The Furry Spectrum

This post is on a question that I get asked a lot.  Not via this blog, but other places, even places that don't know I am a zoo.  The question is: "are you a furry?" So yes, this post will be going a bit into what "furry" has come to mean, how it might or might not relate to zoophilia, and what this relation means in the grand scheme of things.

First of all, to answer that question is always tough for me; my response is generally along the lines of, "Kinda." I like furry art, certainly.  I'll confess I like furry porn.  I like animal fiction, and I've seen The Lion King many dozens of times.  Nala is a total hottie.  If this is all there is to furridom - a proclivity, a paraphilia, whatever - then most certainly I am, and I don't know a lot of zoos who aren't furries in this sense, particularly if we're counting "ferals" (that is, non-anthropomorphic anthropomorphic characters [?]).

On the other hand, I have little to nothing to do with the furry community, don't fursuit or anything like that, don't fancy myself anything other than a simple human, and quite honestly, a lot of self-professed furries would or do hate my guts.  To them, furry is more than just a weird interest in anthro and animal fiction, and I wouldn't count, particularly since people like me make them look bad.  And I can sympathize with this.

I'm not going to claim to be able to draw a line between these two parts of the furry fandom.  Whether I'm a furry or not will continue to be up to judges other than myself.  What I am going to do is draw a line between furry as a paraphilia and zoophilia.  Right after I erect these sandbags around my dwelling.

Alright, so, here's the thing: ever since Kinsey (1948) we have had the idea that sexuality, at least homosexuality, heterosexuality, and bisexuality, are not exclusive categories but are instead along a spectrum.  Later on, this became a series of two axes, which is now widely accepted:



For those who are unfamiliar, what this means is that everyone in the world fits somewhere on this graph: if they are further towards the top-right of the graph, they are more homosexual, and more highly sexual (towards hypersexuality) than the norm (on Y) and bisexuality (on X); if they are towards the bottom-left, they are more heterosexual and asexual (demisexual).  It should be noted that placement on this graph should be considered more diamond-like than square-like, as it is impossible to be 100% asexual and hetero/homosexual, and it is impossible to be 100% sexual (hypersexual) without being bisexual.

Now, it has been suggested, albeit sheepishly, that there may be more to this graph.  A hell of a lot more, to put it bluntly: there may be dozens more axes that can be placed here.  Unfortunately, there just isn't that much interest in research in this area, and no one cares to fund it, so you won't find it in your textbooks anytime soon.  These spectra range in all sorts of paraphilias: sadism-masochism, chronophilias (pedophilia to gerontophilia), anthrophilia-zoophilia, necrophilia-vitophilia(?), and whatever else.

You may think, after considering how generally well Kinsey has been accepted, especially given the time since the bulk of his research was conducted, that this would be a no-brainer.  There are, however, problems with these becoming widely accepted.  The first problem is that, as I mentioned, very little research has been done to support or fail to support such a paradigm shift, and there is no drive to conduct any.  Even pedophilia, which once might have got some interest from legal establishments, is actually quite well-controlled these days, and convicted pedos have some of the lowest recidivism rates of sex offenders.  The second problem is that the current versions of both the DSM and the ICD, which are the two manuals used most commonly by psychologists in making proper diagnoses, really like their categories, and all sexual disorders listed are categorical: that is, you can't be kind of a masochist, according to the APA and WHO.  Thirdly, society doesn't like these people; most of us don't like the idea that we all fit onto a pedophilic spectrum, a necrophilic spectrum, and whatever else.  It's not very scientific, but popular opinion has a much greater effect on the social sciences than we like to admit.

Now that I've finished that little rant, what exactly did it have to do with furries?  As the title implies, it is my personal belief that the furry fandom is on that theoretical anthrophilia-zoophilia spectrum, based on the fact that zoophilia is much more prevalent among furries (Evans, 2008), that I have met few if any zoos out of the many who are not at least mildly interested in some aspects of the furry fandom, and that if you brave it and actually look at furry communities and art, you can literally see that sliding scale.  This is not to say that all furries are secretly zoo.  In fact, it means quite the opposite: although a fair number of furries self-identify as zoos, if we consider that sexuality is incredibly difficult if not impossible to change, based on the fact that there is no 'cure' for homosexuality, pedophilia, etc., you can actually be quite sure that if someone is into furry porn but doesn't have any such interest in real animals, that they are not going to somehow progress into zoosexuality: they already have their place on the spectrum, and they are going to stay there, given that sexuality tends to crystallize by one's mid-twenties.  In short, if we accept that there is such a spectrum, we no longer feel the need to pigeon-hole people into one thing or another, or to make assumptions about someone fitting into some imaginary category simply because they're close.

If we extrapolate here to other sexualities, such as pedophilia, this can have some interesting implications, even affecting national legislation.  Lolicon - that is, children or childlike individuals portrayed sexually in drawings or animations - has come under a lot of fire in the last few years, with people being arrested for creating, distributing, or possessing it.  The idea is that people who view lolicon may eventually "graduate" to child sex abuse, either because they must already be pedophiles if they are viewing lolicon, or because the lolicon itself may make them become pedophilic.  If we consider that lolicon may be to pedophilia as furry may be to zoophilia, some research (already backed by the fact that there are a great many people who enjoy lolicon but are not pedophiles, evidenced by the success of certain television shows that would not exist if they only appealed to the ~3% of the population who are pedophilic) would end the equation of loli fans and pedophiles, and thus the fear and criminalization.

Something to think about.


By the way, over the last week, this blog hit 1,000 views.  Let's celebrate by getting 1,000 more, hm?  Whether you think this blog is insightful or disgusting, entertaining or insulting, don't be afraid to share it; no one will think less of you if you do. ;)

Terminology

There's a lot of discussion in the zoo community and interested parties about what certain words mean.  Generally, it is said that because said community is disorganized and often less than stable, there is no agreement on what means what.

I'd like to change that.  We don't have a definitive lexicon, so I'll attempt to put one here.


Anthrosexuality
A sexual orientation towards humans.  The opposite of zoosexuality, although the two are not mutually exclusive.

Bestiality
The sexual use of animals.  Bestiality and bestials/bestialists, unlike zoophilia and zoophiles, give no regard to the emotions or desires of the animal, and there is no emotional attachment.  First used in the seventeenth century, it's now the usual term used in legal documents.

Faunoiphilia
Sexual arousal from watching animals mating.

Fence-hopping
Having sexual interactions with an animal that is not yours, without the permission of the animal's legal owner.

Horse-ripping
Rather explicit abuse of horses in an often sexualized context that has unfortunately become common enough that it has its own term.  Unfortunately one of the big reasons zooerasty is still illegal in many places.

Zooerasty
Zoosexuality in practice, ie the act of a human having sex with an animal. cf pederasty

Zoophilia
(1) A romantic attraction to animals.  An emotional attachment is necessary (-philia meaning love) and a sexual attraction is generally implied.  It does not, however, need to be present, nor does an individual need to have had a partner to be a zoophile. cf nyctophilia, etc.
(2) A paraphilia involving animals, used in a clinical context. cf necrophilia

Zoosadism
Bestiality, but above and beyond a simple lack of concern for the animal partner in being explicitly physically abusive.

Zoosexuality
A sexual orientation towards animals.  May cover either zoophilia or bestiality, but, like zoophilia, does not necessitate an existing relationship.  Sometimes used today to mean someone who prefers animals, as opposed to someone who will orient towards animals but prefers humans.

Homosexuality in Nature: Gay Animals

Oftentimes when browsing the internet or listening to a right-wing tirade from some backwards-thinking fundamentalist, I find arguments against homosexuality. The most common one is: “it’s unnatural”. Disregarding arguments from religion, apparently if a species were to “go gay” it would die out due to a lack of reproduction, which is why homosexuality is unheard of in animals.

This is, of course, entirely false. This article, in the spirit of the last, will address common misconceptions about homosexual behaviours outside of the human species.

”Doesn’t it only exist in a few species?”

No. Homosexual behavior has been noted in nearly every family of birds, mammals and reptiles, if not every species. Everything from giraffes to lions to penguins to goats, the tendency of which to be exclusively gay is problematic to many farmers.

”But it’s a dominance thing!”

No, it’s not. As it is with female-male relations, the submissive participant in homosexual intercourse is usually the initiator. Furthermore, in gay “relationships” in many species, there is not a single partner who is always submissive and the other always dominant. The partnerships also exist within species that do not have a real social hierarchy. Finally, as it is in heterosexual partnerships, a great deal of affection may be shown.



It should also be noted on a more intimate note that homosexual activities between males is often penetrative, depending on the species (nearly all mammals).

”It only happens in captivity.”

Also wrong. Many of the photos and articles given above were taken in the wild. The fact is that it is much easier to observe animals in captivity, so most of any animal behaviours we’re aware of, we’re aware of through observation of captive animals, at least initially. Naturalistic observation, though, confirms homosexual activity of a wide variety of species outside of human influence.

”It’s a freak of nature; their genes don’t get passed on. They’re going against evolution!”

I see and hear this one a lot, and it’s patently stupid for two reasons.

The first of these reasons is that evolution is not a god. It does not have some grand master plan in mind. There is no driving goal behind evolution except to ensure that a given species thrives in a given environment. While this means that a species must have proper energy usage, tools for utilizing its environment, a certain social structure if necessary, etc., it also means, perhaps even more importantly, that a species must be quite various. If a species’ gene pool is small, not only do you get birth defects as damaging recessive genotypes are realized, but you also have the problem in which if the environment changes radically or some similarly traumatic event occurs, the species is unlikely to be able to adapt. It can never be well-told what a species will be required to adapt to, so it is always good to have as much variety as possible without speciation.

The second reason is something called colloquially the Gay Uncle Theory. This theory has received a great deal of acknowledgment in relevant fields, and essentially states that a while homosexuals are less likely to breed than heterosexuals, they are more likely to assist their relatives in child-rearing, increasing what we call inclusive fitness. Those relatives’ children will be more likely to thrive, and they will also be likely to have the same genes that contribute to homosexuality, so they will be likely to pass on those “gay genes” (on that note, it should be considered that homosexuality only has a genetic factor of about 20%). This theory works primarily with humans and other highly social creatures.

What about those who are not terribly social? It should be recognized that sex in animals is not so much like sex in humans, because they lack that cultural taboo and other lofty implications: it’s simply a mutually pleasurable activity. Some early human societies recognized this, and we of course know of Greek soldiers being encouraged to engage in homosexual activities to strengthen bonds in the army. Animals, it seems, think similarly. Whether they are bonobos trying to chill their group out, or a trio of male lions looking to found or capture a pride of their own, homosexual intercourse seems to play a potentially large role in strengthening important social bonds.

Hopefully this article has cleared a few things up for some people. Though I’m afraid that the people that really need to read this likely won’t, and probably wouldn’t change their minds even if they did, and actually, given the nature of this blog, would probably become even more staunchly homophobic, I imagine that those intelligent people who are reading this will later be able to use these facts, reasons, and sources in future debates with the bigots. Godspeed.

"Am I a Zoophile?"

I get this question more often than one might think.  In this last week, I’ve had a couple people ask me this, and my answer comes down to, basically: what does the word “zoophile” even mean in the first place?

Obviously it means a love of animals, but what is the dividing line here?  If I have a dog, and I love him very much, consider him my best friend, and would rather spend time with him than anyone else, human or otherwise, am I a zoophile?  On the other hand, if someone sneaks into farms in the dead of night to bone random horses, is he a zoophile?  It’s a fact that most people don’t know the definition of a zoophile beyond that it’s someone who likes animals “a lot” – usually “too much”.

I don’t think this is a result of the usual stigma against zoophilia, though; rather, it may be the result of the death of a distinguished emotional relationship.  A zoophile is, quite simply and at the very least, someone who has or desires a romantic relationship with an animal.  Once again, though, we’re left with the question of what this means: we don’t know what romance is these days, beyond things like candlelit dinners and wedding proposals.  We don’t tend to do either of these things with the animals we love, so we must provide a more personal and less situational – and less anthropocentric – definition of romance.

Romance is love beyond that in friendship.  It involves a strong fixation that wants stimulation by all three basic senses, but primarily the haptic.  One wants to not just be close to someone, in terms of the mental and social – like how you and your friend share all secrets you have between each other, and thus you are “close” – but also physically close.  This is in preference to being physically close to any other individual.  It’s also an extreme form of friendship in which one will do anything within their power for the sake of another.  Importantly: this friendship and this desire for closeness are reciprocated.  Feelings of romance do come and go, as they’re feelings that take an awful lot out of us, but two people who often have romantic feelings for each other are said to be a romantic couple.

Given this definition, many people do not believe that it is possible for a human and a non-human animal to be in a romantic relationship.  However, it does happen quite frequently; it simply goes unacknowledged.  We often hear about dogs sacrificing greatly for their human owners.  We know of cats that are with their owners all the time, and are so tuned into their emotions that they seem able to sense them from the other side of the building.  The reality is that it is not the animal aspect that is usually the barrier to a romantic relationship: it’s the human that is unwilling or unable to reciprocate.  Our senses are just no match for theirs, and in a lot of ways because of this, we have troubles understanding them.

Some people do, however, manage this.  And those who are at the same time willing to be literally in a relationship with an animal are what we call zoophiles.  But that’s not all that terrifying, people say: it’s perhaps a little odd to love your cat that much, but nothing outrageous.  When we think of zoophilia, we think less of someone who is mutually cuddling his or her furry companion, and seems happiest only when with them, and more of the guy who’s boning his neighbor's sheep in the dead of night.  This perception is false.

Zoophilia usually does involve sexual interaction with animals.  This is because, as humans, we believe that romance naturally leads to sex.  Animals, as creatures without culture and thus without reverence of sex, think of things the other way around, but that’s for another time.  The point I will make here is that there are people who have sex with animals without that romantic relationship, and who have no inclination to forge such a relationship.  These people are not zoophiles: they are what we tend to call bestialists (although bestiality technically means any intercourse between a human and an animal, regardless of the circumstances, a better term is zooerasty).  The zoophilic community will often show their disdain for such individuals.

One does not need to be a zooerast to be a zoophile, or to be a zoophile to be a zooerast, in the same way that one doesn’t need to be homosexual to have intercourse with members of the same sex, and one does not need to have said intercourse to be homosexual.  However, most people who are or do one thing tend to also fit into the other group.  Is this true about zoophilia and bestiality, though?  I would say that it is.  The people we tend to hear about in the news and other media that have abusive intercourse with animals are not zoophiles, but these people are not representative of the zooerast population: they are the people that have difficulty containing themselves, and are often disordered in one way or another in that fulfilling their sexual urges becomes top priority for them.  They have little interest in the romantic.  Those that do – and are thus zoophilic – tend to be more difficult to spot and less likely to sneak into their neighbor’s barn.  Although this is not an area where reliable statistics are easy to come across, from personal experience I would suggest that the zoophilic population is much higher than that of bestialists and “fence-hoppers”: one study shows that fifteen percent of males have had some sort of intentional sexual contact with an animal at some point in their lives.  As much as three percent have continued to do so.  This is a much higher figure than we would think, given that each time another sheep-shagger is arrested, every news blog in the world has something about it.  It’s on this discrepancy between the bestialists who are detained, and the more covert zoophiles, that I base my claim that the latter group is larger than the former.

What about the other way around?  Are there many people who are in romantic relationships with their animals, but not sexual relationships?  This may also be a higher number than we realize, but these people do not often call themselves zoophilic, due to the word’s sexual connotations.  Indeed, they may not even think themselves particularly abnormal; I know many of these people.  There are those, though, that call themselves asexual zoophiles: people who truly love their animals, but have no interest in becoming sexually active with them.  It is a complex topic, and one that really can’t be resolved at the moment.

But really, it’s just a word: zoophile.  It’s a complicated word that attempts to describe a person, like “Christian”, “democrat”, or “bisexual”; and this means that its definition is deceptively difficult to pin down.  Originally, the word literally did just mean “someone who loves animals” – it was in fact used by animal welfare activists before their mortal enemy, the kitty-diddler, stole it from them.  Its definition changes with how people use it, so if you’re asking yourself right now, “Am I a zoophile?” think about this: would you call yourself a zoophile?  Does it benefit you to do so?  Does acquiring this new label help you understand yourself better?  If not, then don’t even worry about it.  You are you, and, as any real zoophile knows, words are overrated: they can’t express love so easily.  And isn’t love what really matters?