Coming out as an Otherkin

[Tek]

I do have a couple of suggestions/criticisms, but I want to preface all of that with some affirmation. Regardless of how much of the past life scenario is true - and and in what way it is true - the fact that you have found some degree of inner peace is a wonderful thing. And actually, the mental healing that has coming from owning your "otherness" indicates that there is some significant and healthy psychological dynamic going on here.

My personal opinion, grounded in the fundamentals of psychology, is that you have re-owned one or more inner drives that you were previously burying or rejecting. The overall theme here is a battle, within you, between being dominated and being assertive, powerful, and in control.

As an explorer of the transpersonal, I also have some familiarity with spiritual and subtle experiences. Your experience of being taken over by a wolf has some similarity to the experiences that people report of being abducted by aliens. The correlation is not obvious, so I'll elaborate here.

The odd thing about the abductee stories is that very ordinary people, with no astonishing mental or physical traits, are chosen by the aliens to be the progenitors of a new hybrid race. You'd think the aliens would want the cream of the crop! So what I see happening is a genuine spiritual experience that is being inadequately interpreted when the person returns to their normal frame of mind.

I suppose the point that I'm getting after is that your past lives, and possession, are undoubtedly real experiences. But I suggest that perhaps you are misinterpreting them in some fashion. It's just something to consider, which may be helpful in the future.

Personally, I get mine through my sleep, though I'm not one to call them dreams. I have not had a single dream in all of my childhood to this day; my sleep is almost always just a black void of sleep and nothing more.

This is perhaps a minor aside, but everyone has multiple dreams every night. Biopsychological fact.

With that said, I have had an astonishing experience in the dream state which make me seriously question how much we really know about reality and the nature and significance of dreams. It's not strictly on topic, but here's the story if you're interested:

Spoiler:

For a couple of years, I've been writing my dreams down in order to remember them better and to be able to analyze them when I wish to.

This winter, I was listening to a report on NPR about how the FBI captured the Mexican drug lord El Chapo. The description of the chase, in which El Chapo fled into a drainage ditch that ran under a resort hotel, and then went into the building from underneath and went up to the fourth floor where he was caught, exactly matched a dream that I had written down over a year before. And in one of the other dreams that night, I had been in a favela or aluminum shanty with my poor family, where I drove down a dusty road on a motor bike.

I was fortunate to have written the dream down. Even though my dream recall is excellent, I am well aware of the way memories can and do get rewritten, and the extraordinary nature of this apparent clairvoyance would've caused me to doubt the accuracy of the dream - regardless of how vivid and clear the memory is even today.

For me, my only significant focus in life is my mate whom I recently found, and I'm perfectly happy focusing all on her. RAIKEN are all born with one thing that they cannot be happy without, but they can be happy with no matter the circumstance. In my case, it was love with the twinflame (a relationship belief that two people are just halves of one soul waiting to find one another), so even in the worst scenarios, she will make me happy.

I'm not your counselor, but in actual fact, your happiness comes from inside of you. If you allow your happiness to be dependent on external objects or events, you have committed to being unhappy in the present. I realize that this doesn't provide any solutions or helpful strategies, just pointing out the true nature of the situation.

Again, it's great that you've begun to resolve your conflicts. I know you didn't ask for guidance, but I feel compelled to do what I can to help people interpret their depths more fully.

 

[Satan.EXE]

I can respect all this coming from a psychologist, but I hope you can understand that I don't really believe that way of thinking, at least in my own situation.



First point, the possession. Being that I'm kind of an alien myself, I suppose I just look at it like possession, rather than an alien abduction sort of thing. That said, I don't think he was a wolf. In fact, I have my own theory, that there is somehow a connection between Silver and my ex that he led me to. I know that she previously performed magick, and I know that she is a very deceptive, manipulative person. I would like to consider him something of a summoned thing of some sort. I would like to think that I woke up in her awful relationship was her plan all along. She even attempted to put false memories in my head. Afterward, I broke all ties with her, and flushed out everything I knew was false. Either way. In fact, I know that Silver was initially on this website at some point, though I'm not sure where or who he was, what username he was under.

Dreams. Put simply, my mind just... Doesn't work like the average Human. That's partially why I don't believe psychology can explain it. And the dreaming, I still didn't have them. I've even had those nights of vividness and once even lucidity, but it was still blackness. It was... Peaceful. I believe it's what people normally experience in meditation, especially since I cannot actually meditate properly on command.

I don't believe the happiness comes from me, at least not directly. It's the same conundrum I'd had in every life, and it's the mentality given to me since life one. I tend to look at it like a permanent block, where the requirements must be met to unlock it, but as long as they are met, it's like an endless floodgate. Though, I guess that's beside the point.

I do appreciate the interest, I just have heard the psychological standpoint before and even questioned it myself from time to time. I've really questioned just about every possibility on my way to full awakening, which is why I feel I can stand so strongly on my beliefs. I hope you don't take all these no's as simply stubbornness or flat-out denial or rejection.

 

[Tek]

Well, I'm not a psychologist, I'm just really well read. And everything you've said fits within the established research on how the conscious mind operates. I find it very hard to believe that your mind is radically different than other human minds, especially when being different is so fundamental to your identity.

Now were you to show that your brain structures are radically different, then we would have something to go on. Emotions emerged at the same time as mammalian brains, and self-reflective conscious emerged at the same time as the sentient mind. Without some extreme physical difference in the basic structure of your brain, there is no way for there to be an extreme mental difference in the basic structure of your mind.

It's odd that you have said that you are physically human, yet you're also claiming that your brain works differently from other human brains. Rather than simply professing a belief without evidence, perhaps you should contact a sleep researcher or something and see how your brain is actually functioning o_O

But in the end, if you're happy (or at least happier), and you're ok with your interpretation of these things, then that's ok with me :]



Also, I am extremely envious of you "dark and peaceful" dream. What you are describing is being aware during the deep, dreamless phase of sleep - something that I fear I will have to spend years learning to do.



And on the subject of magic and such, I've had a weird dream experience as well with a girl who was into Wicca. She was into me, but married, so it was a no-go. One night I had a dream involving a woman who was pretty and nice, but then her face became disfigured. When I woke up, I had some very disturbing hypnagogic sensations of being dragged towards the head of my bed. That day, the chick called me. Very weird stuff.

A little off-topic I guess, except that we're discussing the weird and wild parts of the world as we (don't quite) know it.

 

[Satan.EXE]

I wouldn't say it's my brain directly, it's... Mrh... Kind of hard to explain. A lot of what I say isn't interpreted the way I meant, I'm so horrid with this language, first language or not ._.

I like to think it is coming from my spirit, rather than my brain, though that probably doesn't make sense.


That isn't just a stage of sleep to me, though, it's all of my sleep. I've been conscious throughout the entirety of one night, and it was like that all the way through. I didn't really think throughout it, and I didn't have to.

I'll stop here on that conversation, I think. I tend to get flighty in disagreements/arguments because of my experiences with others.

 

[Tek]

Is it pretty common for otherkin folk to have memories of a past life or lives?

 

[Satan.EXE]

Is it pretty common for otherkin folk to have memories of a past life or lives?

It's a good majority. In fact, I'd almost say that's what defines it, but I've met exceptions before. Some believe that rather than being something in a past life, that they have spirits of others in them, as though they are all part of one person, or some people merely believe that they are connected to something psychologically rather than spiritually. I've met one before who didn't believe in past lives at all. It's harder for me to understand just what those things mean, but to each their own I suppose.

But, otherwise, yes. When one starts gaining these memories it's referred to as "Awakening", and often the initial memories are only the tip of the iceberg, so to speak. Not counting the two unconscious and two under-spell years of my life, I believe I've been awakened for about three to four years. I might count under-spell years partially because I was able to distinguish a good portion of memories from the lies during that time. I haven't had many as of late (except for a few specifically triggered) so I think for the most part my awakening is completed, to some extent, but that doesn't mean I won't get more in the future.

 

[Star-Lord]

Hmmm I'll play devil's advocate for a moment.

I don't particularly care for the idea of otherkin needing some sort of memory of a past life so that they can understand their identity. The reason I say this is that we have transgendered/transexual individuals (please don't vilify me trans people I understand that these are two completely different concepts I'm just using one as comparison for the point I'm going to make) who don't have "memories" of themselves as a woman or a man. Don't you think this sort of dysphoria could be used for otherkin as well?

I mean all in all I'm siding with twocows and going "a few cards short of a deck" when it comes to otherkin but I just find something really odd about the statement.

 

[Satan.EXE]

Hmmm I'll play devil's advocate for a moment.

I don't particularly care for the idea of otherkin needing some sort of memory of a past life so that they can understand their identity. The reason I say this is that we have transgendered/transexual individuals (please don't vilify me trans people I understand that these are two completely different concepts I'm just using one as comparison for the point I'm going to make) who don't have "memories" of themselves as a woman or a man. Don't you think this sort of dysphoria could be used for otherkin as well?

I mean all in all I'm siding with twocows and going "a few cards short of a deck" when it comes to otherkin but I just find something really odd about the statement.

gah... poor word choice strikes again!

In that sense, you wouldn't have to have memories, no. Memories only apply to those who have past lives. There are the people who, say, have a spirit animal, for example.


You're totally welcome to that opinion, just be aware that you're slandering a surprisingly large community by saying that.

 

[Star-Lord]

You're totally welcome to that opinion, just be aware that you're slandering a surprisingly large community by saying that.

You're welcome to yours as well, but I must say that I find the concept of "otherkin" incredibly offensive to those who have gender identity issues. So as long as otherkins are aware that they're in turn slandering a huge community with their actions... then keep on trucking I guess. I'll certainly keep what you said in mind though.

 

[Satan.EXE]

You're welcome to yours as well, but I must say that I find the concept of "otherkin" incredibly offensive to those who have gender identity issues. So as long as otherkins are aware that they're in turn slandering a huge community with their actions... then keep on trucking I guess. I'll certainly keep what you said in mind though.

I... really don't see the correlation there, actually. Nothing about otherkin community has ever really even had anything to do with gender identity at all, except in cases of otherkin with identity issues, and nothing at all about them implies that the gender identity community is wrong.

 

[Star-Lord]

I... really don't see the correlation there, actually. Nothing about otherkin community has ever really even had anything to do with gender identity at all, except in cases of otherkin with identity issues, and nothing at all about them implies that the gender identity community is wrong.

No, and I don't think people with identity issues have ever said that at all, actually. Just to put it into perspective though, I once knew two people who were having issues with their identity. One of them ended up identifying as MtF (I'm really not good with trans terminology if I'm wrong someone just slap me a PM or something) while the other one ended up identifying as otherkin. The first friend was just really upset because she sees her friend identifying as... I believe it was a sylph, and how would you feel when someone just says they identify as something that isn't seen to be tangible for the human race? For what it's worth, I don't think that trans people believe that you're vilifying them or making implications of the gender identity community being wrong. However, I believe that they feel that when people identify as "wolves", "sylphs", "faeries" or whatever else, it's hard to take people with nonbinary gender identities seriously.

I'm a cisgendered man who has a problem wrapping his head around nonbinary things period, so take my words with a grain of salt.

 

[Satan.EXE]

No, and I don't think people with identity issues have ever said that at all, actually. Just to put it into perspective though, I once knew two people who were having issues with their identity. One of them ended up identifying as MtF (I'm really not good with trans terminology if I'm wrong someone just slap me a PM or something) while the other one ended up identifying as otherkin. The first friend was just really upset because she sees her friend identifying as... I believe it was a sylph, and how would you feel when someone just says they identify as something that isn't seen to be tangible for the human race? For what it's worth, I don't think that trans people believe that you're vilifying them or making implications of the gender identity community being wrong. However, I believe that they feel that when people identify as "wolves", "sylphs", "faeries" or whatever else, it's hard to take people with nonbinary gender identities seriously.

I'm a cisgendered man who has a problem wrapping his head around nonbinary things period, so take my words with a grain of salt.

We never really expect anyone to believe our plight, nothing can be proven, /nor/ can anything be disproven, and that's why we often look to anything else (on either end of that spectrum, because both happen) as ignorant. I don't know much about that community, I've only met a few of varying identities, but all of which I've met were also in the kin community, which makes sense, seeing as I've been in the kin community but not the gender one. I like to believe nearly anything is possible, so long as they don't break the known laws of the universe while here. It's something rarely understood by those who don't experience it themselves, and that is fine. However, that is the biggest reason I think why the community hides away for the most part. Society is so hive-mindedly cruel to those they don't understand... I really wish people could all get along and just respect one another and their beliefs, but not everyone is open minded enough for it, and for some reason this world is just all-around judgemental.

 

[Keiran]

I believe that they feel that when people identify as "wolves", "sylphs", "faeries" or whatever else, it's hard to take people with nonbinary gender identities seriously.

Yes..this is true. It's really harmful when you have people claiming to have been able to control shadows and tying it to an identity disorder.

I have no issue with people believing they were an animal in a past life, but it's clear that the majority of "otherkin" are simply bored (and almost always white) folks. Also, their use of the term "spirit animal" (and the qualities of Japanese culture they commonly insert into their stories) is appropriation of other cultures and is quite problematic.

On the other hand, the persistence of memories through generations of people is quite an interesting topic and I hope we have some revelations about it in our lifetimes.

 

[Oryx]

I've actually spent a lot of time reading the otherkin tag on Tumblr, just to understand, but it never seems to go well. Just now I went to go look at the tag again and actually went as far as to look at a forum dedicated to otherkin, and read through pages of people describing who they are, and found the same thing that I had found before, that's common to your experience as you've related here - everyone who identifies as otherkin is either some kind of super-special fantasy species or a normal animal that's not normal at all (strange coloration, animal royalty, etc). It makes me think that if this was something that wasn't merely in the minds of the people that say it, the vast majority of people would be...honestly, some kind of bug because those are the most common animals in the world.

I mean, I just looked at the first page of intros on the Otherkin Community forums, and got:
-shapeshifter
-angelic mutation of an anime character
-satyr
-three separate fictional characters
-winged panther
-storm dragon
-faun
-an "individual interpretation" of a dark elf
-black and red gorilla
-one cat
-ice dragon
-generic elf
-starseed (??)
-some kind of werewolf/kitsune
-polymorph
-sylph
-half-fae
-blue phoenix/child of a god
-some kind of vampire/shadow controller
-demon

Out of those 20, only one is "normal", two if you count the gorilla that's a color that gorillas aren't normally. The rest are not only fictional/mythical, almost every single one was given with a caveat that explained why they weren't like other kin of that type. That's what leads me to the Occam's Razor conclusion - not that these people are all actually the goddess of Saturn's third moon reborn in the body of an awkward teenager from Oklahoma, but that these people are, like all people, searching for their own unique identity but found human not unique enough.

Reading those intros also taught me one other thing - when you're looking for a way not to be normal, everything is a sign. So many people using the fact that they don't have many friends in the area as proof that they're not human, or that they don't like cities, or that they like small animals, as proof that they must be some kind of otherkin, despite the fact that plenty of humans share those traits.

When I was 10, I had an "invisible dog" that would play with my friend's invisible dog. We would pretend they were running alongside our school bus, hanging out with us, etc. In reality, I grew up a few years and acknowledged that this was not a real thing and just something my head made up for fun. In the otherkin universe, I would be encouraged to meditate to call my spirit cocker spaniel so he can lead me to my otherwordly identity. I think it's healthy to have these kinds of thoughts, but not healthy to entertain them as serious and sustain them for years. I worry about people growing up in the age of the internet that can entrench themselves in an obscure, unhealthy habit/thought pattern/interest through online communities, instead of being forced into the outside world where they can learn to be a part of society.

 

[Cherrim]

I'll preface this by saying I don't believe in this sort of thing and I do believe it's a fantasy, but it's not hurting me or anything so I personally don't particularly care either way whether it were real or not. I do agree with Moogles though, in that people identifying as otherkin likely make it a little harder for people with actual gender dysphoria and whatnot to be taken serious. Although there probably aren't enough otherkin, in the public eye or not (but especially outside of tight-knit internet communities), for it to make that much of an impact.

I'm just kind of curious as to why it... matters, I guess? Assuming you were born as all those things in the past, you've been reincarnated as a human now. Shouldn't that mean you should be living your life as a human to its full extent instead of dwelling on the past? You say that "the part of me that came of this life is dead" but evidently you don't have any of your powers from your last life/lives or you'd, you know, be able to control shadows and stuff. So logically, you're still you either way and shouldn't you be using this life to live differently from the others? I feel like you should be living your life as a human being to its fullest so you can learn what you can from it and apply these life lessons in your next life to be a more mature... creature. If you're just gonna dwell on your life as a raiken during this life, isn't that completely missing the point of being reincarnated and remembering it? Although I guess if it's supposed to be like gender dysphoria it's more about the feeling of not belonging in whatever body you currently reside in than anything else which would make these questions moot...

(Also how come all the raiken have names in actual Japanese and then Raito is just like Light in Death Note where it's literally the katakana version of the English word "light"? That's... well.)

 

[Phantom1]

Aside from what Moogles and the others have said, which I readily agree with.

(Also how come all the raiken have names in actual Japanese and then Raito is just like Light in Death Note where it's literally the katakana version of the English word "light"? That's... well.)

Not only that, but there are holes in the history as well as contradictions all over the place, and it's so historically inaccurate it's sad. (at least the part about supposedly being a former samurai.)

Honestly, none of this seems true and I stand by with a verdict of a few fries short of a happy meal. Look man, nothing on you, it's just it's hard to believe at all. Any of this. It just seems like someone who just isn't happy with their own life and wants to feel special.

 

[Satan.EXE]

Out of those 20, only one is "normal", two if you count the gorilla that's a color that gorillas aren't normally. The rest are not only fictional/mythical, almost every single one was given with a caveat that explained why they weren't like other kin of that type. That's what leads me to the Occam's Razor conclusion - not that these people are all actually the goddess of Saturn's third moon reborn in the body of an awkward teenager from Oklahoma, but that these people are, like all people, searching for their own unique identity but found human not unique enough.

Reading those intros also taught me one other thing - when you're looking for a way not to be normal, everything is a sign. So many people using the fact that they don't have many friends in the area as proof that they're not human, or that they don't like cities, or that they like small animals, as proof that they must be some kind of otherkin, despite the fact that plenty of humans share those traits.

When I was 10, I had an "invisible dog" that would play with my friend's invisible dog. We would pretend they were running alongside our school bus, hanging out with us, etc. In reality, I grew up a few years and acknowledged that this was not a real thing and just something my head made up for fun. In the otherkin universe, I would be encouraged to meditate to call my spirit cocker spaniel so he can lead me to my otherwordly identity. I think it's healthy to have these kinds of thoughts, but not healthy to entertain them as serious and sustain them for years. I worry about people growing up in the age of the internet that can entrench themselves in an obscure, unhealthy habit/thought pattern/interest through online communities, instead of being forced into the outside world where they can learn to be a part of society.

Oh boy... Well, this whole topic's gone repetitive down the road of "it's a mental problem", "it's making others with real problems look bad" and "It just doesn't make sense".

Anyone who says, in any way, that they can prove what they are is real, is most definitely lying. I'm not going to deny that there are a multitude of "fluff" and "roleplayers" in the communities, we don't consider them a part of us. It happens anyways. In some cases, the word and topic of "P-Shift" (physical shifting) is banned because it is physically impossible and with no proof in existence, all it does is stir controversy. Another one is the fact that people come in, stating to be wolves, and make constant reference of howling to the moon; it's a popular misconception.

But to say the existence of Otherkin/reincarnation is impossible is flat-out ignorance. There's no way to prove the validity of 'kin, nor is there any way to disprove it. You can reject it, puts psychology labels on it, call the entirety of the whole community crazy, but in the end it's only your opinion, because you can't confirm it. It can (and is) a popular opinion, but until rather recently, people thought the same about gender identity, about homosexuality, polysexuality, etc. We still live in a very close-minded world of people who just refuse to accept what they don't understand. But we all exist, we're all here as who we are now, and I hope some day that the general populous can be more understanding of /all/ of us... But until that day, it's going to remain a very underground society... It's as simple as that.

I'm just kind of curious as to why it... matters, I guess? Assuming you were born as all those things in the past, you've been reincarnated as a human now. Shouldn't that mean you should be living your life as a human to its full extent instead of dwelling on the past? You say that "the part of me that came of this life is dead" but evidently you don't have any of your powers from your last life/lives or you'd, you know, be able to control shadows and stuff. So logically, you're still you either way and shouldn't you be using this life to live differently from the others? I feel like you should be living your life as a human being to its fullest so you can learn what you can from it and apply these life lessons in your next life to be a more mature... creature. If you're just gonna dwell on your life as a raiken during this life, isn't that completely missing the point of being reincarnated and remembering it? Although I guess if it's supposed to be like gender dysphoria it's more about the feeling of not belonging in whatever body you currently reside in than anything else which would make these questions moot...

(Also how come all the raiken have names in actual Japanese and then Raito is just like Light in Death Note where it's literally the katakana version of the English word "light"? That's... well.)

It really doesn't matter in the end, past the personality abnormalities it brings, it just makes it more difficult for us to fit in; to be "normal" for us is to fake who we are, and while some people are okay with being fake, a lot of us aren't. The communities, while being open-minded and welcoming, are also about the passage and sharing of information between kin, and often also include discussion about spirituality, energy, sometimes magick (because the two can go hand-in-hand). I don't cling to my past, but I acknowledge that it was there. Ignoring my pasts would be ignoring everything I've learned over the years. I didn't necessarily write this OP for it to become a debate on the validity of the group, though, it was merely for a bit of awareness. I came out as what I am, and I'm happy with just that.

I wish I could say, but I didn't just come up with it. That's just how I remember it. While that could be another arguable reason for invalidity (even though the entirety of the debate is pointless in the end), I still won't say it isn't possible somewhere. My home was not Earth, but that's really all I know. It could be a different planet, different universe, different time, different dimension, who knows. But there's so much out there, unknown, that I cannot just push away those memories (especially after having them connect with someone else, who will remain unnamed). I don't need the understanding of anyone but my other half.

Not only that, but there are holes in the history as well as contradictions all over the place, and it's so historically inaccurate it's sad. (at least the part about supposedly being a former samurai.)

Honestly, none of this seems true and I stand by with a verdict of a few fries short of a happy meal. Look man, nothing on you, it's just it's hard to believe at all. Any of this. It just seems like someone who just isn't happy with their own life and wants to feel special.

I don't quite see that, but believe what you will.

It's not very believable, and I get that. But don't think a lot of us asked for this; this form of rejection and mockery is all over. Otherkin don't 'choose' to be Otherkin because they want to feel special. Things happen to make them believe what they are. Even Fictionkin (the ones based on fictional characters). Even I have difficulty believing in them, but I'm not going to deny their existence, because I can't. There are infinite possibilities out there, who's to say that isn't one of them, somewhere?

 

[Oryx]

It's a little unfair to open a discussion on otherkin and then get upset over the parts of the identity that people wish to discuss. This forum isn't a forum on awareness, but a forum on discussions and debates (thus the name), so you may have picked the wrong venue if you weren't open to discussions or debates on the topic.

I find the idea of banning discussion of physical shifting because it's physically impossible but allowing the discussion of magic and such to be interesting. Do you have more information on the difference between the two? Neither have scientific explanations and if polymorphism is accepted as a -kintype (please correct me if that's an incorrect way to say it), why not polymorphism in this world through magick?

You asked how it's offensive to trans* folks, but you just did what causes the offense - equating the two. It's bad enough when real, proven types of marginalization try to compare themselves to other types of marginalization; it's worse when the marginalization is unproven and not accepted as an identity. In addition, I would argue that pedophilia often says the same things you did, that people rejected homosexuality and polysexuality (which isn't true, by the way) for a long time, and therefore pedophilia must be accepted as well. I want to make this clear: I am not accusing you of being a pedophile; my argument is simply that your logic can be easily applied to something that's clearly abhorrent, with no variation whatsoever. So what makes your argument different from that argument?

 

[Satan.EXE]

It's a little unfair to open a discussion on otherkin and then get upset over the parts of the identity that people wish to discuss. This forum isn't a forum on awareness, but a forum on discussions and debates (thus the name), so you may have picked the wrong venue if you weren't open to discussions or debates on the topic.

I find the idea of banning discussion of physical shifting because it's physically impossible but allowing the discussion of magic and such to be interesting. Do you have more information on the difference between the two? Neither have scientific explanations and if polymorphism is accepted as a -kintype (please correct me if that's an incorrect way to say it), why not polymorphism in this world through magick?

You asked how it's offensive to trans* folks, but you just did what causes the offense - equating the two. It's bad enough when real, proven types of marginalization try to compare themselves to other types of marginalization; it's worse when the marginalization is unproven and not accepted as an identity. In addition, I would argue that pedophilia often says the same things you did, that people rejected homosexuality and polysexuality (which isn't true, by the way) for a long time, and therefore pedophilia must be accepted as well. I want to make this clear: I am not accusing you of being a pedophile; my argument is simply that your logic can be easily applied to something that's clearly abhorrent, with no variation whatsoever. So what makes your argument different from that argument?

Actually, I'm not really upset. It's going exactly where I expected. On a side note, I already made my point, I don't mind the discussion, it's still just a little jarring how closed off from the possibilities that people can be. Nonetheless, I can keep discussing, but when you do so with those who just outright don't believe something it's just a uselessly stressful cause.

Physical shifting is the act (that few believe in, with no evidence) of physically altering your body, for example, someone saying they can turn into an animal in this world. It defies this world's laws, and without any real proof it gets tossed into the "fluff" category. Magick, Wicca and otherwise, is valid, and is followed like a religion as much as a practice. It's not like what most people think, though. A lot has to do with energy, connecting with earth and nature, etc. ... not like the stereotype of demonic sacrifice, killing goats and that sort of thing.

They are different, but your segregation of the two is closing your mind to something you just don't understand. They start at the same basic principal of not feeling like they belong on their body. Trans and the like is becoming more accepted, but it was not previously. It's more offensive to say "well this one makes more sense to me, so I'll believe it but not the other kind". I have some trans friends who are also kin. Often, the two go hand in hand. Yes, they're different communities, but they start at the same base concept, and they both struggle to fit in. You also can't say that homosexuals and trans and other weren't rejected; we're still as a society trying to turn the negativity around with words like "gay". We're making progress, but still, there are a lot of people against it. Pedophilia is a topic I'd prefer not to get into. I will say, though, that the base concept and most cases of it would be considered taking advantage of a confused and more often than not unwilling child, well before they're even ready for anything of that sort. So again, I'm having trouble seeing the correlation.

 

[Oryx]

Homophobia has an ebb and flow throughout history, it hasn't been rejected all of history and accepted recently, that was my point; in the times of the Greeks and Romans, homosexuality was normal, for example. Homophobia is certainly a problem today and has been for generations, but it was accepted in the past.

I still don't understand the line between magick and physical shifting - is this interpretation of magick merely in the mind, with no effects on the natural world? If someone spoke about their beliefs that their magick influenced the real world, would they be similarly banned from speaking about it because it's physically impossible? If not, would accepting physical impossibility through magick necessitate accepting physical impossibility through shifting? I never implied that it was Satanic or had to do with sacrifice, but my understanding has always included physical effects on the real world.

Unfortunately, trying to link your experience to transgender issues and imply that those who accept one must accept the other does veer into transphobia. Transgenderism is not your issue; you don't have the right to co-opt its supporters for your own cause. Claiming that one's brain is wired in such a way that a person is a human male instead of a human female is incredibly different from claiming that one's brain is wired in such a way that a person is a fictional race male instead of a human female. Saying you know a transgender person that is also otherkin isn't really relevant; or, if anything, it's no more relevant than a person who says something sexist and claims it's okay because they love their wife. Understanding the nuances of marginalization requires more than one person expressing an opinion; I encourage you to do your own research on the topic, beyond blogs and forums and into the more academic side of things.