to think that children in your child's class don't identify as animals?

[wotnofurries]

inspired by the wearing a tail to school thread, I thought I'd see just how common or otherwise the whole furry/litter tray/identify as an animal thing really is.

Unreasonable = Yes, a child in my child's class does this.
Not Unreasonable = Don't be silly, never come across one in my life.

Can't vote but while there are no furries in DC school DS who is 14 knows of a girl in his year who does this outside school.

I voted YANBU then remembered there is an older girl in my DCs school that always wears a fox mask. I presumed she was just allowed to wear it to hide behind as she clearly either is ND or has issued based on her previous behaviour I have witnessed. But if she was a fox she would grow whiskers and look like a fox, rather than needing to dress up as one. Are adults really encouraging this? Why are adults encouragong this rather than getting to the route of the problem or in the case of younger DC labelling it as what I'd really is, play?

She isn't "pretending to be a cat" though is she? You said she identifies as a therian. That isn't the same.

So you would be OK if the school fed her tin cat food or biscuits ans made her use a litter tray in the classroom?

Obviously not 🤣🤣🤣

The problem is it opens them up to the world of the adults who do sexualise this - if they go online they will easily come across the shite there

I said she says she does. She's obviously heard these words and terminology and uses them without really understanding them. On a surface level she knows what identifying means, but of course she's going to say well yes, I do think I was a cat in my past life as its part of the game.

As I've said many times it would be different if she was much older and I will address it if we get to that point. But right now she's 7, essentially playing as a cat no matter what wording she's parroting, and isn't hurting anyone and neither are her friends.

But I think what @Cornishmama1990 was saying is that she can’t physically stop her daughter hearing these words at school.

That might be true, but she isn't even trying at home.

Sons in senior school, there’s a few there that identify as animals. I told him it was a sexual fetish and a load of old nonsense.
He’s had years of my feminist rants though so knows it’s all utter shite and normally done by attention seekers or those with autism/sexual abuse.

I don't think anyone on this thread has an issue with little children (primary age) 'pretending' to be a horse/dog/cat.

There were some eyes raised about Therians due to various connotations.

The main problem people have is with kids 'identifying' as an animal (which is NOT the same as pretending).

Billy is a boy. His identity is of a kind boy, someone fun, loyal, that plays football enjoys baking. Billy has many interests and sometimes he and his friends pretended to be superheros or Roblox characters or animals in the zoo.

Bob identifies as a cat. He sees himself as an agile cat, a fun cat, a cat that likes milk. He wears cat ears to school. When he goes to.school.he expects his lunch to be served in a cat bowl. When in yr 7 he joins the LGBTQ+++ group to express his cat identity and seek support to get litter trays installed in the unisex toilet area...

Billy - absolutely fine!
Bob - most people.on this thread concerned about!

Come on, now. At least try and make it believeable.

On the other hand, my cat thinks she’s a human being and behaves like one, and I encourage that.

She doesn’t use a human toilet, though.

🤣🤣

Both mine in primary school and as far as I'm aware nobody identifies as an animal.

My kids are 7 and 9 and pretend to be all kinds of things (dinosaurs, cats, aliens) which is fine because it's just pretend play.

I will not be telling them they can identify as anything because they can't. They are humans and I expect them to behave as humans. If they tried to pretend to be a cat and crawl around when it's inappropriate (in public/at the dinner table, they would be firmly told to stop being silly and sit properly.

I can't get on board with any teenager pretending to be an animal and it's not something I will ever play along with as mine get older.

I would love to be a cat and do absolutely nothing all day, get waited on hand and foot etc but it's not realistic. I'm not a cat, I don't want to eat from a bowl on the floor or poo in a litter tray. So really I just want to be a human who doesn't have to go to work but also not realistic sadly.

I came across this for tge first time on holiday in the UK recently.12 yr old girl or thereabouts with fox mask and tail playing on all fours at the playground.It looked very strange.

I have a feeling there was a character in the TV show Years and Years, which was set in the near future, who was a teenage girl who 'identified' as transhumanist (wanted to become one with data) , and had a sort of holographic visor/filter of various animals thing that she wore more and more as the show went on.
It seemed so out there at the time, but there were lots of things in that show that have been quite prescient.

A girl I went to primary school constantly played as animals. Either a cat, horse or dolphin iirc. I used to play with her occasionally, as I was also very imaginative in my play, and liked animals, but she wasn't one of my main friends.

She was a bit of a loner, happy to trot round the playground on her own and seemed content enough. Looking back, I figure she was perhaps a bit on the spectrum and/or just quirky!

My daughter is a therian. I think because she is abit odd, didn’t feel like she fitted in and then found the group of therians and they are all so lovely and supportive. We went to comicon recently and she wore her mask and tail. There was loads of therians there (among other dress ups as you would expect at comicon). But the therians were such a nice bunch. They would smile and wave to each other (she is very shy). Several as they were passing her said they loved her mask (she makes her own masks). I don’t see the big deal. It’s no different to any other trend - like being a goth or emo or something. They aren’t mean they are just nice. She has made friends with a lovely group of girls at her new school too, and some are therians. They are not nasty or bitchy like some of the other ‘groups’ like the dance girls or the netball girls.
the way I see it, she has lovely kind friends, she is happy, she is creative and loves crafting the masks.

Same here. Loads of pretending to be horses - but it was harmless. I’m not sure the same can be said of what’s going on now.

Me too, but I was quite clear of the difference between ‘pretending to be a’ horse for the purposes of a game and ‘identify as/actually think I am’ one.
I also think this is pretty normal in primary aged kids but they are being told that means they are a ‘therian’ (whatever TF that is) not just playing.

Unbelievable! Loads of us know kids who do it. Did you read the post before yours?

I'm a member of the very broad church of "alternative lifestyles" and am a vintage Goth at 55. However much I admire Siouxsie, Robert Smith, romantic Vampire's and dressing up, at no point have I ever "identified" as anyone other than myself which is middle aged widow with an imagination.

My point here is that it irks me when people claim the whole identifying thing is akin to old school subcultures. It really isn't. Yes, we gravitated to a tribe with music and fashion as a unifying factor, but regardless of sex or sexual orientation, what we did mostly on the weekend was reserved for that time and we wore our pentagrams under our uniform or work clothes. We would have been given short shrift demanding to work by candle light or only to rock up to school in the midnight hours in case we vanished in a puff of smoke.

I appreciate that some cases are more complex than others in the case of ND etc and I don't pass judgement on coping mechanisms etc. Those are hard situations and I genuinely feel for those in that position, and am certainly not qualified to have an opinion on that score.

That said, there are those who will be doing it for other reasons, and exploring those reasons, and applying logic and safeguarding, especially in the case of children in the Wild West of the internet is important.

Also, I'm so glad I'm old.

This is what I think it is. Children/teenagers aren't seriously believing they're animals. They'd have to be delusional to think that. They're having fun pretending and they've picked up the "identity" terminology either because they don't understand what it really means, or because they've learnt that some adults take that more seriously than if they just say they're pretending to be a horse. Others (especially teenagers) are just having fun taking advantage of the credulity of some adults.