Hi! 

I'm over atgraemelion  now.

Please add him.

Dear Furs,

Unless you have the power to remove someone from "furry", then your dramagasming over this is a waste of your time.

The average life expectancy for someone in the US is around 73 years.  That's 26645 days. 

By midnight tonight, you will have spent 1 full day on this.  I imagine this wargarrbl will go on for 2 weeks.  That means you will spend 14 days on this.

1/20th of a percent of your life will have been spent worrying about something you have no control over, something that likely wouldn't pertain to or affect you, and something that you cannot stop.

Accept responsibility for everything that happens in your life.  Recognize what you can change.  Show who you are by your actions.  If you live by those words, you'll realize that this is unimportant.

It saddens me to see good people getting wrapped around the axle of something that they don't have any control over.  There's nothing any of you can do about this. 

So what, they're off FA?  They'll be back.  They're still furs.  They'll show up at conventions.  They'll consume art.  

How does it change what you do?   What have you done lately for furry? 
 

Godspeed, Lion of the Senate.

Ya know.. forget it.

This is a test at Fri Aug 7 15:09:53 2009

It amazes me how so many furs who claim to be distant from fandom are so close to it .. not by their actions.. but just by.. I don't know, other people's beliefs of them  For example.. someone in another blog claimed to be very "distant" from furry, and yet.. most people know who he is and of him and think highly of him.

And the really ironic thing is, if you look at it, he IS distant from modern furry.

Lately, it seems that there have been furs in the media "actin the fool" and making it all look bad for us.

And so there have been many wise comments and analysis posts on what could cause this, what brought this on, and what we can do to make the furry fandom a little less "Lord of the Furs" to quote one excellent person.

I'm going to offer another suggestion, one that mixes things up a bit.

Furry is where it's at because the behavior has been condoned for a long time.   It was a series of small steps and decisions that has built this fandom into what it is, and now we have people showing porn in restaurants, dry humping in parks, doing drugs, and talking about boning their dogs.   Not to mention the hitting on children, or many other things.

Except.. this behavior has gone on for a long time.  I've seen staff at conventions ignore drug use.  I've seen staff at conventions be told to "fuck off" when they asked people in leashes to stop leading each other around.  I've seen the same staff ignore the situation.

I think we need to examine some things before we try to solve this problem.  

First, we need to determine what furry is now.  What it should be.  What is MFF about?  What is AC about?  What is being a convention going fur about?  What is being a lifestyler fur about?  What do our conventions currently SAY furry is about by their actions?  What do the websites and mucks say Furry is about?  What gets sold at conventions, and what does THAT say we're about?  What does second life say we're about?  What does Wikifur say we're about?   That's the first goal.  We need to find out what Furry is, and what our actions say Furry is.

The second goal is that we need to figure out what we want Furry to be.  If it's different from what we find out Furry IS, we need to determine if it's wrong or right to be this way.  We need to use our judgements and our values to determine where we want to be and why we're not there.  

Finally, we need to start mapping out a series of actions that get us from point A  (now) to point B (what we want.)  We need to act on those things.  We need to set goals.  If Furry isn't about the porn, then why does Fur Affinity seem to say it is?  If it's not about the sex, why do so many people go to conventions to hook up?  If it's not about the fetishes, why do we condone behavior at conventions that are fetish in nature?    We need to really and truly DO something.   If it means banning people for misbehavior, so be it.  If it means requiring all artists who sell R or X rated art to get their own segment of the dealers den, so be it.  If it means disallowing tails and ears in fine restaurants, okay.  
But we cannot keep doing exactly what we've been doing and expecting a different result.  That's what has gotten us to the point we're at.  If people want Furry to change, they're going to have to be willing to make the hard decisions.
 

There will be a lot more than Arlen Specter flipping by the time this is done.

18 seats are up for election in 2010 in both parties.

Many of those states have flipped in the last election.. and will continue to flip if Obama maintains his good ratings.

Arlene Specter might not be the first to defect from this "war" within the Republican Party.

Lately, I've been going through some changes.    I'm working on a "master post" to explain what my experiences, my goals, and my values were and are.

I realize that sometimes , especially lately, I've been a bit sharp and a bit testy.  I'm sorry for that.  When you spend your entire life being pushed around and treated like shit.. and then suddenly you discover that you have some power in this world.. it takes some getting used to.

I value my friends, and their input.  But I'm 30 now.  I'm moving forward.  And my life has been extremely interesting.  Like I said at the beginning of this year, this is going to be a year of sadness and roughness.   

"2009 is going to be a rough year.  It's going to be more woes than rose.  But we're going to make it.  We're going to survive, and we're going to look to a future brighter than you can possibly imagine."

This is me building my brighter future amongst the smoldering wreckage of this year thus far.  I wrote that before losing someone close.  I wrote that before watching things happen to friends at work.  

So.. if I offend you during this "finding" process, I really am sorry.  It is not my intention.  

I'll be through this soon.

Wow.

More drama in furry.  I can set my clock by this.

Heee.  Furry is a large collection of undefinable people.  Trying to define it is a joke.  It's NEVER really been defined, ever, despite what you experienced during your first few cons when you insulated yourself from things that were surely going on.

Cope.  Just.. cope.  Everything seems innocent and cool and exactly what you want when you first find it.. and then you slowly start discovering things.  That doesn't mean the things you discover aren't "Furry" or that the "old furry" was better.

The old Furry ALSO had convention staff advertising in fetish magazines.   So.. the "old furry" never existed.  It was a product of you being fresh to the fandom, and having nostalgia.

But, given who's complaining, this is nothing new.     He should just accept that this is how it is, how it was, and how it has been.  I know when I did that, my life in Furry got MUCH easier.