Because people didn't dress up as mermaids and go to cons and express how deep down inside they truly are a mermaid, and have a high likelihood of fucking someone else who also felt the same way.
I don't think many people had "a thing" for mermaids though. It was just another human creature with boobs. I don't think most people thought about it any deeper than that
Uh... I hate to tell you this but people absolutely dress as mermaids and do conventions... There's a whole home industry of people who make custom silicon tails.
To be fair, I think people looked at the folks who were into mermaids as outlandish too. "Been around for a long time" doesn't mean the same thing as "totally accepted socially".
I mean, the point of a mermaid isn't that it's a sexy looking fish, it's that other than its tail, it looks like beautiful human women. In some stories, sailors don't even realize they're taking to mermaids because their tails are underwater. Also, mermaids were generally considered bad omens or malicious entities, and when they did seduce humans, it was usually to kill them, so it's not like the folklore was very pro-mermaid sex.
Furries aren't as recent as people tend to think either I might point out, the subculture has existed in some form since like the 80s to my understanding, it's just more popular and visible these days.
We had a general fen con in the area that was known for two large groups. furries and klingons. furries grew so big they did their own dedicated con. to bad because we had two dance rooms and the fur one had the ac maxed. was so great. dance in the regular one till you are sweating like a pig then move to the fur one.
Oh I mean, yeah, anthro characters are probably older than civilization, but I meant the furry fandom as a specific subculture rather than specifically the subject it is centered around.
I was gonna make a joke that it's also an idea that's on so many street corners and coffee cups. However after googling I found out that it's a siren on the Starbucks logo and not a mermaid. My joke fails on both humour and fact.
I went to dragon con one year, people were dressed in all sorts of costumes even though it's not a furry con. And I know the hotels where the con is are incredibly hard to book. That said just once I want some senior executive to accidently book a room in one because he has some meeting with a potential client of something and just so happen to click it at the right time.
He shows up and is completely bewildered by all the people in costumes. "you'll never believe it mark. I rode down the elevator with a robot and I swear to God... Tiny from Bob's burgers"
My partner went to a convention in another city. He was caught off guard by the number of dudes in leather and fetishwear that he saw around the hotel when he first arrived but just thought the city must have a diverse and adventurous night life.
The next morning on his way out he spotted a poster, it was "The Bear Ball" weekend, some disco themed big gay guy event, and the hotel he was in was the headquarters, which explains why most of the other attendants of his conference were being housed in a different hotel.
He said he had some great people watching for the next couple days.
50% of mythology is just fetish, just check out Greek mythology. People most definitely masturbated to mythology in the past based on the amount of fetish oozing out of the stories.
You can't tell me the ancient Greek equivalent to furries didn't think Zeus transforming into animals and fucking was hot.
Probably because old folks know that mermaids are a myth and don't identify as mermaids ( although ai think I saw a docuseries about a 30ish year old thinking he was one)
Where as furries bleed the line between what might be fetish realm, and what might be some people actually believing/thinking they are a furry animal--which would be considered a delusion.
My brother in Christ, werewolves existed for at least 150 years and shape shifting goes back hundreds more. A beast that becomes a person... What could that possibly be for? A person becoming a beast is easy and the not weird part of folk history that didn't upset any kind of established morals. Violence is a part of life. Hot wolf dick that escapes into the night after making sweaty sheets? More difficult to keep as an oral tradition. Well, in stories at least.
Nope, different nerd culture entirely. Seriously, they have their own conventions, instead of fursuits they do custom silicone tails and train to swim in them, have contests and pagents and things. There's basically no overlap between the two communities. Scaleys are folk in the fursuit community who do dragon and lizard personas.
I have odd connections. Being in the film industry I have friends through props depts who do furry cons and one of my coworkers does underwater photography for people in the Mermaid subculture.
Yes, you're right, preschool and grade school children do identify as animals a lot and they're often not ashamed to express it, because it's much more tolerated at that age. It's viewed as wierd in adults though and it's much more rare among adult people. Probably partially because it's a juvenile trait and most people just grow out of that phase , partially because it's viewed as juvenile (and wierd), so many of those who do not grow out of it are afraid to express it. I find it harmless, so I wish for more tolerance.
I would say that if anyone is upset about an older furry, then that person is living proof that furry is a sexualised fetish. Why else would it upset them?
There is a significantly higher proportion of LGBTQ+ representation within the furry community than the general populace, and it makes sense why. Fursonas are another way to explore sexual and gender identities in a safe way, and furry communities tend to be pretty accepting places.
This is just my opinion, but I see kink in the furry community criticized the same way I see kink at Pride events criticized.
You do know that being gay and being furry ain't mutually exclusive right, but I guess whatever justification you can find for letting your true feelings out.