(2020-09-27 16:43)LycanTheory Wrote: My bottom line is that we should not accept being forced to let "kinnies", intersectionality and identity politics bastardize and erode our culture, our meaning of what therianthropy is and the way we view being or feeling non-human.
The missing context is that for some time, there was agreement among the staff that... There has been a push in many communities (everything from us Therians to completely culture-based stuff like Furries), to make the community available to a wider audience and in the process we've been asked to betray our origins.
For example, people in the furry community see a problem with people having feral (quadrupedal) fursonas, because they feel this offends against some people's sensibilities. Yet, having an animal fursona is at the core of what furry is all about (a point no doubt felt more strongly by therians in the furry community) and by changing furry into something that is more compatible with a wider audience, they are effectively destroying what Furry used to be.
Realising a similar push has been occurring in Therian communities -- the desire to deny or exclude certain therian experiences in an effort to make Therianthropy more palatable for a wider audience -- we decided to push back. Therianthropy doesn't have to be popular, it however does have to stay true to Therian experiences.
The argument @
LycanTheory presents here is... related.
Personally I don't see any harm in Alt+H being some kind of an umbrella that includes Therianthropy for what it actually is. But I have always been opposed to attempts to merge all of the varied experiences of Fiction, Therians and Otherkin into a single concept. Our experiences differ, our history differs. Yes, some people do not understand the differences, but it's not all the same thing, it never was.
I am sure that everyone with actual Therian experiences understands the significance of those beyond simple identity. If there is some kind of push to simplify what we experience into the largest common denominator, we are loosing what Therianthropy is actually all about.
Yes by rejecting that push, it will make Therianthropy less popular and accepted by fewer people. Heck, it might even make some people refuse to associate with us. But at least we will still have a community, for actual Therians. A home where there are people, who understand and accept those with Therian experiences -- the actual reason we are all here.
LP,
Dusty