For Young Therians -- Please Read

oooh looklook !! Es me !!!! :D

I loev drawing my forms in realistic styles it's so much "yayayyay !!"

if yur curious, it's a mix of Fallow Deer, Timber Wolf, and muy phantom wings teehee

One time I was walking around by myself downtown (don't remember what I was doing there lol) and was wearing one of my tails, and as I crossed the street some younger teens (probably like late middle school/early high school) started barking at me once we were on different sides of the street. I turned around and playfully was like "C'mon I literally hear that all the time, be more original!", to which they then proceeded to start meowing at me instead. Then a couple of them started apologizing for their friend's behavior, and one of them asked if it (referring to my tail) was a kink thing. "No, I just think it looks cool :)" I told them before they waved at me and walked off.

Honestly shout out to them lol, I hardly ever get negative reactions out in public with my gear but when I do it's almost always kids just trying to goof around and look cool in front their friends, and most likely aren't genuinely trying to be malicious. Never put yourself in danger or submit to harassment ofc, but also never forget that taking a second to put your guard down and just talking to someone can go a really long way.

jsyk, most people aren’t dickwads about therian gear irl.

whenever i do quads, it’s public quads becuase i don’t have a backyard, i live in an apartment complex.

i have had in depth conversations with people who reacted positively to seeing me do quads.

i have talked at length with unhoused people in full therian gear (using only my AAC no less)

i literally just waved and said hi (with gestures, bc i can’t talk) to some landscapers who were cleaning up the grass on the field i usually do quads at! they asked me how i was doing and i nodded and smiled.

it’s literally only losers on social media who are gonna shit on you. i have gotten one, irl negative reaction to someone seeing me do quads in full gear. which was immediately shut down when i smiled and waved.

in general, real life people don’t care how you’re dressed, or that you’re doing a weird sport. they care that you are kind and pleasant to them.

if they do care, being out in public and being face to face (and not hiding behind a screen) with you is gonna greatly change how they interact with you.

do whatever you want forever. no one is gonna stop you. i love you.

maybe there's something im not understanding here, and honestly at the end of the day i don't really care one way or the other this is a pretty exclusively online topic, but the whole "neo/xeno AGAB" thing is like... vaguely transphobic right?

and i am absolutely 100% NOT the person to try to tell others how they should identify or what labels they should be using, im literally a transmasc nonbinary mspec/queer lesbian transspecies werewolf who uses xeno pronouns for fucks sake, it doesn't really get anymore "queer as in wtf is going on" than that.

but from what i've seen and read about it, it kind of seems to be simultaneously reinventing and discrediting the definition of transgender. To directly quote the "AGAB Non-Conformity" infographic made by @/nonconformityhub,

"Those who reject their AGAB, are unassigned, or were forced to fit a binary sex at birth may wish to self-assign a different AGAB. It's based around the idea that we shouldn't be forced to stick with a falsely assigned gender."

like, am i not understanding something or is that literally just the definition of being transgender or gnc?? i think the thing that rubs me the wrong way about it is that it almost kinda implies that as a transgender individual you should or need to disclose the gender you were assigned at birth to others, which (unless it's for legal or health related reasons) you literally just don't. If you are a trans man, congratulations, you are a man. You don't have to be an "AFAB man", you're just a man. As far as anyone else needs to be concerned, you are male and have always been such. The whole point of being trans is to reject the gender you were assigned at birth because it's flat out not what you are.

Idk again I don't really care that much I don't think it's gonna single handedly set back trans liberation or anything of that sort, I just feel like we SHOULD be focusing on dismantling the system of assigning genders at birth to begin with and reasserting that sex ≠ gender, rather than simply modifying the system to appeal to certain individuals and disregarding preexisting communities trying to accomplish that goal, and would maybe just encourage everyone to look at this kind of stuff with some healthy skepticism

the amount of therians and "supporters" ive seen lately trying to claim that "therians don't identify as animals" is genuinely concerning

like actually how did misinformation spread get this bad ?? that is the entire fucking point of therianthropy what are you talking about my dog in christ

yes, i identify as an animal. no, not in an ironic or metaphorical or satirical or for funsies way. i am an animal. i am a therianthrope. stop watering down our labels so that you can appeal to judgmental humans who don't give a shit about us i am begging you

one day very soon therianthropy/nonhuman identities are gonna hit mainstream and i can tell you right now it is NOT gonna be pretty

Im gonna say smth that a lot of yall aren't gonna like but whatever Im tired of nobody talking about it.

The therian community's obsession with zoos is stunting a lot of the cultural growth that we could be having rn.

Soooo many of us are so goddamn busy with trying to prove that we're not zoos or accusing each other of being zoos or shouting from every rooftop available that we're different than zoos, when we could be doing so many more productive things.

You wanna keep potentially dangerous individuals out of the community, I understand that, really I do. But do you wanna know how many animals are saved from abuse by us dogpiling (no pun intended) on someone who incorporates their nonhumanity into kink? Or who speaks honestly about genitalia dysphoria, or instincts to court members of the species they identify as? Or hell, who even acknowledges that there is an overlap between therianthropy and zoo attraction? Zero.

It doesn't really protect anyone, all it does is prevent us from speaking honestly about our experiences, diving into the nitty gritty of what it actually means to be an animal living as and among humans, out of fear that something we told to someone in confidence is going to end up in a google doc next week. No, wanting to have nonhuman body parts does not automatically make you attracted to biological animals. No, being attracted to alterhumans over humans does not automatically make you attracted to biological animals. No, wishing you had a nonhuman family does not automatically make you attracted to biological animals. The only thing that makes you attracted to biological animals is being attracted to biological animals. It truly is not rocket science.

I haven't seen it be as much of an issue here on Tumblr because I guess there's overall less mob mentality and beings are more capable of using critical thinking skills, it's just been frustrating watching so many of the younger/newer members of the community turn into the "crucify zoos at any and all costs" club and trying to strong arm all forms of animalistic sexual expression out of the community to avoid any possible association with zoos from outsiders (spoiler alert: you could sanitize the entire community to the point of chemical burns and uneducated doorknobs would still swear up and down that every last one of us are zoos)

Being trans nonbinary is so annoying because my brain is like "We have dysphoria, let's transition so we can pass!"

Pass as what?

It's so stupid hard to "pass" as androgynous to the general public. It's this obnoxiously thin line that feels completely out of reach to get to, at least not without giving up other forms of gender expression that feel euphoric to me. I wouldn't even mind not being fully androgynous, if nothing else I just want to make people stop and think for a second before they inevitably go ahead and misgender me anyways.

It sucks that the best I can hope for in terms of transition is confusion. I see trans binary folks talking about the euphoria they get from passing and being accepted in society as their true gender, having the ability to go stealth. And I desperately want that too. I wish people weren't so hellbent on sorting others into binaries at all costs, and I wish there was hrt that could make me androgynous without giving me other traits that I dont want (ex. facial hair, bottom growth, heavily masculine voice). I literally just want to be seen as who I actually am and it's crushing knowing Im probably never going to get to have that.