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There's Only So Much You Can Do
6 years ago
Y'know, I've been in this fandom a long time. Started with getting into werewolves, which led to an interest in Darkstalkers after seeing an arcade machine at a local pizza place, which then led me to, after a time, finding "Toonapalooza!" the personal website for Jen "Spunky Wulf" Seng. Wasn't long after that I feel in with some furry groups online, mostly fans of her work joining together on a forum/board for them to chat it up. The rest is a long and somewhat sordid history of me dipping my toes in the edges and staying under the radar, with quite a bit of cybersex along the way.
But it didn't take me long to realize that the conservative and Christian beliefs I'd been raised on, and have kept to for the most part to this day, were not welcome in this fandom. It seemed to be that you could be one or the other and they might give you a little more peace, but those two combined? Not happening. Too many had been burned by self-righteous religious types or bad parenting - often both at once, sad to say - and most of furry swung the opposite way. Neo-Pagans and atheists were more common, and still are, and those who leaned toward right-wing beliefs (in the American sense anyhow) were far less prevalent then those who decried how awful Capitalism was and that Republicans were all jerks.
I have been in this fandom knowing since almost the beginning that my beliefs, political and spiritual, are not welcome. That, in a sense, I'm not welcome. Because, as I've seen over my couple decades among furries, they like to twist you to their way of thinking. Not all of them, but enough to be noticeable, even if most are doing it out of misguided intentions. We won't talk about those doing it in hopes of scoring a new piece of ass to fuck because they're not the focus of this journal.
Well, tonight I got a reminder of that. A reminder that there are people in furry who want me gone, all because I don't think like them, and refuse to.
I was watching a couple videos by this guy who does his best to mess with scammers online, and I got inspired. I had a wicked idea on how to mess with them myself if I ever got a call from one. And I wanted to share it with the local group of furs who live in my area in the Telegram chat we use.
I told them I thought it'd be fun to pretend to be an autistic nerd of some kind, going on and on about some anime convention or something, or his new favorite show, while the scammer is just trying to get him to focus and get his financial information. I thought I'd get a few laughs and a pat on the back for an awesome idea, a way to fight back against those who steal people's money through deceit and threats. Who wouldn't love that?
Instead, I get lectured about using the word "autistic" as a slur, and "perpetuating stereotypes". All because of one adjective in my description.
I don't really feel it was warranted, and being told to take the offending word away miffed me a little. All I was doing was talking about playing a character to mess with scammers and waste their time. I don't think I've ever used "autistic" as a slur - except maybe in that AltFurry chat I was in a while back - and I sure wasn't using it that way here. I wasn't talking about anyone in particular, and even one of the furries who was autistic said he didn't mind it really.
"You don't represent everyone!" came the reply.
"Neither do you," I retorted.
I don't remember all I said, and I'm not sure I even bothered to defend myself or apologize. I had history with at least one of these furs before, a Female-to-Male trans person who seems to be holding a grudge against me. My best guess as to why is because I did a poor job of controlling my hormones and talking about my loneliness and horniness in the general chat. Not my proudest moments, but I did eventually got some sense talked into me and stopped. But apparently I still have to walk on eggshells around them lest I walk into their Social Justice mindset where anything that could offend must be purged.
Suffice to say, things escalated a bit.
After sharing my troubles with another chat that leaned further to the right, I did something that was probably a mistake on my part. It's about the only thing I can think of that I did wrong in that exchange, though I'm not opposed to people from the chat posting screen shots of all that was said. I'll own up to my mistakes. Only way I can improve myself. But yeah, I guess I was feeling a bit spiteful and trolly, so I went back to my post and edited it, removing the word "autistic" from it.
And replaced it with the word "retarded".
I didn't bother to tell them, figuring it'd just lead to more trouble. But someone caught it, and I got lectured at again. Talking about how that was a slur in the "mental health community", whatever that means, and things got pretty heated. I pretty much told them flat out that getting holier-than-thou with me would only result in me thumbing my nose at them.
At which point said person I mentioned before denied being that, before demonstrating my point. You don't get to say you're not a Pharisee and then say how much better you are than me in the same breath. It doesn't work that way.
Soon after, one of the members calls for a stop to the conversation. He wasn't an admin, and it wasn't a demand. Just a suggestion. I was about to post a reply to keep going, but... I remembered being in the Little Tales stream chat, and their rule about calling "bacon" when things got too heated. So, I started talking about bacon. Even as the person I mentioned before, and someone else, continued the previous conversation and called me "garbage" and "disgusting", even going so far as to imply that I'm lonely and unloved because of things like this.
Because, y'know, a Female-to-Male transsexual who's barely out of high school is a perfect judge of good moral character.
In all honesty, I'm not proud of some of the things I said and did. At one point, I did protest that I wasn't using "autistic" as a slur, but they didn't listen. I also might have gotten a bit passive-aggressive, because I don't like when people try to tell me how to live my life. No one has a right to tell me what to say or do, beyond what the law forbids. And until someone points to an actual person that's been hurt by my words or actions, I won't apologize. Even then, that apology is between me and that person, and I'll handle it in private where I don't have to worry about self-righteous jerks judging me for everything I say.
That said, I think I may, to an extent, need to distance myself from furries in general. I've had some fun times with the local group, but I don't have any real close friends there. I'll stay in the chat a little longer to try and talk with people, maybe find some I can trust and hang out with now and then. But I can't see myself staying long term. I don't think they're a good influence on me, and it's been made clear to me that I'm not allowed to question certain things or say certain words. And that one time I got someone putting words in my mouth and misrepresenting me over something I said (Guess who? =D) did not endear me to the group. I simply don't have the energy to defend myself at every turn, and knowing the admins will take the side of the others means that I'll get kicked if I continue to speak my mind. Or just make jokes that offend someone that's easily triggered.
In any case, I wish no ill will toward anyone in the group. A part of me kinda does want those who've judged me unfairly and slandered me to pay for it, but... I don't think it's healthy to hold a grudge. I have too many already, and I must let them go. I don't need to add new ones. So, I'll just pray for them, lifting them up to God, and letting him deal with them. Being in the hands of God is both the safest and most dangerous place to be. So, in a way, it's both a blessing and a curse, depending on how you react to his disruptive nature. I imagine quite a few furries would look God in the face and march right into hell rather than accept his love. Many would run out of abject fear of him. But I pray that at least a remnant will come to know him as he is and have their lives changed for the better. Especially me. Because where I am right now is close to the lowest I've been. It's an improvement over some past moments, but I still don't want to stay here. So, I might as well lift myself up along with the others. Only seems fair.
For now, I'm going to sleep and maybe talk to God about this. I don't talk to him enough, and it shows. Tired of living in sin and misery and having to fight to get anything productive done. At least keeping track of every small good thing I do has helped. I recommend trying it if you haven't, because it will give you a sense of pride you can build upon. It can also help you with self-compassion, accepting that some days you just won't get anything done, but remembering that it's just a hiccup, a bump in the road to self-improvement. And that helps a lot.
May you all be held in the hands of God and know his love. Not as you've been taught or learned, but the deep reality of a God you never knew before, who is desperately in love with you and wants the best for your life. May you meet the real God, to know him better, and find your expectations blown away.
Good night, and God bless.
But it didn't take me long to realize that the conservative and Christian beliefs I'd been raised on, and have kept to for the most part to this day, were not welcome in this fandom. It seemed to be that you could be one or the other and they might give you a little more peace, but those two combined? Not happening. Too many had been burned by self-righteous religious types or bad parenting - often both at once, sad to say - and most of furry swung the opposite way. Neo-Pagans and atheists were more common, and still are, and those who leaned toward right-wing beliefs (in the American sense anyhow) were far less prevalent then those who decried how awful Capitalism was and that Republicans were all jerks.
I have been in this fandom knowing since almost the beginning that my beliefs, political and spiritual, are not welcome. That, in a sense, I'm not welcome. Because, as I've seen over my couple decades among furries, they like to twist you to their way of thinking. Not all of them, but enough to be noticeable, even if most are doing it out of misguided intentions. We won't talk about those doing it in hopes of scoring a new piece of ass to fuck because they're not the focus of this journal.
Well, tonight I got a reminder of that. A reminder that there are people in furry who want me gone, all because I don't think like them, and refuse to.
I was watching a couple videos by this guy who does his best to mess with scammers online, and I got inspired. I had a wicked idea on how to mess with them myself if I ever got a call from one. And I wanted to share it with the local group of furs who live in my area in the Telegram chat we use.
I told them I thought it'd be fun to pretend to be an autistic nerd of some kind, going on and on about some anime convention or something, or his new favorite show, while the scammer is just trying to get him to focus and get his financial information. I thought I'd get a few laughs and a pat on the back for an awesome idea, a way to fight back against those who steal people's money through deceit and threats. Who wouldn't love that?
Instead, I get lectured about using the word "autistic" as a slur, and "perpetuating stereotypes". All because of one adjective in my description.
I don't really feel it was warranted, and being told to take the offending word away miffed me a little. All I was doing was talking about playing a character to mess with scammers and waste their time. I don't think I've ever used "autistic" as a slur - except maybe in that AltFurry chat I was in a while back - and I sure wasn't using it that way here. I wasn't talking about anyone in particular, and even one of the furries who was autistic said he didn't mind it really.
"You don't represent everyone!" came the reply.
"Neither do you," I retorted.
I don't remember all I said, and I'm not sure I even bothered to defend myself or apologize. I had history with at least one of these furs before, a Female-to-Male trans person who seems to be holding a grudge against me. My best guess as to why is because I did a poor job of controlling my hormones and talking about my loneliness and horniness in the general chat. Not my proudest moments, but I did eventually got some sense talked into me and stopped. But apparently I still have to walk on eggshells around them lest I walk into their Social Justice mindset where anything that could offend must be purged.
Suffice to say, things escalated a bit.
After sharing my troubles with another chat that leaned further to the right, I did something that was probably a mistake on my part. It's about the only thing I can think of that I did wrong in that exchange, though I'm not opposed to people from the chat posting screen shots of all that was said. I'll own up to my mistakes. Only way I can improve myself. But yeah, I guess I was feeling a bit spiteful and trolly, so I went back to my post and edited it, removing the word "autistic" from it.
And replaced it with the word "retarded".
I didn't bother to tell them, figuring it'd just lead to more trouble. But someone caught it, and I got lectured at again. Talking about how that was a slur in the "mental health community", whatever that means, and things got pretty heated. I pretty much told them flat out that getting holier-than-thou with me would only result in me thumbing my nose at them.
At which point said person I mentioned before denied being that, before demonstrating my point. You don't get to say you're not a Pharisee and then say how much better you are than me in the same breath. It doesn't work that way.
Soon after, one of the members calls for a stop to the conversation. He wasn't an admin, and it wasn't a demand. Just a suggestion. I was about to post a reply to keep going, but... I remembered being in the Little Tales stream chat, and their rule about calling "bacon" when things got too heated. So, I started talking about bacon. Even as the person I mentioned before, and someone else, continued the previous conversation and called me "garbage" and "disgusting", even going so far as to imply that I'm lonely and unloved because of things like this.
Because, y'know, a Female-to-Male transsexual who's barely out of high school is a perfect judge of good moral character.
In all honesty, I'm not proud of some of the things I said and did. At one point, I did protest that I wasn't using "autistic" as a slur, but they didn't listen. I also might have gotten a bit passive-aggressive, because I don't like when people try to tell me how to live my life. No one has a right to tell me what to say or do, beyond what the law forbids. And until someone points to an actual person that's been hurt by my words or actions, I won't apologize. Even then, that apology is between me and that person, and I'll handle it in private where I don't have to worry about self-righteous jerks judging me for everything I say.
That said, I think I may, to an extent, need to distance myself from furries in general. I've had some fun times with the local group, but I don't have any real close friends there. I'll stay in the chat a little longer to try and talk with people, maybe find some I can trust and hang out with now and then. But I can't see myself staying long term. I don't think they're a good influence on me, and it's been made clear to me that I'm not allowed to question certain things or say certain words. And that one time I got someone putting words in my mouth and misrepresenting me over something I said (Guess who? =D) did not endear me to the group. I simply don't have the energy to defend myself at every turn, and knowing the admins will take the side of the others means that I'll get kicked if I continue to speak my mind. Or just make jokes that offend someone that's easily triggered.
In any case, I wish no ill will toward anyone in the group. A part of me kinda does want those who've judged me unfairly and slandered me to pay for it, but... I don't think it's healthy to hold a grudge. I have too many already, and I must let them go. I don't need to add new ones. So, I'll just pray for them, lifting them up to God, and letting him deal with them. Being in the hands of God is both the safest and most dangerous place to be. So, in a way, it's both a blessing and a curse, depending on how you react to his disruptive nature. I imagine quite a few furries would look God in the face and march right into hell rather than accept his love. Many would run out of abject fear of him. But I pray that at least a remnant will come to know him as he is and have their lives changed for the better. Especially me. Because where I am right now is close to the lowest I've been. It's an improvement over some past moments, but I still don't want to stay here. So, I might as well lift myself up along with the others. Only seems fair.
For now, I'm going to sleep and maybe talk to God about this. I don't talk to him enough, and it shows. Tired of living in sin and misery and having to fight to get anything productive done. At least keeping track of every small good thing I do has helped. I recommend trying it if you haven't, because it will give you a sense of pride you can build upon. It can also help you with self-compassion, accepting that some days you just won't get anything done, but remembering that it's just a hiccup, a bump in the road to self-improvement. And that helps a lot.
May you all be held in the hands of God and know his love. Not as you've been taught or learned, but the deep reality of a God you never knew before, who is desperately in love with you and wants the best for your life. May you meet the real God, to know him better, and find your expectations blown away.
Good night, and God bless.
Here is an example. I might call you a trash panda. As a raccoon you might see that as a compliment. But to another they see it as a slur. Someone might call me a stinker. But as a skunk, it is what I am. Call a poodle a stinker and they will become offended. It all depends on who you are talking to.
As a Christian, it is best to just back away, apologize, and be humble in your attitude. Some people can be jerks. All we can do is pray that they will learn to love other people and be kinder in the future.
Even if I apologize for what I did do wrong, I doubt the people involved will forgive me. They will still insist that my initial post was wrong, even though it was not meant as a slur at all, and insist that I apologize for it. Which I won't do, because I'm not convinced it was wrong. Why apologize to those who wish to make me unhappy anyway? I may still need to do it, yes, but I don't expect it to improve relations between us.
Like the title says, there's only so much you can do. Some people are just gonna be mad.
As far as slurs, most of the synonyms for stupid have been slurs at one point or another. It certainly wasn't WISE what you did, but I don't recall any bible verses outlying what are slurs for all eternity and what aren't - God DOES disapprove of the intent to harm others and cautions us to be mindful of how we use our words, but given the landmine-filled nature of today's discourse, I think the only way to be successful is not to play the game.
I work in the mental health field myself. The standards for what's a slur and what isn't changes on a whim to matching evolving standards. And quite frankly, I can't be arsed to keep up with trends like that.
My general advice is to keep your politics and fandom accounts separate. Too many nutjobs these days to bother debating with. Maybe its cowardly, but i don't see the point.
Even so, I know it's not my main strength. I'll discuss with those who are willing to talk, to exchange ideas and try to come to an understanding. Yet at the end of the day, it's not my calling. I'm more interested in making stories than debating politics. And not enough energy to argue with idiots. I doubt anyone does. They drag you down to your level and beat you with experience. =P