Latest Posts by wanderingcritter - Page 4

After all these years living in my bipedal body you'd think i would have gotten used to walking upright by now, but no i definitely have not.

It's honestly still such a weird feeling, everything about it just feels so foreign and uncomfortable. Not like, literally physically something is wrong (I do suffer semi frequent back pain, though that's entirely unrelated), but there's no doubt in my mind that my brain is wired to be operating a quadrupedal body, not bipedal. Being upright 24/7 goes against my instincts so intensely, it's one of the main reasons I first realized I was a therian.

Even in my current body, with my short neck and weak arms, it still feels more natural and normal to move on all fours than it does to move on two. It's like there's emergency alarms constantly going off in the back of my brain telling me that something isn't right, almost like that sinking feeling you get when you realize you're seriously injured. It's so jarring.

In a perfect world, I would love to be able to regularly move around using a combination of quadrobics and bipedal movements, kind of like alexias.films over on instagram if you know her. Maybe one of these days i'll work up the nerve to do public quads, there's so many cool places around my city id love to practice at

when the gender euphoria and the species euphoria hit at the same time

Me giving flowers to my mom because of all the things she has done for me that make her my mommy and truly shows how much she loves me and I love love love my mommy :)

my album known as "monarch of monsters" is available now. check it out here: monarch of monsters

i also wrote a book for it. you may read it here: monarch of monsters novella

the cover art was created by @glacierclear

Fun in the snow 🦴 - P

Homemade mask- I hope to commission a mask from a local maker that more matches my Fur

Anglocentrism in alterhuman communities: ramblings of a Spanish-speaking dragon and a cat

[original in spanish here, though i have no doubt that this version will be disseminated more widely] • [original en español aquí, aunque tengo la certeza de que esta versión se difundirá más ampliamente]

this post was originally written as part of The Sol System's Alterhuman Writing Challenge. written by @talon-dragonbeast, with the help of my sibling @watcherwingedcat. we hope you like it!

word count: 2422

This writing, which is more of a rant with myself than a proper essay, is one I've been meaning to write for a long time; ever since I first joined an online community, to be more precise. Anglocentrism, according to Wikipedia (and yes, the irony of the article not being available in Spanish is not lost to me), is "the practice of viewing the world primarily through the lens of English or Anglo-American culture, language, and values, often marginalizing or disparaging non-English-speaking or non-Anglo perspectives."

If you are monolingual and your native language is English, chances are you have never stopped to think about the advantage this gives you over those of us who are not so fortunate as to be born with the lingua franca on our lips. Yes, you may have had to study some Spanish in school, but let's be honest, very few people remember what they learn in elementary school. As an English speaker, the whole world is built for you, and it's the rest of us who have to fit your mold. Culture, scientific articles, movies, books, video games, the internet, online communities, technical language, educational videos: even in the most international spaces, everything revolves around English. Which brings me to the subject of this writing: The Alterhuman community.

My name (as I am known on the internet, at least) is Talon. I've been a member of the alterhuman community, and more specifically, the otherkin community, for a little over a year now. Otherkin (a word that comes from other, in Spanish otros; and kin, shortened form of kind, in Spanish tipo) are people who identify as nonhuman in some way. For example, I identify as a dragon (among other things), and that's what I am, even if I look human on the outside and am perceived as such. There are many reasons why someone might believe they are not human, but I'm not here to discuss that, so let's get back to the topic at hand.

Since I've been in this community, I haven't written a single post in Spanish. And not for lack of desire, nor because I am intimidated to share something as personal as my mother tongue. No, the reason is simple: The community does not exist in any language other than English. By this I don't mean that there are no non-humans outside of England or the United States, because of course there are (even if they are on other platforms like TikTok or Instagram), and I'll talk about those later. But simply put, the reason you don't see many alterhuman communities in other languages is because all the resources, the introductions, the chronologies of the (English) alterhuman community, the definitions of the terms, the terms themselves, everything is in English.

I have always been bilingual. Well, trilingual actually, although my third language is not too relevant in my day to day life and I only use it in classes or when someone starts a conversation in the language. It's hard to explain how your brain works when you speak multiple languages fluently, but basically it's like running two parallel systems at the same time, but with thoughts. I don't usually think with words, but when I do it usually happens that some of my thoughts are in Spanish, and others in English, roughly in a 50/50 ratio. Or it can also happen that I start the thought in one language, but finish it in another. Or I may try to use a specific word in English that does not have an exact translation into Spanish, so that when translated literally the sentence does not make sense. Basically, everything I write or say out loud I have to run it through several filters first, one to remove the words from the other language, one to find the words to replace them with, and one to make the sentence make sense. Sounds exhausting, doesn't it? It is. Now imagine if in order to express yourself as you really are, in order to participate in a community with beings who understand and accept you like no other, you had to basically suppress half of who you are, all the time.

The problem is not only not being able to use my native language to express myself. As I have demonstrated in the last year and a half that I have been in this community, I am fluent enough in English not only to be understood when I speak, but also to express such complicated concepts as the self, human nature, the psychology of being, and all that comes with existing as nonhuman. The real problem comes when I try to express relatively common alterhuman concepts in my native language. I'm not just talking about labels like otherkin or therianthrope, which can be adapted to Spanish with relative ease. It's the little things, the simplest things.

For example, the term shift. The word itself is already difficult to translate; during my searches, I found a glossary of terms on the Otherkin Hispano website in which they call them "desplazamientos", which... is an accurate translation, I guess, but impossible to use comfortably in everyday life. There are also terms whose definitions use expressions that simply cannot be translated into other languages. For example, otherkin and otherhearted. In English, the difference between these two terms is that otherkin means "[to] identify as" while otherhearted is "[to] identify with". But this is a purely English expression. In other languages, the distinction does not exist, or it makes no sense to use it; therefore, these terms are totally inaccessible to any international user. Or compound words like "catkin", which are difficult to express in other languages. According to Otherkin Hispano, in Spanish it would be said as is without translation, Soy catkin. But that... is not grammatically correct, since it would be mixing two languages in the same sentence. The most appropriate would be to say Soy gatokin, which sounds wrong and doesn't make sense anyway, because kin is still an English word. Or "hearttype", which in Spanish could be roughly translated as "tipo del corazón" (kind of [the] heart). When saying that you have a specific hearttype, for example "corvidhearted", one way of expressing it could be a simple Soy corvidhearted, which carries the same problems as catkin. Or you could, as Wikipedia advises, say Soy corazón de córvido ("I am heart of corvid"). I don't dislike it, to be honest, but some might find it too metaphorical or poetic.

Finally, and before reaching the conclusion, I want to dedicate a few paragraphs to talk about the alterhuman community that exists in other languages. I mentioned before these communities; that although they do exist, they are very scattered through platforms such as TikTok or Instagram, with which I am not so familiar. But since I can't talk about Anglocentrism without at least talking about the Spanish-speaking alterhuman community, I asked my sibling Watcher @watcherwingedcat what it thought about the topic. This is what they wrote:

Hi guys, I'm Watcher, and I'm here to talk a bit about the Spanish-speaking therian community, which I think is the pristine example of the hate we receive both from people outside the community and from those inside, both Spanish and South American. While this post focused more on the language barriers, I want to focus on the real consequences of this barrier, how it divides us in the way we interact with each other: The social part of this whole thing (as I already said some other time or another and some of my followers know, I am studying Social Education, so from my point of view the social part is very relevant for everything we do). As my sister already said (hi Talon!), the English community is the majority in alterhuman spaces, but, what is the Spanish-speaking community really like?

Not very large, is the answer. The term itself is not very widespread, and the community is quite small. However, after a while of searching, I found it in a little corner of the internet. When I found a community in my own language, I was excited, but my curiosity and joy were soon extinguished... When I saw the reactions to their videos and posts on tiktok mainly. They were packed with hate messages. Packed. If you think hate in the English community is bad, you are not prepared for the hate received in other communities, especially the Spanish one. This is more a matter of culture, a little bit also due to the closed mindedness in countries like Spain, Argentina, or Colombia.

In general, the non-humans of the Spanish-speaking community mostly post about quadrobics and masks. At least, I haven't seen much beyond that, and the community is mostly in tiktok. And the reception of their expression of way of being? Disgusting. To give an example of how bad the hate is, in one of the videos I found (I think it was a therian making a mask or something), humans and non-humans were insulting the therian posting the video, discussions about how we are crazy and sick in the head and should be in mental institutions... It was horrible. The worst were the death threats, even, wishing the therian to die, or hang themselves, or worse (I've even seen rape threats). Comments that said things like, "If my sister told me she was a dog I would take her clothes off and force her to sleep outside and eat animal food, if she wants to be a dog I will treat her like one." Threats of abuse, both physical and sexual... Absolutely disgusting. And the worst thing is that the tiktok platform did not remove these hate accounts, the copy and paste messages of insults, the threats....

I am proud of the Hispanic community for being so open about their identity, don't get me wrong, but there are times when it is safer to just not share that part of who we are with others, especially if you are a minor and vulnerable. That's another issue that concerns me, as I've seen people coming out to parents, siblings, friends, and them just belittling them. That, coupled with misinformation, is a recipe for disaster.

I couldn't help but notice the deep root of misinformation in the non-human community itself. They confuse definitions, the different terms, which leads them to spread even more misinformation. This I don't think is entirely their fault, or that they are so young for the most part, as I have not seen Hispanic therians over the age of 18. I think this is largely due (as Talon already mentioned) to the language difference, and the lack of translation of certain terms. In general, when talking to friends with whom I am open about my non-humanity, I use English terms. It is a little weird to use those words in English while speaking in Spanish, but I am bilingual and for now there is no solution to that. I think the Spanish community would benefit from spreading correct information, and having a platform to express themselves with their own, like tumblr is for the English community. Something my sister expands on in dreir post. As for me here I finish my little comment, I'll leave you with Talon now. Watcher out.

As a conclusion, I would like to talk about the consequences that Anglocentrism might have on non-English speaking alterhumans, and then propose some ideas on how we might begin to address (or at least mitigate) it as a community.

First of all it is the obvious; the vast majority of non-English speaking alterhumans simply never realize that they are alterhumans in the first place, on account of the language barrier. All of the resources for beings who are questioning their humanity or lack thereof are in English, so they are not accessible to people who don't understand the language; therefore, a non-English speaker would have a much harder time accessing them. Another consequence is not being able to express your alterhumanity fully, both internally and externally. Remember when I mentioned that my thoughts are evenly distributed between English and Spanish, always keeping a 50/50 ratio? Well, recently, I have noticed that when reflecting on my identity as a dragon, all my thoughts are automatically generated in English. I find this deeply shocking, as I feel that a fundamental part of my identity is being eroded. It is devastating to feel that you can only express half of who you are, suppressing what could otherwise be a complex and multifaceted identity. Not being able to express myself in my other language limits my ability to explore that part of myself.

Anglocentrism is a cycle that never ends; since all the resources are in English, no members in other languages can join, and since there are no members in other languages, all the resources that are created are in English. And while I wish I could say that I have a solution to end this Anglocentrism once and for all, unfortunately, I do not. I am only one person (dragon), and this is a problem that I alone cannot solve. True, there have been some commendable attempts by the international community (translations of writings, alterhuman blogs in languages other than English, the Eurokin server on Discord are some examples); however, these initiatives often don't often get very far because of the very nature of the community. As I have already said, most of the alterhumans are North American or English, therefore any attempt to globalize the community would be restricted by the fact that there are not many members who would be interested in this in the first place. So what can we do to change this? The answer lies in you, reader. If you have a second language, encourage yourself to create writings in it from time to time. If you come from a culture other than the mainstream, talk about how that affects your identity. If you have traditions specific to your country that you believe are alterhuman in nature, share them. And if you are part of the English-speaking majority, I invite you to contribute in a positive way through simple actions, such as listening to us when we express ourselves in other languages, recognizing that we do not all share the same culture, and keeping an open mind when discussing topics that may be unfamiliar to you. Our strength as a community lies in the diversity of our members; let's embrace it.

STOP THIS IS SO COOL WHAT

The symbol genuinely looks so good omg, I will 100% be using it in the future

It legit makes me so so happy seeing other beings be inspired by my ideas and putting their own spin on it lol this is exactly what I wanted from my original post :3

alternative transspecies flag

i personally believe transspecies is transitioning (socially or medically) to your desired species, including the change of sex identity and sex traits related to species.

personally, because i think shortened words are cool, i like using "transse" (trans-sea/trans-sé) short for [transs]peci[e]s.

the symbol was inspired by the image all the way at the bottom, not by me.

flag is four horizontal stripes, top to bottom; cranberry, lavender, white, lavender, cranberry, then a thin black bar on the right side. symbol is an alternative transspecies symbol, featuring a mix between the bigenital symbol, the mars symbol, the venus symbol with the holothere anchor, and a rounded theta delta.

examples:

a transspecies mare, a transse bull, a transspecies gonosimulite, speciesqueer tom, etc...

i love them so much,,, i made furrification hope u dont mind

me when im a werewolf who somehow wound up in a pack with a coydog, a leopard, a border collie, an opossum, and an orca

Having alterhuman friends is funny sometimes because I'm an eldritch dragon incomprehensible abomination and I'm very good friends with a small domestic housecat

in da classic fit

TT4TT - transgender therian for transgender therian

tired animal, feel your fur against the blooms ✿

Just in case anyone still has any doubts that the "anti-therian packers" argument is at least partially based in transphobia, this is a real, dead serious statement one of my (ex) mutuals made about why minors potentially having access to species affirming gear is wrong.

Like.

I legit don't even know what to say. This is genuinely so upsetting and concerning to hear from someone with a platform in a community meant to be accepting towards all types of individuals.

Not only is this a super inaccurate and invalidating way to think about nonhuman/transspecies identities, but it's also blatantly anti-transgender rhetoric. Replace the word "transspecies" with "transgender", and you have lines straight out of a speech given by a conservative politician about why queer books need to be banned in schools. The fact that they knew what they were saying was similar enough to transphobia that it was going to catch my attention is even more concerning, because it shows that they are capable of recognizing the similarities in their mindset but are simply choosing to ignore it.

I was a transspecies child. I knew there was something innately canine about me years before I even began to question my gender or sexuality. And I wish I had had the language to describe what it was that I was experiencing, instead of thinking I was going crazy for not feeling human.

Mark my damn words, we are going to start seeing a LOT more of this kind of thinking in the next few years (probably even months) and it's only going to get more aggressive, so if I were you guys I'd start putting petty differences aside and start banding the fuck together to help each other and our transgender human friends and family out.

having a prey species theriotype that hasnt been deemed cute or desirable by humans (especially if they also happen to be a keystone species) really sucks sometimes because it's like "im in a really shifty mood rn, let me go look at some pictures or watch some documentaries about my theriotype to feel more in touch with it! :3" and then it's just

*theriotype being hunted*

*theriotype being mutilated by predators*

*theriotype being eaten alive*

*theriotype starving*

*theriotype carcasses*

*theriotype baby drowning*

*theriotype infected with disease*

*theriotype with half of face ripped off*

non-human body flag

for anyone who has / is in a body that is not human, regardless of what labels they use

"wHy aRE yOu DyspHoRic ABouT tHat PaRt??1?!!" idfk man, literally why are any of us dysphoric about anything? not sure if tiktok therians understand what dysphoria is and that like... you don't get to decide what you are or aren't dysphoric about??? sorry that not all of us fit into your neat little sanitized 1000% kindergartener friendly stereotype of what it means to be an animal, cope ig

i no joke just saw a therian on tiktok say “can our community just go back to normal” in context to the packers situation. BE SO FOR REAL??!!! we are literally THERIANS! we were never normal and we never will be. the therian community was never normal. istg 90% of tiktok therians would flip their shit if they went on tumblr and saw how our community SHOULD be in other spaces

something quick for therianthropy day :3

alt under cut

yo! another wolfblood🤙🏽🐾

wild or "tame"?

fuck yeahhhhh i love running into other wolfbloods wsg dawg

im wild all the way no question. i crave living with my pack in the remote wilderness, hunting for our own food and making our own clothes, practicing our traditional customs, openly using canine body language and vocalizations to communicate, shifting under the full moon without having to worry about being caught by humans, all of it. if it were possible for me to live like that right now i'd do it in a heartbeat. interestingly enough i also used to be very judgmental of tame wolfbloods (even before i learned what therianthropy/otherkinity was) which is also very on paar for wild wolfbloods lmaoooo

as of right now i mostly just consider myself to be a wild wolfblood forced to live a tame lifestyle (think like s2 jana), which is fine it certainly has it's perks, but at my core im very much so wild and always have been ⏾⋅𐬹

Unicorns don’t seem to have many speculations regarding the afterlife, and certainly the concept of spooks and vengeful spirits would seem foreign to such laid-back creatures - but of the softer kinds of hauntings, one wonders. With such a strong love of herd and home shown in life, might they not wish to watch over those things even after they’re gone?

"A dragon that uses gasoline and matches is still a dragon" is the most metal thing i've heard in months

To all the alterhumans / nonhumans who dont know what to do: now is the time for you to start putting your money where your mouth is.

If youre an animal, it's time for you to be a goddamn animal. Be feral, Be aggressive, fight for your life.

If you're a dragon, then be a terror to Kings, and start burning down the halls of power like the dragons of yore.

If you're a mythical creature, have no concern for the social constructs of man. Stand proudly outside what people even believe is possible.

If you're plural, know you're never alone. Fight against individualism that seeks to divide each body into deterministic boxes.

If you're a fictional character who saved the world, believe that you can save any world. Don't back down now.

Now is the time to really believe that you are what you say you are. People in power are going to try to take that away from you. Don't fall for it.

It's time shed any preconceptions you have about what you're capable of. If you're an animal it's time to fight like one. A dragon that uses gasoline and matches is still a dragon.

All bets are off. If they want to treat us like dogs in a cage then im gonna start ripping fascists' throats out like one. And I'd better see y'all there with me, on G-d.

the amount of therians and "supporters" ive seen lately trying to claim that "therians don't identify as animals" is genuinely concerning

like actually how did misinformation spread get this bad ?? that is the entire fucking point of therianthropy what are you talking about my dog in christ

yes, i identify as an animal. no, not in an ironic or metaphorical or satirical or for funsies way. i am an animal. i am a therianthrope. stop watering down our labels so that you can appeal to judgmental humans who don't give a shit about us i am begging you

happy therianthropy day

Therianthropy Day is Friday, November 15, 2024

Therianthropy Day is held every year on the first full moon of November. This year, in 2024, that falls on Friday the 15th. According to NASA, this also happens to be a supermoon, which means it’s slightly brighter than usual.

Why that date, and what is the history of that holiday? 

Therianthropy Day commemorates the first Howl, which was held 30 years ago in November 1994. A Howl is when therians meet up together in person. That was a year after the first therians started to meet up together online in November 1993. Therians first proposed commemorating it as a holiday on that date in 1996, in a conversation thread you can still see here. Based on that history, in 2016, Muninn the Raven proposed observing it as Therianthropy Day, though the first posts and community poll about it attracted little attention. I think the holiday finally really caught on in 2021, when I first saw many therians posting on social media about fun things they were doing for it.

What are therians, anyway?

If therianthropy is a new idea to you, or you want to explain it to others who are unfamiliar with it, this essay is a quick and easy to understand introduction to it. It’s available in several languages already, and more translations would be great.

Learn more about the history of the therian community by reading the Timeline of the Therian Community written by @liongoatsnake

What can we do for Therianthropy Day?

I’ve seen therians celebrate it by wearing gear (for example, a necklace with the therian symbol, or clothes with pictures of their species), meeting up with their therian friends, and howling at the moon.

Enjoy some indie games and zines about therianthropy from this hand-curated itch.io collection. Some therian highlights from that: SlumberDragon’s zine of self-care tips for animal folk, @who-is-page’s therianthropy-inspired solo journaling game Wolf In Man’s Clothing, puppygirlbelly’s interactive story I Am Dog(s), and Digital Freegans’s zines THERIANARCHY and BEAST PUNKS.

Are there days for other sorts of alterhumans too?

There are. Alterhuman Day commemorates when Lio of the Crossroads System coined that word on September 26, 2014. Otherkin Day is on July 9, commemorating when the word was coined in 1990, though Arethinn has found that the word’s origin is a little more complicated than that. Plural Events says that Plural Pride Day is the third Saturday of July, and Plural Acceptance Week is that week.

Using my it/its pronouns irl is basically just a marriage proposal tbh

humans are animals too and are valuable members of the ecosystem! no being is inherently good or evil ⭐️🌼

please enjoy these posters i made playing around with dual tone :} all images are creative commons from unsplash!

🍹CHIBI ART RAFFLE!🍹

Would you like to get a chibi doodle like this? Then feel free to participate! :D

🌴 Rules:

- follow me (new followers welcome!)

- like and reblog this post

- stay cool ✌️✨

I’ll randomly choose one winner who’ll get a chibi artwork from me! It can be your own character, or fandom character, or whatever; I can draw literally any species and creatures ^^

Raffle ends on Nov 15! Good luck to everyone 🍀

any trans person reading this I love you

any woman reading this I love you

any poc minority reading this I love you

any queer person reading this I love you

edit:

no matter how many trolls or trumpies come in my comments and spew their nonsense I will keep saying it over and over and over again no matter how many times to show them I will not change. I will never choose violence or hate ever.

any disabled person reading this I love you

any person out of country that wished they could desperately help I love you

Any parents of a queer child who did everything they deemed “right” to protect their child and still feel as though they failed I love you

any person on the spectrum I love you

Any SA survivors I love you

Any person that needs life threatening healthcare and can’t afford it I love you

Any diabetic person I love you

I don’t know you. But I love you. I will always choose love that’s not a bad thing nor will I ever feel bad about choosing it

Augusti~