Is TikT0k Harming Therians?

i actually found out about therians this way, i do find quads interesting. though finding out about therians this way more or less just made me think of it as a mostly religious thing and a sort of fandom since it was mostly young furries i saw doing this. it actually took me a while to research what therians actually are before i thought i might be one, i really do think the way tiktok handles therian information yeah bad but i really cant see a way to stop it. i feel like most will eventually stop since it is little kids spreading alot of misinformation and making up stories of past lives

If I’m being honest, nothing good comes from TikTok in general. Yes I think it is harming therians.
When I had TikTok (a few years ago, I deleted it), I saw a lot of quadrobics videos. However, among those were those rpg type “become a therian” videos with some stupid pop song or other playing in the background.
A lot of misinformation is spread through a platform as such. That is why it is so harmful. I don’t want to sound like everyone’s parents, but I think TikTok is harming this generation. It’s a shame how short some peoples attention spans have become.
The hate communities too? Unbelievable. People who make those are just insecure little bullies who get a kick out of making fun of others.

Yes, tiktok harms therians, I've been on tiktok a while and there is so much misinformation it kinda makes my head hurt, it makes so many people hate on therians when they don't actually know what therianthropy is.
Personally i like doing quadrobics, but only for fun, it doesn't really make me feel connected to my kintypes, running through a forest on all fours make me connect just as much as running through a forest on two legs, I understand how it does help some people connect to their kintypes, it's just annoying how people are called fake therians for not doing it.
Oh and the tiktoks where 'therians' talk about their past lives... ahahah- I saw a tiktok of someone who said they used to be a cat and lived in a clan, not a clowder but a warrior cats clan, the cats also had very warrior cats sounding names which is pretty unrealistic because last time i checked stray/feral cats don't have names, it was a video where they were searching for another cat from their past life and there was so many fake therians in the replies saying they remembered it(around 300 comments)
There are some good therian tiktokers but the majority is just kids roleplaying and seeing it as a trend, not even knowing the actual definition of therianthropy.. The best thing to do about this is to educate them and hope they'll listen

(2023-01-13 14:50)sprucefox Wrote:  Oh and the tiktoks where 'therians' talk about their past lives... ahahah- I saw a tiktok of someone who said they used to be a cat and lived in a clan, not a clowder but a warrior cats clan, the cats also had very warrior cats sounding names which is pretty unrealistic because last time i checked stray/feral cats don't have names, it was a video where they were searching for another cat from their past life and there was so many fake therians in the replies saying they remembered it(around 300 comments)

This makes me so glad I found tg before tiktok. I used to be a warrior cat kid, and if I had been on tiktok when I discovered therians, I think I would have ended up just as misinformed as these kids. I would understand if they were talking about fictionkin, but I doubt many kids on that app even know what otherkin is, let alone any alterhuman terms (other than therian of course).

And 300 comments... that just rubs me the wrong way. At this point, they're all roleplayers using the wrong label. And I kinda hate to say that since I don't mind kids having fun, and I was once like them. But when they're interfering with a community of people with a very specific identity, trying to be this community while being so misinformed on something as simple as the definition, that's where I draw the line.

warrior cats are everywhere

don't waste time trying to explain or convince, no one will listen, in a few years they will realize it on their own.

As someone who has been around the therian/otherkin circles for a long while none of this is new outside of it being tiktok. Terms like fluffies, wolfaboo, tumblerkin, etc etc etc. have always existed in this community. For me, I've never had a tiktok but I still have run into all of this same kind of stuff before on other mediums and have left a number of groups and spaces (one as recently as a couple months ago) over this exact thing. I've seen someone litterally go from tantrum because someone didn't like their favorite video game to two days later suddenly being kin with its characters and having shifts because they had "now accepted" i've seen a group of "kitsune" sit around in a skype group discussing how to calculate their spiritual power levels and how it made them superior to the furries, I've seen "gods" or "servents/children of gods" who every day have a new story how they are more god like and invincible than they were before. It has been over twenty years now since I awoke and really nothing has changed outside of the platforms used. Is it problematic for a community that has to fight for its broader legitimacy? Most certainly yes. Is there much that can be done about it? Unfortunately to sound pessimistic, not really. At this point I am well and truely into my thirties and to put it simply until such a time as the community stops simply being a "fringe group" I do not see much we can do outside of what we already do.

to be as honest as i can, yes and no. but dont come at me, i have my reasoning.

Personally, tiktok was the way i actually found out about my therianthropy. i think i saw that one tiktoker opal.n.friends doing quads and i was like "woah what..thats so cool what is this?" so i looked further into it and i was like "WOAH IS THIS WHAt I HAVE BEEN MISSING THIS WHOLE TIME?!?!" so yeah.

personally i think that the tiktok side of therianthropy can indeed be spreading a lot of misinformation, but it also can help people like me to come to terms with their identity.

(2023-01-14 21:54)tobeaoo Wrote:  Personally, tiktok was the way i actually found out about my therianthropy. i think i saw that one tiktoker opal.n.friends doing quads and i was like "woah what..thats so cool what is this?" so i looked further into it and i was like "WOAH IS THIS WHAt I HAVE BEEN MISSING THIS WHOLE TIME?!?!" so yeah.

I was the same way lol. even though I said on a previous reply that I'm glad I found TG before tiktok, I still admire how expressive therians on that app are. I'm still fascinated by quads and how some people who are still teens can manage to jump 3+ feet in the air on all fours. It's kinda mesmerizing really. And opal in particular is still one of my favorite tiktokers :3

I don't feel like it's especially detrimental to the therian community. A key element of social media is the ever-presence and overabundance of information and entertainment. Younger people at around that age are looking for something to latch onto that makes them feel like they're a part of a community. Another key thing that occurs around those ages is figuring out one's identity. Exploration of identity is how we learn about ourselves. For better or for worse, that just seems to be the way those explorations are manifesting on TikTok.

I don't mean to imply that I condone the types of verbal abuse you mention that some of them are using against other therians. I certainly do not. Rather that it's going to run its course regardless of any intervention any individual may have.

If any of the younger audiences on TikTok right now latch on to therianthropy and realize as they grow that this is their identity, then excellent. They will carry that with them, learn more about it, and fill in the gaps in knowledge they may have. If any of them latch onto it and realize, "Whoa, that wasn't right for me at all," then that's just as well and they'll move on to something else. Social media makes that an easy thing to do since there's always something else more interesting right around the corner.

In the end, it's always easier to live and let live as long as it's not causing any kind of harm to anyone or groups of people. That's just my opinion and perspective on it though.

(Edited for clarity.)

I think Tiktok is definitely harming thertians/the therian community. A lot.

First, and most obviously, it's making it seem like quadrobics and wearing masks of an animal you like is all there is to therianthropy. It's not. I've seen more comments than I can count on quadrobics videos saying, "I wish I was a therian" or "I think i'm a therian, I really like walking around on all fours", and it just completely warps what being a therian really means.

Second, it attracts hate to therians like a magnet. Tiktok often goes extremely viral, and if quadrobics content is all people see about therianthropy, they're going to assume that's what therianthropy is. I've told people that i'm a therian and they've responded with, "Oh, so you're one of those people who walk around on all fours wearing masks?" And it's extremely annoying. Most people who see viral tiktok therian content are haters, or at least don't understand therianthropy. I'd rather therians know what therianthropy is, and not many others, but that's not possible with therian tiktoks.

It's also becoming a 'trend' to post these, and even though I know there are lots of wolves, foxes, and cats in the therian community, this percentage is vastly inflated on tiktok. It's pretty hard to find other theriotypes on social media than these three, which makes me think that some of these 'therians' are just kids who like these animals.

While I agree with many that this 'trend' will eventually die, if it gets too big, it's going to be what this generation mainly thinks of therians. Little kids running around on all fours wearing masks.