Monster Girl or Furry?

sanity2

sanity2

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Jul 16, 2021
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What makes a monster girl and what makes a furry?

At what point does a girl become a monster girl? A huge number of "monster girls" just have animal ears or a tail but are otherwise indistinguishable from a human. At what point do they become a monster girl?

Also, what's the difference between a monster girl and a furry? They just synonyms?
 
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Sphere42

Active Member
Sep 9, 2018
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Both terms lack a proper definition, and since nothing of the sort exists IRL the lines can always be blurred by individual artists.

Typically the difference is the inferred design process: a "furry" starts with an animal and attaches human features or mannerisms to it e.g. walking upright, tool use/"civilised" living, speaking etc. Think Bugs Bunny, Mickey Mouse or Tom&Jerry. But they can also be based on fictional animalistic creatures such as werewolves or dragons which definitely overlaps with "monsters".

By contrast a "monster girl (or boy)" starts with a human and then has inhuman features added to it. I'd definitely put anything with non-animal (plant, fungus, robot, amoeba) or locally entirely human features more in this category. The "ears and maybe tail" variant does have a more specific name "kemonomimi" although I'm not sure whether the Japanese usage would still apply to a girl with cockroach antennae.

Things get more complicated because "furry" is also used to describe the people who are into such characters in general, the internet culture built around that, and then within that culture the subset of characters who actually have fur as opposed to scales, slimy membranes or the like. Outright (fictional) bestiality also tends to get lumped in with "furry (fandom)" but has the more specific term "feral".

Notably both terms are straight up incorrect as per their general usage, "furries" do not necessarily have any fur, or even human hair for that matter, while "monster" girls need not be monstrous neither in appearance nor in behaviour. But both would be exterminated as mutants and xenos in the 41st millennium.
 
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SergeantDauterive

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Jun 10, 2023
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Furry is like when there's way more animal features. A monster girl typically just has a few cute traits, like a tail and ears. The more you add the closer it gets to furry territory.
 
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DocRipper

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Dec 27, 2021
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SergeantDauterive said:
Furry is like when there's way more animal features. A monster girl typically just has a few cute traits, like a tail and ears. The more you add the closer it gets to furry territory.
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That's not exactly a good description of furry.
Monster girl is still a girl, more human. She just has some of the visual/behavioral characteristics of a monster or animal. Furry is visually an animal, but with a human soul. Behavior, speech, thinking, gestures, facial expressions all match humans (so the endless trolling that furry is bestiality makes no sense). It can be anthro or feral.
 
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DocRipper

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Dec 27, 2021
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cohenber101 said:
I have noticed on twitter and E621 that most people stop at 2-4 and 5 it's kinda taboo territory.

Anyway, most people stop at 2
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Really? I would expect Number 3. is mostly a classsic "Furry Standard". 1 is close to Monster Girl and 5...well in "my version", its a bestiality, in the original rather feral. I wouldn't say it's taboo, but ferals has never been widely popular. NSFW versions are often with original animal genitals and not everyone likes it.
 
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SergeantDauterive

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Jun 10, 2023
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cohenber101 said:
I have noticed on twitter and E621 that most people stop at 2-4 and 5 it's kinda taboo territory.

Anyway, most people stop at 2
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Yeah, that seems true. Personally I stop at 1, maybe a like 1.5 (like additional small features like whiskers, cat-like eyes, etc). Once you hit 2 it's just too animalistic imo.
 
cohenber101

cohenber101

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Jun 16, 2018
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DocRipper said:
Really? I would expect Number 3. is mostly a classsic "Furry Standard". 1 is close to Monster Girl and 5...well in "my version", its a bestiality, in the original rather feral. I wouldn't say it's taboo, but ferals has never been widely popular. NSFW versions are often with original animal genitals and not everyone likes it.
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Yeah, Feral are weird. It's like a deep guro, thingy that would gate keeping itself anyway.
 
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RamenShark

RamenShark

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Apr 19, 2020
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in my opinion, whenever I think of furries, I think of characters that has heavily amounts of animalistic features, all be it, fur covering the whole body, canine like mouth, fur ears n tails, bipedal, closely resembling a animal but still not enough to be considered bestiality.

whenever I think of monster girls (boys), I think of a feminine (or masculine) body that has like monster features, like a horns and a tail (succubus for example), sharp teeth (like Mileena), or thinking of another race, like orcs, nymphs, dryads, possibly anything that resembles a human, but isn't.

though some characters (I think personally), can be between, like it can be considered a monster girl while at the same, can be considered a furry.
 
OsamiWorks

OsamiWorks

Member
May 24, 2020
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There isnt a difference, furries have faces with animal traits and thats the line for most people that arent into furry stuff
 
B-doi

B-doi

New Member
Jan 19, 2024
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Alright...

A good general rule of thumb for differentiating between the 2 in edge cases:
-Humanoid head -> Monster girl
-Dog/Canine/Anything else head -> Furry/Scaley/etc.

For example the Hellhound from MGE is a monster girl and not a furry because she does not have a dog head. Despite having a big part of her body covered in fur and exhibiting animalistic tendencies. The main thing to watch out for is the elongated mouth.

(Hellhound MGE) (Some random furry image from google images)
1705702126679.png 1705702339358.png
 
B-doi

B-doi

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Jan 19, 2024
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CaesinEachonson said:
View attachment 3068591
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I guess that is more "literary analysis" approach. Works better if you want to classify a setting as "monster girl" or "furry" but won't work as well if I just provide you with a character design with 0 context albeit "mostly human" covers it pretty well.

Even tho you could absolutely have blatant monster girl designs (succubi, nympfs, etc.) and then just write it like a furry story where humans... exist I guess. And like the one time they are shown they might as well be a monster girl in their own right. Also humans aren't even the only thing being hunted down. The question being more "How would it be to be one of the monster girls"

Or a story with furry designs written like a monster girl story. The characters are obvious, blatant furries but act like monster girls... generally targetting human men singlehandedly and dominating them (monster girls tend to have a strong femdom focus) with the focus being "How would it be to be one of the humans... the prey"
 
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