My school is hosting a discussion about otherkin

I've been a Therian in the Otherkin community for two decades.

I know this is a better comment for /r/changemyview. And it is way too long. But I hope that it will be given at least some consideration. It isn't a rant. Just an explanation of what Otherkin really was and what happened when it hit mainstream culture. Hopefully to clear the air a bit. I realize I am risking being mocked, but I hope you will be civil in your response.

I happen to be a social theorist and professional musician--I hold degrees in music, philosophy and intercultural studies and conduct independent research. The philosophical implications of human-animal studies is of direct and indirect interest to my work.

Much of what you see of the Otherkin community is misrepresentation...the community started in the 90s and mostly consisted of eccentric literati and intellectuals who were strong proponents of an admixture of spiritualism and critical discourse surrounding a variety of issues, from environmental ethics, animal rights, interfaith dialogue and exploration of the sociological implications of new means of communication and virtual reality...self-representation and expression.

In terms feelings and development from a child...what we mean by Otherkin or Therian identity:

Nonhuman identification started as the word conveys...not being able to identify as human. A dislocation of identification with one's own body and species. Identification with nothing in particular, not one's "fellow man". It was a feeling of intense difference: to be a complete outsider to your peers and your own body. It was an indescribably lonely experience. Total alienation from everyone.

There may be a cognitive basis for this rooted in preprioceptive feedback responsible for characterizing the body's impression of itself. It has drawn the attention of researchers in cognitive science in and out of the community.

In any case, this correlates with my personal experience and that of many Otherkin who are serious about navigating the philosophical and psychological implications of their lives. It started out as an intense feeling of inability to identify with other people, with my own species. The mind is a powerful adaptive force. When something is off, it compensates, and as I grew as an intellectual, I found that I identified with a certain species of nonhuman which satisfied the prerational need for understanding what I was. The specific species characterized much of my existence and correlated to atypicalities in my cognition. I felt at ease around it and in finding ways to express my relation to it through art, literature and music.

Obviously, whatever peculiarity my brain had did not impact my intelligence. In fact, I was a bit of a polymath and I picked up several fields and became a professional violinist in 6 years. My brain's quirk merely structured my perceptive experience in a way that is very unusual and does not correlate with most individuals. In this way, I think there is a serious basis for Otherkin in neuroatypicality.

But look, identity is a construct. It is a manner of perceiving relations in the world and one's role in it that develops over a long period of time in response to feelings one cannot describe. The process of attempting to understand these feeling recursively restructures it and forms it a complex of behavior, self-expression, signification, orienting oneself to social structures. It isn't a justification or something you can just wear whenever it is convenient. My identity as a Therian impacts all aspects of my life, everything about it. Not in a negative way. I am quite content. And I incorporate it into my art and performance to create interesting works.

It also gives me a rather unique perspective on certain issues. For instance, consider the idea that identification with nonhumans questions humans' relations to other animal species? By identifying this way, I am leveling the interchange between humans and animals. This is problematic for many people, even if they don't realize it, right? Society is built upon an entire industry that exploits animals as mere means. An animal's well-being is completely subverted for the interests of a human's pleasure. I realize that some of you may not agree with it or see it this way, but at least you can see how it might make individuals uneasy.

For a human to identify as an animal is a gross violation of an unexamined taboo, one that is so strong and so ingrained in our upbringing in this society that the instant reaction is to characterize it as insane, humorous. It isn't even a conscious desire to harass anyone, just a light-heated joke. If I say I am something that strikes you as absurd, without being able to understand what I really mean by that, the logical response is humor. We essentially laugh at what we do not understand. The entire foundation of Comedy is that...revealing the peculiar and weird.

It is that same feeling you get when you read something you feel is so absurd that you start laughing before you've finished comprehending it. And even if that thing had a very interesting point to make, that is not what you are reading.

The humor is a defensive mechanism against the taboo. It is why freakshows were a thing. It is essentially why it is acceptable for musicians to do all kinds of crazy shit on stage which would, under normal circumstances might be criminal, or cause individuals to feel their safety is threatened. If the metal artist did death growls on the street unprompted, people might think he had schizophrenia and call the police. The weird is cordoned off into performance art, because there it can be looked at without have real impact upon human society.

A group of teenagers and some other young collegiate types saw us and made a mockery of it. They started masquerading as all kinds of things... "I identify as a rockkin or whatever the heck". And they used this to subvert and attack activists working in other minority's interests, who were actually serious about their work, albeit sometimes emotionally affected.

It really fucked things for us. It made us look like loonies and created this image we've been struggling against ever since. And, honestly, I don't blame anyone that saw it this way. It is weird and very marginal. But seriously, the shaming needs to be toned down a bit. The whole social justice charade created by kids who could also use the internet was good for a cheap laugh. But by now, it is actually causing people distress. Not because we want to be taken seriously, but because it is constant mockery, and that hurts anyone at all. Even mature adults. But seriously, harassing kids? They are just figuring shit out. They don't know what the fuck is going on. They are going to grow up and discover everything they thought was essentially wrong or an embarrassing misunderstanding of the world. Have some compassion.

We really didn't want anything to do with "social justice". We were a little cloistered group of people who explored religion and culture. I would rather that no one ever knew about us in the first place.

It was a little game that proliferated and became what society sees Otherkin as. That was mainstream media's first impression of us. That is all anyone saw. We were only just figuring out what we were. Trying to sort through all of this shit. And already people started shooting us questions neuroscience wasn't even able to answer yet.

And so, everyone has been building their conception of who and what we are on an entirely false premise. It isn't a game at all. It has implications for research into how the human brain works and the directions our society might take in the future.

I cannot speak for everyone, but I was there when this started. And, to be honest, the original group of intellectuals who started this is so small that our voice has no chance of being heard. What you see, and you will continue to see is a popular appropriation, an humorous game of role play. And it became hip for people to call themselves Otherkin because they really like cats.

I don't know who this individual is that is hosting this discussion or whether they will actually talk about any of the more serious issues I brought up (or if they even know about them), but I've been a part of the community since the 90s. You might go to this discussion and hear someone talk about all sorts of bs. Then again, it might be the opposite.

/r/TiADiscussion Thread