Longform twitter thread about the prevailing furry discourse! CW for mentions of pedophilia, bestiality and rape.

Also, this really doesn't only concern furries, but it seems loudest within furry circles right now, so just make mental substitutions as necessary. Anyway:

I think most reasonable furries would ostensibly agree with "as long as you're not hurting anyone else or forcing it on me, whatever floats your boat", AKA the harm principle.

But the argument being had concerns if – and if so, to what extent – depicting really aberrant kinks like cub or bestiality in fiction indirectly creates harm in real life by "normalizing" such actions.

Which, does it really do that? I honestly don't know! I wouldn't want to discount the experiences of those who claim it has, but there's reason to doubt that that assertion is unconditionally true. Is it a 'does', a 'does not', or a 'can'?

But anyway, this prevailing idea has led, especially here, to a culture of hard lines defining what's okay, and what's a red flag on someone's character that requires their removal from a space.

Which is not something that someone's gonna disagree with right away – of course, get abusers, pedophiles, et cetera out of furry spaces. But how exactly do you decide who's a pedophile and who's a zoophile? What counts?

The answer, in my firm submission, is that it depends on how zealous you are.

What about rape? If you follow that logic, surely non-consensual fictional scenarios have to go too, right? What about hypnosis, where consent is often iffy or outright manipulated?

Keep going, and the conclusion you reach is that any kink, or any instance of a kink, that would be unsafe, unsane or unconsensual in reality, is equally unacceptable to depict in fiction.

I don't think it's that lines /can't/ be drawn, and the entire umbrella of 'kink' is an all-or-none thing; it's that those lines /aren't/ being drawn, or agreed on, or even talked about. It's down to prevailing culture and popular opinion.

It seems like people are increasingly enthusiastic about removing bad people from furry spaces, and it also seems like the circle of content acceptable to explore in fiction is shrinking. Someone else will always have stronger opinions than you, and the room rewards that.

Not only is there no discussion being had about the underlying assumptions that inform this kind of culture, at least in my circles, but even /suggesting/ one seems to draw ire.

After all, nobody wants to be the person to defend content of which the production or consumption is seen as morally repugnant and a stain on their character. Because doing so /implies/ things.

In conclusion: It's all a big mess.

Also, IMO this absolutely does relate to general cancel culture, I would even say it's the same phenomenon with similar causes, but a broader conversation about that is way outside the scope of what I can talk about.