May 14, 2025
Adam Neely recently published a video The Ethics of Fake Guitar. In it, he discusses the controversey around edited—comped, quantized, mimed, or "faked"—guitar performances on the internet. Summarizing from his video, some members of the Rock/Metal community find these performances to be wrong or immoral: they deceive the audience, set unrealistic standards for young musicians, and give an unfair advantage, such as when acquiring gigs.
The chapter of the video essay that piqued my interest was Adam Neely's analysis as to why some members of the Rock/Metal community are outraged. In particular, he ties musical genres to communities of people, and those communities to their core values. Quoting from Adam Neely, "in the Rock/Instrumental performance community, ... the core value is athleticism" ^1: pushing oneself to perform the music with one's own strength and discipline is viewed as an ideal of the community. This is in contrast to, say, the Hip Hop community, whose core value Adam Neely identifies as authentic "lyricism" ^2—the Hip Hop community is not outraged over edited (vocal) performances because their values surround wit and cleverness, despite the fact that the same critiques of edited (guitar) performances ostensibly apply.
I feel that the furry fandom, like music, has many subcommunities nested under the broader enjoyment of anthropomorphic animals. It was enlightening for me to attempt to identify some of these subcommunities, so here is my vibes-based (read: not well researched) take on some subcommunities of the furry fandom, as identified by (a) the social media platform on which they primarily reside, (b) their primary age range, and (c) their core value.
Bluesky/Mastodon. Late Gen X/Early Millennial. Core value: authentic altruism. I view these furries as applying their core value by volunteering at conventions and hosting events. I also view silent suiting, where the purpose is to entertain others by allowing participants to more easily suspend their disbelief, as an expression of this core value.
Twitter. Late Millennial/Early Zoomer. Core value: authentic sexual expression. This is the community I feel I belong to most wholly. I view these furries as supporting each other through their kinks, whether it be latex, ABDL, straightjackets, chastity, or pup play. Speaking of pup play, I view this community's repeated litigation of whether pup hoods should be allowed in convention spaces, and the repeated verdict of "yes", as evidence of its core value.
TikTok/Instagram. Late Zoomer. Core value: authentic normalcy? This is a community which I admittedly have little perspective on, though looking up "furry tiktok compilation" on your search engine of choice might give you some idea of what I mean.
Just as there are many, many genres of music, there are tons of subcommunities within the furry fandom. The platforms and age ranges which I listed above are coarse approximations, and there is plenty of mixing between all three subcommunities between all platforms and ages. The ones above are just subcommunities which I have some loose perspective on, and which I found interesting to contemplate. I am interested to hear more perspectives on other subcommunities that exist, as well as the underlying values they embody.