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Laurie Pycroft
sqrrl101
08 January 2008 @ 07:59 pm
Animal people  
One aspect of transhumanism which I'm going to be watching with (slightly horrified) fascination is the way that some people are inevitably going to start (and already are) using technology to alter themselves into anthropomorphic animals. It's a not-uncommon theme in cyberpunk/futurist fiction, and seems to follow on from the furry culture. Furries are weird as hell but, from an anthropological point of view, endlessly interesting. They're one of the many "perversions" that the Internet has helped foster and inter-connect, and I think it's a wonderful thing. We're going through a second sexual revolution at the moment, where people with strange fetishes and desires are able to be themselves and interact with other members of their community, and every day I become less surprised, and more amused, by the things which people would like to do with eachother.

Having said that all that, I wish the furries who go on about "fursecution" would just give it a rest. If you're going to shout about your sexual choice, you've got to accept that some people are going to mock you for it. To some degree, I think the same thing about parts of the "gay pride" movement. Yes, you're gay and comfortable with yourselves. We get it, well done. Believe it or not, you don't have to define your entire life by what you most enjoy sticking your dick in (or having stuck into you).

Normality is generally defined as the middle 90% on a scale, but there are so many attributes making up a person that it's highly likely that you're going to be in that bottom or top 5% in at least a few things. By that logic, it's pretty unlikely that one will be "normal" in everything, meaning that full normality is very abnormal. Ultimately, everyone is a bit of a freakish pervert, but that's part of what makes life enjoyable.
 
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malvino[info]malvino on January 8th, 2008 08:27 pm (UTC)
I am completely normal in every possible way. The Daily Mail presumably hates me for it, because they can't find anything about me to hate.

Laurie Pycroft[info]sqrrl101 on January 8th, 2008 08:29 pm (UTC)
Completely normal? You freak!
Patrick The Wierdo[info]lilmuckers on January 8th, 2008 09:28 pm (UTC)
oh indeed. the secual revolution is indeed still going on. i mean the 70's sex outside marriage started becoming common, and acceptable.

and with the internet pornography has become a lot more accessable... leading the act of solitary masturbation not being a taboo anymore. it's just something practically everyone does.

and as for furries. i'm completely indifferent one way or the other. in my mind that stalking cat dude is just like a guy/gal who goes and gets a bunch of tattoos and piercings... better perhaps because he at least has a target... a perpose beyond putting holes in himself and getting beeped at airport security.

some people have fetishes for leather. some have fetishes for latex, some pain, public exposure, bodily functions, bukkake, colossal breasts, whilst these might not be truely "run-of-the-mill" like self gratifications has become, it's all good.

if a guy gets off to cutting off his own nipples, and finds a gal who gets off by cutting off a guys nipples, then who's to say it's weird. they're perfectly suited for each other. sexually at least.
infact. if i could find something like that, i could share something as avant-gard as that with someone, and have that connection, maybe not nipple slicing, but something else i feel defines me. then i'd consider myself pretty fucking lucky.
Laurie Pycroft[info]sqrrl101 on January 8th, 2008 09:59 pm (UTC)
I'd still say it's weird, but there's nothing wrong with weird. Weird can be fun, exciting and new, and provided one doesn't force one's own brand of weird on anyone else, it's all good.

You're absolutely right about the cutting thing. I believe the right to consensual sexual acts between two partners extends even as far as killing, which is why I was displeased by the German courts' decision to jail that guy who cut off and ate the his internet-found lover's penis. The "victim" agreed to it, and that makes it alright by me. Still weird, but nobody has a right to dictate to anyone else what to do with their body.
Patrick The Wierdo[info]lilmuckers on January 8th, 2008 10:03 pm (UTC)
indeed so!

as long as all parties consent i honestly don't see what's wrong....

however. the german court thing... i can understand why they reached that decision. it's against the law. and whilst i believe in freedom etc. laws are there. and even if they're silly laws that don't make sense in this modern age (read: a fair proportion of the US constitution) they're still laws. if you don't enforce the laws... then it's just anarchy.

on that matte,r it angers me that speeding fines are going up and mobile phone penalties are going up to try and curb it. unless you enforce the goddamn law, people aren't going to obey it!
Laurie Pycroft[info]sqrrl101 on January 8th, 2008 10:08 pm (UTC)
I would disagree on the enforcement of law. If a judge can see that a law it morally flawed, then it's not justifiable for him to continue enforcing it simply because it's the law, at least not in any serious way. He should either refuse to hear the case or pass a sentence which essentially doesn't punish the defendednt in protest of the law's injustice (e.g a £1 fine, or a minute in custody).
Patrick The Wierdo[info]lilmuckers on January 8th, 2008 10:10 pm (UTC)
indeed true.
that's fine, but some of these laws do have minimum sentences. as i recall that german dude did get a comparitively light sentance.
Laurie Pycroft[info]sqrrl101 on January 8th, 2008 10:16 pm (UTC)
I recall that it was still a few years, and I think that mandatory minimum sentences are bloody evil.

Upon checking, it turns out that he originally got an 8 1/2 year sentence, but that was changed to a life one. Pretty unfair for just indulging his sexual urges with a consenting partner.
Patrick The Wierdo[info]lilmuckers on January 8th, 2008 10:18 pm (UTC)
true enough, but i'm sure he'll get out early. only the ones who fuck about in prison stay their full sentences.
Ed Fortune[info]ed_fortune on January 8th, 2008 11:25 pm (UTC)
Hmm, two things you may enjoy:

The future not being what you expected, I suggest Doktor Sleepless:
here. You'll need a .cbr reader.

Also, Barbelith's head shop has much to say on gender identity, and is well worth a swim.
Laurie Pycroft[info]sqrrl101 on January 9th, 2008 12:21 am (UTC)
Gender and sexuality (like a lot of things) are over-compartmenalised. The Kinsey Scale does a much better job of defining sexuality, and gender is much more than a simple binary thing. Apart from transgenderism and suchforth, there are millions around the world who simply don't have either XX or XY genotypes.
Ed Fortune[info]ed_fortune on January 9th, 2008 12:28 am (UTC)
I great deal of intellectual tossing off is spent on gender studies, frankly.

People like to talk about sex, and themselves. If they can make themselves look clever doing so, good for them.

Frankly, the subject bores me senseless. Who I kiss is who I kiss. A snog is not a political statement, not is it healthy to think it is.

What did you think of the comic?
Laurie Pycroft[info]sqrrl101 on January 9th, 2008 12:35 am (UTC)
I can't read it at the moment- I'm on my mum's laptop and can't install a .CBR reader, but I'll have a look when my PC is working again.
Nia[info]h8d_bitch on January 10th, 2008 09:33 pm (UTC)
SPOTTED.
Your fuzzy angel wolf ^.~[info]insanity_j on January 11th, 2008 11:29 pm (UTC)
Furries can be pretty varied i guess, you can get some like myself who are mainly in the fandom because of curiosity and for making friends, also i find the artwork to be quite hot and the ocasional yiff never goes a miss, but i'm pretty sure people don't want to know about that. Of course you can get some pretty strange characters within the furry fandom, some of them actually are aroused by animals, infact i know of a man over on furaffinity who married his horse, there are pictures of him making out with it which did instantlymake me go "Ewww". But it doesn't offend or hurt me in any way so i say let him get on with it.

All the furries that constantly go on about being discriminated against anoy me. i know there are alot of silly anti-furry and anti-troll videos on youtube , my name is even used in one of the troll's videos, but i see it as pointless, if you are going to retalliate to them, then they are just going to get more anoying, and the furs who constantly complain are humouring the trolls, as a result they just continue to be fucktards, probably people who are outcasts and are bullied in the real world so they take out their frustration on groups of people online. What the the furries don't seem to get is that if they refused to acknowledge these individuals, then they would get bored and find somebody else to pick on, but no, they want this war to end, but at the same time want to be the winners of it. IT DOESN'T MATTER WHO WINS IT!, as long as both sides are no longer caulsing trouble then there won't be any of this Fursecution going on.



Laurie Pycroft[info]sqrrl101 on January 12th, 2008 12:57 am (UTC)
The ones that scare me a bit are the people who seem to honestly believe that they're the spirit of a dragon or whatever trapped inside a human body. There are some real weirdos out there on that Internet.
Your fuzzy angel wolf ^.~[info]insanity_j on January 12th, 2008 05:18 am (UTC)
Dragon-therians are allways absolutely bonkers, This guy made me laugh to be fair: http://youtube.com/watch?v=TK4fjMhGn-I
Your fuzzy angel wolf ^.~[info]insanity_j on January 12th, 2008 05:20 am (UTC)
Not only a racist, but someone who believes they are a dragon, it's just too insane.
Laurie Pycroft[info]sqrrl101 on January 12th, 2008 05:25 am (UTC)
He's a solipsist- someone who believes that they're the only real person, and that the world is a product of their own consciousness. Solipsists are retards, which goes some way to explaining why he's such a freak.