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.

@starkatt @shoofle if i may interject, what is "postfurry" anyway

@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/

@starkatt @shoofle this is really really hard to read and is not helping my comprehension very much ;-;

@typhlosion @shoofle Yeah like basically everything else written about postfurry it's intended for an internal audience, not an external one.

@starkatt @shoofle that seems intensely counterproductive

@typhlosion @shoofle It really is :/

This essay is a lot easier http://www.adjectivespecies.com/2015/06/17/on-postfurry/

@starkatt @shoofle i will take a closer look at this in just a bit, thank you

@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

@starkatt @shoofle for me it feels more like i am too... bland, in a lot of ways? to throw myself into these concepts, despite liking the sound of them. like my worldview is too straightforward for this stuff or something. it's hard to put my finger on

@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]"

@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

@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