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Friday, July 1, 2011

The Sound and the Furries

What Wikipedia says about Furries,

Furry fandom is a fandom for fictional anthropomorphic animal characters with human personalities and characteristics.[1] Examples of anthropomorphic attributes include exhibiting human intelligence and facial expressions, the ability to speak, walk on two legs, and wear clothes. Furry fandom is also used to refer to the community of people who gather on the Internet and at conventions.[2][3]

What I think that this really small description of this huge subset of people fails to describe is the sweetness of it all. Although there are plenty of people that creep-up the place and don't bathe enough, most of the fursuiters and the fans are sweet and unassuming people that receive new people with a kind of warmth and mirth (in spite of so many of them being socially awkward and "weird") that cannot be replicated by all of the bullshit that people invite into their homes through the media.

After Garett, his friend Georgette and I left Anthrocon, we ate at The Sharp Edge in Downtown Pittsburgh where two yuppie women dined at the next table. While Anthrocon was over for the year, there were a few remaining furries wandering the streets with tails, feet and badges. They stopped in mid sentences to have a jeer and then returned to planning their "happy hour," at Mad Mex. Oh yeah, the FURRIES are the problem and deserved to be treated with your jeers...you scazwags. I'm so sure that you're the very definition of style and sophistication as you're pounding seven dollar peach margaritas in your pumps.

I find it hard to describe the kind of soul that would be able to stand a really furry suit in the summer for the sake of fandom (I mean, why not have the convention in the winter? Then, you could be outside and be totally comfortable), but I really feel like they should be under considerably less scrutiny than the drunken idiots filtering out of PNC Park after watching the Pirates lose for the bazillionth fucking time. Oh really? Drunk at a baseball game? Well, you TOTALLY reserve the right to judge people.

I cannot say that I will be suiting up next year, but I hope to go to more than just a day's worth of Anthrocon activity in 2012. Besides, I'm still hoping against hope that there is some kind of Fursuiter karaoke.

Enjoy the pics. Some of these costumes are brilliant!
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2 comments:

  1. and most of them are hand made! You should have done the Furry Hunter contest by DVE. The top three pictures featuring furries and a DVE sign won tickets to U2. My plan was to sell them and rip off some fan but alas, I was unable to go furry hunting this year :(

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  2. Hmmmm... those Furries can be real assholes after a few drinks as well. They reduced a comic friend to near tears last year.

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