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need some responses/help from furries!!! comment here!!!
11 years ago
ALRIGHT
so this is a fairly weird question and i would also like to mention that i do not want biased responses just because you watch me here. for the sake of privacy, we'll call the person i'm referring to in this journal as "w."
anyway, w really wants to go to a furry convention. w is not a furry. and, in my experience, bringing along somebody who is not a furry to a furcon generally is not a good idea. especially when you're traveling to and attending the convention with all of your furry friends. at least, that's my opinion. i find that it makes other furries uncomfortable because they feel the need to include the other person such as w in conversations and activities- even when nonfurs have no idea what's going on or how to include themselves in said conversations and activities. this just ends up being uncomfortable for everybody because w would have no idea what to do but sit and observe (which can make some people uncomfortable) or try to be a part of the group without actually knowing what's going on (which makes for an uncomfortable experience for both parties.)
w's argument is that they have a small group of friends that happen to be furries (including myself and my roommates) and that they really enjoy this group of people. and, while w does not necessarily include themselves in the furry community online, they would love to get to know people irl at conventions. not necessarily because they want to stay involved in the furry community, but because they think furries are interesting, cool people. they also argue that it's unfair to assume they [w] would be uncomfortable or make others uncomfortable just because they are not furry- that it's elitist and rude to suggest that they would not be as welcomed or have as much fun because they are not directly involved in the community.
so what do you think? how do you feel about having somebody who is not a furry [and does not necessarily plan on ever being one] a part of your con group? how do you feel about them attending the con in general? do you feel like it's great that somebody would just want to have the experience of a fur con, spend time with their irl furry friends, and watch them interact with others? or do you think it would make you uncomfortable to have somebody tag along who doesn't have any plans of being a furry and maintaining furry friendships online (as the furry community is primarily an internet-centered subculture)?
so this is a fairly weird question and i would also like to mention that i do not want biased responses just because you watch me here. for the sake of privacy, we'll call the person i'm referring to in this journal as "w."
anyway, w really wants to go to a furry convention. w is not a furry. and, in my experience, bringing along somebody who is not a furry to a furcon generally is not a good idea. especially when you're traveling to and attending the convention with all of your furry friends. at least, that's my opinion. i find that it makes other furries uncomfortable because they feel the need to include the other person such as w in conversations and activities- even when nonfurs have no idea what's going on or how to include themselves in said conversations and activities. this just ends up being uncomfortable for everybody because w would have no idea what to do but sit and observe (which can make some people uncomfortable) or try to be a part of the group without actually knowing what's going on (which makes for an uncomfortable experience for both parties.)
w's argument is that they have a small group of friends that happen to be furries (including myself and my roommates) and that they really enjoy this group of people. and, while w does not necessarily include themselves in the furry community online, they would love to get to know people irl at conventions. not necessarily because they want to stay involved in the furry community, but because they think furries are interesting, cool people. they also argue that it's unfair to assume they [w] would be uncomfortable or make others uncomfortable just because they are not furry- that it's elitist and rude to suggest that they would not be as welcomed or have as much fun because they are not directly involved in the community.
so what do you think? how do you feel about having somebody who is not a furry [and does not necessarily plan on ever being one] a part of your con group? how do you feel about them attending the con in general? do you feel like it's great that somebody would just want to have the experience of a fur con, spend time with their irl furry friends, and watch them interact with others? or do you think it would make you uncomfortable to have somebody tag along who doesn't have any plans of being a furry and maintaining furry friendships online (as the furry community is primarily an internet-centered subculture)?
Honestly I think you're way overthinking this. Furry is not some kind of special club that only furries can understand or be a part of. Cons are often full of people who don't identify as furs, and furries are about the most welcoming people on earth. It sounds more like you yourself are uncomfortable with the idea, and I'm not sure why. I doubt others would share your discomfort.
w is known to come off as an asshole. he can be vocal about his opinions and i fear that he would ask a lot of intrusive questions and say things that could be offensive or harmful to those involved in the community. he also is known for his "i literally do not care about anything" attitude.
personally, it was uncomfortable for me to have a nonfur (it's weird labeling people but i have no idea what else to refer people as??) as a part of our congroup at fwa. she was hella sweet and great!!! but it was obvious that we tended to accidentally ostracize her because we were constantly making stupid inside jokes and gossiping about artists and other dumb shit- which she had a hard time following. again, a great person! but it was fairly clear that she felt a little left out.
so my fear is that w would not only be a little difficult to introduce to other furs, but he could be disrespectful as well. ya know? he doesn't really want to get to know the artists or really even get involved at all. just be there to observe and experience. i'm pretty alright with that, but it's just his personality in particular that worries me.
the main reason i posted this was because we started arguing about it when he immediately became defensive. i really just want to understand his point of view. but it's hard when he can't see mine.
heh heh sorry for getting personal. i suppose i'll end up deleting this journal later and seriously talk to him about why it's so important that he wants to go and what he expects at a convention.
I can say from experience that I've been in situations where I'd been in a con group, and we would have a person from outside the fandom with us, and we brought em along with us for a bit. We were all pretty welcoming, they had good time, were generally fascinated, the furries in the group were happy to share info and discuss things with the person, etc etc, it went well. But these situations always were always limited in timescale. Never more than a few hours. Bringing somebody for the entire duration of a con is a lot more risky. Might take up a bigger chunk of your time that you wanna spend doin furry things, and they might lose interest in the whole thing after a day or 2. In this regard, the situation becomes kinda tricky, and it might not be worth bringing them along for both your sake.
That aint to say it isn't impossible though. It really depends on the sorta person w is, but people can get a lot out of con's by doing a lot of wandering and exploring. I feel like my first con experience had a bit of that element to it. I was barely involved with the fandom, but kinda went to a con on some crazy whim, spent most of the time wandering and exploring, meeting a lot of people who were into stuff that I really wasn't into, but had really great discussions with. I really enjoyed that, but again, thats just me.
In the end, I think it depends on the sorta person w is here, and whatcha think they would get out of a few days of a con. Best that I can figure.
you see, i'm absolutely willing to explain what's going on for his sake, but i don't ever want him to feel left out when i scurry off to make art with my favorite people or gush over somebody's gallery. maybe i'm just selfish, but i prefer that everybody be equally excited and happy to be at the convention. i feel like it would be hard to maintain when somebody (or at least w, the person i'd be responsible for bringing along) isn't necessarily included in all of my activities during the con.
i suppose if i were to go to travel to a convention, he'd have total freedom to leave and explore the city. he's 26, so it's not like he requires supervision. plus he enjoys urban exploration, so he'd always have something to do. i dunno know. i'm sure we'll figure something out. i really don't want to "deny" somebody a sweet fuckin' furry convention because i'm scared it'll be awkward.
And sure, I'm sure there are plenty of things that might appear awkward at a furry convention, or conversations that might be a bit alienating. But, I'd almost argue that this would be expected to be the case with something like this, dare I say the reason for going to a furry con if you've never done so before. In the mind of someone who wants to discover new things, you have to expect the unexpected. You're gonna see people having weird conversations, odd behaviors, you're not gonna get a lot of whats going on at first cause you're stepping into a whole new world. Maybe theres some stuff the guy will ever understand. But he will have been there to see it. To enjoy the spectacle of this strange little furry world. They are going to see it because it differs from the norm, and they want to know more.
Again though, I have to say it comes down to how you feel this person would react to furries. Conventions can be akward, weird places, but I think you'd agree there are some degrees of awkwardness that are worse than others. Being weirded out a little bit here and some confusion there isn't that bad a thing, but if you feel theres gonna be a lot of negativity and abrasiveness, maybe it wouldn't be the best idea. It really depends on the person themselves!
So my first response to your journal is that you're being a little unfair. However, you say that prior experience with nonfurs has told you that it makes things unfun for everyone. Why exactly? Did the other nonfurs have personality clashes? Did they not like furries as much as they thought they did? Is it only because they didn't get the furry jokes/porn?
You seem to know W pretty well, so I would assume that you could make a good decision on if he'd blend well with your furry friends or not, simply based on personality, not where W resides on the "furry" scale.
But then I read all the comments on the journal, and you actually go further to explain that you think W is a bit of an asshole. W has good intentions but just is not that great a socializer. So taking that into account, how do you think your other friends would react? If you're pretty sure W would mess up the whole dynamic, then don't bring W - but don't bring W because of his personality. Don't exclude him just because he's a nonfur.
i was grumpy and sleepy when i argued about this with w this morning, so it's also hella biased. in the end, i've come to the conclusion that it doesn't really matter. if he wants to come along, he can- as long as he has basic respect for the fandom (no laughing or gawking or making fun of people for their interests, etc.) which, after knowing us as long as he has, he should have the capacity to understand. he spoke about bringing along another non-fur mutual friend of ours to go explore the con with him- so they can both enjoy the con in their own way without being dragged around artist alleys or meeting internet friends.
i wholly support diving right into interesting situations and conventions. this situation in particular was just a tricky one because my friends generally just agree that only a group of furries go when we travel to cons. and, again, i like everybody being happy in this situation.
honestly, i might just attend one with him one day. he's fun to explore with and we'd probably just ended up getting drunk and trying to make friends with everybody. if i wanted to part ways to hang out with other furs, it's not like he can stop me or that he'll need supervision when alone. i apologize for such as grumpy ass journal. we just butt head a lot for dumb reasons when we get real sleepy. i love his dumb face to death but sometimes i like to be an ass to him just cause i woke up on the wrong side of the bed.
regardless, whatevah! gonna delete this journal soon anyway because i realized how dumb and elitist i sound haha.
That said, if he has a genuine interest in going and isn't the type of person who's going to need to hover around you 24/7, I don't see why he shouldn't go! Some of my favorite interactions at cons are reactions from non-furs who are totally enthused about the whole thing. :) If his only real experience with furries is with your local friend group and you think he has a tendency to be inquisitive about things to the point of being offensive, I'd definitely suggest he read up and get an idea of what the fandom is like, maybe watch some con videos so he has an idea of what to expect. If you've got a local con or one within reasonable driving distance, perhaps that's a good place to start. That way he can go for a little bit and head back home if he decides it's not for him.
I think a lot of this also comes down to: do any of your furry friends really want to be around w in an intimate living quarters scenario for a weekend? Does he actually care about learning about furries or is he just going to explore the city and generally be an asshole to people? I just have a hard time thinking w actually cares about any of this stuff.
anyway, he's got a lot more going on up in that skull of his than anybody realizes. with a good talk, i doubt he'd go around being an asshole. as long as he's going to have fun and have new experiences, i don't care. he can explore on his own while i spazz out with fellow furs. after all, if he's willing to pay all that money to get in the con in the first place, i doubt he's gonna do it with malicious intentions. and it's not like i can forbid him from going anywhere that he wants to go. he has a car and his own money. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
i dont know. it's certainly a weird situation, but who am i to tell em no if they're legitimately interested in learning about the fandom and meeting the people involved? i just dont want to be some weird elitist asshole because im afraid he might get obnoxious. we wont know what'll happen till it happens i guess. living next to, and really enjoying people who happen to be furries, i'd hope he'd understand how important it is to those involved. if my friends were a part of something like that, i suppose i'd be really curious too. also- phil wants to go with w if he ends up going. so he'd have a buddy to get drunk and explore with.
guh im so back and forth haha. at this point, i feel like i'd feel better if i just went with the flow and see what happens. if it turns out it's a big mistake, then it won't happen again. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
tl;dr
if he goes, i'll just give him the "don't make fun of anything/anybody" talk- which, when i approached him, he said went without saying. and then let him have fun at the con he paid for. i have no obligation to follow him around or vice versa.