Part 3 - January 8, 2003
I was talking with Giza
on FurryMUCK earlier today, and he mentioned something that got me
thinking about furry fandom's self-image problem (as opposed to image
problem, which while it could be better, really isn't that bad... but
that's another story).
Every now and then, I'll stumble across someone saying "I don't like furries because they're [angsty/whiny/irresponsible/in-your-face/insert random bad qualities here]." (For clarification, that isn't a quote from Giza, it's just an example of the attitude I'm talking about.)
I maintain that's not a Furry thing, that's an Idiot thing. There's people with bad qualities in any group. Being in Furry fandom doesn't have anything to do with that.
Now, I'll admit part of the reason I've never been able to understand that
attitude is because I only hang around with cool people, so maybe I'm
biased. I've no doubt there are bad people in the fandom, but in my
experience they've been the exception, not the rule.
Consider this similar example: Someone who had just gotten started on
LiveJournal was lamenting that they didn't see what what so great about
it—all it seemed to be was lots of drama and people being angsty. Out
of curiosity, I checked their Friends list, and he was right... there was
lots of drama and angst. No wonder he was complaining! The funny thing
is, that was more a result of hooking up to angsty people than a
quality of LiveJournal.
I am reminded of the Discordian Sermon on Ethics and Love.
("WHAT IS THE MATTER WITH THAT, IF IT IS WHAT YOU WANT TO DO?" "But
nobody wants it! Everybody hates it." "OH. WELL, THEN STOP.")
Or, as Al Goldman said: If your life is full of evil people, then you need to find new people.
Life, like furry fandom, LiveJournal, or pretty much anything else worth
doing, is what you make of it. Folks can choose to surround themselves
with negative people so they can feel justified in complaining about
how miserable things are, but I'd say they don't have a realistic
perspective.
The argument could be made that I don't have a realistic perspective, either... but keep in mind I'm not the one who's
complaining about it. -:)
|
