Hello there! I've been using this site for a while and it never really dawned on me about what makes a Furry? Is it just being turned on by animalistic characters? Identifying as an animal? Having a spirit animal? I'm not trying to be insulting, but I just always wondered what made someone one. I'm very fond of the art furries often make, I think it's cool that they spend the time, love, and money on suits or art to make themselves into what they'd like to be and so on and so forth. I wouldn't really say I IDENTIFY as a furry, but was curious on other people's answers.

I suppose i'd also be curious as to how people found the Animal/Fursona they identify with.

tumult said:
Is it just being turned on by animalistic characters?

No. Many furries don't actually like yiff. I know many that actively detest any part of the community into yiff as they see it as part of the reason why the general populace doesn't like furries because to the general public, they think it's always about weird kinks and fetishes, which isn't the case for all furries.

tumult said:
Identifying as an animal?

Idk about everyone but I don't know if most actually identify as an "animal," I personally don't

tumult said:
Having a spirit animal?

A spirit animal is just said to be a spirit that helps guide you, and this can take many forms for many different people, it doesn't necessarily even need to be an animal. And not everyone considers themselves spiritual or has that guide. It's all based on belief of the spirit and doesn't really have anything to do with being a furry or not. People like to have comfort in tough times and often look at religion, and thus belief of the spirit, to get that comfort.

As for the fursona question, I can't answer because I don't have one.

it's kind of like this.

tumult said:
Hello there! I've been using this site for a while and it never really dawned on me about what makes a Furry? Is it just being turned on by animalistic characters? Identifying as an animal? Having a spirit animal? I'm not trying to be insulting, but I just always wondered what made someone one. I'm very fond of the art furries often make, I think it's cool that they spend the time, love, and money on suits or art to make themselves into what they'd like to be and so on and so forth. I wouldn't really say I IDENTIFY as a furry, but was curious on other people's answers.

Basically, it is your decision. If you want to enjoy parts of the fandom, without calling yourself a furry, go for it. If you enjoy only a tiny bit of it, and you want to call yourself a furry, go for it as well. There are no criteria that "have to be fulfilled".

And people who identify as an animal are otherkins, they aren't particularly a part of the furry fandom, but I'd assume there is a big overlap with those two fandoms. (I am not even sure if it is correct to call otherkins a fandom)

tumult said:
I suppose i'd also be curious as to how people found the Animal/Fursona they identify with.

Mine was simple. Favorite animal + favorite color + stuff I like (e.g. piercings) + parts of my personality - parts of my personality I don't like.

tumult said:
I suppose i'd also be curious as to how people found the Animal/Fursona they identify with.

Dogs aren't even my favorite animal (that would be seals or various wild cats I can't choose between). I'm a cat person actually, pet-wise. But I find little dogs very relatable. I see a king charles spaniel and I go, that's so me :)

Also I knew I wanted long floppy ears, so that narrowed it down to certain dog breeds, a lop rabbit, or nubian or boer goat. I wanted her to be fluffy, which ruled out the goats (plus while I love goats, I don't feel like they match my personality that well). I don't remember how I decided between a dog vs rabbit since it was many years ago but I ended up going with a king charles spaniel dog. Probably because I felt like it matched my personality and how I feel better than a rabbit. She's brown and white to reference my real appearance, her ears and head fluff are meant to look sort of like my hair, her body type is similar to mine, and she wears my clothes. Recently I gave her my glasses too. Her eyes are green because it's my favorite color.

idk, to me it's more about Disney cartoons affecting my tastes in fantasy from a very young age and less about self-identification or w/e. I don't even have a fursona and I'm not much of an animal person irl, but I like all the cool art and other stuff that comes out of the fandom. We've been anthropomorphizing animals since the dawn of history so it's natural that this fandom is a wellspring for creativity and interacting with it in any form, whether you're just an observer or actively participating in it should, by definition, make you a furry.

But "furry" is ultimately a label, and whether you want to use it and what it means is entirely up to you. Personally I don't really call myself one, I just think cartoon animal people are neat.

dubsthefox said:
Basically, it is your decision. If you want to enjoy parts of the fandom, without calling yourself a furry, go for it. If you enjoy only a tiny bit of it, and you want to call yourself a furry, go for it as well. There are no criteria that "have to be fulfilled".

And people who identify as an animal are otherkins, they aren't particularly a part of the furry fandom, but I'd assume there is a big overlap with those two fandoms. (I am not even sure if it is correct to call otherkins a fandom)

Mine was simple. Favorite animal + favorite color + stuff I like (e.g. piercings) + parts of my personality - parts of my personality I don't like.

This is what I always say beig a furry is more of an identity than a fandom. You must like Mario to be a mario fan, you don't have to love anthros to be a furry, although that would help. Folks who say you must like this or that before being a furry are gatekeeping.

what makes someone or something a furry is decision made by themselves. furry is a fandom slang to describe a member of the fandom, but overtime it received more definitions to describe any anthropomorphic animal, though it's more of a fandom slang than anything else.
disney is not affiliated with furry fandom so their properties like zootopia and lion king is not really a 'furry' media nor objectively makes you part of the furry fandom, just general movies about anthropomorphic animals for everyone, and identifying as an animal or one of the anthropomorphic characters is moreso makes you an (other)kin.
to the furry side, you can indulge in furry spaces like furaffinity and convention while not identifying as a furry.

tl;dr you're only a furry if you describe or identify as one.

There is no single definition of "being a furry", a lot of people who consider themselves "furries" have different understandings of the term.

Here is a scientific attempt to study the diverse group known as "furry fandom" -> https://furscience.com

And how'd you choose your Fursona?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4rrXR6n0RTY

tumult said:
I suppose i'd also be curious as to how people found the Animal/Fursona they identify with.

I don't have a sona.
Do I need a sona to be one of the cool kids?

My best comparison is that the furry fandom is similar to being a Taylor Swift fan.

You can enjoy Taylor Swift's music without identifying yourself as part of the fandom, also known as a Swiftie.

mantikor said:
I don't have a sona.
Do I need a sona to be one of the cool kids?

It's extremely fun to create and have one!

cloudpie said:
It's extremely fun to create and have one!

it can be, but also creating something that you're going to attach your identity to for the foreseeable future can be a lot of pressure to put on yourself if you do start the process of character creation with the intent of creating a sona.

"Words don't mean things, people mean things" - Lance Bush

Essentially my response whenever this question or analogous ones come up. You might debate it for certain ingroup/outgroup labels where gatekeeping is a clear element (eg. college graduates), but some groups have a strong distrust of gatekeeping, and I would put 'furry' in that latter category. That tends to produce the effect that 'whether you fall into this category' is more clearly a matter of agreement and not of prescriptive definition.
For example, if you are browsing comments on posts and you see one that you personally think is a typical furry opinion, and you agree with it, then maybe this should count towards the conclusion 'I am a (that-thing-that-I-personally-label-furry)'.

I don't think there is a fact of the matter about whether someone 'is' a furry or not, though. I interpret claims that 'i am / am not a furry' as mainly 'waving the flag' type speech acts.

To become a furry isn't anything complicated; either you choose to be one or you don't. It's a subcultural self-identifier for people who like anthropomorphic animals to various degrees, sometimes sexual, sometimes not (I'm sure you can guess that most of us here are the first kind).

Technically you don't need to identify with any animal or have a fursona to be a furry, but I do anyways. How I came up with mine (an orange-white cat with a red hoodie) is purely because I needed a profile pic for an account on a writing forum, and for that I just drew the first thing that came to mind in Krita, which was me as a cat. It wasn't the best drawing, but it stuck with me as a design as I've gotten older (I say, remembering it's only been a year since then even though I was a closet furry for 5 years before that).

I'm not a furry, I was merely pretending I swear!

I don't have a fursona or animal I identify with, nor have I thought about making one, however if I had to choose one, it would be a siberian husky, no special reason I simply like them.

I don't like giving non-answers so here's my definition. A furry is simply a fanatic of the concept of anthropomorphic animals. In other words someone with a strong interest of anthropomorphic animals. What is considered a strong interest is up to you. While I wouldn't say it's concrete but there are levels of furrydom. level one is just actively consuming "furry" content. level two and three is creating furry content and a fursona. Level four is participating in furry community events. Level five is fursuiting. Doing any of these things doesn't make you a furry but I haven't met a furry who doesn't do at least one of them. I do believe a solid definition of Furry is will help defend against confusion and misunderstanding from people not in the know. As for a fursona I've been creating one not by choice but out of coincidence due to wanting to get into VTubing.
Here's a crash course on Furry: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kl-uRO_CIYg