To not buy her a tail, so she can be like her friend who ‘is a therian’

[Laura9899]

My ten year old has a friend who seems nice and has sane sensible normal parents and yet she wears a tail and tells my daughter she’s a therian. I’m not in any way happy with all the furry rubbish and this feels along the same lines. My daughter has now asked to be a cat for Halloween, then asked for a furry tail as part of her costume, and now I think it’s actually so she can join in with her friend. They are only ten so it’s likely just play but there’s no way I’m letting her go out in a tail 🙄.

But again, being a furry or a therian doesn’t make someone a paedophile, I explicitly said children shouldn’t be exposed to kinks or anything sexually inappropriate. But I very much dislike the insinuation that kinks are so awful, that children are almost being sacrificed to it to try and make it appear more normal to the rest of society.

Yes we should call out paedophilia, grooming, child abuse.

We should not kink shame adults.

For the record, I’m not into that, but what I am into would probably make you clutch your pearls.

Went down the Wiki rabbit hole and looked up therians - apparently there's an entire sports community attached to it called quadrobics that involves exactly running around on all fours 🤣😄🤣😄🤣

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quadrobics

@Antisocial81

It’s the thin end of the wedge. I know a girl who identifies as a boy (mostly, although sometimes she’s a girl and sometimes non binary). Also identifies as a range of different animals and wears tails and masks. And is gay (except when she’s not). Multiple changes of name too. And her mum just goes along with it all, and expects others to indulge her too. It’s mind boggling. I’d nip it in the bud now and bring her back to the real world.

This ^

@67789d · Yesterday 23:54

Her friend isn't a therian, she is just a silly girl, with daft parents if they are indulging this stupidity

And this. ^ I'm so glad mine are grown, and I don't have to put up with, and indulge in any of this shite. And no, it's not 'just them being kids' as someone suggested. No-one pulled any of this bollocks when I was a kid. Nor did it happen when mine were kids (noughties.)

All DH and I had to put up with, was them being Emos!

I miss Emos!

@Papster · Today 00:20

Tell her you’re allergic to cats and she’s going to have to be rehomed or put down.

LOL! This ^

This thread sounds like the Monty Python mouse sketch.

No I don't think they know, hence I said they're no doubt completely unaware of it....should we let kids play with other adult things because they don't know what they are? Where do you draw that line?
I'm saying this as someone with a 6 year old dd who regularly pretends to be a cat because she loves cats. When it goes into therian/ identity territory, there's a line being crossed where it gets weird and borderline inappropriate in my opinion.

I did too and was heavily still into make believe and role play, far healthier than the skincare routines and Temu hauls 10 year olds are engaging in today.

And we wonder why mental health figures are so high. Kids can’t even innocently play now. It’s insane.

It's natural for kids to play make believe a and dressing up. A phase that they usually grow out of.
The problem is all this nonsense about wearing furry ears and tails at school and going around meowing. I have read things about this and wondered if it really happens in school and is tolerated, or someone's having a laugh.
Either way, a firm NO you are NOT going to school pretending to be a cat.
Get your uniform on and get your arse to school!!

Im in my 30s and when I was at school, we had a group who played horses. They took it very seriously.

There was another group who made up ‘sexy’ dances and dressed like they were going clubbing. I know which I’d prefer for my daughter.

I think the trouble with therian is, it’s the idea that one really is a cat inside and has ‘the soul of a cat’, whatever that means. Theres a whole ideology that the individual goes through ‘therian shifts’ and an online community that tell others what these experiences should feel like. I know this because of a 10yr old I know who’s all over it.

I don’t think it’s frothing to have concerns about children of that age believing they really can be a cat inside. At the least parents should be saying that is not possible. I agree let them play but play isn’t about ‘having a community’ and devoting themselves to an ideological standpoint, which I see this 10yr old doing.

It’s also been interesting seeing the peer responses, my DDs thankfully have just said ‘friend thinks they are a cat but they can’t be really so I just be nice about it’. Other peers however have been fully influenced and also claiming they’ve always been a cat really. In their case it seems a fear of growing up, and about bullying - so deciding to ‘opt out’ rather than all the impossible work they perceive is required to fit in. It’s a complex defence mechanism imo, not harmless at all.

I see lots of 10 year olds engaged in imaginative play.
Perhaps I should tell them to stop and get a screen!

Teens have explored different identities always. It’s a natural part of development.

I went - crazy hair sprayed hair a la Bonnie Tyler, to rock chick - skin tight jeans and stilettos, to goth with black finger nail polish to hippie all the way through to now - very boring middle aged SEASALT woman.

Exploring different identities and cultures has always wobbled parents - youngsters were not allowed to see Elvis or The Beatles for example because of the fears of the influence on them.

My guess is this is just play for them both. Might be the friend has hit the beginning of puberty and is trying an identity out. But I think the level of panic is OTT. I know the internet, porn and grooming is a risk but these girls don’t have access to any of that yet presumably.

I see teenage girls walking to and from comp in the shortest skirts and knee high socks - a very sexualised look if you hold that lens up. My stilettos would have been too - but I was oblivious. Victorian era according to AI: “teenage girls and young women engaged in subtle flirtation by wearing highly ornamented stockings or tightly lacing their leather boots to show off a dainty foot and ankle when they naturally lifted their dresses to step into carriages or walk”

I hope that we can raise girls into women that understand the patriarchy and how it’s shaped us, how we can choose what we wear and don’t need it to conform to satisfy the male gaze. That just because we dress a certain way doesn’t give anyone the right to disrespect us, harass us or assault us. That we have body autonomy. That porn often presents a warped depiction of sex that is mostly to satisfy male fantasy and is often degrading of women. That there are people out there who will have nefarious intentions but that we have rights and how to protect ourselves.

But for now, let her play. Let her have her innocence without letting a dark underbelly of society (of which there are only a few - most people regardless of sexual
orientation and identity are ‘benign’ all the way through to ‘good’ people) infect it through your fears OP.

Sorry it's just bloody weird.

I would be discouraging the friendship and possibly book something for Halloween. (Theme park type event) to avoid her seeing said odd friend. This would also stop the hype around the build up to their planned feline Halloween adventures.

I would purchase any costume other than a cat one.

But a cat dress up tail isn't an adult item? I mean, there are fetishes about adults dressing up as babies, it doesn't make it inappropriate to use nappies on a real baby. Dress up costumes are kids items, even if there's a kink that uses them. Or should we stop kids wearing school uniform because there's a kink preference about that?

@Squishymama Kink-shaming is my kink. Don’t yuck my yum.

I made a tail for a Halloween costume out of black tights and stuffing no fluff involved. Get her to make one of those if she wants a tail. Don't buy into this nonsense.

Exactly this! The current cult of Trans is entirely down to young kids being exposed to absolute garbage on social media. Otherwise, why wasn’t it such an issue 20+ years ago?

Predatory men will use any means to access their prey - young impressionable children. They don’t hang around in playgrounds anymore but they’re hiding in plain sight on the Internet.

The naivety of many posters on this thread is quite shocking.

🤣

The tail was for me as an adult as I was a Brownie leader and pinned on with a safety pin.

It can be innocent. My only worry would be that there are some pretty fucking far from innocent men online (and irl) fetishizing the whole thing. Ergo I would not encourage it, and would monitor internet usage.

It's not all lounging about, sleeping and eating treats, enjoy licking your bum 😀

I consulted some of my young people in residence. The general thought was that the adult furry community was something that you should avoid at all costs - broad mindedness only goes so far and their broad minded goes far beyond the Mumsnet norm. (One of them had a friend who was a costumier for the furry community crafting outfits and so on but only did it as a side hustle as a teenager and the young person said he contemplated it but it would mean dealing with seriously weird people.) For what it's worth another one of them said if he had a 10 year old he certainly would not let her go out wearing a tail because for 10 year olds it is not sexual thing but people may well get the wrong impression.

So surely the answer is to monitor internet usage, not stop dc engaging in imaginative play?

I just can't get behind the moral panic if a dc dresses up as a cat. It's far more likely to be that they're reading Warrior Cats than a sex thing.

Dressing up is fine for Halloween, fancy dress parties, World Book Day etc, but that's where it stops.

When parents indulge their children into wearing animal tails/masks etc and allowing them to identify as an animal, is setting them up for a fall. The poor child will be ridiculed and bullied. There's different and there's bonkers, and the above is bonkers.

Allowing your daughter to be a cat on Halloween is perfectly fine in my book. If she wants to start wearing it in every day life, then yes, that's an issue.

Stop kids playing dressing up? Stop any dressing up that also has been used sexually (I would imagine everything has been BTW).

Most people don’t see a child in a dressing up costume as sexualised. Most children dressing up don’t do it to be sexualised.

There are, of course, predators out there and we need to teach kids about body autonomy and rights. We need to teach them about healthy sexual relationships and about consent.

There are of course some children for whom identity becomes tricky due to other developmental or contextual issues.

But for the vast majority of society - this is a couple of 10 year olds innocently playing and it’s a normal developmental phase and it will move on.

I think the total split in opinion here is because both parts are true.

It can be a bit of innocent dress up and some nice creative play and gor lots of kids this is as far as it goes.

But for others its a much deeper, more insidious experience that we wouldn't want our kids exposed to.

For the kids doing it in most cases it's entirely innocent but there is a dark element that you don't have to go far into the Internet to find and it's a gateway to lots of other problematic issues. Most probably avoid these and it's a quick phase but you need to be aware of them.

Seeing the young adults into this wandering round university campuses shows that there's more to it than a quick phase for some at least.