Pokemon, Digimon, Sonic, and Fire Emblem as a kid planted the groundwork. Then, when I was a teen, the MLP phenomenon started. I looked up clop ironically. And then looked it up again. Purely ironically, of course. And then I started looking up porn of franchises I actually cared about, and so on. Fast forward about ten years, and we're here.

shit man, its kinda embarassing.

as a kid, i really liked animals, and five nights at freddys def didnt help. in middle school i was a social outcast amongst social outcasts. i remember meeting 2 people in the fandom who were hiding in the bushes. this one girl who scared the crap out of me hissed at me. i wanted to be liked so i made a fursona, but i never met the scary girl ever again after that year. probably for the best, heard that she snuck a frog into the classroom and killed it when she got caught.

at the same time, it was thanks to her that i found the fandom, and through the fandom i realized i wasnt cis or straight lmao.

i think i became a furry by finding MLP futa porn made by BlackJr combined with later discovering the works of Miso-Souperstar
good stuff
and ive found plenty more amazing art from then on
being a pokemon fan also lead me to good stuff as well since i love pokemon anthro of all kinds

<---What Space Jam's Lola Bunny does to a mf.

Palcomix shit in early 2010s.

penisthief said:
shit man, its kinda embarassing.

as a kid, i really liked animals, and five nights at freddys def didnt help. in middle school i was a social outcast amongst social outcasts. i remember meeting 2 people in the fandom who were hiding in the bushes. this one girl who scared the crap out of me hissed at me. i wanted to be liked so i made a fursona, but i never met the scary girl ever again after that year. probably for the best, heard that she snuck a frog into the classroom and killed it when she got caught.

at the same time, it was thanks to her that i found the fandom, and through the fandom i realized i wasnt cis or straight lmao.

boi, she sure was crazy. Weird way of finding furries tho

envwy said:
idk me curious

parents bought me Star Fox Adventures in preschool and it made me very horny. i don't know if it's typical for most people to feel horny before puberty, but that damn blue fox was a catalyst for a very weird childhood. i didn't discover the furry community until i was already a teenager, which i found after discovering kemonomimi girls from touhou. they really are a gateway drug. i never made a fursona and i think that the costumes are scary, i don't really want to "be" an animal, but i would marry one if they were real (although ironically i hate human body hair).

it's sort of funny, now that i'm in my mid twenties, i actually browse e621 and find some nice art of a character, and then i end up watching the movie or show because i found porn of it, rather than the other way around.

there's really only a few species i'm actually into: foxes, wolves, and raccoons. they have that pointy face. i'm actually a little concerned that we can't find a foxxo that doesn't get oversexualized. i really like zhen from kung fu panda 4 because she's not depicted as a shameless tease like krystal, diane, or nick. species stereotypes are very limiting.

Maid Marian. She was very attractive, you could even say she was a fox!

Also bee porn.

For me there was no awakening from TV or movies or even games. Just a case of hormones raging combined with curiosity. First it was Pornhub with the vanilla stuff then rule 34 for pokemon where one of the first things that got my interest was the ashchu comic from palcomix. Then it was candyfoxy, haychel, winick-lim, etc. Came across some "material" on tumblr before the nukes wiped out all the material and the lovely furry oc and pokemon blogs and another thing I found I had an interest in. I won't say what but it is on the default blacklist (and no it's not gore. Im not that much of a freak.) Then along the way I found this site years ago which was fine for me since back then most of what I was looking for was there. I do find myself questioning every now and again how things would be if I didn't have that curiosity back then. Then I just shove that thought to the back of my head saying it was inevitable. With the references people would be making later down the line on youtube, I would have wanted to know what their referencing and end up in the same spot, only slightly older.

Saw some cartoon porn of an anthropomorphic character, thought it was hot.

Admittedly, the definition of ‘Furry’ isn’t very widely agreed upon, is it?

Simply laughing at a Bugs Bunny cartoon and deciding that it’s something that you enjoy and want to keep enjoying is enough to make you a Furry according to some people.

There’s folks who think it’s not enough to find cartoon animal people sexually attractive, you’re not a Furry unless you identify as a cartoon animal person and hate being a real human that exists in three spacial dimensions.

Oohhh I love this question! It was braixen. I woke up one day, realized I thought braixen was kinda hot. Excepted my fate and made a fursona that day. Haven't looked back sense

I think that the starting point was when i was looking for hentai and i found one of Eipril's videos, and when i least expected i got very into furries, But i am not a furry okay? i swear

youbetterbeelieveit said:
Maid Marian. She was very attractive, you could even say she was a fox!

Also bee porn.

Maid Marian very nice с:
For me, it all started with the character Sasha from "All Dogs Go to Heaven"

I started off thinking it was weird and "ewww grossss!!!" when I was like 12, but then I was looking at so much furry art I fell in love with it lol.
I tried hiding it under "I'm just looking at it to make fun of it, obviosuly, I would never!" but it didn't work. It's funny looking back at my old discord messages and seeing this transition happen

My hatred turned to addiction smh, I wouldn't have it any other way

boolde said:
I started off thinking it was weird and "ewww grossss!!!" when I was like 12, but then I was looking at so much furry art I fell in love with it lol.
I tried hiding it under "I'm just looking at it to make fun of it, obviosuly, I would never!" but it didn't work. It's funny looking back at my old discord messages and seeing this transition happen

Same here man, lol

I lived in an all female household (I am male) and the general culture was women = royalty and men = evil. We had stacks of art supplies and I would draw what you call feral furries a lot because it was kind of a "politically neutral" option. I grew thicker skin as an adult (and moved into my own home) and now I am able to shrug off criticism for drawing boobs or butts when it's necessary. I still draw anthro furries a lot because I'm good at it and it's my go to when I have art block.

Porn

I really can't remember that well how I got into furry content on YouTube. But yeah it was YouTube.

I blame whoever installed furcadia on a middle school lab computer and piqued my curiosity. Used my hand me down pc to investigate what it was because the teacher didn't know.

That investigation culminated in the question "Why do I find a drawing of a dolphin with tits attractive?"

Having unrestricted internet access as a latchkey kid probably did a real number on me, now that I've gotten around to thinking about it.

Oh well.

There was cropped nitw porn of Gregg and Angus on a YouTube shitpost thumbnail and I was curious about the horny state of the fandom at the time. The video doesn't exist anymore but the artist was Glitter-trap-boy.

I found a book called warrior cats in the school library when i was about 14 years old 14 years ago (im 28 now) and I went online looking for the rest of the books cause our library didnt have ANY of the sequal books, I ended up finding Jay Naylors website and reading his online comic called better days annnnnnnnd it was a wrap, thats my furry origin story pretty much

It started off with me finding a YouTube channel that introduced me to the original species Avali. I did some digging and it led me to fur affinity and what not, and eventually created my own avali OC. A few years pass and I actively watch other furry creators and eventually lost interest in the avali, (I was only curious about the species and it turned out it really wasn’t entirely my cup of tea). It wasn’t until I found the animator Wingedwolf94 that I discovered skulldogs and thought they were an interesting blend of cute, creepy and badass. Finally, I created an OC, (the one as my PFP and first one I was truly happy with) and wound up here somehow.

anonymouslurker99 said:
Saw some cartoon porn of an anthropomorphic character, thought it was hot.

Admittedly, the definition of ‘Furry’ isn’t very widely agreed upon, is it?

Simply laughing at a Bugs Bunny cartoon and deciding that it’s something that you enjoy and want to keep enjoying is enough to make you a Furry according to some people.

There’s folks who think it’s not enough to find cartoon animal people sexually attractive, you’re not a Furry unless you identify as a cartoon animal person and hate being a real human that exists in three spacial dimensions.

I would argue that to be a furry requires two things, 1. You have an interest in anthropomorphic animals, and 2. You’re willing to personally call yourself a “furry”. The fact is the definition that most people have are either too vague (being a fan of anthros) or give the fandom a bad image by stating it’s inherently sexual, (I know it’s ironic saying that on a site that mostly consists of porn and is owned by a sex toy company)

combination of MLP and Skylanders. especially that bird lady from the 5th game. those hips, good lord.

Imma be legit, it was mostly because of MLP R34 and that of other characters like Krystal, Rouge the Bat, Gardevoir, etc. I've always liked anthro characters but I didn't start calling myself a furry until recently

Probably the case for a few, but I remember being around 10 or so and watching Digimon Tamers and thinking like, "When I grow up I wanna marry Renamon!". And I also just REALLY liked anthro characters in general, almost all of my drawings as a kid had lil' characters with animal heads.
For a long time I didn't even know what a furry was, and I only started to understand the concept when I was around 16. Took me until I was 20 and to go like "Yeah, guess I'm a furry.".

Disney when I was a kid.

I've been somehow into seemingly every thing that furries have liked since the eighties. Really like vore. Then got into MLP. Furs quickly swarmed there too. I just kind of decided that among the scope of people I stick up for, furs are strongly among them. I high fived a griffin in a fur suit within the last twelve hours and I'm on e621 commenting. So I guess to many that probably qualifies

Looking up Lucario on Google images and falling down a rabbit hole wondering why some art pieces were tagged furry.

The rest was history.

bladeedge said:
Disney when I was a kid.

Disney really started it for me too, I think. I remember seeing that scene with Nala in The Lion King and recognizing they were bedroom eyes (before I even knew that term). Disney animators know exactly what they're doing. I mean, it's common in the animation industry, but Disney is huge and all.

It was just the 'back of my mind aware that non-human/furry characters could also be attractive/sexy', and finding the occasional bit of furry art I happened to stumble upon to be nice to look at (unless the art was dogshit, of course). Didn't used to actively search for it though, especially back when I was mostly into anime/manga.

I really got into it though, when I got into MLP: FiM though, and started looking more at image boards like this one. It was also around the time I started watching less anime. I'm fairly broad in my interest though (furry, scalie, alien, feral, humanized, robot/android, standard human, etc.), and might be more broadly classed as a xenophile (though that term has real-world implications that are a bit racist for me to use that term outside of places like the furry community that would be more likely to understand what I mean) or omniphile (though I do have some aesthetic standards, to say nothing of personality standards). Don't misunderstand though, it's less that I'm a stereotypical horny bard (or humps-everything dog) type and more that I just have a broader aesthetic sense (what you might call a 'wide strike zone') I guess. I like my fics to have more romance than porn, and I'd prefer clean romance over 'nothing but porn', for example.

afanofskulldogs said:
I would argue that to be a furry requires two things, 1. You have an interest in anthropomorphic animals, and 2. You’re willing to personally call yourself a “furry”. The fact is the definition that most people have are either too vague (being a fan of anthros) or give the fandom a bad image by stating it’s inherently sexual, (I know it’s ironic saying that on a site that mostly consists of porn and is owned by a sex toy company)

Works pretty well for me. Personally, I'd put it more like this:

• 1 - An interest (a fascination with, up to and including romantic and/or sexual) in anthropomorphic animals. Consumption [of content] (even if only in your head)
• -and/or-
• 2 - A desire to take on animalistic physical traits. Incarnation (or the desire to incarnate/reincarnate)

1 is not necessarily going to engage with 2, and 2 isn't necessarily going to care about the art side, but I think both could be considered furries. Someone who is exclusively 2 though, would probably be better associated with the therian/therianism camp specifically, rather than a furry.

I do agree that if someone is willing to call themselves a furry, than they should probably be taken at their word regardless of whether they might be considered to be borderline, seeing as the border is pretty blurry.

I might say that appreciation of some furry art isn't sufficient. Simply liking how something turned out, or having some interest in mythology surrounding anthropomorphic animals isn't the same as being a furry. It's like the difference between appreciating games as an art form or liking the lore of a game, and actually playing games. In other words, there is a difference between someone who might go to the museum out of idle curiosity and say they happen to like one piece or other and never really think about art much otherwise, and someone who has some fascination with art (even in cases where the person in question might keep quiet about it for fear of reprisal).

Not that I want to gatekeep or anything. It's just fun to try to come up with definitions/interpretations and the like.

I would say mostly a lot of Anime Cartoons with characters that had furry features.

Saphira.

I don’t even remember how many years ago I found a YouTube video with these weird things called furries in big colourful suits, love it

Start to wonder around Reddit, fall down the Reddit kid pipeline, oh no

Gets into all the anti-furry shi and starts to harass poor furries online, :(

Watch Beastars a couple of years later, absolutely love it and joins a server

Learn that place is full of furries, start to get into furry porn, and end up becoming a furry

the were-cleaner game

envwy said:
idk me curious

Wanted to get into art and earn money but rich furries are mythic tier.

Maid Marion in Disney's Robin Hood. And then roughly around the same time Animalympics just added to it. The latter is a case of the animators knew exactly what they were doing.

Given the age I was at the time, this means I've been a fur for almost my entire life.

Born this way, I think. Obsessed with pikachu and pokemon in general since I was a tiny kid, and always more imagined being a pokemon more than being a trainer, or just having animal features in general. Me and around six other kids had a longstanding pokemon RP from around ages 8 to 12 where we exclusively played pokemon, and my favorite character was a pikachu. I played pokemon mystery dungeon at around the same time, then discovered furries at around age 11 and was hooked. Didn't pick a fursona for a good while, but when I did the choice was kinda obvious.

I wanted to watch lewd content but I actually don't like IRL all that much. So I consumed a lot of Hentai when I discovered it and eventually found Yiff as well. Exploiting real actors and actresses for money is something I dislike so the only IRL I occasionally watch is amateur where the participants filmed it themselves.

Coming across different suspicious images as a kid on google while looking for pics of cute animals.

What really sealed the deal was seeing Dogear218's Zootopia comics on Youtube around 2016 (although censored). I believe it was his comic "Itami o Tomonau Aishikata", though I can't seem to find the original upload anymore.

I preferred drawing animals as kid, grew up as a wolf/dragon girl in early 00s internet. I wanted to expand to drawing humans when I evolved into a weeb. I realized that I could not draw human faces at all, so instead I started drawing furries. Eventually I discovered that there is in fact a whole community for people enjoying this stuff. It has been downhill ever since.

Unlike others who got into the community due to shows and characters from them and all that, I just stumbled onto furry art and got into it.

Also, Wooloo.

Got really into things like Over the Hedge, Regular Show, Hey Arnold etc. as a kid and that lead me to Fanfiction, which lead me to reading lemons/smut and looking at art on Deviantart, then eventually NSFW art on Google Images and eventually then e621 lol.
The earliest NSFW art I specifically remember looking up was Pokemon.

Long story short, Fox in the Stable

vulpin3 said:
Long story short, Fox in the Stable

I REMEMBER THAT.

world of warcraft lol

PMD fancomics on SmackJeeves (RIP SmackJeeves)

Mostly from Pokemon and Sonic, but also from other games, anime and cartoons with animal characters in them

Spyro, MLP, and not quite restricted internet access.

That said, I feel like I could've turned out a lot worse given the internet access.

TMNT, Rescue Rangers, Sonic, Pokemon & Breath Of Fire

All begins when I'm was 3 y.o, and once time I'm going to dolphinarium with my mom, and this visit really impressed me. I really liked dolphins and became fascinated with them at that age. Perhaps you have already guessed what it is about, probably my first sexual excitement was related to them.
I don't remember myself well at that age, but as I grew up I'm discovered a lot of kid cartoons, and gradually noticed that he was in love with some furry characters. Years passed, but nothing significantly changed, the only thing was that I no longer observed in myself a desire for real animals, as it was in early childhood. Until I was about 10 years old, I still liked some cartoon characters. But later, this trend has slowed down. And , I'm 12 years old, I fell in love with a real girl at school for the first time, and it seems that this fetish was supposed to come to nothing. But after couple years, when my teen age was in strongest phase I'm more and more start hearing about furries and this starting angry me, I'm become a truly furry hater, leaving hateful comments in all places related to this subculture. But at the same time I started to encounter furry porn, it was something like "Zootopia 18+" in Google search. I reassured myself, that Zootopia characters isn't real furries (idk why xd), but it was very hard and shy process, once I'm find NSFW art with "real furry" in google and I was very scared by this, I was embarrassed. But I'm still was was locked in himself, until one February day. Im found a guy in one tg group who had sending a lot of furry/yiff stickers in the chat. And here came the point of no return. At first, as always, I denied everything in myself, and told myself that when I went to bed it would all pass the next day, but it didn't pass. And now, I'm here.

Dunno if I can rightfully call myself a furry since I basically just look at the art and have no interaction with the fandom outside of that, but animals are just a more cool to me than people. They're more interesting to look at, which translates well to erotica.

As to how, I was maybe around 12 and just starting to get fucked up by hormones. I somehow ended up on herpy one night, if anyone knows/remembers that site. The rest is history.

I grew up watching a lot of television shows with anthropomorphic animals and even played a lot of video games that included them as well. Pretty sure my very first crush I ever got was when I played Um Jammer Lammy for the very first time when I was like 3 years old or something (I don't remember the exact date but this is an estimate), I am a full-grown adult and still have a thing for her (even though I now have a human girlfriend, but she doesn't mind cuz she's just like me lol).

Also, these anthropomorphic furry animals comforted me during hard times in my life (I won't go into detail about anything but you can guess for yourself), so I guess the comfort has lingered from then to now.

Even though I had a lot of friends in middle/high school, there were some kids that criticized me for liking furries and even doing art of anthropomorphic animals (which I sometimes still do on my free time), but luckily I had many good friends, and most of them felt the same way as I did (and most of us still do), one of these friends is my current girlfriend (before you think she didn't give me consent to write these things about her, she really doesn't care and is literally right next to me as I am writing this so yeah).

I felt embarrassed about being sexually attracted to furries, sometimes even wanting to be one myself, most of my male counterparts were all into real women (but I soon realized some of them were as goofy as I was and liked furries too), and my hormones where WAY out of whack, I was pretty much jerking it every day (which sometimes got in the way of schoolwork, but I soon figured out that I could have a healthy balance). Most of the time I jerked off, it was, in fact, to furries (sometimes I just imagined them in my head).

There was just something about these female (and occasionally male) anthropomorphic animals that just triggered something in my brain, some sort of spark, enigma, whatever you might call it, that really made me feel special, somehow, even though it didn't (and sometimes still doesn't) make any sense.

I never told my mother that I felt this way, but I honestly didn't feel like I needed to because I think she got a hint (I usually joked about how I was married to Lammy to her and she got me a plush Lammy on the Christmas I was 13, damn, unrelated but that was already almost 14 years ago, time is always flying innit?)

Anyway, I think I've already given enough detail so there you have it, didn't mean to write a whole essay but I'm bored and I got off from work early today xD