History of the Otherkin Community | Resources | Forums

At the moment, I'm holding back from contributing a lot of the historical data I have on the community.  I'm still trying to figure out what is and is not appropriate to include.

For instance: one major otherkin list (at its time, the largest, I believe) went defunct due to major personal conflicts.  I personally don't think it would be appropriate to air those conflicts in a historical document, but at the same time they provide depth that the raw data of when it shut down does not.  They explain why it happened.

Similar information would also be necessary to document and explain the existence of three main "factions" in the otherkin community throughout much of the late 1990s and early 2000s.  Without that information, I'm not sure how well the document really gives a sense of what was going on in the community at the time.

Then there are the biggies: Hope-Corde/Paranexus & The Shadowdancer incident.  I'd be very much inclined to document both of those, both as a matter of community history and as a caution against similar groups in the future. On the other hand, I'm thoroughly sick of going back over the details of either, and I wonder if including that information will really be helpful or just start another round of High Drama.  Especially since so many of the primary sources are irretrievably gone at this point.

Liryen said:

I haven't. What I should have said was that I understand about being sick of discussing something, and the drama that follows. Sorry!
 

Perfectly ok.   I just misunderstood you.

Archer said:

My general feeling on such things is to include as much information on everything as possible, and if drama ensues, then it ensues.

Some of the drama that has shaped the otherkin community has been deep enough to end marriages, and of a highly personal nature.  I see no reason to publicly drag the individuals involved back through such experiences now that they have been forgotten.  Some things need to be remembered, so they won't be repeated by the community.  But personal matters like that?  Despite the effect they may have had on the community, I think it best to let them be forgotten. 

I enjoyed reading the history a great deal, though there was a lot that seemed to be missing – especially in terms of the various php boards. I have various logs in various places that should detail dates and names relating to quite a few of them, though. I'll have to start digging them out.

Now that I can agree with, and I look forward to seeing the information.  I haven't been especially active on any of the php boards since the Otherkin Resource Board shut down, though I hung out on FAE for a bit.

Btw, since you know a bit more about that side of things, do you happen to know where the bulk of the users from FAE ended up after it shut down?  Or, for that matter, where the users of MSN Otherkin ended up after MSN groups shut down?  I feel like there should be a lot more forums out there than I'm finding, given the number of people that used to be around on boards like that.  Not to mention all of the defunct otherkin lists…

Archer said:

There's a difference between listing private details of people's lives, and saying "Person X and Person Y had a disagreement related to Z, which led to A and B happening."

Less than you'd think, when the disagreement related to Z was a very personal matter.

The major otherkin list you mentioned shutting down due to personal conflicts – if the conflicts were made public then it's not really a private matter anyway.

The conflicts were announced to the members of that list because, at the time, we needed to know something of what was going on.  When the owners split up, one of them (who had been less involved in the actual running of things) tried to make a power play and freeze the main moderator out.  It was practically a custody battle, which the list-members were stuck in the middle of.  But I don't think that makes it any less of a private matter.

Re letting things be forgotten or dragging someone back through experiences . . . well I don't think anyone's suggesting an otherkin historian should drag out people's most uncomfortable secrets and demand they read reports on them. But again, that's very different from explaining what happened and why.

 Again, less than you'd think when the "why" of the list ending is the same "why" of their marriage ending.  If they want to put the explanation out publicly somewhere, I'm sure they would have.  Apart from the announcement to listmembers during it all, they never have.  So I really don't think it's my place to.

If the ultimate goal is just to be a list of dates and people and places, then personal matters (the whys) are not relevant anyway . . . but if it's going to be an actual history, then what happened and why it happened are pretty much the whole point. So it all depends on the ultimate goal, really.

 At the moment, Orion wants to keep it the former and not get into all the personal drama.  I think I agree with him on this.

FAE – I have no idea. I mainly lurked so I don't even remember many names. MSNOK – I'm sure Nimkaru's around somewhere, but the last I looked I couldn't find him with that name. There is at least one dedicated unicorn message board out there though, I'd be amazed if he wasn't on that.

 I've checked for some of the names… some seem to have disappeared, like Aiaqel.  Others seem to be over on LJ now.  Few seem particularly active, among the FAE mods.  Don't remember enough of the regular members to look for them.  MSNOK mods, I could care less about and frankly never want to see any of them again.  But it seems like there should be a huge number of MSNOK regular members that would have needed to migrate elsewhere when MSN groups shut down.  I don't remember seeing any influx of new members on any forums that would correspond with that.  Which is one of the things that is making me think I'm missing forums for the links project…

Arethinn said:

FAE refugees: Dan O'Dea is still around a bit – you've probably seen him on the otherkin livejournal community. He's also on Embracing Mystery (one of the mods I think).

I have seen Dan on LJ, and also over on Meetup.com, he's running two Texas-area otherkin meetups I believe.

Everyone else I can think of that was a major player there but not elsewhere (that is, aside from a few folks like myself and Archer who have always been on multiple boards), like Syleniel, Aiaquel, Grimm Judge, etc., some of whom I saw when going to Dancing the Endless Dream (now defunct; I refer mainly to the 2007 event, which was my first), seem to have gone nowhere else public. Whether they have their own regional Texas or Houston or DFW-etc mailing lists or something, I don't know.

 Not sure.  I know the Elenari from Texas still have their list, and now a new LJ community though I'm not a member of either at this time and don't know how active they are.  Haven't seen any of the non-Elenari from that forum elsewhere.  Maybe they do have a private forum somewhere, I know they were being hit pretty hard by some of the trolling communities (forget if it was POE, SomethingAwful, ED, or all of the above.)  Or maybe they're getting away from the whole thing, as the discontinuation of Dancing would seem to imply.