Why is therianthropy involuntary? A definitional boundry.

That's something I wanted to see being thoroughly discussed on the forums, however I am having trouble finding any clear threads about it, so I am starting my own. If I missed something, I apologize.
This idea stems from a discussion in another community claiming that therianthropy is voluntary, which feels very wrong to me. As someone who wouldn't choose to be a therian despite loving some aspects of it, it's something I can't simply get rid of, regardless of how much I've tried.

That got me thinking, though...what exactly do we mean when we say therianthropy is "involuntary"?

In my opinion, experiences themselves are what are the most involuntary, because many describe it as something they didn't intentionally "create", however experience isn't involuntary by definition either. You can choose an activity, but you cannot choose/control the results of one, nor the feelings/sensations. Even if someone intentionally explored their identity through meditation, visualization, or other things, would the eventual sense of identity be something they consciously chose, or something that emerged beyond their direct control?
It does get blurry. It's not like an on/off switch. You might voluntarily engage in things that influence your mind, while the resulting experiences and how deeply they remain are outside of your control.

It's easy to say that we didn't choose to be a therian, however what exactly wasn't chosen? Was it the experiences.. identity, interpretation of those experiences?
There is at least some degree of interpretation involved, but at the same time, that doesn't necessarily mean the identity is a conscious choice. You don't simply decide what feels authentic to you. At most, you choose whether to accept it, reject it, or how you describe it.

All of it combines different ideas into one statement, it could mean different things.
Saying therianthropy is entirely involuntary can be a community boundary, but it becomes complicated when it is treated as a fact about identity formation, since experiences, interpretation, and self-identification can involve different levels of agency.

Definitions often do more than just describe something, they also create a distinction between one thing and another. In this case, defining therianthropy as involuntary helps separate it from things like roleplay, intentionally choosing an animal identity, or other forms of identification. That doesn't necessarily mean those other experiences are less meaningful or less genuine. It just means that, within the common definition of therianthropy, involuntariness is used as one of the criteria for what falls under the term.

The question is whether "involuntary" is describing a consistent part of the experience itself, or whether it is also a boundary created to preserve a distinction between different experiences that might otherwise overlap, because if it is a boundary, then saying "therianthropy is involuntary" is partly about how the word is defined, not necessarily a statement that every possible form of therianthroopy can only happen involuntarily.

So, when you say therianthropy is involuntary, what exactly do you mean by that? Is it the experiences, the identity itself, the inability to change it, or something else?

When I personally describe my therianthropy as involuntary, it is because the main chunk of what I think, feel, and experience comes without my input. When I experience phantom limbs, it is usually because I just woke up or felt a gust of wind. When I feel that strangely intense urge to gape my jaw at people who piss me off, it comes as a sudden pulse of instinct and not something I decide would be a good idea. When I feel a profound sadness at the way my chest seems caved in, unable to hold flight muscles, it is out of my claws. I do not choose to feel sad. It simply happens. These are things I deal with, put up with, sometimes hate, sometimes enjoy. I am not in control of when these feelings appear and I did not ask for them, nor can I get rid of them or stop them happening.

There are voluntary aspects, of course. I choose to cover my home in banshees. I choose to paint myself at times. I choose to dress in bright colours. I sometimes choose to manifest phantom sensations to minimise dysphoria. These are all parts of my experience, but they are indeed brought on. Would I say these are integral to the experience? No. If I didn't experience dysphoric sensations I likely wouldn't do any of this. I can stop doing these at any time. Are they false or fraudulent experiences because I choose to behave in these ways? No, they're part of how I present and manage myself. I can understand people when they say some aspects are voluntary as a result. To say the entire thing can be voluntary though? No, I do not understand or believe that.

I often wonder if it is a fundamental misunderstanding that leads people to say it is voluntary. Yes, I chose the label. Yes, I chose to identify as an ikran. That sounds bad and very anti-therianthropic, but think about it this way:

I chose to use the therian label because I experience therianthropy.
I chose to identify as an ikran because the ikran fits my experiences to a T and is the best representation of what I feel.

Is this what people mean when they say the identity is voluntary? If so, it is leading to some very harsh misunderstandings and discourse that could so easily be avoided if everyone was on the same page.
I often think the identity-first language is a bit of a bane on the community at times and if this is the case, it is yet another example of why experiences need to be at the forefront of what it means to be nonhuman.

We aren't therians ourselves but are still nonhuman and would like to talk about this.

When we look within we see ourselves as something nonhuman, we did nothing to influence this and did not choose to look like what we are on the inside. We're all different kinds of nonhumans.

Firefly did decide to identify as an attack helicopter for fun however. They did not look inside and see an attack helicopter, but they did want to take back the term that anti-alterhumans and anti-trans people use and make it into something fun.

(Today 17:46)Emi Wrote:  I often wonder if it is a fundamental misunderstanding that leads people to say it is voluntary. Yes, I chose the label. Yes, I chose to identify as an ikran. That sounds bad and very anti-therianthropic, but think about it this way:

I chose to use the therian label because I experience therianthropy.
I chose to identify as an ikran because the ikran fits my experiences to a T and is the best representation of what I feel.

We find what you said here to be very interesting, often when someone claims to be a therian and says that they chose their theriotype they get backlash. But when you phrase it like that, you technically do choose a theriotype that best fits you. So why does this happen??

I think that over time the word "Chose" seems to have become a word that will get you backlash in certain alterhuman spaces and may be interpreted in the same way no matter context. Even if you didn't specify you were otherlink or that you chose that creature as a type because it fit your experience.

We've also noticed that some therians on certain platforms absolutely REFUSE to accept that you can voluntarily identify as something, or view otherlinks as lesser than involuntary identities

There's nothing wrong with voluntarily identifying as something, it's just that it would fit the label otherlink. And that's perfectly okay, this identity can be just as powerful and just as valid as therianthrope. I'd also like to note that it's absolutely not anti-therian

(Today 17:18)Murray Wrote:  Definitions often do more than just describe something, they also create a distinction between one thing and another. In this case, defining therianthropy as involuntary helps separate it from things like roleplay, intentionally choosing an animal identity, or other forms of identification. That doesn't necessarily mean those other experiences are less meaningful or less genuine. It just means that, within the common definition of therianthropy, involuntariness is used as one of the criteria for what falls under the term.

I think it's worth noting that, in the situation that inspired this conversation, a therian was being belittled for their definition of therianthropy (as a non-voluntary experience), because their perspective was in the minority (on a large alterhuman discord guild).

There are a lot more non-therians than there are therians, so as a rule, therians who experience therianthropy as we do, will always be in the minority. And this means that we cannot rely on the normal mechanism by which society at large decides whether someone's identity is to be validated or not: Which is that if you don't qualify in the view of the majority, you simply have to accept that nobody is going to believe you.

The only thing we will ever have in this regard is our individual perspectives. In other words, we will not be able to impose our definitions, however we will still be able to hold individual opinions and the option not to acknowledge people who believe differently.

(Today 17:46)Emi Wrote:  I chose to use the therian label because I experience therianthropy.
I chose to identify as an ikran because the ikran fits my experiences to a T and is the best representation of what I feel.

Views I agree with all round, but especially this.

My identity is secondary to my experience of therianthropy. I did not choose my therianthropy and in fact there are people out there who reject their therianthropy, yet are still therians.


As I've said elsewhere though, I think identity isn't really as central to therianthropy as people make it out to be. I think therianthropy is primarily the experience, which is why therianthropy is commonly described as a vague animalistic nature. Meanwhile identity itself is much more relevant to the otherkin, to whom identifying as a specific type of creature is much more significant (aka, identifying as a unicorn, rather than experiencing horse-like tendencies).

The fact that young people cannot tell the difference between said groups is part of the reason why understanding of this topic is as poor as it is.

LP,
Dusty

(Today 20:24)DustWolf Wrote:  My identity is secondary to my experience of therianthropy. I did not choose my therianthropy and in fact there are people out there who reject their therianthropy, yet are still therians.

While I'm new here, I will say this is the perspective I have of therianthropy at this time. If it isn't experience-first, it's more of a wish than what actually is. That would place it in the fandom category, and then what would the differences be between therians and furries?

The involuntary point is what crystallizes the experiences as just those - not vacations of choice, but actual reality. The simplest comparison I can make here is the number of people who try to "pray away the gay" but can't. As one who attempted to as a teenager, it became very clear to me involuntary nature is still true whether one chooses to identify with it or not. In fact, I'd argue that experience, painful as it was, made it extremely apparent to me that aspect of myself was not a choice. Therianthropy is much alike in that regard, I believe.