Analysis - Half-Life 2 (2004)

It's an 4/10 game, and a terrible sequel. Play it if you haven't already, but the first game in the series, it's expansions, and HL2's Episodes, are far better in level design, gameplay, story, and content.
EDIT: By 4/10, I mean it's mediocre. Not bad, not terrible, but not great or just okay - average being 5. Think of it as 2 stars out of 5. I understand that a lot of people work with the common "6 is terrible, 7 is okay and 8 and up is great - anything 5 or lower isn't worth a buy", but that's not me, because that makes no sense numerically speaking. I'm not IGN lol.

Story

Before we talk about Half-Life 2's story, we need to talk about Half-Life 1's in order to compare the two.

Half-Life 1 puts you in the shoes of Gordon Freeman, a guy with an MIT PhD and military-grade weapons training as part of the Black Mesa Hazard Course. Gordon, unlike most protagonists, has no personality. He is not a character in Half-Life 1, but rather a blank slate for the player to project a character into. Is Gordon a scaredy cat, or a cold blooded killer? Is he a murderer, or a pacifist? The player decides, and the game lets them play it out. This is why he is a silent protagonist, the player gives him character and voice, not the game. He can talk according to several in-game and out of game sources (refer to his Letter of Admission, and press E on an ally, for example).

Half-Life 2 throws all that out the window. Gordon Freeman is the savior of mankind, the only hope for humanity, the brightest star in the field, the biggest Gary Stu. Reviewers at the time said the same, and unbiased people trying HL2 out without first inserting themselves in the hype train say so too, and with good reason. Every person in the game knows Gordon and loves him, everyone follows him without him even asking, everyone provides supplies to him and lets him steal medkits from dying people, because he's Gordon Freeman, who can do no wrong. Doesn't matter if your Gordon Freeman during Half-Life 1 was a psychopath that killed everything he saw, from cockroaches to Barneys to aliens - now it's Gary Stu's turn, and you have no say in it. He's still silent, but without any reason for it, and now there's NPCs talking about how he doesn't talk much as if he was actually a mute, which is false, as stated in the previous paragraph.

But let's shove aside the protagonist, what's going on around him? Well, once again let's go back to Half-Life 1 and see where we left off to contextualize the story.

Half-Life's expansion packs were not shy in their content, not just in gameplay and levels, but also plenty of story. Half-Life: Opposing Force was the last game in the HL1 chronology, and the first expansion pack to come out, it takes place after every other expansion and the main game, starting around Forget About Freeman (when Shephard wakes up). In it, we see that:

1. There's this Race X threat that is trying to terraform Earth into something akin to their home dimension, known just as X or World X.
2. There are Black Ops male units sent in to extract a nuclear device from one of the many old ICBM rockets found in Black Mesa Research Facility (as it used to be an ICBM test silo about 5 decades prior to the events of the games), with the intention of nuking the facility to prevent X terraforming from spreading and in an attempt to eradicate any witnesses of the HECU's wrongdoings or of the Black Ops' conspiracy, which also led to conflict between the HECU and BOps.
3. Most of the HECU units in Black Mesa were Privates, as they receive orders from a Corporal like Adrian, which himself got promoted days before the incident due to meddling by Gman, explaining why Gordon managed to take down so many of them and why the situation was so poorly handled in terms of civillian casualties.

Half-Life: Blue Shift was the second expansion pack to come out, and starts adjacent to HL1, only a bit sooner. In it, you play as Barney Calhoun, one of the many Barneys that roam the facility in HL1. As Barney, you find out that:

1. Several Black Mesa employees managed to escape through various routes; not all of them died to the nuke, Xenians, or the Army/MARSOC/Black Ops.
2. The HECU were initially non-aggressive until Gordon started engaging them in the High Security Storage Facility (completely off-limits to R&D and the Security Force, let alone to a mere Research Associate like Gordon).
3. The New Mexico Railroad Line is directly connected to the Black Mesa Research Facility, meaning supplies and otherwise come through via land (which can easily be tracked, no pun intended, using something like Google Maps).

Half-Life: Decay was the third and last expansion pack to be release for Half-Life 1, and also starts adjacent to Half-Life 1, though how much sooner or later is unknown. In Decay, you play as Gina or Colette, and the expansion contextualizes and builds upon a lot of things the original Half-Life merely mentioned in passing, despite their seemingly important nature (for example, the Satellite Delivery Rocket you launch in On a Rail, or what exactly happened to cause the Resonance Cascade, etc). As these two ladies, the player can clearly see that:

1. The HECU were called in by Rosenberg, the creator of the Anti-mass Spectrometer, as he and the two Scientists used the Uplink station above the Hazard Course to contact the proper authorities for help with evacuating personnel and dealing with the alien threat.
2. The Satellite Delivery Rocket only hadn't been launched prior to Freeman's arrival because the launching system required the Black Mesa Air Control to give "the all clear" that would allow it to launch, so that it could later be used, in conjunction to all the safety mechanisms such as the Dampening Locks, also activated by the two doctors, to "revert" the Resonance Cascade and stop the Xen fauna from being randomly teleported into Earth, limiting the alien threat only to Nihilanth's troops and to Race X.
3. In the out of game material included with the game, it's shown that there isn't just a Mark IV HEV suit, but also a Mark V Prototype ready for testing.

All this information combined with the nuke being set off (thus preventing the X flora and terrain from spreading any further.. or did it?) brings up many questions. What were the repercussions of all these events unfolding at pretty much the same time? How many of the escaped scientists and Barneys managed to reach the urban centers, and how did the government react? Did anyone see the nuke going off, and how did society handle the sudden appearance of Xen fauna due to the resonance cascade? What are Gman's motives, and is he really the administrator of Black Mesa, using some sort of Displacer Cannon to move around? How can he always arrive just in time, and how many people did he directly affect like with Adrian? Did he only save Adrian for as long as he did to use him against the Race X forces? Why? What about all the HECU that didn't die at Black Mesa, who saw everything that happened? And what about the Black Ops? Were all this to go public, would the US be seeing a third world war with something like Russia, given the country's weakened political and military strength? Just how public is Black Mesa's existance, is it as public as the game makes it out to be (tram announcer asking employees to give out recommendations, the railroad line connection)? What happened to the Mark V prototype? Did the Nihilanth and Race X only invade Black Mesa and it's general vicinity, or did they go further than that? How much further did they go, if so? What exactly led the HECU to start attacking Black Mesa personnel, rather than simply detaining them after finding them in off-limits areas? Was it the Gman?

Half-Life 2, being the great sequel it is, ignores all of that, skips 20 years into the future, creates a new threat (the Combine), shoves the player into "Eastern Europe"'s "City 17" (very specific) where everyone speaks English and looks American, barely mentions any of the events of Half-Life 1, and doesn't answer any of the above questions. Hell, it raises more questions than it answers, considering even the simple concept of giving Gordon his suit again is done terribly and in a way that makes no sense (it's a Mark V now, so it's the prototype, right? Except Kleiner says it's Gordon's suit, which STILL fits him, and if so, how did he get it, and how did he get the resources to modify it into a fully blown Mark V?). So how does the story hold up on it's own, if we pretend it's not a sequel at all?

According to HL2, "humanity" was defeated by the Combine after 7 hours of battle, with no explanation given as to why the Combine attacked (what for) or why they didn't just eradicate humanity at once. Instead, they basically made City-sized gulags in Eastern Europe, with no explanation given for the location's choice, or to why everyone speaks English, without showing as much as an accent, with 2 exceptions (Grigori, who has an Eastern European accent, and Odessa, a brit). The game takes place in one of these Cities, the capital of the Combine gulags, City 17, and it makes it clear that the Combine presence on Earth at the moment is simply a garrison formed to control the population, with the real brass waiting on the other side.

Funnily enough, the printing press still worked so that they could take a picture of the burning UN HQ and print out "Earth Surrenders!".

City 17 is ruled by "Wallace Breen", who used to be Black Mesa's administrator. In fact, he rules the entire Combine presence on Earth, with no explanation given as to why the administrator of a nuked facility became world leader instead of a capable politician or an actual Combine person. He resides in a tower simply known as The Citadel, and rules with an iron fist, taking notes from Orwell's "1984" without understanding any of it's nuances. There's this "suppression field" which prevents people from reproducing, and everyone lives off of free food given by the government, with no explanation given as to where it comes from or what it is. Soylent Green, anyone?

The Combine are the most generic evil bad guys, with no redeeming moral qualities or even as much as a motivation other than "kill humans, lol". They drained the Earth's ocean, with no explanation given as to why or how, and they come from another dimension, because of course they do. They also use mortar canisters that have headcrabs inside in order to easily and effortlessly take out entire enemy bases, with no explanation given as to how they have all these headcrabs. They call their crappy transhuman garrison the Combine Overwatch, who are assisted by Civil Protetion, who are just regular humans.

The Resistance are the only force standing against the Combine. They're a group of scattered around cells that take refugees from City 17 so they can gather up refugees, with no explanation given as to why they have as many supplies as they do. They never attack the Combine, and had no plans of doing so until Gordon blew up a prison (Nova Prospekt) and killed pretty much all it's prisoners for the sake of saving one guy because a girl wouldn't shut up about it. Real hero right there. The Resistance is led by Eli Vance, a guy from Black Mesa, who's aided by Isaac Kleiner, a guy from Black Mesa, with help of a spy called Barney Calhoun, a guy from Black Mesa, and Mossman, a girl that would be from Black Mesa if it weren't for pesky Gordon getting her job instead, and Eli's daughter, Mary Su- I mean, Alyx Vance. There is no explanation given as to why they're all related to and mostly from Black Mesa, but you should already expect that at this point.

I could go on - there's a lot I haven't even touched on - but it'll take way too long, and I'm sure you already get the picture. The story is bad. Not only does it completely disregard the previous entry in the franchise, but it also sucks on it's own, due to humorously poor writing and a lack of any care and attention given to why Gordon being quiet in HL1 was thought of as a good thing rather than a hamper on the story potential.

Since "HL:VR" looks like it's going to be a Half-Life 2 prequel, I can already guess it'll be just as flawed, if not more, considering neither Randy Pitchford nor Marc Laidlaw are going to work on it, and I doubt they'll touch on any of the questions left open by the games before Half-Life 2.

Level Design

Half-Life 2's level design is the very definition of a mixed bag. The game sometimes has some very clever and original arena designs that still look like they could be a real place somewhere, but also sometimes has some really badly designed or simply uninspired areas. The first two chapters of the game have no combat and are just the introduction to the inconsistent and illogical world the game is set in, with it's nonsense characters and the annoying Mary Sue.

The third chapter, where the gameplay kicks in, has some really good pacing, but predictable "ambushes" (areas full of explosive barrels, what a mystery, I wonder if any enemies are going to appear near them) and an extremely linear corridor design makes the levels bland and uninspired, until you get to the canals, which are just that, wider hallways with water covering the ground, some pipes, some mud, and no thought as to where you need to go. There's an annoying helicopter, the game gives you an SMG with almost no ammo (45 when you pick it up, 13 from each dead enemy), throws the most annoying enemies in the game at you (manhacks) and leaves you with just the pistol and SMG up until the next chapter, Water Hazard, which is a continuation of the same thing but this time with terrible vehicle physics between the actual shooter gameplay, and where the player gets their hands on the 357, the game's revolver. Chapter 5 is just a cutsce- scripted sequence that takes much longer than it should, with a terrible weapon introduction near the end (remember in GTA San Andreas or IV where the game takes the player's control away to tell them tutorial stuff? Basically that, but instead of taking the control away for 10 seconds it traps you in the same area for about 10 minutes to play with Havok physics).

Chapter 6 is the game's attempt at horror. It throws spooky sounds at the player (which will be covered more in-depth in the sound section of the review) and forces the player to use the Gravity Gun by not giving them enough ammo to do anything, with the only enemies you find being zombies and headcrabs. Not fun. It's also where you get the shotgun, though, and after you get out of Ravenholm (the spooky zombie town) you get some of the best that Half-Life 2 has to offer, right before the next 2 chapters... which are both just another vehicle section, this time with even worse physics and with Antlion enemies constantly bugging you, no pun intended. It has a memorable bridge sequence and a fun fight against an airship, but that's just a rehash of HL1's cliff section. Nothing new. When you finally get out of the god damn vehicle in chapter 8, you do a fun standoff against the Combine Overwatch forces and then have to bother with more Havok Gravity Gun shit to proceed to the next chapter.

Chapter 9 is Nova Prospekt, it has the worst level design in the whole game, and it's the only chapter where you get to use the Bugbait, which lets you control Antlions for as long as the game wants you to. Nothing happens here. Chapter "9a", Entanglement, is where the prison areas get a major improvement. It's almost perfect, but is completely ruined by having 3 tower defense sections where you put reprogrammed Combine sentry guns around so that the Combine can die for a bit until the knock over the turret and you have to kill them normally before setting up again. The first one is fine, but the second tower defense section is terrible. It takes way too long, there are far too many soldiers, there aren't enough health resources, and the turrets keep falling over no matter how well you position them. Best way to get through it is to speed time up by 10, turn godmode on, and hold the turrets to kill the soldiers until Mary arrives after you're done. By the time you get to the third one, it's already gotten old, and it's a lot easier than the second one, so it's just boring.

Chapter 10, "Anticitizen One" (which is what the Combine call Gordon), starts out with a boring scripted sequence where Mary's useless robot kills some Combine and flies away on a Dropship. Some "creepy" music plays and then you're clearing up mines while some NPCs tell you how to play the game. Why introduce a new enemy type like these mines by showing them in action, killing, say, a headcrab, or a zombie, if you can just have NPCs spout exposition about how it works?

Chapter 11, "Follow Freeman" is pretty much the last one in terms of urban combat, but this time there is no mine spam or annoying NPC tutorials - it's just the player, the enemies, and the environement. This is Half-Life 2 at it's best. You also get to spend time with Barney, who, even though his personality is severely downgraded from the one seen in HL1, is still better than Mary.

The next chapter, "Our Benefactors" has the player entering the Citadel to try to get to Breen before he can teleport to the Combine's world and become a spooky flying grub alien "Advisor". It has some cool level design, but the Citadel is better done in Episode 1 than in this (as is the urban combat from the last chapter). The final chapter with gameplay is just the boss fight, which boils down to kill Combine, grab energy ball, shoot at Breen, repeat. It's as bland as they come, but at least it's better than walking into a Slipgate to teleport yourself inside the end boss and win the game just like that. And that's it, that's the whole game. The only good parts in it are done better in Episode 1, and pretty much all the other games in the series outperform HL2 in every way.

Gameplay

Half-Life 2's arsenal is composed of a few hitscan weapons, and very few projectile or throwable weapons, with one melee:

• Crowbar - Melee
• 9mm Pistol (USP) - Hitscan
• SMG1 - Hitscan
• Grenades - Throwable
• Zero Point Energy Field Manipulator (Gravity Gun) - Projectile
• Shotgun (SPAS) - Hitscan
• Pulse Rifle (AR2) - Hitscan
• Crossbow - Projectile
• RPG - Projectile
• Bugbait - Throwable

10 weapons. In comparison, this was Half-Life 1's arsenal:

• Crowbar - Melee
• 9mm Handgun (Glock) - Hitscan
• Grenades - Throwable
• Shotgun - Hitscan
• 9mm AR (MP5) - Hitscan
• 357 - Hitscan
• Tripmines - Trap
• Satchel Charges - Trap
• Xbow - Projectile
• Gauss Cannon - Hitscan (with charging shots)
• Hivehand - Projectile (homing, too)
• Snarks - Throwable (alive, can attack the player if they don't find a target in time)
• Gluon Gun - Hitscan (with a delay)

13 weapons.

Not only does Half-Life 2 have less weapons, but the ones it does have are bad:

• Bugbait is only useful in Nova Prospekt.
• Pistol is only useful for the first few levels before the SMG1.
• Gravity gun is only useful if there are props nearby that are light enough to lift but heavy enough to kill.
• AR2 is literally just the SMG1 but with a different alternate fire, and with more damage and less ammo capacity

It also completely lacks any sort of truly alien weapons, like the Snarks and Hivehand, or any trap weapons, like the Satchel Charges and Tripmines. There isn't much to do other than shooting, and the shooting isn't good either. Most weapons are inaccurate at long ranges compared to how accurate enemy NPCs are, there isn't any feedback to damage other than a single flinching animation per enemy that doesn't always play, and the weapons don't deal much damage either, with the exception of the Shotgun, RPG and Crossbow. Even the 357 feels underpowered due to it not being able to do anything to enemies without the player hitting a headshot.

So not only is the weapon variety bad, the level design a mostly bad mixed bag, and the gunplay bad, but there's also the terrible enemy variety. These are the enemies HL2 has to offer (not counting things that don't do damage like scanners):

• Civil Protection
• Manhacks
• Barnacles
• Zombies
• Zombie Torsos
• Headcrabs
• Fast Headcrabs
• Fast Zombies
• Fast Zombie Torsos
• Poison Headcrabs
• Poison Zombies
• Antlions
• Antlion Guards
• Combine Overwatch Prison Guard
• Combine Overwatch Soldier
• Combine Overwatch Shotgun Soldier
• Combine Overwatch Elite
• Rollermines
• Hopper mines
• Striders
• Gunships
• Hunter Chopper

Seems like a hefty list, right? Well, not really. Civil Protection and the 4 Combine Overwatch units are the same to fight, the 5 Zombie types are pretty much the same except one leaps and another is a bullet sponge that shoots Headcrabs, Antlions, Rollermines, Hopper mines and Manhacks are only seen in specific chapters, the Antlion Guard is a boss-type that appears only twice, Gunships and Hunter Choppers are pretty much the same except the latter was a one-time boss fight and the former are "common" enemies, Striders are basically land Gunships, the 3 headcrab types are prety much the same except one is fast and the other puts you at 1 HP but doesn't kill you or deal damage. So, really, we only have:

• Combine
• Zombies
• Chapter specific enemies
• Combine Rocketsponges
• Bosses
• Headcrabs

Yeah... not good. And you never get to fight any more than one of these groups of similar enemies at once, it's either one or the other. One moment it's Antlions, the other it's Combine, then Zombies, etc. You only get to see different enemy types interact (like you did all the time in HL1's Surface Tension where both are hostile to the player) in the Episodes, and even then, only rarely.

Sound

Half-Life 2's sound design is full of low quality and low frequency sound effects (a lot of which are in Ravenholm, which is supposed to be spooky), generic royalty free sounds, annoyingly loud ambiance (like the animal sounds in Water Hazard that become especially annoying in the washing machine Havok puzzle area), and inconsistent weapon sounds (Shotgun sounds different on my hand than it does on his, same for Pistol, AR2... but not the SMG1 or RPG?). It gets the job done but it doesn't deserve any more recognition than that.

AI

The Combine AI are a huge step down from the HECU AI. Technologically, the Combine are more advanced, but combined with the poor level design, they fall flat. Refer to this video for an in-depth explanation.

The zombies in Half-Life 2 are more intelligent - they go after props in their vicinity to throw at the player, their headcrab detaches from the host from time to time after death to attach the player, they pretend to be dead to surprise attack the player as they wake up, and they can be split in half but stay alive afterwards, crawling on the floor. However, all of this goes to waste considering the simple truth that Half-Life 1's zombie AI was much more threatening. They moved faster, hit faster, hit harder, and they took more than just one Shotgun shot at point blank to die. They were dumber, yes, but they were tougher. In Half-Life 2 the zombies are more intelligent, but aren't a challenge. The new versions share the same AI but with minor modifications like being able to leak or throwing headcrabs rather than props.

The Civil Protection, despite being supposedly human, barely react to getting shot. Like the Combine, they simply do a small flinching animation from time to time, but never get stunned for more than a quarter of a second. In Half-Life 1, Quake, and Doom, it was possible to stun-lock an enemy by simply shooting them repeatedly due to a consistent and long flinch animation. In Half-Life 2, the enemies barely ever stop shooting until they're dead. And melee enemies' attacks can't be cancelled with damage, with the exception of the Gunship and Antlion Guard, which get stunned by explosions.

Technical

Half-Life 2 is touted as a revolutionary game with a revolutionary physics engine and revolutionary graphics. This is false. The Havok physics engine predated Half-Life 2 by years, and was already used in video games like Max Payne 2. The graphics are also nothing to boast about - the facial flexes were great at the time, and they CAN still look good nowadays on certain characters like the Gman or Alyx, but most of the time they leave a lot to wish for, and don't come even close to something like Uncharted's or L.A. Noire's facial animations. The shading on the maps is extremely basic, and the lighting is completely baked, with the few realtime shadows there are sticking out like a sore thumb. Shading on main story characters like Alyx and Eli, and on weapons like the Shotgun and SMG1, are the game's graphical highpoints, but most of it is dated and basic looking, with unrealistic lighting and low poly map geometry.

The Source Engine still performs well today and can be made to look good with some low-cost shader implementations, keeping the performance at a good level on very low-end computers while obtaining good graphical fidelity. The sheer modding capability of the Engine (no thanks to Valve, as it's just a leftover from Quake's time) is something truly special, and it is sad that most games nowadays have barely any modding support, like CS:GO, DOOM (2016), and Quake Champions. I suppose selling skins and sprays is more profitable than allowing the user to make their own clientside skins and sprays to use in-game, and greed is what drives corporations like Valve, Bethesda and EA.

Rebuttal - Kothorix

If it wasn't obvious by the window icon, the blog's logo, my mod's server, my avatars on everywhere, and the FurAffinity account linked on my Steam profile, I am part of the furry fandom.

Let me begin this post by stating that I hold no ill will towards Kothorix. As negative as my opinion of him and the community he fosters has changed radically in the past month, I would never want any harm to come their way, physical or psychological.

With that out of the way, I'll be tackling his arguments one by one through the video's transcript. If you don't like that kind of thing, you can skip to the part where I make a more general statement about the fandom.

"The Furry Community Is Worse Than You Can Imagine"

"If something makes you miserable, at some point you just have to stop doing it. So let this video serve as my resignation from the furry community. I could end the video right here but undoubtedly people want to know my reasons why. So let me tell you just how awful the furry community actually is."

What a great way to start the video, by throwing the entire community under the bus. I'm sorry, but none of the things you'll mention in the next 34 minutes applies to me, anyone I talk to who is a furry, or you when you were one, and as the video is supposed to explain how the ENTIRE community is, in your words, awful, worse than any viewer can imagine, this shouldn't really be possible. You built your entire audience and most of your content around the furry fandom and yet you think you're above it all? Get off your high horse.

"COMPLETE SEXUAL DEGENERACY: I'm not the kind of person who usually calls people degenerates or cares about society's moral expectations. I'm pretty deep in the furry sexuality stuff myself, but even I know that you probably shouldn't fuck animals, and you definitely shouldn't fuck kids, but there is a sizable chunk of the furry community who do at least one of these things."

Says what source, with what information, from what research, with what sample size out of how many people in the fandom? You are, as you'll prove in the next sentences, simply taking your anecdotes as the ultimate truth.

"When I first joined the furry community about 15 years ago I was 14 years old - almost immediately upon entering the community, I was tempted into online sexual encounters with older men. They do things like roleplay cuddling to groom me into getting used to increasingly sexual situations. At the time I wasn't bisexual and had no interest in men so they'd use furry female characters as their avatars so I'd have less of a problem with it. This would change over time as they introduced me to their other characters. It would start with sexual roleplay with their characters but eventually led to talk about sex in real life, culminating in wanting to meet up for real life sex. I was always smart enough to tell them no, which usually led to an argument, anger, and the ending of the 'friendship'. This didn't happen just once, this happened numerous times over the years to me between the ages of 14 and 17 - of course I was just a horny kid without the knowledge or life experience to know what was going on so I never reported any of those people and it's been too long for me to remember any of their names at this point. The kicker here is that I fully believe that most of the people who were and are still involved in this are too delusional to actually realize what they are doing or that there's anything wrong with it. If you are underage in the furry community, it is almost a certainty that you will be approached by someone who will try to prey on you. They are smarter than you, and they will use your emotions against you. They will lie about their age and gender, and you won't know."

That's a lot to unpack. Firstly, like you said, you were "just a horny kid". From having a quite similar personal experience with the fandom, I can safely say that it's partly your fault for letting yourself get into these situations. You can't just blame everyone else for getting you into sexual situations when you willingly participated in them.

Secondly, how much was the age difference, actually? You keep saying "older", but never specify. Was it other teenagers? Young adults? Middle-aged adults? If they were either of the first two, it's likely they were also "just horny kids without the knowledge or life experience to [...] know what they are doing or that there's anything wrong with it.", no more at fault than you were. Plus, you say they lied about their age and gender, so how the hell DO you know they were older? They could easily have been little kids pretending to be older, it happens all the time on the internet, for any given reason.

Finally, this isn't an issue limited to furries. You act like it is, when it really ain't. There are pedophiles everywhere on the internet, and in the real world. That's why my parents, at least, educated me about the dangers of interacting with strangers online about anything like that, as things may not be what they seem to be. Apparently, yours failed to do so.

Furries have bad enough a reputation already. We don't need you making matters worse for us.

"I've seen people try to downplay the amount of pedophiles in the furry community, but they fail to realize one thing: the furry community is a gathering place for horny teens who 'just want to be your slave owo'. If you DON'T think actual practicing pedophiles flock to the furry community, you are a fucking moron."

No. Just no. The furry community is composed of people with a liking for anthropomorphic animals. Does it have sexual subsets? Yes. Are they a huge part of the fandom? Also yes. But it's not the whole thing. As for calling me a "fucking moron"? It's as weak an ad hominem as your arguments are.

"But let's move on to everyone's favourite topic [shows that 18.4% of people participating in a survey aimed at furries identified as zoophiles]. Now it's no secret that about 20% of the furry community are self-proclaimed zoophiles. I have no doubt that at least half of those people are actively involved in bestiality, or have been at some point in their lives."

Firstly, checking the source for that statistic (which you didn't link in the description as a source because hey, who cares about objectivity when all you want is to push an agenda), it turns out it was conducted in 2008, with a sample size of 7000 people, some of which could likely be trolls trying to muddy the waters. But even if we disregard that possibility and say that those 7000 were all furries, we have to also take into consideration the fact that the furry community is composed of many times more than 7000. Just AnthroCon's attendants alone account for over 7000 people, and most furries haven't gone to a convention or even live in the US to do so in the first place.

As for assuming that half of the 1288 zoophiles that participated in that survey have committed acts of bestiality, if you have any evidence for that, bring it up, if not, then don't go assuming and spouting these things as the truth. I have only met a single zoophile that acted on their feelings (in the comments section of your "In Defense of Pedophiles" video, unsurprisingly), and I've met at least 6 zoophiles whose names I can recall. So I call bullshit.

"In my mind, in concept, there isn't much of a difference between sex with an animal and sex with a child; both are cases where one party's taking advantage of the difference in mental acuity, level of understanding, and power. I've heard many arguments like 'But my dog likes it!', well my 14 year old self certainly liked getting sexual tension from older, more experienced people, but that doesn't make it right. My point is that practicing pedophiles and zoophiles are extremely common in the furry community [...]"

Not as common as you make it out to be. You have provided zero statistics for practicing zoophiles OR any statistics even remotely related to pedophilia in the furry fandom. The rest of that paragraph I actually agree with.

"[...], but let's move on because even without the rampant criminal activity, the furry community still has plenty of other problems with sexuality. Many people in the furry community are borderline sociopathic when it comes to sex. They will constantly push themselves on you for roleplay, forcing you to block them, and even after that, they'll make new accounts and try to win you over in some new way. Sometimes they'll even go as far as to blackmail you or otherwise threaten you for not roleplaying with them. They'll use emotional manipulation or outright lie to get sex from you. Oddly enough, I've noticed that some of the worst perpetrators of this kind of behaviour are actually underage. These kids absolutely do not care about you or the amount of trouble you would get in for engaging in sexual activity with a minor! They will absolutely try to destroy your life for their own sexual pleasure."

Yeah, and it takes time for them to learn what they're doing is wrong. Humans are still animals, and puberty is that point where the hormones pretty much take over. It's bad, but it's normal, and it is possible to counter-act it. I actually agree with you on this as well, though it brings back my earlier point of you talking about "older men" when almost all "sexually active furries" that I see are as young as you say you were when you joined the community. My point of contention is that instead of just blocking them and then complaining on YouTube, it would've been better for them if you put up with their shit and told them no again and again, always explaining why, even if the explanation itself was just Ctrl+C, Ctrl+V. Now you could say they're not your responsibility, but as they're part of the fandom, and since you seem to care about its quality, improving it should be on your mind at all times.

"If you need examples of this [...]"

I don't. I know it happens.

"Fortunately, I'm suspicious and distrusting enough to have never been tricked into getting involved in something like this, but even the underage people aside, there's still many grown adults who do the exact same thing."

Oh so the "older men" were "grown adults", glad you specified, even if it's still bullshit and most likely just young adults or horny kids. Look, there's at most half of the fandom that is involved in sexual activity, and most of them are people going through their puberty. Some are young or older adults that usually make art or quietly enjoy it, sharing their likes and dislikes with other furries or people in general whom they trust. I have never seen that type of person actually turning out to be an adult. They always turn out to be children pretending to be older than they really are just so they can get into situations that'll get them off.

"They will pressure you into sexual roleplay, constantly. I tend to be kind of a pushover and don't block people when I should, and this has led to various individuals attempting to get some kind of sexual activity out of me for years, even after me telling them hundreds of times that I have no interest in them. About 10 to 20% of my daily interactions with furries is just turning people down who want online sexual roleplay, and that is not an exaggeration."

Didn't you say just a few seconds ago that you blocked the teens that went after you? Or does this only apply to the adults?

"Now, I'm pretty liberal, I'm usually not the kind of person to care about how often people have sex or who they have sex with, or what kind of sexual activities they do, as long as they're legal, but being part of the furry community has made me wonder if I should re-evaluate that. There are people in the furry community infected with life destroying STDs like HIV, who still have sex with dozens of people, usually without the courtesy of telling them they're giving away a death sentence."

Again, you talk about it like it's exclusively a furry issue. It happens in the furry fandom too, but it's not just furries that have HIV or that have sex anyways without telling. Not every problem in the world is because of furries, y'know.

"We see these fun little charts pop up every now and then of who fucked who at a furry convention, because as it turns out: uh-oh, a few of those people had HIV. Some of these people will have sex with nine, ten or upwards of a dozen people in the course of a 3 day convention. Now that's kind of impressive, in its own way, and I don't want to judge others by how often they have sex, but I just feel like rampantly spreading disease throughout the community is somewhat of a bad thing. And obviously not everyone with HIV does this, but the problem is it only takes one person doing this to destroy dozens of people's lives."

Oh cool, so now you're throwing dirt at conventions, saying "some people" have sex with "upwards of a dozen people" in them (without citing any sources), and once again making a human problem seem like a furries-only problem. And that chart? It's fake. He later admitted it being proven so in one of his social media accounts (Discord, Twitter, something like that). If you can, please link his comment on the graph or screenshot it and post it in the comments, or send it to me on Discord. I like to cite my sources, but I just can't find it, and I apologize for that.

"Knowing the lengths I've seen some furries go to to try to get some sort of sexual activity, I have no doubt in my mind that it is common practice to lie about if you've got any sort of disease, or just lie about being tested in the first place, or just not be tested in the first place. Also you can manipulate people into having unprotected sex, so having sex with a furry at a furry convention just seems a bit like playing Russian roulette. It even makes dating a furry dangerous because you never know if they're the kind of sex obsessed psycho, who hides their various STDs from you, tricking you into thinking that monogamous sex with them is safe, which sadly isn't as uncommon as you would hope."

Again, this isn't a problem with furries, it's a problem with people in general. Just as there are DOOM fans that are school shooters, there are furries that are like that. One bad apple does NOT spoil the bunch, they don't represent me, and I am a furry, and a proud one at that. Also, Jesus, man, change HIV with GRID or AIDS, and replace furry with gay, and you'll sound just like a homophobic Christian. You've devolved into a completely delusional furry hater at this point in the video, and we're only 6 minutes in.

"The sex obsession in the fandom is so bad that it seems to melt some people's brains into a sort of sticky white goo. I've noticed that generally the longer someone has been part of the furry community, the more likely it is that they can't actually hold much of a conversation. The only thing they seem to think about, or want to talk about, is related to sex. They don't really know how to speak to you outside of flirting, sexual RP, or linking porn. Now I do like to flirt, and I like to roleplay or look at porn once in a while, but I can't imagine doing those things 24/7. The amount of times I got bewildered stares because I said I didn't wanna talk about sex, is kind of a testament that this really is all some of these people know. They don't seem to understand that there's more to having a personality than your sexual orientation and what kinks you have."

Hey Kothorix, I know I've already mentioned this, but have you ever heard of puberty, and how everyone deals with it differently? Sure, you personally can't imagine thinking about pornography and roleplay all day, every day, but some people are like that for a period in their lives, and yeah, sometimes they keep it going afterwards. You seem to think of these people as less than you, with their "sticky white goo" brains. Get off your high horse, we're all human, and some of us are furries. That's all there is to this entire "sex" argument you keep trying to push.

"Overall, I feel like the furry community can almost be viewed like a failed social experiment: what would happen, if we broke down all the rules of normal society, and got rid of all taboos and only ever encouraged people to do whatever degenerate sexual thing they wanted."

Now that's an attack on the fandom if I've ever seen one. Let's grab the definition of the word degenerate real quick, from Google:



So what this guy is basically saying is that the furry community is solely composed of a bunch of immoral sex addicts with low mental capacity. Nice.

"And to be honest, I am guilty of feeding into this as well. I've made numerous videos defending various kinks and other aspects of furry degeneracy."

Back at it again. Not 10 seconds have passed and you're already insulting the fandom again by calling us degenerates. I'll just quote myself for this one: your ad hominem attacks are as bad as your arguments.

"Though I do want to make one thing absolutely fucking clear, because a lot of the morons out there don't seem to get it: I only ever defend kinks, art and fantasies, not actions."

Same here. I am not defending anyone that acts on their desires in a harmful way. To me, as long as it's not harming anyone, I don't care. If that person talks about it near me, I also don't care though, unlike you. I'm not going to shame them for being born with a sexual abnormality, it's not their fault. And it's likely not their fault that they can't help but talk about it either. I know it, because I've gone through these things myself. You haven't, so you lack empathy.

"For the first 20 years of my life, I was a pretty devout Christian. I was raised to believe that pretty much anything sexual was wrong, and you were a bad person for even having thoughts. But even at a young age, I knew I was a furry. Even before I joined the fandom, I had sexual urges for anthropomorphic characters. I couldn't help but have those urges, and to this day I still can't. This absolutely tortured me. The fact that I was such a degenerate, and thinking that some all-seeing, all-knowing, power, knew this too and hated me for it. Even the people around me hated me for it. Other Christians called me a devil worshipper, for having sexual thoughts about dragons."

Ah, so now you think what they were doing is justified because you were a "furry degenerate", and so you're following in their footsteps, but using a different excuse? Now it makes perfect sense why your rhetoric is so similar to that of a homophobic Christian. It also explains your lack of empathy for furries going through puberty and making it public. They are most likely atheists and so lack the fear of God's fatal moral compass, which you were under. That doesn't make you better or worse, that just makes you different, that makes them different from you. You need to understand that people can be different without being worse than you.

"So when I turned my back on religion and the misery that comes with it, I took it upon myself to let others know that they were not hated for having those urges and thoughts that they can't control. But I thought there was an understanding, that I was only talking about thoughts or artwork. When I talked about not hating people for having these urges, I never meant to encourage anyone into taking action."

Yes. And you shouldn't have stopped just because people were willfully misunderstanding what you were saying just to justify their already established beliefs. But you did. Not only that, but you stopped, and instead went to directly talk shit about furries in general, because of course, all the pedophilia and bestiality totally represent the entire fandom, and are problems completely limited to it! Yeah... no. Not at all. It's a small minority of actors, in a minority of sexually abnormal people, in a minority of the population that identifies as a furry. Remember, you assuming 9.2% of furries do at least one of these things doesn't make it true. It just makes you sound like an asshole when you don't cite any evidence for 3 quarters of your argument.

"I still fully believe that people should not be hated or judged simply for thoughts or urges they have, no matter how terrible those thoughts are. But the problem with the furry community specifically is that for every person in the fandom - like me - encouraging people not to feel bad about having a certain kink, there will be someone else, encouraging people to act out on those urges. I never meant to try to normalize things like bestiality or pedophilia, and I don't like those things myself, I only ever wanted people to know that I understand the struggle of having taboo thoughts that everyone else hates you for."

Hahah, no you don't. You judge people with furry sexual thoughts as degenerates, you don't understand the massive struggle of going through puberty, and there isn't a 1 to 1 ratio of "white knights like me" vs "horrible pedophiles and zoophiles". It's another minority to add to the hierarchy I established above. And if you don't think that's accurate, that's fine. I'm not going to call you a moron. As long as you have evidence to back up your counterclaims, that is. Kothorix can only seem to think of SnakeThing and Kero when it comes to the latter, and I can think of no more, but boy can I tell you about the dozens of furries that encourage acceptance about these kinds of thoughts. There's me, there was Kothorix, there's Rysis, there's 4 friends I have on Discord whose name I won't mention, and more to be found. Stop trying to blow the fandom's negatives out of proportion, Kothorix. It's not doing you, or the fandom, any good.

"But I think that the whole Kero situation was really the final straw. When I first heard of some of the things people were being accused of, like sex with roadkill, I laughed to myself: 'No one does that! Sex with the rotting, bloody carcass of an animal? That's laughably, cartoonishly disgusting'. That's something you think of when you're drunk, to be the punchline to some over-the-top joke. Then I saw the videos, and the pictures.."

So because you were present during one of the many furry-related controversies of the last decades you decided to leave because of two furries' actions. Okay. They don't represent the entire fandom. Yes, they reflect a problem in it, but that problem is, like I've said time and time again, not limited to the furry community.

"When I was doing medical training for the army, we had to watch videos of animals being sliced open, so that we could see what arterial bleeding and grievous wounds will look like on something alive. But as awful as those videos were, and as hard as it was to watch, it had a purpose, it served to teach us, and to desensitize us, so that we could save lives someday. But as desensitized as I am to that kind of thing, I was not prepared for those zoosadist group videos. They served no purpose, other than the sexual gratification of an individual. Having urges is one thing, but actually going through with it, torturing animals and fucking their corpses and enjoying it on a sexual level.. something is just inhuman about that. I don't wanna share the same species as these.. people - much less the same community."

Firstly, there is no confirmation that all of the content in the zoosadist group was originated from furries. You just seem to correlate the two because of how you found out about it - Kero the Wolf, medium-ranking furry brass on YouTube, so to speak. So you can't really attach the label furry to all those people just because they're doing bad things to animals, that's just being intellectually dishonest with your viewers. Other than that, I agree, as stated before. Don't commit sexual intercourse with living beings of lower mental capacity than the average 18 year old human. But dead ones? It's disgusting, I don't agree with it, and I also think it's immoral, as I think dead beings deserve respect (I'm one of those people that tends to take out dead animals from the middle of the road so their body doesn't get destroyed any further by traffic), but it doesn't harm any living being, so I'm not gonna go after them for it. Just keep it as far away from me as possible. With that said, I'll repeat myself, there are bad people everywhere, including the furry community. Deal with it. Leaving the fandom does absolutely nothing to change that, especially not if you keep every piece of furry-related content and branding you once created, which, according to you, should attract these sorts of people.

"I-I can't make videos showing the furry community in a positive light anymore. I can't defend people's kinks. Because whenever I get a message from someone who says they watched one of my videos and they wanna be a furry now, I just feel a tinge of guilt. It feels like I've just recruited someone into an animal torturing sex cult."

So that's your definition of the furry fandom then. "An animal torturing sex cult" composed of "sexual degenerates" and "morons". What a pleasant individual you are, I'm really sad you left the fandom (Can you sense the sarcasm through the screen? You should).

"THE ABSOLUTE HUGBOX: The furry community is full of some of the most hateful, vindictive people I've ever met, and at the same time some of the most sensitive crybabies imaginable. Almost every furry I've ever had the displeasure of arguing with has no problem spewing hatred, insults and outright slander, what will absolutely crumble when given back even a fraction of it."

I can't help but feel like that's exactly how you'll react to reading this, if you'll read it at all. After all, why read through criticism if it feels better to simply ban all dissent and maintain an eternal echo-chamber of some of the most unpleasant and spiteful non-furs and ex-furs I've ever talked to. And by the way, the reason I mention this specifically, is because I was actually banned from his Discord server after saying "another person manipulated by Kothorix's shitty video joined the server". At the same time, there were people raiding the server, using sexually explicit avatars in the -18 channels, telling so-called "crybabies" to leave if they got offended, making jokes about gassing the Jews, stoning the gays, burning the niggers, and other equally awful and unfunny things. I personally am not bothered by these sorts of jokes, but it is notable how the only thing disallowed in that server is disagreeing with Kothorix's retarded (as in backwards, retrograde, out-of-date) logic.

"What's worse is that the community has this habit of wrapping their arms around the precious, delicate, crying baby snowflakes and then, what I've come to call cry [inaudible] their perceived oppressors. Across furry chatrooms and even in my own Discord, I've seen people defend someone who have had a minor disagreement with, as though I just threatened to murder their entire family. Often I hear the excuse: 'You made them cry!' as if shedding a few tears proved that something I said was truly this unimaginable travesty. And God forbid that someone I say something even slightly abrasive to be a woman."

I agree entirely. It is a big problem in the fandom that everyone is too sensitive. But the problem is, the solution to that problem isn't to make them cry or to block or ban them for being the way they are, the solution is to, well, make them not be so sensitive. Help them grow a spine, help them handle emotional situations better. Now you could say that the only reason I personally go out of my way to do that kind of thing is because of my interest in Psychology, but honestly it's simply because I care about the community and its members. If I see people getting their emotions hurt, I'm not going to attack whoever made them feel bad, nor am I going to cut an onion (that is to say, make them feel worse), but rather I'll tell them what to think in those situations, how to react to them, and why. Good reasoning and emotional assistance is more helpful than "Haha, you weak-ass fucking delicate snowflake! I'm better than you! You are what's wrong with furries!".

"There are so few women in the community that many of them, especially if they even have a small amount of artistic talent are treated as incorruptible queens by their group of followers. And if you dare to so much as glare in their direction, their army of white knights will happily charge into battle, boners in hand. Most furries are terrified to have any public opinions about anything because they know it might upset someone. They're even afraid to be associated with people who say things that might rouse the ire of the hivemind. And don't worry, we'll talk about that later."

Sounds a lot like you're describing your own fanbase and how they react to their almighty Avatar of Akatosh being disagreed with or dissed even slightly.. and oh yes, we'll talk about your "hivemind" theory later.

"I've known people so afraid of being judged by other furries, that they asked not to have their name put in the credits of my video as a supporter, because while they agree with the things I say, they know that my name attached to theirs will probably put them on some kind of blacklist, or something. This is also why, when you speak to some furries, they apologize to you a dozen times within the first few minutes of meeting you. They are so used to everyone being so easily offended that they preemptively apologize for anything that could even somewhat be construed as something offensive."

And of course, you're so against this sort of mindset that you ban everyone that disagrees with you from your Discord because they might hurt people's feelings with their logic and reason. Now you'd probably say at this point that you don't ban anyone, that your moderators do, which would be fair if it wasn't for the fact that you literally deleted all rules from your Discord server after posting this video and chose said moderators yourself. Moderators that seem to have only been hired due to their supporter status, considering their utter inability to deal with any sort of situation that comes up in the server.

"There's also a large portion of the community who seems to hate the idea of bettering themselves in any way. They seem to very much believe in the idea that you should stay a mental child for your entire life. If something upsets you, instead of confronting it, you should avoid it. If someone argues with you, you should block them, even if they were a close friend who was only trying to help you."

Right back at'cha, Koth.

"Many furries seem intent on avoiding any negative emotion at all costs. If you have any sort of anxiety issues or problems coping with everyday life, you will be aggressively coddled. You will be told to avoid those things entirely. You will never learn how to deal with stress or anxiety, but dealing with stress is an important part of maturing. Dealing with negative emotions strengthens you as a person and allows you to feel less stressed. And not dealing with it has the opposite effect. It's no wonder that so many furries are perpetually depressed, angry and offended. When you spend all your time running away from these emotions, even the slightest thing will upset you. In an attempt to run away from these things, they only ever make it worse for themselves. Many furries just ignore this, citing some self diagnosed mental illness that prevents them from ever maturing as a person. So they sit and suffer forever, and are forever coddled by this self destructive community. The furry community is a bit like Neverland - you go there, and you never grow up. You never mature mentally, emotionally, sexually or socially."

I fully agree. So why are you running away from the negative emotions the furry community has apparently brought you, instead of dealing with them like the adult you pretend to be? Oh and, once again, not a furry problem. That's a problem every teenager has, which is why going to school and living with all the abrasive bullies is so important. They either learn how to live with it, or they just give up and kill themselves. Thing is, most furries don't wanna run the chance of the latter, so they just keep everyone on emotional life support for as long as they can.

"Maybe that's the reason why so many furries seem to have basically no personality. They have nothing interesting going on in their lives, they have no opinions about anything, all they know how to do is be angry and cuddle RP."

Yeah, not a lot of people feel like they can do anything interesting. I myself couldn't do anything a year and a half ago other than basic C# scripting on Unity, but with determination (created from hopefulness towards my skills improving with time) I managed to achieve great things in this short period of time. But not everyone has that sort of determination, not everyone has hope in themselves, and shoving their lack of hope in their faces like you're doing isn't helping them feel better or do any better.

"Speaking of which, on top of being a figurative hugbox, the community is also quite a literal one. For whatever reason, the only activity the furries ever seem to want to do is cuddle. Instead of saying 'hi', you get a cuddle roleplay response. If you ask a question, instead of an answer, you get a '*hug*'. Maybe it's because they know, that if they actually say anything or have an opinion that goes at all against the status quo, they'll be chastized by the rest of the community, or maybe they really just do lack the social skills required to hold a conversation. In any case, I do want to grow up, I do want to better myself, even if it means becoming a person that says things that part of society don't really agree with. Having character means having character flaws as well. So? I'm leaving the community."

I've never seen anyone do something like that other than people showing off their YCH hug stickers in Telegram after I say hi. I only ever get *hug*s when I talk about my life issues, and I only say *hug* when I don't know what else to say to make that person feel better, to express my care for their well-being. What's the problem with hugging? It's literally just a quirk of the fandom that we usually don't shake hands but rather hug instead, as if everyone's part of this big circle of friends. It's part of the truly special thing about furries, how everyone is treated as a close friend by everyone. Of course this isn't a perfect thing, but it far from a negative aspect. And please, just stop attacking furries, yeah? Of course youngsters that have barely had any social interactions in real life are going to lack social skills. You build skills over time, not overnight. And another thing, please explain how exactly "having character means having character flaws as well" correlates in any way to "I'm leaving the community", because it simply makes no logical sense.

"PERPETUALLY HIGH SCHOOL: I don't think anyone would argue that the average age of furries is about 19 years old, maybe even younger."

You did earlier, when you said the furry fandom attracted droves of grown adults interested in pedophilia that were super common from your age of 14 to 17, after which they apparently disappeared? Anyways, yeah, you're inconsistent as hell, and you arguments are shit, but please go on.

"I also don't think that it's a stretch to say that most people lose interest in being furries - or at least stop being super active in the community - by the time they're about 30. What this means is that the community is stuck in a perpetual high school atmosphere, and with that comes all of the annoying bullshit that you would expect. 19 year olds can be pretty dumb and immature, and it's not different for furries."

Correct! Ding ding ding, he fucking got it right! It's a problem with people in general that also exists in the furry fandom for some specific reason! Yes! Now, like I already said, the solution to that is to help them deal with their emotions and act more mature around people they don't know. You can't expect people to change if you give them no reason to do so.

"They'll believe anything they hear and spread rumors and unsubstantiated claims about people. They'll judge people and anyone those people associate with based on fabricated bullshit that makes no sense and could be easily rationalized if they spent even a few minutes thinking about it."

Damn, Kothorix back at it again perfectly describing his non-fur and ex-fur fanbase and Discord community in the video against furries! Y'know, I think his notion of "furries" comes solely from his interactions with his followers, because seriously, most of them considered themselves furries before this video went up (after which they left the fandom too because, well, look at the quote above).

"I've had people who I thought were good friends completely turn on me because of some shit someone else said about me. To this day, there are people I was once friends with who will no longer talk to me because of some non-issue from years ago, or because I talked to someone that they don't like."

Yeah, that happens everywhere on the internet. Grow the fuck up and deal with it, stop blaming it on the furry community and running away from it. Running from your problems won't solve anything... now where did I hear that line, eh?

"As an example of just how ridiculous these rumors tend to be, I get both called a Nazi and an SJW depending on who you talk to. Both sides of the fandom - which, we'll talk about later - are absolutely sure that I am simultaneously both of these diametrically opposed things. It's so irrational a claim, they have a hard time even forming an argument against it. So I stop trying. They then take my silence as me admitting guilt. This is often the case. Anytime someone blocks you, ignores you, fails to answer a question, makes their profile private, or anything similar, people take it as an admission of some kind of guilt, even though it's almost always for the simple reason of not wanting to deal with a bunch of idiots."

Of course, everyone you disagree with is a bunch of idiots, morons, degenerates.. as much as I think Black Mesa fans, SJWs, race realists, Fallout 76 fanboys, and other groups, are wrong, I don't go around insulting them and blocking them because I know I can prove them wrong. And if it turns out I can't, I reevaluate my position and consider the fact that I may be wrong. That's something you fail to do, intentionally, it seems, because, of course, the infallible, incorruptible, incredibly credible Avatar of Akatosh can never be wrong on any given subject.

"Many furries lack even the most basic of critical thinking skills. Take this tweet for example. This person has taken it upon themselves to report any Tweet they think might be breaking the rules. In the Tweet I make fun of the trend of naming YouTube videos really outlandish and provocative things to get views. This person has taken it as some kind of threat because I used the words 'kill yourself'. It takes someone else to convince them that this is not the case. This isn't an isolated incident. With almost every one of my Tweets there is usually at least one person who has no concept of context or humor, and they are always a furry."

So, you were a furry YouTuber up to the point of that video's release, everyone knows most of the furry fandom leans far to the left wing, and you think that this is a problem with furries because all you see in your Twitter is.. furries? Look, if you ran a brand completely unrelated to furries like, I don't know, a firearms safety channel with your face plastered all over it wearing sunglasses, and all the negative responses you got like that were from furries, you'd have a point. But this isn't the case, most of the people watching over you and following you are furries, so of course your negative responses would come from furries. Look at me, if you need an example. And likewise, pretty much all your positive feedback used to come from furries. Nowadays it's a mixture of confused furries, non-furries, and ex-furries, all on the hate train against the fandom, because now that you've done it, it's cool to hate furries.. again.

"It's gotten to the point where I've seriously considered just blocking every person on Twitter with a furry avatar. Some of the Tweets I see are so stupid that I don't even feel comfortable making fun of them, because it's quite possible that the person writing them is actually mentally handicapped. And even if they aren't, literally retarded, I'd still consider their level of intelligence to be a disability."

Oh yeah, just block all furries indiscriminately, even though you have a furry avatar yourself, because as you've already established, anyone that doesn't fall in line with your way of thinking is a stupid moronic retarded degenerate furry who deserves no care or attention whatsoever and is the cause of all the so-called problems that make you want to run away from the fandom.

"As I said before, anything I'm stating here could be said about any group of individuals who are around this age. I didn't like teenagers when I was a teen and I certainly don't like them now that I'm almost 30. It's not that this kind of immaturity is unique to the furry fandom, it's more that I don't wanna be part of a fandom where this is the average mindset. Let me be clear: not all 19 year olds are like this, and I don't hate you just because you're 19."

You didn't say that before, though, I did. This entire video you have only talked about furries this, furries that, and you never make it sound like the issues aren't exclusive to furries. And you know what? Not wanting to be part of a fandom mostly comprised of teenagers because of their mindset is fine. It really is. If all you had said was that single sentence, on Twitter, or on Discord, as an announcement, it would've been just fine. But no, you had to make an over 30 minutes long video dissing the fandom for things you can't deal with personally. And that's where I take issue, because you clearly have influence over your 50 thousand followers, and telling them that the furry fandom is solely comprised of negative aspects is absurdly irresponsible and shitty, as is saying everyone that disagrees with you is [insert insult here]. And yeah, you do hate a lot of people just for being 19 years old. 19 year old people are just not yet biologically and socially fully developed, so you're blaming them for not being way ahead of the curve. You're being unfair to them, and no matter how many times you say "I don't hate you for being 19", the truth is, every aspect you've described how you hate, defines how most 19 year olds are, as I'm sure you're aware.

"If you like my videos, that's fine, I'm glad you watch them. It's just that I don't really think that we're going to have much in common, and I really don't wanna hang out in your Discord Server full of your 19 year old friends. Let me put it this way: think of a group of people you really can't identify with, for this example we'll say 10 year old girls. I seriously doubt that you wanna play with Barbie dolls or put on makeup or, whatever it is 10 year old girls usually do. The things they have fun doing seem boring and uninteresting. You certainly wouldn't find conversations with them to be very stimulating. You are older and wiser and the issues they have seem rather small and easily fixable to you. It's not a whole lot different for me compared to someone who's just coming off of high school. I don't hate you, I'm just not really interested in you."

Well you're certainly older than most furries, sure, but wiser? This is the problem with you, you can't hold yourself to the same level as others, you keep thinking you're better because you're older and not a furry anymore. You aren't. I've seen and interacted with many better-off and more intelligent furries around my age than you. People that know how to put heated arguments and dissenting opinions aside for the sake of being friends or at least being friendly. If their problems are so easily fixable to you, then why not help them? Are you so heartless that you'd rather block them and run away from the fandom, blaming it all on them, when their problems are supposedly "easily fixable"? How can you know you're not interested in them if all you see is a mentally retarded, idiotic, moronic, immature, degenerate 19 year old furry? Have you ever heard of the phrase "never judge a book by its cover"? You really should apply this to your day-to-day interactions with furries.

"But it's not just the semi generational differences in interest that pushes me away, it's also the extreme immaturity and vindictive nature that many furries seem to have. The best examples I can give are things that affect me personally on a day to day basis. I run a Discord Server with about 3000 members, most of which are furries. Occasionally, some of the members of the Discord will have some kind of issue with me."

At which point you take it upon yourself to ban them all, while keeping the constant shitposting and anti-furry sentiment as lively as possible.

"Instead of approaching me about it, or just leaving and forgetting about it, they'll take it upon themselves to make yet another, anti-Kothorix Discord Server. They'll manufacture and spread misinformation about me. They'll stay in my server to find any sort of tidbits of information to give the world to try to make me look bad. And they'll even go as far as to support me on Patreon just to share Patreon-only rewards with as many people as possible in an attempt to sabotage my career. I've spoken to several other furries who are somewhat in the public eye and this sort of thing happens to them too. This is the kind of childish and vindictive people that the furry community is full of."

I can't deny that these sorts of people exist, but I can deny the idea that the furry community is "full of" them. They don't represent the majority of furries that simply discuss ideas, create art, suit up in public, or do any amount of other things. Not only that, but once again, it's not a furry issue. It's an issue relating to people in general. Not just teenagers, not just young adults, not just furries - people. Get it in your thick fucking head that not every problem in the world is caused solely by furries.

"Just like high school, the furry community is an on-going popularity contest and attention seeking exercise. It's no secret, and it's often mocked, the lengths people will go to when designing their characters to be unique so many bright colours, outlandish designs and strange details. And much of it is simply for the sake of being noticed."

How do you know? Oh yeah, you don't. What's the problem with people always trying to out-do others? Yeah, it can be comically absurd at times, but it's not a bad thing at all. I'd say it's good to have comic relief from time to time coming from inside the fandom, as long as you don't do what you're doing and make it out to be a problem that needs fixing for some reason. I guess it offends you that people want to be noticed among the crowds? Note how I say people, and not furries in that last sentence. It's not. An issue. Limited. To furries.

"Fursuiting, too, is often done just to seek attention. While people say they do it to express themselves, going to an actual furry convention with tons of fursuiters really opened my eyes to the truth of it. Many fursuiters would stand in open, public places, simply to be seen. Some would stand by the entrance of the building for hours, walking back and forth in front of the entry line, just to be as noticed by as many people as possible. Just like their characters, people often make their fursuits as flamboyant as possible adding bright neon colours, LED or strobe effects, noise makers, any number of other things just to get people's attention."

And what's the problem with that. You keep repeating how furries just want attention, but you don't say what the problem is with that, not even once. It's like you expect people to just automatically agree with you that it's a bad thing, even if you give zero reasons for it. Let people be happy through whatever way they want. If it ain't your thing, don't do it, it's that simple. There's no need (or reason, apparently) to point a finger at them and say they're wrong for simply wanting to be noticed.

"People spend excessive amounts of money on fursuits from specific makers, because for furries, it's much like wearing name-brand clothing. I know the common reason is 'I like their style' but that's the same thing anyone who spends 200 dollars on a Supreme T-shirt say. This is more of a personal gripe but it's always baffled me when people would be willing to spend thousands of dollars on these goofy bizarre, giant-headed name-brand fursuits, when for the same price or less you could get a more realistic looking suit that not only looks way cooler and more interesting but would fit right in in renaissance fairs, anime or gaming conventions."

If you want a realistic fursuit to be shown around furry and non-furry conventions, go ahead and buy one yourself. If you don't think cartoony fursuits are cool and interesting, other people do. I know it's a hard concept for you to grasp, but people can have different tastes and opinions than you without being degenerate inferior beings. It's their money, and they'll do whatever they want with it. What they spend their money with is none of your business, be it a shitty iPhone, a shitty Supreme T-shirt, or a cartoony fursuit.

"But I think that the answer is just that the giant headed cartoonish style is trendy right now, and the only thing that matters is being popular. I used to watch furry cringe compilation videos where people would dress in their fursuits and go to Walmart or McDonalds, people would stop and stare, gripping their kids, obviously distressed at what's going on."

Oh no, the horror! Someone dressed in a costume with a style they liked, having fun being silly, while their friend records it for them, with a very obvious camera that's in view of anyone looking in their general direction! Hide your kids! Run to the mountains! Save yourself! But don't link any videos to examplify your false and silly claims, just show a static image of a furry in a supermarket, yeah that'll do. And of course, the ex-devout Christian, ex-furry, now furry hater used to watch furry cringe compilations. Of course he did.

"I used to think that maybe the suiters were just oblivious to the scene that they were causing, but now I realize that they do it specifically to cause a scene. Frankly I get kind of triggered when I go to an anime or gaming convention and I see people in their fursuits, dancing around at the entrance for attention. I wonder how many furries would appreciate if a group of historical reenactors dressed up in their Confederate or Nazi uniforms and danced around in a furry convention."

If someone asked "Hey Garg, what was the best thing that happened to you in the past 2 months?", I'd say it was meeting a fursuiter at a gaming convention I attended, and getting to take a picture with and to hug them. You're saying you get triggered by seeing that kind of thing? Well I don't. And you know what? I'd actually really like to see historically accurate recreations of old military uniforms. Hell, I even want to make a Wolfenstein Mondkommandant cosplay to wear at the next gaming convention I get to attend! Problem is, all of that is really irrelevant to the conversation! Your analogy fails completely on a basic level due to it being a politically and historically charged activity compared to some silly animal suit. This is called a false equivalency.

"I have no interest in dealing with high schoolers and people who act like that. I've already been through high school once, and I hated it. Then I went through it all over again in the Army. The furry community is in a perpetual state of high school and probably always will be. I have no desire to be part of it any longer."

And I have no interest in dealing with old grumpy assholes with a superiority complex followed by a group of unfunny kids that think they're smart by doing everything they say is good.

"THE HIVEMIND: I don't use the phrase 'Social Justice Warrior' much, because it doesn't have a whole lot of meaning anymore, and it's mostly just used as an insult. And I'm not sure I've ever met someone who self-identified as a Social Justice Warrior."

The term Social Justice Warrior was created to identify and anger the kind of people that fought for "Social Justice". Nobody ever self-identified as an SJW without the context of a response video, except for perhaps HBomberGuy, who self-identified at one point as an "SJeW", referring to the victimization of Jews in 1940s Germany by the far-right Nazi Party.

"But if I had to give meaning to the phrase I would say it's a form of vigilante-ism. It's the idea that even if something someone does is legal, if it's something you personally still see as bad, they must be punished. And a large portion of the furry community very much epitimizes this idea of Social Justice vigilante-ism. They have a set of rules for how you will behave, and they will punish you through a variety of means for disobeying. Furthermore, they carry out this punishment without much thought or nuance because, well who has the time for that when you could just attack people in a blind rage. I call this group 'the hivemind'."

Why? Just call them Furry SJWs, Furry Moral Vigilantes, Furry Thought Police; "hivemind" only describes the idea that they all think the same way, which clearly isn't all there is to it, by your definition.

"The hivemind knows what is best for you, for the furry community, and the world in general. The hivemind will bring about the next golden age utopia, and will do so through the cleansing of the impure, the unjust, and, well, anyone that disagrees with them, really."

Oh, so you and your fanbase, then. Gotcha.

"You will be assimilated. Resistance is futile. I'm pretty sure Tumblr is pretty much dead, so the entire platform migrated to Twitter. But if Tumblr was a place for angry teenage leftist artists to bitch about social issues, then something tells me the majority of it's users may have been furries."

Of course, because furries are the only angry teenage leftist artists there are out there in the world. Furries are the scum of the Earth, and furries must all disappear because they disagree with me on a few subjects, and are younger than me. Perfect logic on display right here, folks. Remember, this is the supposed "rational" leader of the furry fandom. Well, at least now he doesn't pretend to be a furry anymore, so that's good for the community.

"You cannot say anything on Twitter without at least a dozen or so pissed off 19 year old furries telling you how much of a shit person you are."

Yes, because you can tell exactly how old they all are just from how they act online, and older people are always correct and mature. Oh, and they're all furries, no exceptions, and it isn't because your channel is almost completely centered around furry subjects, or at least was. Not at all...

"For a group that talks about how much they hate bullying, they certainly do a lot of it. The hivemind will go ahead and tell you that you aren't welcome in the community over the most minor of slights. Did you tell a slightly edgy joke 5 years ago? You are problematic. Did you express a positive sentiment towards someone the hivemind doesn't like? Problematic. Have you never actually done anything that could even be construed as some kind of -ism? Oh, don't worry, the hivemind will find something. If you even seem like the kind of person who may have done something to someone at some point in your life, the hivemind will make you a target. They will intentionally take things you say out of context, they will fabricate evidence against you, and outright lie. They will approach you and goad you into saying something incriminating. They will pose as a friend or supporter to get you to lower your guard. They will dig through your Discord server's message history to find things to use against you. They will bully you, harass you, dox you and do the same thing to your friends. They will push you to the point of suicide and then openly celebrate your death. I am not exaggerating. This has happened. One of the most interesting things about the hivemind is the level of inconsistency within it's own rules. Inconsistent moral outrage seems to be par for the course. For example, even the hivemind will agree that the furry community is mostly sexual and sexuality is something to be celebrated. However, the types of sexuality and fetishes you are allowed to have seem to change on a weekly basis. Today, bondage is in, it's a fun healthy kink, everyone should try it to spice up their love life, but next week, bondage is disrespectful towards woman and perpetuates rape culture. Last week lion king porn was acceptable. Everyone loves the lion king! But today, all drawings of quadrupedal animals is the same thing as bestiality, and will be shunned."

You really think there is some sort of hivemind, don't you? Have you ever considered that maybe... maybe that assumption is incorrect, and it's actually many people with different points of view, with varying points of view, in fact? Have you ever considered that maybe, just maybe people can grow as a person and change their opinions on certain things based on new considerations or findings? No? Of course not, it's all just a hivemind, gas the Jews, yadda yadda.

"Here's a fun experiment: ask a member of the hivemind if furries are zoophiles because they sexualize anthropomorphic animals. They will say no, of course not, it's only artwork."

No, they won't. When people defend anthro pornography, the excuse isn't that it's just artwork, it's that they're anthropomorphic. They're just different looking humans, and are not animals, and shouldn't be seen as such. This is a really basic concept that most furries grasp, but I guess those damn 19 year olds are just part of the hivemind, right, Koth?

"Next, ask that same person if liking drawings of young characters makes them a pedophile. How could it if it's only artwork, right? Now sit back and take note of the mental gymnastics."

Bestiality is the act of sexually abusing an animal for sexual gratification. Zoophilia and pedophilia are sexual fetishes. False equivalency again. Not only that, but I'd personally say that liking feral porn can be derived from zoophilia, just as liking drawn child porn can be derived from pedophilia. But hey, like you said, if I disagree with you, I must be part of the hivemind. No individual in the furry fandom that disagrees with you on anything is an individual, they're just part of the hivemind. Oh, and, trust me, I'm doing way more than just taking notes about your mental gymnastics.

"The hivemind's rules are often so hypocritical and nonsensical that they are at times impossible to decipher. Take for example this Tweet: 'you are a trump supporter and therefore completely fucking forfeit your right to participate in a meme started by a trans girl, asshole.'. There's a meme going around where you draw your character in a certain sweater. This person is responding to another saying that they cannot participate in this meme because they are a Trump supporter and the meme was started by a trans person. [pointless, time wasting silence]"

How is that hypocritical and nonsensical? That person genuinely thinks that Trump supporters are all transphobes and thus don't have the right to have fun with what trans people create. I disagree, and you do too, but the difference between you and I is that you think that person isn't an individual, and that what they said doesn't make sense. It makes sense within that person's political beliefs. It doesn't make sense within mine because I have not seen enough transphobic Trump supporters to assign that quality (as in adjective) to the majority of those people, not because I disagree with them and they're a furry 19 year old something something insult.

"You may think this person is just being over the top as a joke but upon further inspection, no they are being serious. Now this is only one example but these kinds of psychotically nonsensical Tweets are fairly common within furry Twitter."

No, I may not, because I don't disregard everything I disagree with as a joke. I don't call everyone I disagree with a troll. I analyse their arguments and see if there's any point in discussing them. In your case, for example, I watched the video, thought it was amazing, watched it again, saw that it was actually really shit, then joined your Discord and saw the effect it was having on your followers, and now I'm responding to it because it's creating a problem that shouldn't exist in the fandom. That Tweet isn't "psychotically nonsensical", it's just something that you disagree with, politically. It's their opinion.

"The hivemind seems to believe that being the victim of something, makes you the absolute authority on that. So much so, that anyone who is not a victim of that thing is not allowed to have any sort of opinion on the matter. You may also not question the validity of those claiming to be victims."

It's like that for a reason. This reason. Misrepresentation from outside observers. You think most if not all furries are 19 year old idiots that can't be helped, not worthy of your oh so precious and glorious free time. You don't understand how it is to go through puberty without the moral compass of religion, yet you talk down to teenagers like you're some kind of authority on who is or isn't a decent human being. You don't understand how it is to be a fursuiter, yet you talk down to fursuiters like you know what style would be best and their reasons for doing what they do. That's why so many people are apprehensive and even aggressive towards outsiders judging what they should or shouldn't do towards certain situations. I'm not saying everything an outsider says is invalid; they are, and I don't agree with that, but I'm saying it mostly makes sense from a logical (and emotional) standpoint.

"This has led to a culture within the hivemind of perpetual victimhood. The more bad that has happened in your life, the more powerful you become among its ranks. People wear their self-diagnosed mental illnesses as badges of honor, adorning their profile bios. I've seen people in heated debates over which one of them is more abused. Why would anyone try to improve themselves when being as disabled as possible grants you so much authority?"

I agree, it's not a healthy attitude and it does happen a lot. That's why furries like me have the responsibility to show them how unhealthy that attitude is, why they should change it, to what, and how. But you'd rather just run away, because damn those pesky degenerate furry teens, right? They don't need help with their easily fixable small issues!

"And for all of the hivemind's efforts, they very rarely succeed in doing much of anything helpful. All their attempts to bully people out of the fandom usually only end up causing more people to oppose them. More people who are now militized against them! More people voting for the political candidates the hivemind opposes! All of the hivemind's gatekeeping into the furry community is almost entirely useless! Even if the hivemind does succeed in getting someone banned from every furry website and every furry convention, that person can easily just make another character, and re-enter the fandom! They do it all the time, anyway."

I agree, though it's not as easy as you make it out to be to make a new "character" if that character is their fursona. They identify with it. It's not just something they make up for funzies. Of course, you'd only understand that if you were a furry, but right now, you're just another outsider hating on the fandom for stupid reasons.

"The hivemind represents groupthink at it's worst. Why anyone would want to be part of the community completely inundated by this is beyond me. And what's worse, is now a second hivemind, whose stated goal is to be anti-hivemind has popped up."

Man, you have no idea just how much this applies to your fanbase. Seriously... I really have to wonder if you weren't actually referring to them intentionally while writing the script for this video.

"In concept, opposing the hivemind is not a bad idea, but the problem is that the anti-hivemind tends to use the exact same tactics as those they claim to hate. Just take a look at my Kiwi Farms page. That's a fun read. It's got people on there who claim that I'm a Trump supporter and try to use it as an insult. And at the same time, it's also got people on there who claim that I'm a Social Justice Warrior, and try to use that as an insult. [On screen: 'These things are more implied than specifically stated. I know you all like to be sticklers about specifics whenever it's conveniant.', and yes, he did mispell convenient]"

So by this sentence, when you say "hivemind" you mean SJWs, and when you say "anti-hivemind", you mean right wingers and centrists that use SJW tactics. This is why people want you to be more specific. As I've already stated, you are influential. You have a responsibility. It's like if all of a sudden a bunch of news publications started publishing fake news mixed in with the fact of the matter in order to push an agenda *clears throat*. People would have a problem with that because those news publications have a responsibility to be as objective as possible when delivering the facts, rather than try to push their opinions along with it and manipulate the audiences. Likewise, when you talk to your audience, you have a responsibility not to mislead them by misrepresenting whatever topic the video entails.

"Two groups who claim to be completely opposed and claim to hate the tactics of the other side, but actually act the exact same way! Take the example of a recent Tweet I made when I apologized to Dogpatch for talking shit about 'im, and stating Deo's a decent person, if you actually get to know her. If you don't know, those two are individuals often associated with the hivemind."

I agree, there are hypocrites on both sides. And yes, I do know Dogpatch Press and DeoTasDevil, and I don't like what they do for the furry community. However, I'd say you shouldn't have spoken ill of them before even meeting them in the first place. You can disagree with people without throwing insults around. Hopefully one day you'll learn that.

"Many of the responses to that Tweet, are just some of the anti-hivemind individuals just being vitriolic. I responded by pointing out that what they are doing seems a lot like bullying, which they often accuse the hivemind of, and some of the responses to the second Tweet are even worse, including one Tweet for me to straight up kill myself, which unfortunately has been deleted. But my point is, in their mind, when the hivemind dogpiles people like this it's abuse and harassment, but when the anti-hivemind does the exact same thing, it's 'criticising someone's actions'. Some of these Tweets even seem to imply that if you've been abused in any way, it's okay to act like a complete cunt. Hmm, that's starting to sound like some other people we know, isn't it? Now I'm sure I don't need to go into more detail about the groups of people I'm talking about, you've definitely encountered many of them."

Indeed. I have not seen said replies to the Tweets you mentioned, so I'll just trust you on this since it doesn't sound outlandish or inflammatory. If anyone is up for checking it, be my guest and I'll update the post, but I've already spent 3 bloody days on this response, and I'm really stressed about the whole ordeal.

"I know it's not unique to the furry fandom, and I know, vocal minority, yadda yadda, but there lies the problem: when we talk about this sort of behaviour in other groups as a vocal minority, usually we're talking about maybe 5%? But in the furry community, it's more like a third, this shit is prevalent."

Not really, and no. A vocal minority means a minority. There's usually no talk of percentages since there's never exact statistics on these kinds of issues. You're pulling this out of your ass, too. If not, then please, for the love of all that's holy, provide sources in the description. It really helps make your point more solid if you either don't cite any statistics or cite some that actually have a source, like the inconclusive survey you mentioned way before.

"With most communities or groups like.. Gamers, you can just kind of ignore the crazy ones. If you are a furry, you cannot escape them. Most of the major furry websites and conventions are run by these people."

Define "crazy gamer". Oh, and yeah, uh, I've been ignoring all the crazy furries for a long time now and it's very much possible. Problem is, you're surrounded by your band of crazy furry followers, and they're all you seem to interact with nowadays. They don't represent most furries, and I can assure you, your experience is vastly different than most furries'.

"The only way to get away from them is to leave the fandom entirely. So I suppose you can raise your cans of illegally purchased [inaudible] in celebration, because this time, you've won. I'm leaving."

It isn't. You're just running away from the fandom, but trust me, your followers? Those furries you interact with on the daily? Your haters? They're not going to magically go away just because you renounce your label. This isn't going to do anything for you. But for the fandom? You've just made a long-ass video that'll feed into every furry haters' confirmation bias. They'll go "See? Even the furries know it's bad! They've even adopting our vocabulary", or "Yes! Thank God, we've saved one of them!", and it's all thanks to you. But in terms of everything you've mentioned in the video? None of it will go away. Mark my words, because even if you're not a furry? They still are (at heart, at least, even if they say they no longer are because "hurr durr the Avatar of Akatosh left so I'll do too").

"IN CONCLUSION...: Listen. I know I'm not perfect. I used to be 19 too and I'm sure I was a complete spaz, probably worse than some of the people I'm complaining about [On screen: 'My nickname in high school was literally "Spaz".']. I know I've aided in that culture of oversexualization, I know that I can be a drama queen and that I am a bit oversensitive, but I want to change those things and in order to do that I have to leave the community."

And you assume that none of the furries you've interacted with would want to better themselves if they were shown why what they were doing was bad, because of course you do. You assume that because you're older than them, that you're automatically wiser and better than them, because of course you do. And yet you have the gall to admit at the end of this shitstain of a video that you share many traits you criticize all furries for having? Dude, what the hell?

"I've come to be known by some as the voice of reason within the furry fandom. If you believe that, then listen to my final message to you furries, as a fur: the furry community is toxic. People throw around that word a lot, but don't seem to know what it means, so let me explain. It doesn't just mean someone has a bad attitude. Toxic doesn't just mean that you're sick. Toxic means that you have such a volatile, contagious illness that anyone who comes into contact with you contracts that same illness and goes on to spread it to others. The furry community is toxic, because the people inside it are infected with and spread a self-destructive, poisonous mindset, and the most dangerous part, is that for the people infected, the symptoms are almost invisible. They're invisible because inside the community those symptoms are the norm."

I used to see you that way too, until you made this shitty video, then the next shitty video, and so on. You're speaking out of your heart, not out of your mind, and it's causing issues for the fandom. This "self-destructive mindset" you talk about is literally just anyone that disagrees with you, from everything you've said. You're not thinking this through, or at least I hope you're not, because if you are, then heaven above, I have never met such a disgusting, spiteful, hateful and illogical individual in my entire life.

"Now you can tell yourself that the furry community 'is just about liking anthro creatures', but that too is a self-deception, and one of the signs that you are being infected with this illness."

Add that to the adjective list! Furries are mentally retarded, diseased, idiotic, moronic, immature, degenerate 19 year old high schoolers, part of a hivemind, and thus with no individual thoughts or beliefs.

"You can talk about how anything I've said only applies to a vocal minority, but the fact of the matter is that almost every furry falls into at least one of the groups that I've mentioned above."

No, negative, nope, negatory, nein, nyet, não, and no (Spanish). Almost every member of your viewerbase falls into one of those hivemind groups. But furries in general? Inaccurate. And as for this "illness", you literaly just defined it as something all furries have, so there's no point in arguing that it's not something all furries have. There is a point, however, in talking about how this "illness" idea is complete anti-furry nonsense. Firstly, the only reason you talk about it metaphorically as an illness is to make it out to be as bad as you think those differring opinions are. Secondly, there are no hiveminds per se and people have individual thoughts, opinions, and beliefs. Thirdly, you have only experienced American furries or furries who are part of your audience, and considering my interactions with them, it's no wonder you have such a negative view on the fandom. You need to re-evaluate what you see as the furry fandom.

"So do yourself a favour and distance yourself from the community before it's too late and it's consumed 15 years of your life. I've tried to help the community from the inside. With these last few years on YouTube that's been one of my goals, but I finally realized the problem. It's something I'll call the teacher's fallacy, that is, thinking you can teach a group of people who simply do not want to learn."

Hah, no. You were stupid enough to only occupy yourself with furry-related things and not have anything else on the side. Nobody reading this should "distance themselves from the community". Instead, they should stay just as they are, if they're happy. If they're not, they can stay a furry, and search for other interests. For example, I really like Quake, Half-Life and Grand Theft Auto IV, so I hang around people that like those things as well as furries. And well, dear reader, as I'm sure you're about to find out, that's exactly what Kothorix is going to do, except he's going to say he's not a furry while doing it because, well, y'know, he's above that kind of thing. Furry? Pfft, that's youngster stuff.

"As I leave the community, I want to give some clarification as to what I even mean by that. Despite everything I've said in this video, no, I don't hate you for being a furry. I don't hate furries in general. It's just that I'm sick of interacting with groups of them. I'm sick of the same arguments over and over. I'm sick of feeling stressed out about what the hivemind thinks about my latest Tweet, and I just don't identify with most of the young adults who make up most of the community, so it's hard to find friends. But I don't hate you, and I'm not going to purge my life of all furries."

"I don't hate furries, I just don't want them anywhere near me! But I'm going to hang around them anyways, despite everything I literally just said!"

"Most of my friends are furries, and they will remain my friends. All that's changing is that I'll seek friends elsewhere too, which is something I've never really done before. I'm not going to stop making YouTube videos, it's just that now my videos will be less furry-centric. I'm not saying the topic is completely off-limits, but videos about it from now on, will be as someone outside the community. And yes, I'll still be using my dragon as my channel mascot, but we're going to be making some changes with how I make videos so the overall presentation is.. less furry. And while I'll always be interested in anthropomorphic characters, art and animation, I'm going to cease using furry as my identity. Think of it like someone who is moving, someone who lives in the city but has gotten sick of the insane drivers, nearly being mugged on a daily basis and the general atmosphere of city life. I'm still the same person, just in a different location, a little bit further away. You're still welcome to come visit."

Well, you know what? I don't welcome your negativity. And before you call me a hiveminder, a troll, a bully, an idiot, a moron, an immature degenerate, a retard, diseased, toxic.. you can just call me what I am: a furry.

I'm not going to stand here and let some guy with 50 thousand people following every single word he says talk shit about MY fandom. I truly wish you would actually leave the fandom, purge all furries from your Discord, Patreon, follow through with what you said in the video and block every person on Twitter with a furry avatar, and completely rebrand your channel, taking out the dragon and taking down every video about furries you've ever made except this one. You know, like The Dishonored Wolf did. I respect his decision, and him as a person. Yours, and you? Not at all. My reasons are as stated above.

I'd like to see you try to survive on YouTube without any furry's support. But you can't do that, because you know it'd be wrong to block out those that built your success, and that it would completely kill your channel. You know you depend on furries to earn a living, but that doesn't seem to stop you from dissing the whole community, because you know they'll believe anything you say now that you've earned their trust.

You speak big words when you say you're leaving the community, but in practice all you're doing is removing the label from yourself. Other than that, you're just doing what you should've done long ago, which is finding other interests to talk about and groups to hang out with. You are a sad individual, and I wish you the best in your future endeavours. Just please, for the love of F@©K, never talk about the furry fandom ever again. Furries don't need any more negative outsider bullshit being pushed as the truth.

Kothorix himself

Kothorix has proven, with this video, and his "You're Wrong About Fallout 76" video, that he believes that anyone who disagrees with him is a mentally retarded, diseased, idiotic, moronic, immature, degenerate, 19 year old part of a hivemind, and thus has no individual thoughts or beliefs. Because of this belief of his, he thinks that any two people that he deems to be part of the hivemind (that is, any two people he disagrees with on any given subject) who have differing opinions and points of view, are proof that the hivemind is hypocritical, and thus every member of it is a hypocrite by extention. If you can't see the problem with that incredibly faulty line of logic yourself, there's something really wrong with your interpretational skills.

In the video he describes that the reason he's leaving the fanbase is because of two main things:
1. Guilt of association (pedophiles and zoophiles)
2. Annoying, immature, childish, attention-seeking, degenerate, mentally retarded, diseased, idiotic, moronic, and ultimately inferior beings known as "19 year olds" and "people that don't know how to deal with puberty"

He literally claims in the video that 9.2% of all furries are practicing zoophiles or pedophiles, if not both. The only evidence he cites related to this is a 2008 survey with a tiny sample size of 7000 people (which is less than the amount of convention goers at the last AnthroCon) which only states that 18.4% of participants identified as zoophiles. He also makes many other false claims about inexistant statistics, such as saying that, when referring to SJW tactics, usually a "minority" refers to 5% on any given fandom, while he knows for certain (without any proof, evidence or even an anecdote) that at least a third of furries do that very thing.

The other point can be easily dismissed as him being a grumpy 29 year old who's angry at 19 year olds and their, according to him, "easily fixable and small issues". So yeah, all that pressure from parents telling you to go to university (if you have any), the pressure of having to find a job in order to pay for said university (if you can't), having to deal with your sexual thoughts and lack of social skills, having to deal with student debt if you don't end up being able to afford university (which most people can't), etc, are all just small and easily fixable issues. They're nothing important you guys, why would the great Kothorix waste his time with stupid and immature 19 year old furries?

His fanbase isn't any good either, they're a big part of the reason why he maintains this toxic, "I'm better than everyone because I'm older and thus more intelligent!" attitude. It's mostly composed of ex-furs or non-furs that make anti-semitic and racist jokes all day, every day, on his Discord server. Almost all of them just follow whatever Kothorix says as gospel, adding their own excuses in order to make it the ultimate infallible truth. I'd go as far as to call it a cult, if I cared to know the specifics of what exactly qualifies as a cult.

His Discord server only has 2 rules as of writing this post, one being "don't be an asshole", and the other being "don't be a crybaby". Therefore, if someone is being an asshole, it's up to the staff to see if they decide, and if another person complains, they're breaking the "crybaby" rule. The server also allows minors to view the +18 channels, and allows any member to have an NSFW profile picture, and to be in any channel (including the ones where NSFW content is prohibited). It's quite amazing, especially considering how much of a problem he says he has with the legality of minors and sexual content. Doesn't seem like he's too concerned, to be honest.


So, to finally conclude this enormous, stressful and rage-inducing task, allow me to address myself directly to Kothorix:

You don't get the right to describe the entire furry community in such a negative light just because some people ruined it for you.

Don't ever misrepresent, insult and belittle the members of this fandom I hold so dear to my heart again.

Don't ever refer to the furry community as "an animal torturing sex cult" composed of "annoying, immature, attention-seeking, childish, degenerate, mentally retarded, diseased, idiotic, and moronic" people again.

And lastly, don't ever talk about us ever again in general. We've had more than enough negative press from outsiders, and you've made it clear that you have no intention of showing furries in a positive light.