Swiftpaw's Tree

[(SP)]

http://www.otherwonders.com/swiftpaws/ther.../sexuality.html




2013 Mod Edit: The above link doesn't work anymore, but its content can be found here. For future reference:

Therian Sexuality

Well, it's Valentine's Day yet again and I'm forced to gag repeatedly during the day at school, surrounded by lots of people who apparently take this day as a free pass to be allowed to gush and tongue in the hallway. Of course, everybody has chocolate and are in good, generous moods as well, so it's not a total loss.

I've hosted an essay by Coyote on zoophilia already, but this one is personal and says a bit different. These aren't his words and his words aren't my words. Just to get that straight.

As spring comes around again, jaguar has made a reappearance and it's easier to 'shift' ... or at least, I'm more aware of who I am. Therians understand what I mean.

Now, here is my freaky thought of the year.

I take PE as a junior because I thought I could buck the system and not take it at all. Long story short, I failed and now I'm taking it with freshmen. We're required to dress down and so I have to sit down there for ten minutes before we can leave, doing absolutely nothing. Changing a shirt and pants is not exactly a high-IQ operation, but you never know with freshmen...

We were switching back into regular clothes after class, and I looked around and I had a thought. This thought is disturbing and goes against plenty of social conditioning, for better or worse.

I have no attraction to either sex, except by individual personality.

I figured I was gay for a long time because I never was attracted to any guys, and that was the other choice, right? But, I was wrong, and at this point I think I can safely say I don't like humans. No gender about it.

However, and this is where it gets tricky. I don't know what attraction and 'love' is supposed to feel like, but I'm assuming this is it. With cats, house cats or big cats, that attraction feels real. It doesn't feel fake or made up. I think I can justify this by me "being" a cat in all ways but physically.

Here's where I get all defensive, because I'm insecure. Everything I've ever heard about animals is that they're inferior and if I have any feelings towards them, I'm a sexual predator or something crazy. Of course, I'm female, so that throws a wrench in the whole thing. I also get defensive because it feels like the one community who might be sympathetic either hasn't considered yet or doesn't have the brains to consider at all the attraction that would be natural if only I were a cat physically.

Having the sexual attraction, the emotional attraction, the sheer pleasure that comes from just sitting somewhere with a cat and talking with it and petting it... having that attraction crosses a serious line in the online therianthrope community.

It does feel sometimes like I'm not trying hard enough to convince myself that I want to be a normal teenager, or that I'm just fucked over. I guess I just need to convince myself about this without coming off as "oh, i'm gonna go screw cats". Some of the best moments in my life were with my cats, not even thinking about them sexually, though that feels natural when I'm around them.

This is me trying to reverse sixteen years of conditioning.

I go and post things on the community boards and feel like we're all talking in abstract. I don't think a lot of those on the other end are actually in tune with animals, which angers me but also just sets me loose to do my own thing. It's easier to go against the grain when you have such a low opinion of the grain in the first place.

This community talks often about how they have urges to bite, or mark territory, or establish dominance, or how they look at things like they were an animal. But when I go and say the following, what would my response be?

"I am attracted emotionally and spiritually and physically to the jaguar."

Okay, so here's the important thing. The first two up there are completely accepted online, but it's the third that causes trouble. It doesn't even matter that I wouldn't ever act on my feelings. It doesn't feel like I'd ever need to act on them, just hanging out with a cat will do it. I would never dream of forcing an animal to have sex, or anything as crazy as that.

But the community will not accept that people can have that last attraction. Maybe it's because the community right now is primarily in their teens, but why are people surprised?

There's a certain body type, similar to the feline furs played in chats. The kind of person that's slightly muscled and tall and lean, and the short haircut and way of moving. That last is important. The cat movements, and the awareness, are the strongest qualifiers.

I think attraction is much more than just hormones. I mean, what makes someone not just attracted to say, guys vs. girls, but to a specific body type, way of moving, eye color, etc? I think that's beyond just hormones.

I've met a few people who strike me as felines (we seem to attract each other) but they weren't ever *cats* in the therianthropic sense. Our friendships were me making that connection because of my attraction.

I am a cat in all senses except physical, so wouldn't my mental thought processes and initial sexual and emotional attractions be based on that? It's not like I meet someone and think "oh, they're cute" but then chastise myself, "no, they're not a feline". I don't force myself into that, because I don't have to. It simply doesn't even occur.

Cats are everything I want to be, everything I should be. The feline form is the perfect form that makes me feel at home and perfect and real. I'm happy just being around them, lavishing attention and playing the power struggle games.

In human society the issue of "zoophilia" is treated as a dominance thing, but that's not it at all. I don't think that's it for true therians, but for many humans who don't have the connection.

I was thinking about this topic again the other day because some freshman guy came up to me and asked me if I had a boyfriend. I told him to shove off, not because he was a guy but because he was a freshman and presumptuous. So he called me a dyke, laughing maniacally as he ran off.

This attitude is completely typical of high school students, but I can't speak for the adult world. I don't even know how it is for male therians who have and accept this part of themselves.. in the world it's assumed that if you're not interested in the opposite sex you're interested in the same, and from assumption come a whole range of attitudes.

Now, I've known one guy who was asexual. I guess that's the answer that people will accept if I'm ever asked point blank, which is all right with me. That's the human world. It's the therianthrope world that scares me. Your mind and spirit and instincts are totally that of a cat, or wolf, or whatever, but somehow you're still only attracted to humans...

I feel like I could be happy without having sex in my life, really, is all. Like it's not like sexual attractions aren't *there,* it's that they're not big enough on my "radar screen" for them to be a significant thing. It's not truly "asexual" in the sense that there's no sexual attraction, it's just that it's like it's not that big a thing and I can live without it.

I'm not saying every person with that strong animal connection is going to be sexually attracted. There's something to be said for the physical self. But for those who believe they are their animal and who have no ands-or-buts about it, maybe there's some soul-searching to be done.

[Guest]

Another link, sacredprofane? I bow to your superiority.

[LostDaemon]

Oh my...

Somehow I knew that the two communities I'm in currently would converge at some point. Poor therianthrope...

I somehow have an incredibly open mind towards almost all kinds of alternative sexualities. One of my friends could probably be considered a zoophile, and this does not concern me in the least. This poor therianthrope seems to be asexual through a lack of attraction for a different species than she is - and while if she was in her trueform, she probably wouldn't be asexual at all, in her current form she has no other acceptable option, to herself or society.

I can certainly sympathise, as it seems I may be in a similar position myself.

-LD

[Wild Seven]

LostDaemon: Ditto. You took words from my mouth ~_~

[Cate Perfect]

WOWWEE is this an old thread!

Cate