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Gay 'Community' vs Fur Community
12 years ago
General
In case you hadn't noticed already, I'm male and enjoy the male form. That would make me rather
gay in the normative sense. Was I born with it? Probably. I identified as wolf a few years before
I identified my attraction towards members of the same gender, but that's another discussion at
another time. Basically, my built-in attraction has always seemed just that: hard-wired.
I did most of the typical rituals and rites of passage that a modern, gay urbanite can expect in
western society: I struggled as a teenager, came out just after high school, joined a gay youth
group, marched in pride parades, went to gay bars, volunteered everywhere I could to advocate
marriage equality, rights and other just causes. I did these things because I wanted to change
things about society and its laws.
Over time, I couldn't help but become...isolated. The fine folks I met doing gay-oriented activities
had busy lives that didn't quite include developing new relationships. Friends that I had close and
dear to me drifted away, both geographically and emotionally. I even lost a number of close friends
to death, back when retroviral therapy was just a dream.
As I reached my late-thirties, I looked around and noticed that I was...alone.
Sure, I had married the man that I am proud to share my life with. I have a loving family and had
a few close friends spread throughout the US and Canada. This is not to diminish these relationships
at all...I just felt isolated.
All the volunteering, late nights at the bar with acquaintances, 'social' websites and even the
occasional march/protest against some injustice had resulted in abject solitude.
What happened?
For one thing, times changed. Friends with HIV stopped dying. Marriage equality is rapidly becoming
the norm. Being gay is generally not an issue in most places in western society. This is not to
belittle or ignore the struggle that gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered people face constantly
in places like Africa or Asia. Basically, for me, gay folks assimiliated themselves into society.
The 'community' vanished.
Was there ever a community in the first place? Maybe not. A 'community' based on a biological trait
that galvanized itself against injustice doesn't seem like a firm foundation. Eventually, if
successful, it would end naturally. Seeking community in this fashion would ultimately result in
a participant, namely me, to become...alone.
Searching for a community to belong to has always been part of who I am. After a year of plunging
headfirst into the fur community once again and taking the initiative to contribute and meet others,
I have encountered more 'community' here in the fandom than at any other time of my life.
Furs are bound by a few common interests, most of which are not even remotely connected to our DNA
or character traits. These interests power the community forward and the fuel is art, music, crafts,
fursuit-making, dance, writing and a whole host of creative pursuits. The community is full of an
exceptionally diverse group of individuals that have really opened my mind to an entire spectrum
of viewpoints and passions. I have connected with a vast amount of you through the simple fact that
we are all furs.
The connections we make here with each other are stronger than any I have ever experienced anywhere
else. I have made friends in the last several months that I value and cherish and celebrate beyond
anything.
It makes me astoundingly happy.
I have found community.
For this, I thank you.
gay in the normative sense. Was I born with it? Probably. I identified as wolf a few years before
I identified my attraction towards members of the same gender, but that's another discussion at
another time. Basically, my built-in attraction has always seemed just that: hard-wired.
I did most of the typical rituals and rites of passage that a modern, gay urbanite can expect in
western society: I struggled as a teenager, came out just after high school, joined a gay youth
group, marched in pride parades, went to gay bars, volunteered everywhere I could to advocate
marriage equality, rights and other just causes. I did these things because I wanted to change
things about society and its laws.
Over time, I couldn't help but become...isolated. The fine folks I met doing gay-oriented activities
had busy lives that didn't quite include developing new relationships. Friends that I had close and
dear to me drifted away, both geographically and emotionally. I even lost a number of close friends
to death, back when retroviral therapy was just a dream.
As I reached my late-thirties, I looked around and noticed that I was...alone.
Sure, I had married the man that I am proud to share my life with. I have a loving family and had
a few close friends spread throughout the US and Canada. This is not to diminish these relationships
at all...I just felt isolated.
All the volunteering, late nights at the bar with acquaintances, 'social' websites and even the
occasional march/protest against some injustice had resulted in abject solitude.
What happened?
For one thing, times changed. Friends with HIV stopped dying. Marriage equality is rapidly becoming
the norm. Being gay is generally not an issue in most places in western society. This is not to
belittle or ignore the struggle that gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered people face constantly
in places like Africa or Asia. Basically, for me, gay folks assimiliated themselves into society.
The 'community' vanished.
Was there ever a community in the first place? Maybe not. A 'community' based on a biological trait
that galvanized itself against injustice doesn't seem like a firm foundation. Eventually, if
successful, it would end naturally. Seeking community in this fashion would ultimately result in
a participant, namely me, to become...alone.
Searching for a community to belong to has always been part of who I am. After a year of plunging
headfirst into the fur community once again and taking the initiative to contribute and meet others,
I have encountered more 'community' here in the fandom than at any other time of my life.
Furs are bound by a few common interests, most of which are not even remotely connected to our DNA
or character traits. These interests power the community forward and the fuel is art, music, crafts,
fursuit-making, dance, writing and a whole host of creative pursuits. The community is full of an
exceptionally diverse group of individuals that have really opened my mind to an entire spectrum
of viewpoints and passions. I have connected with a vast amount of you through the simple fact that
we are all furs.
The connections we make here with each other are stronger than any I have ever experienced anywhere
else. I have made friends in the last several months that I value and cherish and celebrate beyond
anything.
It makes me astoundingly happy.
I have found community.
For this, I thank you.
One unusual trait of the fandom I had never noticed before until recently, is that not only do we learn more about other members of our furry community, we learn most of all about OURSELVES. Before I became furry I labeled myself as straight, especially since I fell in love with my current mate. But since becoming furry I started to become aware of feelings that I had suppressed many years that started to resurface. Now, I am not ashamed to consider myself bisexual.
In many ways, I have been able to understand my non-fur bi friends in a deeper sense.
Another topic I may explore for a future journal is how my transgendered friends inspire me as a fur. This world is an amazing place when your eyes are open.
Yeah, there's a reason I came back here. You're part of it, everyone here is part of it. I'm tired of denying that I need community and friendship as a part of my life, and the kind I find here is the kind I want to keep for as long as I can think to keep it.
Thanks, canine-bro. Great sentiment, and I echo wholeheartedly.
*yipYIP*
It's definitely easier to be in a furry community, as you basically craft a second personality from scratch - turning over a new leaf in a sense.
Now I wish FA could provide the option to "fave" journals.
So much of our human lives are filled with numbers, words and bits of information that have such utilitarian purpose. To be part of a community that values randomness, gesture and creation is an amazing experience that I so very much love.
Although... I feel the same way you feel about the furry community. I've made so many awesome friends since I joined and everyone is so welcoming and accepting ...it is so awesome :3 Rejoining the fandom was the best decision I've made. =)
A community of our OWN choosing that is far more dynamic and accepting is found with the furs. I wouldn't have it any other way! Besides, how else would I have met you? I am very grateful that I did! :3
I believe that when we grow up we succumb to the rhythm of society and lose some routine in our more immediate relationships, but here we have found a place with an endless passion for art, friendship and community. I never had seen before this in nowhere.
I feel proud that you feel comfortable to be able to ponder, show your feelings and experiences. These things makes here a homely place and this community bigger.
Thank you very much
I like how you state 'endless passion for art, friendship and community.' Eloquently said!
Community and 'home' sometimes have nothing to do with where I live or you live. Fur is home. Fur is community. I am deeply appreciative of that :3
I have learned over the past while that 'furry' seems to be very North American in so many aspects, with a big emphasis on the west coast cities. Vancouver seems to have an abnormally large fur population relative to its size, as well as Seattle. I can only hope you can come out west and see us some time!
A larger component to community, as related to fur, is the internet. We exist here just as much as we exist physically in our hometowns or cities. It does fuel the imagination for travel and to be with others in the community when we connect online. It does not, however, provide a substitute for face-to-face interaction and I do hope that you find that (or it finds you!) some day.
But is good to hear that you are okay today
I've contemplated this quite a bit too, actually. I've watched the gay community here in Spokane basically dissolve and vanish over the past decade. The bi-weekly gay newspaper that I used to write for folded years ago, with a half-hearted attempt to revive it never getting off the ground. The gay community center closed (and has been reopened in a new location but with a focus on youth activities rather than being more for the community at large). There are no "gay bars" in Spokane anymore -- several are "gay-friendly", however. The annual Pride weekend, which went from being small to being rather large and well-organized just within the past 10 years, has become mostly just an event for the drag queens at this point.
And all this accompanies a nationwide vanishing of places like GLBT bookstores, which used to serve as hubs of information and interaction in cities everywhere.
I look back at seminal gay manifestos from the 1970s like The Faggots And Their Friends Between Revolutions, and there is a definite sense that there is something entirely unique about being gay or lesbian or bisexual, that there is this group of people who have something special and insightful and magical and necessary to contribute to society at large. Today, being gay is pretty much just like being straight only with different plumbing. What happened? Where did the magic, the sense of mission in the larger world, the interest in contributing in a unique way which the other 90% of the world cannot... Where did all that go?
Like you, I'm finding the furry community later in life, and I'm astounded by the creativity and passion which the fandom brings to light in people's lives. And the intensity with which they share what and who they are. And it makes me oh so happy.
I hope that 25 years from now, that same passion and sense of community still exists for furries. Because while I still care passionately about gay community issues and causes and work basically daily toward full integration (which is different from marriage equality, esp on a cultural level), I don't see much "community" amongst the GLBT people anymore. I hope that never fades for furries.
You have summed up my experience as well quite beautifully. Yes, I recall that we as gay people had an innate 'differentness' that was celebrated and cherished. I cannot pinpoint when that slipped away.
Like you, I do not know where it went...but I have my suspicions.
I would love to believe that part of it went here, the fur community. I know friends that have found similar community among artist groups like Steampunk and comics. Still, others have put their unique sense of 'differentness' into spiritual and environmental movements.
Part of me is proud that it lives on elsewhere, but there is a tinge of sadness when I think back to how special it really felt to be gay.
As well, I re-joined the community as an older (i.e. over 30) person and wrote this partially due to a dumb-ass comment that won't leave my head. Some snide remark a few months back (not directed at me) about 'creeps that suddenly become furry at forty.' I've also heard similar comments recently about greymuzzles being called 'creepers.' Really? Is this the best you can do - painting an entire age group with one smear-brush?
Is this little essay meant to somehow justify my re-entry into fur? Maybe. Do I get defensive at times? Sure.
Do stupid attitudes ruin my experience in the fur community? No. There are far too many creative and intelligent furs out there.
You are one of them, ErgonWolf :3
Personally, part of what finally flipped for me in getting over that is the realization that, as an elder in a community such as this, I have wisdom and life lessons to share with those younger furs who might listen. And I think that's an important thing to contribute, if one is allowed. Planting little seeds here and there can have bear much fruit across the years if they find fertile ground to land in.
(And anyway, the younger guys have never turned my head, really. When I was in my mid-20s, I was chasing the guys who were the age I am now. As I've gotten older, I'm finally in my own "target group of interest", which has been an interesting thing to realize. I'm cruising my peers for the first time. :) )
So yeah, all those haters who brand the older guys as creepers... they'll all hit 30+ someday too. I'd hate to think that furry is like Logan's Run and we have to be culled once we hit a certain age. That kind of attitude won't lead to anything good across time.
*holds you close, loving you lots*