Otherkin

"Tom identifies as plural, polyamorous, enby otherkin." "Oh, that's a pretty extreme combo even for the cutting-edge SJW standards." "Come on, don't be such a fuddy-duddy!" "I don't know. It sounds very strange to me. I should probably watch more Netflix and spend more time on Mastodon to get used to such stuff. By the way, does he also identify as nudist?" "I don't think it's technically possible." "Why not? Isn't it marginalized enough?" "Because they're also an ardent member of the furry fandom. You won't often see them without a costume."

Starseeds are not otherkin, but they can overlap.

It appears that many otherkin are unaware of what makes them different. They just know they are not normal humans.

A close friend of mine turned out to be otherkin as well, and I added her to the group so she could discover who she is.

You’ve already told Tumblr that you are definitely, really a wolf with wings; you’ve argued in favor of Otherkin rights and awareness; you’ve become a leader of the Otherkin community.

In addition to the otherkin identify as animals, there are some who identify as mythical creatures, like dragons, fairies, or vampires; fictionkin, who identify as fictional characters, frequently from anime series or videogames; weatherkin, like Marco, who identify as weather systems; conceptkin, who identify as abstract concepts; spacekin, who identify as celestial bodies; and several other even more obscure categories (musickin, timeperiodkin—the list goes on).

There exists an actual community of people who pretend to be animals and call themselves “otherkins.” As a piece in Vice once put it, “Otherkins are people too; they just identify as nonhuman.”

One does not conjure up new categories of being lightly, but Laycock does not hesitate and also introduces the concept of ‘otherkins’, “individuals who identify as ‘not entirely human’.” Otherkins have an unorthodox “framework of metaphysical beliefs,” Laycock says, “If it were orthodox they would not be other-kin.”

The page stretched for thousands of entries by users named Starkin and Faefolk411 and NosferatuReborn, their avatars drawn from luridly-rendered fantasy paintings or sketches of people with horns or hooves or wings. “You ever heard of otherkins? They’re people who identify as part animal or spirit. They claim to be dragons, vampires, elves, that sort of thing.”

Some elves claim to be allergic to iron and other products of encroaching modernity, while one breed of Otherkin—dragons in human bodies—insist that having no allergies is a sign of Otherness.

The living Otherkin are a loosely affiliated group of mostly young people who believe themselves to be magical and spiritual creatures: elves, werewolves, dragons, fairies, angels, hobbits.

Another is that I myself identify as Otherkin—a wolf therianthrope, to be exact—and I find this particular subculture to be absolutely fascinating.

In an archaically bound volume, Gibson explores the affirmation of the Otherkin community (who identify as partially or wholly animal) through the collation of visuals from mainstream culture, including Instagram filters and computer game clips.

Not the Otherkins. They’re pretty cool. This is a sub-culture of the Otherkins. Some of the human-puppies have started a new group in Exeter.