Sorry if this topic is a bit controversial but recently I was ratted out and banned on a Discord server because group of people assumed I was a zoophile irl because my choices on what I find hot isnt up to furry standards. They were okay if the users there say they find Lucario, cinderace, lola bunny, and nyanta attractive, however when I shared mine, these groups I dont think have an actual name: (Jewelpets, Minccino, Kyubey, Morgana, Tsukino and Tony chopper) people on the server were harassing me and calling me a fake furry and got banned for zoophilia, some even accusing me of doing stuff to my pet cat they knew of through dox, and everyone (even the furries of that server) thought I was unacceptable to be in a furry fandom. To the furries here, is it actually illegal and zoophilia to be into those types of characters or are they bullshitters?

I don't think you really need an answer to this question, so the only advice I can give you is to try to find a Discord server not full of literal children.

(If you made a conscious choice to hang around children, then that's concerning either because you're also a child and therefore should not have an account here, or because you're not and therefore should not have an account anywhere.)

To me, the whole issue with beastiality, the reason it's ethically unsound, is that animals lack sapience and are usually on a level of social intelligence comparable to human toddlers. So as far as I'm concerned, a character can be a on full quedruped and being attracted to them wouldn't be zoophilia as long as they are demonstrating human like social intelligence and the ability to give informed consent. It's literally not even related to beastiality in my mind, just a person with an exotic body.
So no, those people don't know what they're talking about. Their standards don't even make sense. I'd consider lucario AT LEAST a semi-anthro, (idc how much they stand on their hindlegs) and Chopper, (his first name is Tony!?) At least in his bipedal forms, an anthro.

wat8548 said:
I don't think you really need an answer to this question, so the only advice I can give you is to try to find a Discord server not full of literal children.

(If you made a conscious choice to hang around children, then that's concerning either because you're also a child and therefore should not have an account here, or because you're not and therefore should not have an account anywhere.)

All of the ones i know on there are adults. Idk discord generally is pretty crappy anyways and i prefer telegram where my personal opinions are better supported.

thelibertineyeen said:
To me, the whole issue with beastiality, the reason it's ethically unsound, is that animals lack sapience and are usually on a level of social intelligence comparable to human toddlers. So as far as I'm concerned, a character can be a on full quedruped and being attracted to them wouldn't be zoophilia as long as they are demonstrating human like social intelligence and the ability to give informed consent. It's literally not even related to beastiality in my mind, just a person with an exotic body.
So no, those people don't know what they're talking about. Their standards don't even make sense. I'd consider lucario AT LEAST a semi-anthro, (idc how much they stand on their hindlegs) and Chopper, (his first name is Tony!?) At least in his bipedal forms, an anthro.

I dont really see the problem with liking these kinds of characters and it isnt entirely frowned upon as its just opinion in the end, a mostly unpopular one sure but its not illegal like certain other fictional fetishes afaik. I dont think fapping or having the thought of mythical talking creatures is even beastiality since the act isnt being committed and they can consent anyways. Theres so many eevee hornies, im surprised chibi furries and ferals are still not normalized.

A lot of the chibi like furries and ferals that communicate range from toddler like (eg a jewelpet or some pokemon in pmd) to highly intelligent (digimon and kyubey)

(Im pretty sure its tony tony chopper. Though ive heard chopper tony tony before too. The former is whats normalized for me.)

The Discord users are in da Nile.

I recommend deleting all of your accounts, starting over, but never using Discord again.

lance_armstrong said:
The Discord users are in da Nile.

I recommend deleting all of your accounts, starting over, but never using Discord again.

one guy got pissed at me and reported me to discord and banned first acc few months back.

as for the 2nd

already right ahead of ya.
https://i.imgur.com/sBGMgJ6.png
honestly, Discord's somehow worse than twitter.

Do you consider it to be zoophilia to like feral characters if they're obviously made to be sentient?

The typical human being suffers from a selective inability to divide reality from fiction when it comes to things they personally have distaste for. Some can recognise this and correct it, others choose to rant on Twitter.

Although if you want to piss off those people, you can always bring up the point that if a one-tonne mountain of muscle, bones, and hooves capable of caving in your sternum with a single kick is displeased with your nonsense... being directly behind it is a surefire way to die.

When it comes to paraphilias, where we each draw the lines between "harmless kink", "weird fetish" and "disgusting perversion" varies from person to person. While these people may find your taste in characters abhorent, there are many, many people who would call them degenerates for liking any furry character, even something as 'tame' as Lola Bunny.

Personally, I think IRL bestiality is disgusting and morally unjustifiable, as I'd hope any sane person would. However, in the world of furry art, even if the artist draws an animal as physically animalistic, they are nearly always anthromorphized in other ways, such having a human personality. As long as your attraction to 'feral' characters requires that non-animal factor, I don't see a problem. Nobody's tried to cancel Eddie Redmayne yet.

What about liking humans with animal-level intelligence, is that zoophilia
I guess the infected from various zombie movies would count

mantikor said:
What about liking humans with animal-level intelligence, is that zoophilia
I guess the infected from various zombie movies would count

I mean, people like wrestlers--

bitwolfy said:
Being able to consent is the key.

I think this is really what it all comes down to. If they can consent, then it’s ok. Aka, the Harkness test

Consent is cool 😎

secretfox said:
I think this is really what it all comes down to. If they can consent, then it’s ok. Aka, the Harkness test

Consent is cool 😎

Do xenomorphs pass the Harkness test? If no, then I guess it's bestiality or possibly pedophilia then.

thegreatwolfgang said:
Do xenomorphs pass the Harkness test? If no, then I guess it's bestiality or possibly pedophilia then.

Expanded universe prior to the dumb shit that Prometheus did? Yes; they're psionics capable of waging planetary-scale genocide against subspecies of their own kind and are biologically-immortal (technically speaking they're eusocial and only partially-capable of reproduction outside of the queen anyway).
Personally, if it can kill you in literal fractions of a second, consent becomes assumed when it doesn't... kill you.

secretfox said:
I think this is really what it all comes down to. If they can consent, then it’s ok. Aka, the Harkness test

Consent is cool 😎

That image is on E621.

furrin_gok said:
That image is on E621.

Nice, I saw it on reddit a while ago, and didn’t know it was here

Nope!

And in the same way that it isn’t Zoophilia to be attracted to this: https://static1.e621.net/data/8b/84/8b84af73ab21774945701e14b4d7dc2b.jpg

You’re good.

It ultimately depends on how you interpret the definition. Interestingly enough, there's a stronger argument that liking anthro characters is zoophilia:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zoophilia
Zoophilia is a paraphilia involving a sexual fixation on non-human animals.

https://www.merriam-webster.com/medical/zoophilia
an erotic fixation on animals that may result in sexual excitement through real or imagined contact

Given that an anthro fox, cat, dragon, etc, definitely isn't human, if you have a sexual fixation on these non-human animals, that clearly applies. There are no definitions that care about sentience of sapience. However, there's counter philosophical argument with the fact that anthros and semi-anthros don't actually exist in reality, so can a depiction of a non-existent creature be called a "non-human animal" since it doesn't actually exist to be studied and classified as an animal?

In the end, this is all art and fiction. Liking semi-anthro, anthro, or feral characters is as much zoophilia as liking cub, chibi, and loli/shota is pedophilia. Some people may throw around those terms derisively because they want to deride people who like it, but short of any legal precedent for thought crimes and criminalizing art or fiction of this type, it's just bad words meant to label you an "other" so they can demonize you for liking what they don't like. Even if semi-anthros could never be classified as zoophilia for whatever reason, it very likely wouldn't change their perspective of people who like it; they'll just find some other word or excuse to say bad things about people who like it.

watsit said:
In the end, this is all art and fiction.

This. People can like violence and destruction in video games and movies, but it does not make them violent or fixated with chaos in real life. Likewise, liking something in artworks does not necessary mean you like/condone it in real life as well. Problems only arise when people cannot differentiate between what is fiction and what is reality.

watsit said:
In the end, this is all art and fiction. Liking semi-anthro, anthro, or feral characters is as much zoophilia as liking cub, chibi, and loli/shota is pedophilia. Some people may throw around those terms derisively because they want to deride people who like it, but short of any legal precedent for thought crimes and criminalizing art or fiction of this type, it's just bad words meant to label you an "other" so they can demonize you for liking what they don't like. Even if semi-anthros could never be classified as zoophilia for whatever reason, it very likely wouldn't change their perspective of people who like it; they'll just find some other word or excuse to say bad things about people who like it.

This

No point caring. What you look at in fiction doesn't determine what you like irl. A lot of people are refuse to accept this based on some sort of "that's yucky/wrong" sentiment.

rape

Harkness Test? We ain't got no Harkness Test. We don't need no Harkness Test. It don't have to pass no stinkin' Harkness Test!

lance_armstrong said:
rape

Harkness Test? We ain't got no Harkness Test. We don't need no Harkness Test. It don't have to pass no stinkin' Harkness Test!

<Japan>

"YOUR RESISTANCE ONLY MAKES ME HARDER--"

</Japan>

votp said:
<Japan>

"YOUR RESISTANCE ONLY MAKES ME HARDER--"

</Japan>

I’ll admit, I do enjoy a good tentacle monster XP

No.

A study was recently done on zoophilia (like, literally, saw it posted up yesterday I think) that suggests that, once you control for the relatively high proportion of zoophiles in the furry fandom, the remaining proportion do not seem particularly zoo-inclined (as far as I understand it). Furthermore, drawn (semi-)feral art is typically not illegal in the vast majority of places. It does not count as animal pornography in the eyes of the law.

However, that said, I find it necessary to push back against the narrative here. I'm a zoophile. I've always been open and out around this forum. I think zoophilia is not immoral, and the arguments people tend to make are generally bad, in a ton of ways. This really isn't the place to argue about it but it bothers me seeing it go open and unchallenged here, so I guess feel free to PM me if you want to discuss.

watsit said:
Wikipedia and Dictionary links

Last thing I want to say is, as far as actually understanding the topic, I think this is a better link that actually includes more relevant research and modern perspectives:

https://psychology.wikia.org/wiki/Zoosexuality

clawdragons said:
A study was recently done on zoophilia (like, literally, saw it posted up yesterday I think) that suggests that, once you control for the relatively high proportion of zoophiles in the furry fandom, the remaining proportion do not seem particularly zoo-inclined (as far as I understand it).

Could you cite the study? It might be an interesting read on how they determined their sample and the criteria they have used.

However, that said, I find it necessary to push back against the narrative here. I'm a zoophile. I've always been open and out around this forum. I think zoophilia is not immoral, and the arguments people tend to make are generally bad, in a ton of ways. This really isn't the place to argue about it but it bothers me seeing it go open and unchallenged here, so I guess feel free to PM me if you want to discuss.

Last thing I want to say is, as far as actually understanding the topic, I think this is a better link that actually includes more relevant research and modern perspectives:

https://psychology.wikia.org/wiki/Zoosexuality

I would have given more of an opinion of the subject if it weren't such a taboo topic, but I agree with your sentiment there. However, it does not help when the terms like 'zoophilia' and 'zoosexuality' have been lumped together or used interchangeably to describe the act of 'bestiality' itself, especially when describing a bond that may not even be sexual in the first place.

thegreatwolfgang said:
Could you cite the study? It might be an interesting read on how they determined their sample and the criteria they have used.

I considered linking it, but I genuinely don't know if I can. See, it's not been properly published yet, but a rough draft was sent early to a site where some participants were gathered. Which, I don't think I ought to link that site here.

I would have given more of an opinion of the subject if it weren't such a taboo topic, but I agree with your sentiment there. However, it does not help when the terms like 'zoophilia' and 'zoosexuality' have been lumped together or used interchangeably to describe the act of 'bestiality' itself, especially when describing a bond that may not even be sexual in the first place.

I do understand that many people don't feel comfortable speaking up. I do understand that. I'm out to quite a few people in my life, only one of whom is anything other than supportive, but I doubt most of them would defend the topic if it were being discussed negatively.

But, agree, the terminology has gotten much clearer recently, but the history and common understanding of the terms has them jumbled up and confused.

clawdragons said:
I considered linking it, but I genuinely don't know if I can. See, it's not been properly published yet, but a rough draft was sent early to a site where some participants were gathered. Which, I don't think I ought to link that site here.

Ah, an unpublished article. Hopefully it is peer-reviewed and gets published from a reputable scientific journal. Although the scope of the study may not be that wide (other than simple statistics on the number of people in the furry fandom), I hope that articles like this would shed more light and understanding on the topic in general.

clawdragons said:
A study was recently done on zoophilia (like, literally, saw it posted up yesterday I think) that suggests that, once you control for the relatively high proportion of zoophiles in the furry fandom, the remaining proportion do not seem particularly zoo-inclined (as far as I understand it).

I'm confused what you mean by this. I interpret this to say "when you account for the higher-than-normal number of zoophiles in the furry fandom, the rest aren't zoo-inclined", which sounds like an obvious statement that "non-zoophiles aren't zoophiles".

clawdragons said:
A study was recently done on zoophilia (like, literally, saw it posted up yesterday I think) that suggests that, once you control for the relatively high proportion of zoophiles in the furry fandom, the remaining proportion do not seem particularly zoo-inclined (as far as I understand it). Furthermore, drawn (semi-)feral art is typically not illegal in the vast majority of places. It does not count as animal pornography in the eyes of the law.

However, that said, I find it necessary to push back against the narrative here. I'm a zoophile. I've always been open and out around this forum. I think zoophilia is not immoral, and the arguments people tend to make are generally bad, in a ton of ways. This really isn't the place to argue about it but it bothers me seeing it go open and unchallenged here, so I guess feel free to PM me if you want to discuss.

Last thing I want to say is, as far as actually understanding the topic, I think this is a better link that actually includes more relevant research and modern perspectives:

https://psychology.wikia.org/wiki/Zoosexuality

Hmm, I used to think furry in general was illegal when I was young, then I thought only the base form and earlier pokemon and similar were illegal later on. I have high doubts nowadays. Are there countries that actually ban semi-furry? I know japan has it caught in cross but to be fair the entirity of porn is "bannend" there and my ex-bestie mentioned that his country of Singapore had banned it and certain sites like Patreon, furaffinity and... sigh... Discord also banned it, although for the same kinda reasons- "chibi" and semi-furry could easily be mistooken for "cub content".

Hopefully the study of feral and chibi being ok is given more into light so I would stop being harassed for what I enjoy.

watsit said:
It ultimately depends on how you interpret the definition. Interestingly enough, there's a stronger argument that liking anthro characters is zoophilia:
Given that an anthro fox, cat, dragon, etc, definitely isn't human, if you have a sexual fixation on these non-human animals, that clearly applies. There are no definitions that care about sentience of sapience. However, there's counter philosophical argument with the fact that anthros and semi-anthros don't actually exist in reality, so can a depiction of a non-existent creature be called a "non-human animal" since it doesn't actually exist to be studied and classified as an animal?

In the end, this is all art and fiction. Liking semi-anthro, anthro, or feral characters is as much zoophilia as liking cub, chibi, and loli/shota is pedophilia. Some people may throw around those terms derisively because they want to deride people who like it, but short of any legal precedent for thought crimes and criminalizing art or fiction of this type, it's just bad words meant to label you an "other" so they can demonize you for liking what they don't like. Even if semi-anthros could never be classified as zoophilia for whatever reason, it very likely wouldn't change their perspective of people who like it; they'll just find some other word or excuse to say bad things about people who like it.

Yea I never get why people keep throwing fiction into reality rules. Might as well ban Fallout: New Vegas because you can kill every npc there and murder's illegal obviously. And yea... I highly doubt cub and semi-anthro will *ever* be normalized to others like the most vanilla designs of furries we all love. We'll still see bans on them and its unfortunate.

clawdragons said:
A study was recently done on zoophilia (like, literally, saw it posted up yesterday I think) that suggests that, once you control for the relatively high proportion of zoophiles in the furry fandom, the remaining proportion do not seem particularly zoo-inclined (as far as I understand it). Furthermore, drawn (semi-)feral art is typically not illegal in the vast majority of places. It does not count as animal pornography in the eyes of the law.

However, that said, I find it necessary to push back against the narrative here. I'm a zoophile. I've always been open and out around this forum. I think zoophilia is not immoral, and the arguments people tend to make are generally bad, in a ton of ways. This really isn't the place to argue about it but it bothers me seeing it go open and unchallenged here, so I guess feel free to PM me if you want to discuss.

Last thing I want to say is, as far as actually understanding the topic, I think this is a better link that actually includes more relevant research and modern perspectives:

https://psychology.wikia.org/wiki/Zoosexuality

>"I'm a zoophile"

To me, I'd think youd be one but in the most legal way possible. Just looking pics of them and maybe fantasizing. Something I do but with mythical ferals. So IMO its 100% fine.

thegreatwolfgang said:
Ah, an unpublished article. Hopefully it is peer-reviewed and gets published from a reputable scientific journal.

That's the plan, as far as I understand it. University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, was approved by the ethics board, performed, and should be being sent into peer review shortly, published once that's all done, all that good stuff, assuming no hiccups.

If you like I can try to remember to send the info to you if I see that get done and once it's on a site I think is within the ToS to link.

watsit said:
I'm confused what you mean by this. I interpret this to say "when you account for the higher-than-normal number of zoophiles in the furry fandom, the rest aren't zoo-inclined", which sounds like an obvious statement that "non-zoophiles aren't zoophiles".

Well, the questions weren't just "are you a zoophile" but a bunch of questions addressing various sorts of things. There are were 20 questions relating to various aspects of zoophilia, then several relating to opportunism, being a furry, being a zoosadist, creating four general categories, then, a scale of 1-7 of agreement for each.

So basically, what I mean (as far as I understood / got out of the study) by zoo-inclination would be... The level of agreement with those various questions among those who were furries but not also clearly zoophiles. The increased interest among furries is thus a matter of there being the high proportion of zoophiles compared to there being latent weaker interest among the general furry population. Does that make more sense?

The questions were similarly able to distinguish zoosadists and opportunists from zoos, indicating the four groups are actually distinct, and also giving a way of distinguishing them via a set of questions and such.

The funny thing is that we used to call it "feral" and furries didn't have a serious problem with it, not everybody was into it but it was generally accepted, but then ferals called themselves "zoophiles" and made it creepy.

You folks really don't have anyone to blame but yourselves for people suddenly not liking you.