arcanicanis on Nostr: I can probably attest to some of the same, just lesser severity. Of being a stupidly ...

I can probably attest to some of the same, just lesser severity. Of being a stupidly naive kid on the internet, pulled into fandom things early, and only being able to distinguish the sensibility of a person based on their avatar and how well-spoken they are. Getting pulled in by art communities and webcomics, and gradually into weirder forms of content. Then later on when I had a vehicle, started to be involved in local fandom and staffing for conventions, while just looking past all the negatives and oddities.

Started to get trapped into certain belief systems (the ones fairly exclusive to furry fandom) that only created excuses to have depression and ‘pity Olympics’. Then I actually started to browse around and actually see what a lot of the people of the fringe look like (of folks that I thought were sensible people), but when you just see what they look like, it becomes exceptionally obvious in just appearance and attire that something is way off with them, even to the most socially-underdeveloped of autists to see.

Finally had some self-reflection, moved away from those fringes and beliefs, and have been a lot more functional since; but still somewhat ‘trapped’ into the general broad sphere of ‘furry fandom’ for friends/connections, since being with social outcasts during developmental years probably doesn’t help one’s social development. For a majority of folks I’ve kept an eye on over the years, it’s pretty much a ‘Hotel California’ where I just see people get sucked in, develop into the worst of habits, and despite however many times they ‘officially announce’ that they’re “leaving”, they’re always still stuck here.

I feel bad for the next naive generation getting sucked in by catchy furry VR memes on TikTok and such, not knowing where they’re going to end up.