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A few years back , I had the opportunity during a large convention to converse with a fursuiter whose talents and antics I admired greatly. Long ago, you see, before furry was much of an organized fandom I was a suiter myself. As we spoke, just a few feet away two dogs and some sort of feline were playing gently with a little boy and girl, whose eyes were as big as saucers. All was going well until another suiter– who I’ll very carefully fail to describe– walked up, took his head off, and asked one of the dogs when the F he was going to come back to the room. And that, needless, to say, ended that. In a flash the moment was gone and the offended parents were dragging their screaming kids away.

“There ought to be a law against that,” I muttered.

“Yeah,” my friend replied. “Abuse of magic in the first degree.”

For fursuits are magical, you know. Anyone who’s ever worn one in public understands this, all the way to the innermost depths of their soul. The human mind is built to function via the complex interaction of symbols, and few objects carry more symbolic weight than a ‘suit. Putting one on messes with your head – and those of others – by eliminating or masking all the cultural symbol-sets by which others understand at a glance who you are and how you fit in. Your hairstyle, your clothing, your posture and gait…even your face, the most important identifier of all, is whisked away. No one can even tell for sure if you’re male or female. All the social markers so vital to everyday hominid life are tossed to the winds, leaving all who see you adrift and in a state of vague unease.

The effect is double upon the suiter himself, however. When he looks in the mirror, he greets a total stranger. A blank slate, in other words, whose duty it is for him to fill out and bring to life. The “mask effect” is well known in psychological circles, so I won’t belabor it here. Suffice it to say instead that a good costume, particularly a whole-body one like most fursuits, is both liberating and exhilarating. For my own part, wearing one had the effect of sort of turning up the “contrast” knob on life. Everything became sharper edged, I grew more aware of my surroundings… Every second of every minute burned itself into my memory. I was alive, in short, fully and completely in a manner that I’ve never achieved in any other way. I wasn’t a very good fursuiter – in fact, I rather stank at it and that’s why I gave it up. Yet…those few hours I spent here and there in suit remain among the most intense memories of my life.

These mental/social identity-softening effects lie at the root of a fursuit’s magic, and also explain why it’s so powerful. Nothing affects how we see the universe more profoundly than our viewpoint, and nothing I can think of short of hallucinogens in massive doses does more to alter said viewpoint (on the part of the suiter and bystanders alike) than a fursuit.

This is particularly true of children, whose grasp on reality is still not yet all that firm to begin with. After all, are their TV screens not alive with capering animals who smile and laugh and play? The jump from reality to fantasy is much smaller for them, so that the mere sight of a decently-made fursuit can transport them into a sort of delightful alternate world.

“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” I can hear my patient readers thinking just about now. “We all know that clowns and such have a special role in society, and that it’s wrong to break the illusion and ruin the magic.” But… As furries, I suspect we’ve grown a bit jaded to the wonder of it all. We tend to forget how powerful our magic is, like the unnamed fursuiter in my opening example, and abuse it with more terrible effects than we know.

Back when I fursuited, the only venues available were kid-related activities. The first major one I “worked” was playing the Easter Bunny at an orphanage for abused little girls. It was a pretty tough gig, because most of the residents were in their teens and thought a guy in a bunnysuit was about the uncoolest thing possible. But one little girl about six or seven years old – I’ll call her “Alice” – met me with wide eyes and asked “Are you a real rabbit?”

“Of course!” I reassured her. Then for the next hour she prattled on and on with me about what it was like to be a bunny while I improvised. “Of course I eat grass! But only cooked grass – I’m a civilized rabbit!” Then the Easter Egg hunt was finally held, and while Alice was off hunting eggs (she won!) the orphanage’s counselors closed in on me en-masse and demanded to know what I’d been talking to her so long and intently about. At first I was angry – it sounded like they were accusing me of something pretty terrible.

“No!” they explained. “It’s not that at all. You see, she was terribly abused about six months ago, and hasn’t said a single word to anyone since.”

When Alice came back with first prize she was still full of chatter, and when I left she was energetically telling her counselors all about me. Half of them were crying.

And so was I.

So… Fursuits are magic of a very special and sacred kind. No one will ever convince me otherwise. Not only that, but they’re potent. Those wearing them carry deep obligations to use their powers responsibly. Far too few seem to understand this, in my book.

And the fursuiter who used the F-word in front of children with his head off in public? He told me to F myself a few minutes later, when I tried to explain my concerns. It’s too bad that every story can’t have a happy ending.

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What’s the smallest, cheapest, fastest, newest, and most powerful gaming console? Don’t know? How about this one. There have been between eighty to one hundred thousand of what units sold? Don’t know? Don’t worry, we didn’t know either, but forunately Wolfin shares and enlightens us with the answers.

Stuff we mentioned today:

• Ouya

Hosts: Tikaani, Wolfin
Today’s Featured Picture by:

Daily Show: October 12, 2012 - What's the smallest, cheapest, fastest, newest, and most powerful gaming console? Don't know? How about this one. There have been between eighty to one hundred thousand of what units sold? Don't know? Don't worry, we didn't know either,

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No …………………… No…………………….. No………….  This is not happening!!! Looks like I need to kick someone in the balls and/or vagina . Watch …. cry …. comment ….

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I would love to connect to the furnet #redditfurs, but I have no idea where to even start. Can someone give me a crash course on how to at the very least get connected? It would make my day!

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So I have a friend who is very obviously a furry; the only problem is he doesn't know what the fandom is, or that it even exists. How should i bring him in without creeping him out?

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Howdie bear friend!

I'm so dearly in love with our fandom and my enthusiasm after over a year has not really ever faded.

But my emotional condition has varied as I want to go to meets and fursuit events so badly but just don't have one red cent to spend after bills and food. I had gone to some a while back and there are friends and others I can get a ride from on rare occasions so I know how to get to some meets and events but there is always a need for money, even mass transit with a discount. My budget says “no.” Plus I find that especially without a handler / hearing ear person to help me out I can get upset easily from misunderstandings and so on so I'm reluctant to go as well. Sorry for the long explanation.

My problem is I'm so very happy and proud to be a furry when I watch the videos on YouTube and all the other stuff yet it also can be dearly painful that I'm stuck at home so much just like so many furries and cannot get out to have fun too.

I was so jealous of seeing other furries having fun and that I wasn't having fun, so I put my paw down and made my fursuits so I could have fun too. I didn't know what a rare and precious thing it was and how few get to fursuit or have fursuits. And that it is infrequent and difficult to get to fursuit let alone have the same fun.

I so dearly love our fandom but the best way to handle it would be to stop watching so many great videos about us and to become jaded and not so interested so therefore I'm not so emotionally invested in the concept and the fandom. I dearly love all furries!

I have few friends but without money and my best friend barely able to get around himself, etc. I don't have much emotional support or relief outside of some low level amount from online friendships.

And I don't ever want to become jaded one dang bit! I love the fandom and it's worth the pain. But it is a lot of pain.

I need to get out so very much. I need to fursuit in public as it's so much fun but the local city police told me I'm not allowed to fursuit at the park and so forth with what's stopping me. I'm afraid to go out these days. Yet fursuiting was the incentive to get out and do things. To get exercise or go to the park.

My energy levels as much from depression as anything are very low so it's difficult to get myself to do much of anything. Like calling park commissioners to deal with the police problems at the parks. And I'm very busy from so many things I have to do in all sorts of things like trying to get decent hearing aids though I won't be able to use them much like when fursuiting.

So how am I going to deal with all this? What more than I have and had learned how to deal with emotional difficulties that I can do? I'm trying but so very close to giving up. So very close but so "obsessed" with our fandom that fortunately I won't ever truly give up though I try to keep the fursuits in storage since it's wear and tear wearing them as well as there is almost nothing I can do in the cramped house in fursuit anyway (long story).

It's just so painful and so difficult and so lonely.

And a whole heck of a lot of other furries feel the same way too (depending on circumstances).

--Excelsior the Lion

* * *

Dear Excelsior,

[FYI to Papabear’s readers, I know Excelsior and have chatted with him online a number of times, though we have never met IRL.]

There are a couple of issues here that need addressing: 1) your hearing impairment; 2) your lack of money preventing you from easy travel; 3) the cops telling you that you can’t fursuit in a park; 4) your intense frustration over not being able to socialize with furries.

Let’s address #3 first. There is no California law that says it is illegal for you to wear a fursuit in a public place such as a park. If there were, then I couldn’t have done this at a park in Riverside:
Papabear crashing a wedding reception. Therefore, these cops are denying you your rights. Contacting the park commissioner will, as you found out, not yield results because they are the ones who probably contacted the police in the first place. If I were you, I would look up a pro bono lawyer and explain to them that the cops are denying you your rights; not only that, but you are deaf and they are harassing a person with a handicap. At the same time, contact your local newspaper and give them the details of the story of how the police are making a deaf man’s life miserable when all he wants to do is harmlessly fursuit in the park. Any news director is going to eat that story up, believe me (I’m married to a former news director).

Okay, so that’s dealing with local derpy public officials; now on to the furry community. Just to make sure bases are covered, I’m assuming you contacted Hearing Services of Antioch, which is your area service for the deaf at 4045 Lone Tree Way, Suite D, Antioch, CA 94531, phone 925.778.3298. But if you haven’t, or haven’t done so in a long time, you should really contact them and pick their brains on ways to improve your daily life with your hearing impairment. 

As for money, well, many of us struggle with that, the obvious solution being to make more money, but sadly Papabear can’t help you there.

Okay, so that is #1, 2, and 3, now to #4: meetups with furries. I’m sure you’re aware that the Bay Area Furries Meetup Group is based in Danville, which is less than a 30 minute drive from your home. I’m hoping you have some connections there? Someone who could occasionally drive you? 

If not, you know you COULD organize a furmeet at your own home. Bring the furries to YOU, since you can’t go TO THEM. Make sense? You can have a party and have people bring a dish and drinks and hang out, play games, watch movies, whatever you like. (Oh, and another option, though not quite as good, but pretty darn close, is to get involved in SecondLife, where there are tons of furries and places to hang out with them.)

So, the lesson here is twofold: 1) don’t let the police and county officials push you around when you are legally in the right, and 2) there is ALWAYS a way to get around roadblocks if you have the will and creativity to do so.

Good luck, Excelsior,

Papabear

P.S. If anyone reading this column lives in the San Francisco area and has more tips for Excelsior, please comment below. Thanks!