[Note from Patch:] Thanks to Summercat for this guest post. It’s a follow up to: Ever hear that Altfurries are just trolls? A real Nazi leader is taking them seriously. More than a few commenters had a mistaken impression that Dogpatch Press was original poster for a photo of “nazi furries”. We weren’t. That was a screencap, and it wasn’t posted to endorse the contents. An automatic feed to Twitter made it the cover image there.
Summercat continues:
We’re creatures of the internet. We all know that images and photos can be ripped from their context and spread around with new interpretations that show them in a different light than intended. Context matters, even for items that appear to be clear cut.
A prior article I wrote about Altfurs includes a photo shared by Neo-nazi Andrew Anglin. It shows three fursuiters posing happily in front of a Nazi flag.
I’ve seen this picture for years. I’ve heard many stories about it – that it was someone’s home, it was a Nazi museum, or that it was photoshopped. I’ve thought poorly of those who were in the photo, disappointed in all three and especially towards one of them, who I had admired up to that point.
The truth of the matter is fairly innocent. The picture is real and not photoshopped – but resharing it has stripped away the crucial context.
[Patch:] Here’s examples of the photo being used to represent Nazi furries. These bring up other interesting info too.
- An article at TheRooster.com makes it cover image for the story of the Furry Raiders ruining RMFC.
- A Geek.com article has the photo (also reposted to the Hatewatch twitter account with 76,000 followers.) The article was written by a former admin of Portal Of Evil, a site devoted to cataloguing the worst of the internet. It was from the bad old early 2000’s “yiff in hell furfags” time. Portal Of Evil spread hate and debate about fandom members like 2 Gryphon, who joined the Nazifurs Livejournal group. The Geek.com article gives background about the Second Life troll group “Furzis”, without getting to the part where the Furry Raiders spun off from it. The NaziFurs on Livejournal claim to have invented the “pawstika” armband, and want no connection to Furzis or the Furry Raiders. Hilariously, everyone involved sounds like they would be first in line to be executed by fascists AND each other.
- Incidentally, you may also notice a famous “Furries for Trump” image that I’m told also misrepresents the furs in it.
In response to the article on Altfurs being taken seriously, Beetlecat spoke up about the provenance of the picture – and identified herself as one of the three suiters. In 2009, they were among a group of six furries who visited the Alberta Aviation Museum. Beetlecat, RavenWolf, and Amran were in suit. They spent time posing for personal photos of their fun trip, never expecting to be immortalized for the wrong reason.
This was taken at an aviation museum in Alberta in like 2005 when you could make a Nazi joke without people getting seriously concerned lol
— Adum (@HorseWengh) August 22, 2017
It was taken at the Alberta Aviation Museum. And yeah no one in that photo holds any Nazi views.
— Beetlecat Originals (@Beetlefursuits) March 9, 2018
Source: I'm on the left.
These photos were provided by Amran (the foxcat suiter with the red marking), from the same trip. This is not a Nazi museum or someone’s home shrine, but a Canadian museum and an unfortunately taken-out-of-context pose. According to Beetlecat and Amran, none of the three hold Neo-nazi viewpoints. Amran has even stated that the photo was uploaded without their permission.
@foxcats (Amran) wrote:
Hello Dogpatch Press! Someone pointed out to me your article showing an image of three fursuiters posing with a display of WWII artifacts at a museum. This photo was taken at the Alberta Aviation Museum in 2009 with a group of six, including myself, who had gone for a short tour there. (In the photo are Beetlecat, RavenWolf, and Amran – myself). Unfortunately someone had uploaded this and other photos without our consent. It took off quickly afterwards. I’m linking you to a few other images from this outing to help show that it was taken at the Aviation Museum. I’d like to confirm that as Beetlecat said, this was an innocent tour. None of us hold views aligning with how the photo has often been misinterpreted.
Context always matters. Nearly a decade ago, not as many people on the internet were as sensitive to the appearance of Nazi symbolism as today. Social media wasn’t as much of an organizing center for the kind of hate group activity that came together in Charlottesville in 2017. At the time I was still thinking that most Nazifurs were either trolling or doing it as mockery of Nazism. It would still be a number of years before I realized differently.
What was intended to be a silly picture got removed from the original context and made into some sort of pro-Nazi Fur image, against the wishes of those pictured. Hopefully this clears some things up, and though I never expressed my disappointment, I own an apology to Amran for thinking ill of him like that.
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