Fascinating episode. You both went deep into the history of the "kins". Toward the end Gio was creating links I hadn't considered between the furries and traditional cultures.
TL;DR - I think we are interested / dismissive of these subcultures and worldviews because they are too impractical to be of any threat to most of us, and are so childishly impractical that they are sort of self-cleaning oven when it comes to the long term problems they might present.
The thing I like most about you two talking is listening to you dissect these ideas with scholarly tools in a manner I can’t imagine their authors intended. :) Like the name dropping of some of the most influential thinkers in history in reference to folks who have a CON as their cultural mecca feels to me like good television. :D
Great pod as always!
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(the TL part follows, I am sorry / you are welcome)
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I always have to fight the urge to completely dismiss topics like this. It feels to me at base like a form of hobbyist mental illness. Maybe cognitive LARPing is more in the lingo for the discussion. For example when you guys are talking about traditional / historical animist belief sets I would see a direct correlation there. However, the difference is these Otherkin have access to a whole world of evidence to the contrary, or even just more normative explanations for emotional and mental phenomena they are experiencing.
Those tribal beliefs come from a time where largely illiterate groups of pre-industral folks were searching for meaning, or a useful framework to explain hugely broad experiences they had in what was an often brutal and short lifespan. Agreed that having elders to guide that understanding is maybe a missing piece. But only in so much that elders maintain the dogma of a belief.
I think it is this lack of dogma (is that a pun?) that makes them come off as endearing or charming. There is a childish nature that comes with a blindered, or irrational worldview. The plain impracticality of living a truly niche, non-conforming life such as theirs feels almost Quixotic, were it not so amorphous and fluid. The way you two describe some of it, you get the impression that people do not stick to one flavor of kin. They instead flit from one explanation to the next. As if its core IS the transitions, not the states they lead too.
At the end of the day I am always of a mind that you should tell whatever stories to yourself that you need to so that you make it to the end of the day, and the morning that follows. I KNOW I have all kinds of useful fictions I create in my head everyday that I treat like fact. Life is still hard, no matter how far we have come society wise. But also we should all be very aware of what can go wrong when you are laying down tracks as the train is rolling.
Fascinating episode. You both went deep into the history of the "kins". Toward the end Gio was creating links I hadn't considered between the furries and traditional cultures.
TL;DR - I think we are interested / dismissive of these subcultures and worldviews because they are too impractical to be of any threat to most of us, and are so childishly impractical that they are sort of self-cleaning oven when it comes to the long term problems they might present.
The thing I like most about you two talking is listening to you dissect these ideas with scholarly tools in a manner I can’t imagine their authors intended. :) Like the name dropping of some of the most influential thinkers in history in reference to folks who have a CON as their cultural mecca feels to me like good television. :D
Great pod as always!
-------
(the TL part follows, I am sorry / you are welcome)
-------
I always have to fight the urge to completely dismiss topics like this. It feels to me at base like a form of hobbyist mental illness. Maybe cognitive LARPing is more in the lingo for the discussion. For example when you guys are talking about traditional / historical animist belief sets I would see a direct correlation there. However, the difference is these Otherkin have access to a whole world of evidence to the contrary, or even just more normative explanations for emotional and mental phenomena they are experiencing.
Those tribal beliefs come from a time where largely illiterate groups of pre-industral folks were searching for meaning, or a useful framework to explain hugely broad experiences they had in what was an often brutal and short lifespan. Agreed that having elders to guide that understanding is maybe a missing piece. But only in so much that elders maintain the dogma of a belief.
I think it is this lack of dogma (is that a pun?) that makes them come off as endearing or charming. There is a childish nature that comes with a blindered, or irrational worldview. The plain impracticality of living a truly niche, non-conforming life such as theirs feels almost Quixotic, were it not so amorphous and fluid. The way you two describe some of it, you get the impression that people do not stick to one flavor of kin. They instead flit from one explanation to the next. As if its core IS the transitions, not the states they lead too.
At the end of the day I am always of a mind that you should tell whatever stories to yourself that you need to so that you make it to the end of the day, and the morning that follows. I KNOW I have all kinds of useful fictions I create in my head everyday that I treat like fact. Life is still hard, no matter how far we have come society wise. But also we should all be very aware of what can go wrong when you are laying down tracks as the train is rolling.