For a while now, I've been thinking about why it is I find it difficult to draw a persona or some kind of representation of myself or other people as human (as opposed to a human-shaped animal). I've had dissonant thoughts about portraying animals as humans, so I'm trying to justify it as drawing humans as animals instead of animals with human traits. My fursona is a representation of a human and its appearance and every choice about it is supposed to remind myself that I'm still, despite of everything, part of the animal kingdom. It feels less human-centric to think of it that way, and I find solace in that because the other way of thinking about our place in the food chain feels violent. Maybe that's why I prefer the term "furry" over "anthro". I wouldn't like to anthropomorphize animals, but rather to de-humanize myself and friends who like that kind of thing.

Recently, I started reading this book titled "Ways of Being" by James Bridle, these thoughts are at least in part inspired by some of its descriptions of the more-than-human world from said book.