im scared of this silicon dawn set because it's so cool and it's been built up so much and i'm scared because what if it doesn't feel like anything for me. what if im not into it and it just feels like meaningless randomly selected cards
@shoofle it's built out of a very specific cultural context (postfurry) so if it doesn't resonate that's okay? It's not about you being right for a deck, it's about the deck being right for you, yeah?
@starkatt postfurry stuff has always felt like. like it's laser aimed at me but it never feels available to me as a genuine thing, like the only context i ever encounter it feels delayed through five levels of performance and so it feels weird. and like i get the sense that that's the only way it exists. but it still feels weird sometimes to me
@shoofle It's... bah. I'm "a member of that community" and have a lot of complicated feelings. It definitely is filtered through five layers of performance and post-structuralism and post-irony but the core social spaces are also hella gated and elitist; you're not imagining things.
@shoofle It's like, there's an internal cultural conceit that the ideals of postfurry are somehow niche, which becomes self-fulfilling when evangelizing is only directed inwards.
@typhlosion @shoofle Short version: furry + posthumanism + poststructuralism + cyberpunk.
Much longer answer: a kind of overwrought three-part essay: http://orrery.prismaticmedia.com/2016/12/24/postfurry-101-the-pledge/
@typhlosion @shoofle Yeah like basically everything else written about postfurry it's intended for an internal audience, not an external one.
@typhlosion @shoofle It really is :/
This essay is a lot easier http://www.adjectivespecies.com/2015/06/17/on-postfurry/
@starkatt @typhlosion I... Honestly don't feel like there's necessarily much enrichment to be had from reading about what exactly defines post furry at this point
@typhlosion @starkatt lemme correct that - I don't think I've ever gotten anything from reading about postfurry history and etiology except for a vague unease that I either don't belong because I wasn't there, or that I'm supposed to be laughing at everyone involved
@typhlosion @starkatt @shoofle we're technically part of the community too, but also feel the same level of... shame/self-recrimination? and i almost wonder if part of that is, like.
"theoretically, postfurry should be vast and interesting and freeing. but it doesn't feel that way? but all these people can't be wrong, so the problem must be on *me,* right? [as opposed to the ideology or community]"
@typhlosion @starkatt @shoofle *rel8a8le.* and honestly, that's kind of an ironic feeling to have for a community that theoretically prides itself on uncertainty, and fluidity, and experimentation. i really h8 the idea that we. have to prove ourselves as cool/interesting/fluid/weird/etc enough in order to even find out whether the community is or isn't worth interacting with.
@starryblush @starkatt @shoofle yeeeah =w=
i really am not very cool/interesting/weird though. i'm a decently well-off cis white guy who hasn't more than dipped toes in anything spiritual or, uh, i guess the word is identity-variant? a lot of the impressions i get from reading on postfurry stuff resonate with me but i kinda feel locked into this space of "no, you're not a cool kid, you don't get to sit at their table"
@starryblush @starkatt @typhlosion hey let's make our own table
Not in an angry separatist way just like
Let's make a table
@shoofle @starryblush @starkatt i don't think ikea is open at this time of night
@typhlosion @shoofle @starkatt i'm not even sure i could get to the closest ikea on public transit. we should probably just get the table on amazon
@typhlosion @starkatt @shoofle at the risk of being trite, everyone who jumped into the identity-variant pool started outside it. we are literally unrecognizable from what/how/who we thought we were this time in 2010. and imo, that doesn't have to be the case for you, and it's okay if it's enough, but it's a shame not to give yourself permission to explore at all?
@starryblush @typhlosion @shoofle ...you just said what I was trying to compose, but better <3
@starkatt @shoofle @starryblush well it's not paralyzing to the point that it's keeping me from even learning, because learning is very important to me! it's just tough to feel like i'm properly "getting into" it, i suppose - tough to know where to start, because jumping right in headfirst feels like it'd both be overwhelming and make me feel like i'm just pretending most of the time
@typhlosion @starkatt @shoofle @starryblush By now I'm sure you've heard somebody say it, but I will just in case anyway. I think everyone's felt like they're just pretending at some point. It's okay, really.
@typhlosion @starryblush @shoofle @starkatt congrats :) you're a postfurry!
@Fuego @typhlosion Seconded. ^.^
@typhlosion @Fuego Well, which build do you want to aim for, 'shiny service-bot', 'betentacled ocean-friend', or 'glowy rave-toy'?
@typhlosion @Fuego Well, that's okay, arguably pokefurs are postfurry BY DEFAULT, see part 3 of my seven-part medium thinkpiece on the subject.
i think i'll just do my usual thing and maybe not treat these kinds of ideas as a full creed so much as take what interests me and hack on it til it feels more like me
will probably keep you all posted if any of the resulting changes in my self-identification and behavior are actually things i recognize
@typhlosion @Fuego Hmm, that sounds like "doing postfurry" to me. ^.^
@typhlosion @indi I identify as "ditzy bitch that hates technology" so there's a big range.
@typhlosion @indi you are so on my wavelength. I write kernel exploits for a living. It's like invoking horrors.
@typhlosion @indi I... also have all of those things...
@Fuego @typhlosion Yeah I think @Fuego hates computers like a miner hates rocks: "There's too fucking much of it all around me and it could collapse and kill us all" ;)
@typhlosion @Fuego "...And I have to work on it all day ANYWAY"
@indi @typhlosion cantankerous-miner-sona
@indi @typhlosion and yet I still trek into he mines every day :/
@typhlosion @starryblush @shoofle As far as identity stuff goes the best advice I have is to surround yourself with people who share the things that you feel might be resonant but you're not Enough of. Having possibility models --seeing that these things are actually things people can be -- is crucial.
@shoofle @starryblush @typhlosion Seeing how people live those things is also important for seeing the diversity in what being That can mean in practice. The dominant narratives make it seem like it's 100% That Thing in all ways all the time, but nobody ever is.
@typhlosion @starkatt @starryblush same tho... That's one of the reasons I dislike seeing something as widely applicable as this as a community rather than a conceptual toolkit. But anyway. Imo the curiosity is enough calling so long as you're not being judgmental about it
@starkatt @starryblush @typhlosion for what it's worth I get that feeling a whole lot and my guess here is that it's probably wise to explore even if it feels fake
@typhlosion @starryblush @shoofle @starkatt I kinda think coming up with a textual definition of "postfurry" is just as difficult as doing the same for "furry"... possibly compounded by the fact that it's defined IN TERMS of furry.
@starkatt @shoofle @starryblush @typhlosion The best definitions I've found for both tend to be in the DOING; you can tell when someone's 'doing furry stuff' without having words for it exactly. You can say stuff like "it's an anthropomorphic animal, and it's being handled in a way that is *waves hands vaguely* so it's furry." And that means it's basically a social-context definition, and THAT means the subject is fraught and awkward in a ton of different ways.
@starkatt @shoofle @starryblush to me it's like... i feel like there oughta be this "if you don't feel the calling then you don't belong here" type of je ne sais quoi sensation that i just lack, like trying to investigate this more would just be an act of imposterism
idk