Talk:Otherkin

Why does this entre article describe the definition of the ones who stole the term "Otherkin"? Why does it describe these people why say it means they are something completely else with their entire being and use it to justify their weird social behaviour etc? It's embarrassing and ruins the reputition of the ones who use this term the correct way.

Being an Otherkin means the same as being a Therian, just it's the umbrella term for those who feel a spiritual connection to a mythical non-existing creature. It's nothing else but that. StarSuicune (talk) 12:17, 12 January 2022 (UTC)

Are there particular sources in the article that are invalid, or other sources that argue differently? The current sources seem to clearly define "otherkin" as a person identifying as non-human, similarly to this article; source #14, Otherkin Timeline: The Recent History of Elfin, Fae, and Animal People, Abridged Edition, even traces usage of the term through the 1990s.

Avoyt (talk) 18:32, 30 May 2022 (UTC)

Abridged Edition... Everyone on the internet should know that this is the polar opposite of a valid serious source. Abridged describes nothing but a parody. StarSuicune (talk) 09:04, 21 February 2024 (UTC)

According to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary, "abridged" means "shortened and condensed." Some examples that Merriam-Webster gives of abridgements are abridged dictionaries and abridged editions of classic novels. Those are not parodies. Abridged does not mean a parody, it means a shortened edition of the standard length book by the same title. An abridged edition of a book keeps only a selection of the most important parts of that book. The source that Avoyt mentioned, the Otherkin Timeline, was available in both an abridged edition and a standard length edition. Whether an abridged edition is a reliable source depends only on whether the standard length edition was a reliable source too, unless if a particular abridged edition happens to have cut out something important, in which case the standard length edition is relatively more reliable. DruryBaker (talk) 03:15, 7 September 2024 (UTC)

I agree with Avoyt that we need more specific information on what you're asking for. Tathar (talk) 11:41, 4 September 2022 (UTC)

I agree. I'm otherkin and this article is completely wrong. My identity as otherkin purely stems from not being comfortable looking like a human and wishing i could look like a different species. I find the appearance of the human body boring and uninteresting, and wish i could look more unique in a way clothing cannot fix. None of this has anything to do with religion or belief that I am literally part animal. It's all to do with the appearance I am comfortable with. Otherkin are one of the most discriminated groups in modern times because of articles like this. TidalTempestBM (talk) 08:58, 6 June 2023 (UTC)

@TidalTempestBM Your personal experiences with the term "Otherkin" are not relevant to the contents of an encyclopedic article about the subject.

If there is to be an encyclopedia entry for "Otherkin" it should adhere to the most commonly recognized definition of the term as described in scholarly sources, as is the case for all of Wikipedia.

If this definition shifts, the article should reflect that. However, this article is not "completely wrong" simply because it doesn't reflect your personal relationship to the term. Agentdoge (talk) 05:24, 8 June 2023 (UTC)

Yes. This is strongly reminding me of a debate I ran into between some tarot card users, with one approaching them from a [pseudo-scientific] viewpoint of the cards representing psychological archetypes along Carl Jung and Joseph Campbell lines and useful as a form of cold-reading psychoanalysis, with the other insisting they were a form of powerful occult magic and deeply religio-spiritual, with each claiming the other was a "false practitioner", in an argument that to anyone not involved in the topic seemed somewhere between pointless and absurd, especially to people who use them simply as a form of entertainment. The vast majority of source material on tarot cards says they are a) playing cards used in a variety of mostly European games, and b) a form of divination called cartomancy (i.e., a belief in them having magical/occult/spiritual power); our own article on the topic reflects this sourcing, and does not address archetypal psychology interpretations because there is virtually no reliable sourcing for this, no matter the fact that there are people who approach them this way.

If there is or becomes sourcing on otherkin/therianthropism as simply a form of body dysphoria with no spiritual or other subcultural aspects, then we can cover that. Maybe such sourcing already exists, but until editors have reliable sources on this in-hand, we can't do anything with the article content in such a direction, certainly not based on personal-experience/viewpoint anecdote. It is natural that various approaches to such things will exist among individuals, but we can't write based on their talk-page opinions. In short, if someone feels the article is "absolutely wrong", then they have to cough up reliable sources that their viewpoint actually deserves any due coverage, and even then it is certainly not going to prove that those with a different view of this are "abus[ing] this term" and not using it "the correct way", only that there are multiple noteworthy views/approaches. See also WP:NPOV: Wikipedia is not interested in any "righting great wrongs" fringe activism viewpoint-pushing. PS: This condemnatory urge seems very closely related to the censorious and pseudo-moralizing nature of kink-shaming; even though the otherkin thing is not centrally about sexuality, it certainly has that component to it, as does furry/plushy, the vampire scene, etc. Which is to say, the more judgemental someone gets about "the other side" on a matter like this, the faster and more firmly they should be ignored. PPS: There doesn't seem to be any reliable sourcing available anywhere to support the notion that "otherkin are one of the most discriminated groups in modern times", and crank, victim-posing claims like this tend to be rather offensive to people who are actually subjected to daily discrimination and worse because of their ethnicity, gender presentation, disability, etc. No one on the bus knows you feel like a wolf or elf.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  13:24, 3 February 2024 (UTC)

Not just non-physical ones, even. Your personal emotions about the topic don't dictate things such as this. If needed, I will try and scrounge around for the archived evidence. 98.188.246.215 (talk) 03:31, 29 May 2024 (UTC)

I’m a Fictionkin Therian,and I may try to get into studying therians,but this article is absolutely wrong,I’ve read enough to know that,I even have a Gacha OC that’s a Therian,Otherkin is an umbrella term for Therian,otherkins are people who identify as a mythical creature(note:Unicorns once did exist,it was scientifically proven.),and I know all the umbrella terms for Therian.All of this article is wrong. Applethetherian12 (talk) 14:59, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

I feel that the beliefs section is the most wrong, but it could just stand out to me. I'm not sure though and I would like to learn some stuff so hit me with what you think i guess. TurtleDemon666 (talk) 00:37, 31 January 2024 (UTC)

ONLY a "spiritual connection?" Really, man? Have you seen the polls done on alt.horror.werewolves that have been archived? Absolutely ridiculous to claim such a thing. Spiritual AND psychological Otherkin have been around for years; it's disrespectful to narrow it down in such a way. 98.188.246.215 (talk) 03:25, 29 May 2024 (UTC)

Hi, @98.188.246.215 . I don't personally identify with this community, but I do try to keep a close watch on this article since it's very prone to vandalism. I can hopefully try to help you out with understanding some of the situation, especially since you're offering to find some sources for claims.

Have you seen the polls done on alt.horror.werewolves that have been archived?

Wikipedia's sourcing standards require verifiability and reliable sources. Usenet polls aren't going to work, nor frankly are a lot of the sources already in this article (why are we citing RPG rule books, for example). You can find more on how Wikipedia handles sourcing at WP:RS and information on usenet specifically here WP:PUS. This is why another user almost instantly reverted your otherkin wiki citaton; it fails our sourcing standards pretty badly and cannot be relied on.

Spiritual AND psychological Otherkin have been around for years; it's disrespectful to narrow it down in such a way.

My understanding from trying to keep vandals away from this page is that it's possible you may actually be able to cite this. There does seem to be some work discussing the religious and psychological elements of this group in peer-review, so it's entirely plausible the point you want to make has already been covered by sources Wikipedia accepts.

I'd caution you against thinking this article is going to end up going in a direction that everyone who identifies as Otherkin will accept, since a lot of it seems to be restricted to discussions on social media with only a tiny bit of bleed over into reliable sources. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 06:47, 29 May 2024 (UTC)

I've just gone through and tried to clean up this article to a degree. The sourcing in it is still quite bad, but there's an extent to which this is so far outside what I usually edit that I don't want to be too heavy handed. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 07:27, 29 May 2024 (UTC)

Well,I’m a fictionkin Therian,but I do agree,a lot of people are mean to me because I’m a Therian,I study Therians a lot,so I know the terms Applethetherian12 (talk) 21:57, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

ThAnKyOu! Siarraonpaws (talk) 04:22, 27 January 2025 (UTC)

100% agre Epok128 (talk) 19:10, 18 April 2025 (UTC)

@Epok128 You’re replying to a three year old post, but I’ve been hoping someone who actually knows about this community would work on this article for a while (just following the standards for reliable sourcing. Be the change you want to see! Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 19:28, 18 April 2025 (UTC)

Unfortunately I do not know that much about therianthropy, but enough to know that this is wrong. Maybe I should do my research. Epok128 (talk) 16:13, 19 April 2025 (UTC)

Basically every attempt at discussing therians in this article, with a few exceptions, have run up against issues with WP:RS. It seems that much of the otherkin community escapes academic interest and occurs across social media, and we're never going to be able to cite tumblr, for example. I think the biggest issue here is WP:NOTABILITY. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 16:53, 19 April 2025 (UTC)

Being otherkin is not the same as therianthropy, and neither are only for mythical creatures. The umbrella term for the entire range of identity is Alterhuman. WolfKid99 (talk) 15:35, 6 February 2026 (UTC)

Is it really appropriate to call otherkin/therian a "subculture"? This is not the furry fandom, which absolutely is a subculture akin to goth, emo, punk, etc based around a common interest or style. Otherkin/therian is often spoken in a similar vein to concepts like gender identity, psychological topics, or metaphysical constructs. These are humans who believe themselves to be either mentally and/or spiritually aligned with a non-human species. While our society may frown upon this phenomenon and may take offense to have this compared to gender identity, that does not discount the similarities. Calling otherkin and therian "subcultures" is in of itself offensive and inaccurate because the "polite" thing to do in our current societal expectations is to relate this phenomenon with the furry fandom subculture rather than exploring it as a psychological and metaphysical topic to prevent any association with topics like gender identity and transgender issues. Which is more of a marketing ploy to normalize transgender topics in the mainstream and keep otherkin/therian topics in the fringe fearing that its association will hinder transgender acceptance. I say this not as someone judging either group, I am merely making an observation. I find both topics of otherkin and gender identity fascinating. ChallengingAnthropocentrism (talk) 03:32, 20 April 2025 (UTC)

You’re free to try to find reliable sources that meet WP:RS to discuss it in the article. Though I think you may have skimmed too quickly; much is said here about this being more substantial than the furry fandom, going as far as discussing papers that talk about it in terms of a spiritual identity. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 05:08, 20 April 2025 (UTC)

it's wasn't a skim. I purposely highlighted that aspect not because the article breaks down the difference between the two, but the fact that it refers to otherkin as a "subculture." That would be like calling transgender identities as a "subculture." There is a subculture around these topics, but the concepts themselves are not subcultures. ChallengingAnthropocentrism (talk) 06:59, 20 April 2025 (UTC)

Except be all metrics it basically is sitting somewhere on a spectrum between a subculture and a spiritual belief, with most of sources discussing them as a subculture. I think comparing otherkin to trans individuals and the erasure of their existence is deeply offensive, however. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 07:08, 20 April 2025 (UTC)

Why would it be offensive? Because one expects social acceptance but the other doesn't? Why wouldn't trans identities also be a subculture then? What of someone was trans and therian? ChallengingAnthropocentrism (talk) 07:47, 20 April 2025 (UTC)

I’m not touching this with a ten foot pole and highly suggest you reconsider this line of rhetoric as well. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 07:48, 20 April 2025 (UTC)

I am an anthropologist, it is my job to explore social phenomena, no matter how socially stigmatizing. Just because one topic is more socially acceptable than the other does not negate the similarities between the two. If a group takes offense to it, that doesn't make the comparison incorrect, it just means the group is worried about not being taken seriously by the mainstream culture. ChallengingAnthropocentrism (talk) 07:54, 20 April 2025 (UTC)

Trans individuals are a sociocultural and biological phenomenon. Trans people exist independent of any social or cultural framework, and have through all of recorded history. Trans people are not a subculture or religious and spiritual movement. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 08:42, 20 April 2025 (UTC)

That is exactly my point. Which is why otherkin and therian should not be conflated with the furry community. ChallengingAnthropocentrism (talk) 01:55, 22 April 2025 (UTC)

Well,I am trans and a Therian Applethetherian12 (talk) 15:12, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

"This is not the furry fandom, which absolutely is a subculture akin to goth, emo, punk, etc based around a common interest or style. Otherkin/therian is often spoken in a similar vein to concepts like gender identity, psychological topics, or metaphysical constructs. While our society may frown upon this phenomenon and may take offense to have this compared to gender identity, that does not discount the similarities."

All I'm going to say is this absolutely sums up exactly what is going through my head and echos a lot of the confusions that I have. 2601:280:5302:5440:C1A8:9BA1:D910:7A26 (talk) 19:54, 3 May 2025 (UTC)

Plurality (identity) Just got moved so there is at least some consensus if sources can be found 24.155.147.109 (talk) 18:01, 8 September 2025 (UTC)

From my perspective, it is as right as it is erroneous to call otherkinity or therianthropy subcultures, and both the subcultural and identity‑phenomenon perspectives should be reflected per WP:NPOV and WP:UNDUE. As @ChallengingAnthropocentrism pointed out "There is a subculture around these topics, but the concepts themselves are not subcultures."

In a polish article I have created PL:teriantropia współczesna I follow that distinction by first defining therianthropy as a phenomenon/identity, and only then noting that it "can be defined as a dispersed community or subculture of individuals who identify as Therians"; in that sense the "therian community" (gear, quadrobics, jargon, spaces) is a subculture..

The core of otherkinity in recent primary research is often defined as a sui generis construct/phenomenon (or identity phenomenon) involving persistent self-experience with its own internal structure (and concepts) rather than through the notion of style (of life, clothing), or value-sets which are qualitative properties of a "subculture". Baldwin, for example, explicitly analyses "other‑than‑human identity" and focuses on how participants narrate continuity, similarity/difference, and person‑to‑world fit. Shea goes further and argues that otherkin identities "cannot be reduced to only spiritual/socially constructed ‘human’ frameworks," and must be understood as “a philosophy of a state of being nonhuman,” i.e. a form of identity rather than simply a belief system or social movement. That suggests the phenomenon is not cleanly reducible to any single existing category (religion, fandom, subculture, pathology).

Some of this literature itself draws a cautious analogy to transgender identity at the structural level (awakening to an identity that was present but unrecognized, tension between assigned vs. authentic self), while simultaneously stressing that the social and political contexts are different. The point of that analogy in the sources is not to equate histories of oppression, but to clarify the difference between "identity" and "subculture." Given that, it seems inappropriate to treat any invocation of this distinction as inherently “deeply offensive” and, on that basis, to exclude identity‑focused framings that are supported.

While the mythological therianthropy have existed throughout the history, the occurrence of something more akin to modern definitions is a questionable topic. Yet, I don't see how that could inherently erase it as something occurring autonomically of the sociocultural narrative in the modern times. Current research suggests that identity can arise and stabilize at the level of personal identity and lived experience, not only as a derivative of pre‑existing sociocultural narratives. For article purposes, that seems like a strong argument to (a) retain “subculture” language where sources use it, but (b) also explicitly acknowledge that several high‑quality sources conceptualize otherkinity/therianthropy as an identity/phenomenon in its own right. Wσlrεη⎇ (talk) 17:36, 15 February 2026 (UTC)

We absolutely should edit the article to remove the "subculture" identifier as it doesn't accurately describe this phenomenon. I propose changing the first sentence to "Otherkin is an identity and spiritual phenomenon where individual humans identify themselves as partially or fully non-human, typically identifying as non-human animals but can also include mythological/legendary or spiritual entities." Then followed by a brief connection to the subcultures that sprout from this phenomenon. This would be similar to your Polish article on Therians, at least to how it translates to English. ChallengingAnthropocentrism (talk) 19:39, 22 February 2026 (UTC)

Everybody experiences being otherkin/alterhuman differently. I don't mean to dismiss concerns about discrimination or misinformation; however, a lot of the stuff that is being mentioned is personal experiences that do not belong in an encyclopedia article. I appreciate your concerns, but it's also kind of hard to figure out what's right and what's wrong when everyone is just firing personal experiences/beliefs at each other.

To my knowledge:

-Therian: Someone who either feels like an animal inside or feels as though they were an animal in their past life. For some, it is simply appearance related, or species dysphoria related, and not literal. Personal experiences and literalness varies.

-Otherkin/Alterhumanism: An umbrella term for people who feel as though they are not human, or don't like being human. Some people name the animal/type of thing* they feel like, while others don't.

-Furry: Somebody who dresses like an animal or likes pretending that their an animal? Please please please don't yell at me if this is incorrect or discriminatory, a lot of misinformation is going around about this sort of stuff and I am unsure, definitely correct me if I am wrong and sorry in advance.

I also do not agree with calling it a "subculture", as it does not seem very inclusive. (See "Subculture?" for more)

*Sorry if the word "thing" isn't exactly a great phrasing, I didn't really know how to rephrase. 2601:280:5302:5440:C1A8:9BA1:D910:7A26 (talk) 19:41, 3 May 2025 (UTC)

You got Furry,Therian,and Otherkin right,but Alterhumanism is actually the same thing as a Therian.

(nothing was offending) Applethetherian12 (talk) 15:15, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

It's absolutely *not* the same as therian, Alterhuman is a umbrella term that includes therian, otherkin and some other not-quite-human or not-fully-human identities. 195.80.120.242 (talk) 12:00, 5 October 2025 (UTC)

You can see this here: https://otherkin.fandom.com/wiki/Alterhuman which lists the entire history of the term with sources and references 195.80.120.242 (talk) 12:03, 5 October 2025 (UTC)

The thing is, terms kind of change real fast and it's hard to completely explain them, especially in Wikipedia where you need reliable sources to support most claims.

My personal understanding from being in the alterhuman community for so long is that alterhumans are everyone, including people who are human but experience species differently than usual, like fictionkin, zombiekin who still identify as human, etc.

Nonhuman is the... as it sounds, nonhuman version of alterhuman. Some people use that because it doesn't suggest they're human.

Otherkin, I've seen, is most related to being the opposite of therian- therian being an animal that is living on Earth, although for some they ignore that definition entirely. Otherkin, then, are extinct animals, mythical creatures, or just creatures that don't exist on Earth.

Furries are just people that like anthropomorphic animals or making animal original characters.

Sorry that this is a wall of text. 🫀 Crash // Organhaver (talk to me, maybe?) 15:17, 5 October 2025 (UTC)

Organhaver you are.....correct! I really appreciate it people get it right you get a gold star ⭐!!(this is a joke lol!) Sunstride the Cheetah (talk) 01:20, 2 January 2026 (UTC)

The redirect Θ∆ has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2026 February 28 § Θ∆ until a consensus is reached. Abesca (talk) 01:30, 28 February 2026 (UTC)

So I've recently learnt that Therian subculture is a page, and as that page was created recently, this page still frequently discusses the experience of self-identified therians, not otherkin (although I believe the page on therians should mention that it is, in itself, a subcategory of otherkin earlier on in the page, rather than how it is currently). As currently, the Otherkin and Therian subculture pages are quite mixed, I think we should probably migrate some information from one page to another so the pages don't lose focus? kitokat (xe/it/any) (talk) 09:19, 10 March 2026 (UTC)