Why can't people choose to voluntarily be otherkin? I mean, people choose to be transgender too (hi, me, I chose to be trans and I love it), and people can choose to be plural and make willo head mates, so why can't people choose to be otherkin? Like why is good faith KFF and choicekin not valid? Why do we NEED to be otherlinkers or synpaths?
This is pretty hard one question. I'll try to give some answers, but since I've been a part of alterhuman community for a relatively small amount of time, I might not know everything and please do not take things I say as a gospel.
I do not know much about choicekins, so I can't say much about it, but I think the problem with 'good faith KFF' is that they still call themselves/associate themselves with 'KFF'. And the problem with KFF is that KFFers misuse the term "kin" and a lot of KFFers were harassing fictionfolk.
KFF, or ‘Kin for fun’ is a term for those who claim that ‘kin is only for fun and a choice and means identify with/relate to instead of ‘identify AS’ and the culture the people who said this built on their stolen word.
Ie- The group of people above and the ensuing culture they created built on top of misinformation, a stolen word, and the harassment of fictionfolk.
The term is one that the KFF chose for themselves after a fashion, as they claimed they ‘kinned for fun’ rather than like all us ‘serious otherkin freaks’.
source: [link], fragment of The Dragonheart Collective’s Testimony on the KFF Phenomenon
When KFF first started to kind of become a thing, therians and otherkin welcomed them into the community with smiles on our faces and our arms open with eagerness, more that willing to extend welcomes and compassion towards these individuals.
Unfortunately, this trust proved to later be foolish. As we were stabbed in the back by many early KFFers. Not only did they too call us kinnie in a derogatory fashion - but they extended it by calling us other things such as delusional and laughing in the faces of spiritualkin and psychologicalkin alike whenever we shared our experiences.
With their growing presence, came the phrases that many use today. Co-opting our language and STEALING it from us. It honestly, probably, wouldn't even be hated as much if these hurtful things had never happened. But unfortunately, they did, it's a reminder to many on how early KFFers stabbed us in the back, stole from us, and then tried to erase our culture from the inside out.
source: [link], fragment of one of Calico's (@/this-is-kinmisia) posts
Also, I want to say that synpaths are different than otherkin. Synpath is is considered to be synonymous with otherhearted which is a deep connection with something. Otherhearted is commonly described as "identifying with", while otherkins identify as their kintypes.
-Identifying with an animal species- not as it- This honestly might be the most distinguishing feature. The description of being “fully” or “entirely” human was common, as was being a human who “acts/feels like a [insert animal]“. Overall the theme is identifying with (not as) an animal so strongly that it’s a part of who one is as a person.
source: [link], fragment of Common Themes in the Early Animal-hearted Scene
Synpath is a tidy name for something you identify with on several levels, which could be a concept that resonates really strongly with you, an animal or mythological creature you feel you act like, or a person or character you share a lot of common behaviors with, among other things.
source: [link], fragment of Synpath FAQ
And when it comes to "Why can't people choose to voluntarily be otherkin?": there are some discussions about this topic. Rani (@/a-dragons-journal) have some posts about this topic and have reblogged some discussions about it.
One thing is that voluntary nonhumanity has been often conflated with KFF, which is because both KFF and copinglinkers were preceded by what was called "copingkin".
I'm not one of the people in question, but as someone who also used to feel this way and has changed its opinion, my reasoning boiled down to basically - why is it that we treat this one origin for nonhumanity as inherently so different it has to be separated out into a separate label, when every other origin is considered "valid" therianthropy/otherkinity?
The answer often, unfortunately, ultimately boils down to the fact that voluntary nonhumanity has historically often been conflated with what we now call KFF and has historically been called fluff or tumblrkin - people who don't actually identify as their "kins" at all and are misusing our language to discuss roleplay or otherwise a hobby.
source: [link], fragment of Rani's response to one of submissions posted on @/otherkin-confessional
Copingkin
The trend of people saying they were 'kin to cope' also started happening around this time. YBC's misinformation caused a lot of people to start saying they 'kinned to cope' to try to reconcile their experiences with the 'kin outside your privilege' assertions in an effort to avoid harassment. Many people who said they 'kinned to cope' would additionally claim otherkin were ableist for correcting them on the definition of otherkin being identifying as something onan integral level.
Many copingkin created a label called 'IDs', which were characters one identified strongly as because they had a mistaken idea of what being fictionkind meant. 'ID' was the precursor to 'IRLs', and in fact even this early you would find people who would say they were 'not just kin they were this character IRL' as to why they labeled that character as their 'ID'.
The pre-copinglinkers (those that assume a voluntary identity as something to cope) were part of this group too, and would later end up splitting off into their own community following Who-is-page's coining post for the word in 2015. There were also a few confused psychological otherkin who didn't have the full context for the discourse that identified this way when they were fully covered under the actual definition.
Copingkin are also part of why there are so many older fictionkin who are aggressively spiritual elitist- they swung hard in the opposite direction of the 'kin to cope' crowd as a defense. Again, it doesn't excuse the elitism towards those with psychological origin, but it explains it.
source: [link], fragment of The Dragonheart Collective’s Testimony on the KFF Phenomenon
Even though I can't give a clear answer, I hope this helps.
If anybody wants, I could send some links to some conversations/posts about that whether the term otherkin should include voluntary identities as well.
Also, if anybody wants to share their thoughts (or some resources) on this topic, please, do this! (and, please, correct me if I made any mistake in this post)
