What I think is the most important relevance of historic anthropomorphism is to establish that something must obviously differentiate the two
In fact, our viewpoints are compatible. I think the major sticking point is that a majority of the furry fandom who resort to siting historic anthropomorphism aren't taking this view; they view anthropomorphism in ancient cultures as inseparable from furry. This is what I object to, and am railing against.
Another problem is that I am more interested in furry as genre than fandom; I'm less interested in why furries are furry and why furry is furry, if you can dig it. The question of animal symbolism becomes more important in the fandom than the genre; a furry may choose a wolf "fursona" (do we still use that word?) because of the power symbolism, but I see no evidence that Eric W. Schartz chose Thomas Woolfe of Sabrina Online's species for any particular reason (though that's not really a good example, since I don't believe that character was originally Schwartz's creation).
Well, I like this point.
What I think is the most important relevance of historic anthropomorphism is to establish that something must obviously differentiate the two
In fact, our viewpoints are compatible. I think the major sticking point is that a majority of the furry fandom who resort to siting historic anthropomorphism aren't taking this view; they view anthropomorphism in ancient cultures as inseparable from furry. This is what I object to, and am railing against.
Another problem is that I am more interested in furry as genre than fandom; I'm less interested in why furries are furry and why furry is furry, if you can dig it. The question of animal symbolism becomes more important in the fandom than the genre; a furry may choose a wolf "fursona" (do we still use that word?) because of the power symbolism, but I see no evidence that Eric W. Schartz chose Thomas Woolfe of Sabrina Online's species for any particular reason (though that's not really a good example, since I don't believe that character was originally Schwartz's creation).