Beto O'Rourke falsely called a furry by NRCC after Democrat opens bid for Presidency
On March 14th, following the announcement by Texas Democrat Beto O'Rourke that he plans on making a presidential run, the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC) made a tweet incorrectly claiming that the candidate is a furry. This claim stems from video of Beto in a sheep costume was released in January, however his purpose for wearing it had nothing to do with furry fandom activities.
Beto was a part of a band who donned their sheep costumes while performing punk covers on stage in El Paso. The intention was to hide their local demeanor and to play it off as if they were a New Zealand band from out of town, according to a Mother Jones interview. I suppose it's fitting if you are fleecing your band to be more exotic than it is, than a sheep outfit fits quite well.
The misappropriation of anyone wearing an animal costume being a furry seems to be a growing trend. It should be known that it is estimated that only 1 in 5 people who are in the furry fandom own an animal costume of their characters, and that the fandom is mostly about the fantasy of playing animal characters, or enjoying content that focus around animals that are given human characteristics. Fred Patten, one of the fandom's founders who recently passed on, didn't even have an animal character persona.
It also should be denoted that furry is not directly affiliated with either party of the U.S. partisan binary. There have been Republicans who have flirted with the fandom before more directly, including representative Kelly Townsend of Arizona who picked a lion fursona, while using art she did not commission; a faux pas in the fandom.
It's also important to note that someone wearing and animal costume does not necessarily make them furry. That would mean that there would be far more of us than there are. There are sports mascots, street-side performers, faking that your band is cooler than it is, or other such reasons one could wear an animal costume as well. It's sort of like how just because you're for small government doesn't mean you're a Republican, it only means that if there isn't one presiding in the White House.
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Sonious (Tantroo McNally) — read stories — contact (login required)a project coordinator and Kangaroo from CheektRoowaga, NY, interested in video games, current events, politics, writing and finance
Comments
o'rourke should lean hard into the furry thing so that 2020 has another moment like 2016's "pokemon go to the polls".
O'Rourke: "...because it's not truly the American Dream unless everyone can see, um--" [looks to intern, who nods vigorously] "...Your Character Here."
A furry complained about the Washington Examiner followup on this, which has an out of context citation to an IARP study with fandom attitudes about sex. https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/national-republican-congressional-commit...
Writer responds:
https://twitter.com/SaysSimonson/status/1106302119852851201
"Apologies to the furry community if my language implied you’re all depraved perverts and not just some of you"
I advised the furry that the writer worked for Daily Caller and tabloids, safe to say he wont give good faith and will bait and toy with people who engage, and relish clicks if it gets spread wider, it's lose-lose.
The furry considered trying to report it as fake news and I added that they likely give wide leeway to a guy making sarcastic or satirical comments on his own account (mean or not). The WE article links a study, so it's sourced even if it's larding on gratuitous detail to mock, and such is politics these days. I don't believe that newspaper will care (they like all traffic, pissed readers or not). In cases like this i say "be the media""
How is that fake news or anything to complain about? The "sexual fetish" thing is perhaps an overstatement but otherwise that paragraph is accurate. The sexual aspect is important to a lot of furs.
"If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind."
~John Stuart Mill~
It’s even extremely important to you... you shouldn’t be so modest here..
behave on this platform all holier than thou, but back in your patch... erm
yes, it is. but not to all furs.
Why should we panda to a minority? we did that once in this country and it got us an idiot in the white house.
"safe to say he wont give good faith and will bait and toy with people who engage, and relish clicks if it gets spread wider"
Well your assessment is obviously self-evidently correct. I mean... we're on The Internet.
I had to laugh at the last paragraph.
Its true to say that, but in practice its not so.
The "furry" label is used vicariously as an insult, and as a label in itself to label people who work on anthro art.
The Washington Examiner turned a molehill into a mountain based on a single word in a RNCC Tweet. One can ask was necessary for the NRCC to throw out the furry word. Still this much ado about nothing. I find the Washington Examiner more at fault by twisting the RNCC post and for their misuse of the Fur Science 2011 data. Better would be the 2018 statement on sexuality
https://furscience.com/research-findings/sex-relationships-pornography/5-10-feti...
If anything good, the mainstream press has ignored this story.
I still find fault with RNCC. There are very good reasons to oppose Beto O Rouke, why bring up furry and twist him wearing a mask as part of a band.
Now let say for the record, I became a Furry during the peak of my involvement with the Republican Party (i.e. before Trump). My Fursona is a more conservative than I am, and a Republican Black Bear. I often joke around wanting to be the highest ranking elected Furry Republican and my favorite comic strip is Mallard Fillmore a comic about an anthropomorphic conservative Duck. I see this as just silliness to bring up furry as something negative.
But what about the eating dirt and feeding his wife baby shit?
Someday being a furry will be a plus for a presidential candidate! (Yeah, sure...)
Fred Patten actually had a fursona; not one he chose himself, but Jim Groat dubbed him a bald eagle, because he was...bald. Fred once said he thought of himself more a raccoon, but the eagle fursona stuck.
Here's a drawing I did of Fred as that eagle: http://www.furaffinity.net/full/30026296/
- Joe
Actually it's funny you should say that because seeing how terribly furries almost always handle power, even over something like a website or a forum, I've sometimes entertained the thought that perhaps the best candidate to govern a furry community would have to be a non-furry, but one who really gets the fandom/culture and is advised by the more mature/enlightened furries.
I appreciate how you were like, "funny you should say that", and then proceeded to talk about things that had nothing to do with what he said
I figured people would be smart enough to extrapolate that what I was getting at with that was, hell no a furry wouldn't make a good president. I regret that that's not true of you. But I also regret that I'm not surprised when obvious shit flies over your head anymore.
Wow. Words of wisdom... and I mean that sincerely.
They can start by getting rid of Rakuen.. seeing his goal is to completely control the South African furry fandom for his own agenda.
That would make a difference and put an end to a lot of the drama
In speaking of presidents and involuntary fursonas, I head Teddy Roosevelt was compared to a bear by others and wasn't too fond of the affiliation with ursine.
Not unlike some modern day rulers.
"If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind."
~John Stuart Mill~
That's rich coming from you Lord Firedog... go back and rule your kingdom while the rest of the intelligent people speak here
He seemed to be more into moose.
That s why I had fun chatting about that activity with one of those first generation furries Changa Lion, of the Prancing Skiltaire furry house . Beto O Rourke was one of the hackers in the Cult of the Dead Cow. I remember looking at their forbidden files in the library in the 90 s! Funny that the news called him a furry, and he used the net handle Psychedelic Warlord in 1987. So Changa, does anything in there ring a bell?
You might enjoy what Changa says about things here https://dogpatch.press/2019/03/21/beto-orourke-furries-hackers/
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