think we are. >~>

Not sure what to say since that sounds about right.

Some people are in it for the fact that its a group of people where you can act like someone that may or may not be similar to yourself. (Not sure if that sounds weird but.. :P) Also making friends can be a big part of it. Not that everyone lacks social skills, but its always nice to have more friends regardless, right? ^^

Alternative social interaction. That's really all it boils down to. We're still humans, and humans are and always will be social creatures to varying degrees.

On a slightly unrelated note: Are we even a 'fandom' anymore? Furry originally was a group of cartoon-anthro enthusiasts (Funny Animals and the like). And while that enthusiasm, that 'fandom' for trademarked anthropomorphic still exists, I'd argue we've become fans of each other even more. /musings :P

very well put, that is all :3

no wait that is not all *rolls around cutely like only otters can and chirps* :3

We're a fandom in that each of us are fans of anthropomorphic characters, and that's really the bottom line of the whole thing.

Which yet validates my point. :3

Hmmmmmmmmm... Yeanumber2issotrue. >:PPPP