Otherkin: proving we’re only ‘human’ one day at a time
January 14, 2006People ask ‘what does it mean to be Otherkin’? A better question is ‘what does it mean to be human?’ I don’t know what ‘humanity’ means to Otherkin, but I know what it means to other humans.
It’s easy to get this gist with language like ‘I’m only human’ or ‘kill babies, are you even human?’ Most people when they say human do not in fact mean the biology of it. To most being ‘human’ means several things.
Sentience: the ability for self-awareness and independent thought
Compassion: the ability to feel empathy and emotion for other beings
Fallibility: the ability to make mistakes and be wrong about things
Mortality: the ability, nay, inevitable eventuality, to age and die.
Can any of us deny taht any of those traits apply to us (well, maybe one per person is debatable)? Anyway, these are the traits by which humans judge the “humanity” of other species. In literature when meeting alien races and in every day life, but also it is the standard that we judge what animals we keep as pets, and which are fit to eat. The fewer of these traits an animal seems to poses the more inclined we are to consume it without guilt.
Whatever we were in the past, it seems we are now subject to the ‘human condition’.
You forgot one BIG human trait, honey….one trait that has been the downfall of humanity since the dawn of their time…
Humans have always feared and/or hated what they don’t understand. THey can’t simply be, or say that things simply are, but have to go further. They damn all consequences at times, no matter if they think they don’t, and pursue their ‘higher’ goal. They are often destructive, creating cycles of negativity in their wake, no matter how small.
ALL things age and die, hun. Does that make a tree human? Or coral? Or a fish? Or a dog? ALL things age and die…even what seems to be immortal.
Why do people insist that humans are the only sentient beings? Why dont’ you believe there can be others? Why do humans believe that only their lives are signifigant because they are sentient? ALL FORMS OF LIFE ARE SIGNIFIGANT! NOT JUST HUMANS. Everything plays a part and is important.
Humanity has a tendency to forget that.
ALL LIFE is signifigant, no matter how small. Humans have an ego that since they are sentinet, they have power over all other things that are not. That they have a right to destroy life.
What gives humanity the right to do the things they have done? You have said it yourself in your article.
“In literature when meeting alien races and in every day life, but also it is the standard that we judge what animals we keep as pets, and which are fit to eat. The fewer of these traits an animal seems to poses the more inclined we are to consume it without guilt.”
i dont know of any living thing that doesnt have those attributes on one level or another. All animals do, for one. All forms of life are sentient. Those aren’t traits to define humanity, because they apply to all. People think its wrong to eat puppies but not wrong to eat pigs, what is that? In many cultures pigs were kept as dogs. When its written ”The fewer of these traits an animal seems to posess..” the keyword is seem, because they all posses them though a fish might not be able to show it. It’s just a matter of our ignorance.
”it seems we are now subject to the ‘human condition’” I agree with this; all otherkin are human as they are in human bodies and are subject to the same fallacies. Like Judah said, humans have a severe case of xenophobia and superiority complex, thinking they are apart and above everything else, when in truth there is only one.
First off: The “human trait” of fearing that which is not understood is a generalization, not an enduring trait at all. Some humans don’t, in fact, fear what is not understood, and some, though a scant few, have actually based their lives on the pursuit of knowing the unknown. Some did this to alleviate that fear, but some have done it out of sheer curiosity, open-mindedness and a thirst to understand.
Second: Compassion sits in the same boat. It’s not an inborn human trait to be compassionate. Some humans are not.
Sentience and fallibility, I’ll agree with. Mortality, I’ll disagree with, except in the purely bodily sense. Humans have souls that live on after death (most of the time). In this sense, humans and otherkin are no different.
I will also agree that all life is significant…however, all life is not sentient, including and especially a fish. It’s not a matter of whether or not they can show it. If sentience is equated with self-awareness, then an animal with a three-second memory span can’t be sentient (this is biologically speaking), as it can’t be self-aware. The possession of a Self requires a standing memory. Otherwise what you have is an entity with an ephemeral mind, only conscious at any given moment of what is right in front of it. Consciousness and self-awareness are two different things.
Of course, on a spiritual level, all life is on equal footing. All life is sacred and on some level, conscious.
That whole bit about this factor of “human” traits deterring humans from eating certain animals, like Lion pointed out, is ridiculous. Pigs are among the most intelligent animals alive but ham sells in every corner deli. The only animals about which I could say this is true are simians, and that’s probably only because of how startlingly close humans are to them genetically. Again, like Lion pointed out, different cultures eat different animals…travel the world for long enough and you’ll find a group of people who eats just about everything (including monkeys and even other humans).
But to wrap this up, since I’ve already overanalyzed this, this definition of humanity could use some work. Defining humanity is probably the biggest obstacle to defining otherkin, since about the only thing that defines all otherkin straight across the board is their “otherness” with regard to humanity.
Look deeply into this issue and you’ll come to learn somethign important about both groups, which joins them together.