Ask questions related to otherkin, systems, linkers, otherhearteds, flickerers and more!
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We don't have the spoons to run this anymore, but are keeping this up as an archive. Feel free to make a similar blog!
Alterhuman: Those who hold an identity that is not strictly (or not at all) human, doesn’t fit the normative human identity while still remaining human, or is human plus something else.
Welcome to Ask An Alterhuman! We’re a blog dedicated to answering questions about alterhumanity of all kinds! Whether you’re alterhuman and looking for advice, or a human wondering what something means, this ask blog is open to all!
We include anyone who identifies as alterhuman or who falls under the alterhuman umbrella. Otherkin, otherhearteds, plural systems, therians, vampires, godshards, otherlinkers and anyone else!
More under the readmore!
A bit about us:
We go by Interstellar collectively.
They/it generally works for us!
Our blog is @interstellarsystem and we also run @alterhuman-culture-is!
We have over 400 people in our system, most of which are fictives.
We have so many different people with different identities in our brain. There are so many creatures.
We write individual names and pronouns of those who respond to asks at the bottom of them! If you have asks for specific system members, someone with a specific identity, or you want to ask for community feedback instead of just an answer from us, feel free to specify that!
General blog info:
Community feedback is always welcome unless the asker specifies they don’t want that.
We’d like asks to remain respectful, hate will be deleted unless there are misconceptions we can correct that we feel would be beneficial for others to read.
On that same sort of note, discrimination based on identity or race or anything else will not be tolerated.
Non-alterhumans can ask questions!
If we end up getting something wrong, we’re definitely open to being corrected! In fact, please correct us if we say something that isn’t true. We want to make this blog as helpful as possible, and sometimes due to being such a large system, memories and ideas slip through the gaps.
Trigger Warning Tags are linked here. Warning tags will also be tagged with #tw if any other trigger tags are needed.
I recently figured out that I was otherhearted, does that still make me part of the therian or alterhuman community if I'm not a therian?
Hey!
As a refresher, therian means to identify as a nonhuman animal. Such as being able to say "I am a cat", and feeling as if in some aspect, you are literally a cat--even if not wholly.
Otherhearted means to identify with something. Such as saying "I feel as if cats are my family", or "I should have been a cat but I'm not", along with other things that don't mean you're literally a cat.
Alterhuman, on the other hand, can mean a lot of things. It is a big umbrella term that just means you don't fall within the societal definition of "normal humanity", which can absolutely include otherhearteds, as well as therians and many, many other things. Alterhumans can be completely human, they can be nonhuman, both at once, or even aspecies too.
You'd be included under the alterhuman umbrella and a welcome part of the community, but you wouldn't be a therian. That being said, otherhearted experiences can still be very adjacent to therian experiences and a lot of the time you won't be actively removed from therian communities if you're "only" otherhearted. You can still talk to therians and share similar experiences, and you're still absolutely welcome in the alterhuman community as a whole.
A lot of the time, otherhearted tags are crossposted into by therian blogs, which does make it pretty confusing when they're talking about therian/otherkin experiences in a tag meant for a different identity. It can be difficult, but if you're looking for more 'hearted blogs to follow, @otherhearted-culture-is is one we can personally vouch for, and they might have tips for finding community if you need them!
What is it called when a person wants to be something nonhuman (such as a mythical creature) but doesn't actually believe that they are that creature?
That could be a lot of things.
Maybe otherhearted could fit? From the wiki page I linked:
"The nature of the connection has been described in a variety of ways, including seeing the being as family, wishing or aspiring to be the them, being "almost" one of them, or feeling like they ought to be one but are not."
If you'd like to become that creature, though, consider otherlinking!
Is it odd that I'm okay with being a human? Like if I had the choice to be my theriotype I'd choose that, but I'm okay with having a human body
It's perfectly normal. A lot of nonhumans feel dysphoric over being in a human body, but that doesn't mean everyone does or has to. Therian as a term doesn't mean you have to identify wholly as an animal either, and in fact we've seen it described quite often as "part" animal or something similar. You can be both, or you can be one and be fine with being the other.
Alterhuman as a term is inclusive to those who are still wholly human, mind you, so there's humans around in the community as well. There's a lot of internalised misanthropy and general dislike toward humans in the community but really, there's nothing wrong with being one or being okay with your body.
I'm a fictionflicker and I get very few shifts, is that normal?
Yep! A lot of fictionflickers only really get shifts after directly engaging with the source media, which is a whole part of the experience.
Even if you only get shifts when engaging with source sometimes or rarely, there's no minimum limit for how much you have to shift to have a fictionflicker. You can have it happen once and that'd still be fine and still mean you're able to say "I have flickered as x character".
Hi, im an alterhuman host for a tulpagenic system- i lean towards a god or like primordial eldritch horror kinda thing?- what would the term be for that-?- or godkin? Or celestialkin?
~ Lyxie 🌌✨️
Godkin is a common term and catch-all for godlike beings in the community, though divinekin, celestialkin, eldritchkin or anything that you feel fits best would absolutely work. We see a few eldritchkin posts in the tags, and godkin are also around. The thing about kintype labels is that you define them yourself, and there doesn't need to be anyone else using the term for you to use it. It's whatever you feel describes you best, and is understandable to outsiders if you want it to be, or if that's important to you.
It's all about what you want to describe yourself as! If your kintype is best described as divine or god, use those. If you'd prefer to drop the -kin suffix and just call yourself a primordial eldritch horror, that's also free to to.
Do you happen to know, is there any term for feeling very strong connection with universe, feeling like you are part of it in a way that makes you feel like you are not only a human? It's hard to explain sorry..
I guess there is not term for that but I'm still asking :)
It depends on how the connection feels to you.
Do you feel like you are the universe in some way? That would fit more into otherkinity.
Do you have a strong connection to the universe while not feeling like you are literally it? That sounds more like being otherhearted.
There's other terms such as vaguetype which might better suit you if you don't feel that otherkin/otherheartedness fit your experiences. You're also absolutely free to create your own term for your experience.
There's a lot of experiences under the alterhuman umbrella that might not have terms coined for them yet, and really, if calling yourself "alterhuman" is enough, then you're absolutely under no obligation to break it down further into sublabels.
does anyone else see their family pets who are similar species to them a their siblings? or if its your own pet, as your pup/kitten/etc? please tell me im not the only one
We personally don't, aside from maybe seeing our pet birds as our flock in a way. But we know of other alterhumans who do! Others are more than free to chime in with their own experiences.
Anyone, alterhuman or not, is capable of experiencing phantom limbs and other types of shifts. There's actually a phenomenon that is called "shifters disease" in the community, referring to non-alterhumans discovering the community who get shifts for a while after reading about shifting experiences.
Otherlinkers are no different, and can experience shifts just as anyone else has the potential to.
Hey, we've cleared all asks older than 6 months in the ask box in an attempt to get more into posting. You're free to resend, we just needed a cleanup!
We've also added a few resources to the pinned post and changed it up a bit.
Hey! For any of you guys on Cohost, we've made an alterhuman page over there for a similar purpose to this one, but also including other alterhuman-based blogs run by us. Check it out here if you'd like!
We're not leaving Tumblr any time soon or really ever, by the way--we're just branching out!
Hi! I’m not an alterhuman, but I think alterhumans are pretty cool.
Anyways, I once saw someone who identified as (in a gender-related way, I think?) a robot post a meme about those one of the captcha thingies. I thought it was funny, but then someone else responded, “If you’re not a human, does that mean you don’t deserve human rights?” beneath their post. I got really upset. That person was being a jerk, right?
Also, there’s a pretty big overlap between the queer and alterhuman communities (as in, a lot of the alterhumans I see are queer in some way), but does being an alterhuman always count as being part of the LGBTQ+ community?
I hope you have a good day, and also, your blog is cool. :)
Hey!
Yeah, generally people who say things along those sorts of "you don't deserve rights if you're really nonhuman" are trolls or just generally rude. Regardless of how people identify, people still obviously deserve rights so they're taking it very out of context.
And even then, how exactly are the people who say this stuff treating their animals (because this line of thinking is also commonly used for those who identify as nonhuman animals) if they feel the need to say this about nonhuman identifying people? That bit has always made me feel extra weird about it.
They're just generally trying to get a bite out of people and being argumentative in general, I find it easiest to not bother with them if they're going to use arguments like those, they're clearly not there for discussion.
As for your second question though, not necessarily! It depends on the individual as to if they identify as LGBT+ or not, regardless of if their alterhuman identity affects that. It's very nuanced, but overall if you're alterhuman you aren't LGBT+ by default and vice versa, but in a lot of ways you sure as hell can be.
There are some identities that tend to overlap more than others but there's so many reasons that someone's identity (be it alterhuman or LGBT+ at first) can affect the other. Nonhuman identities can make your gender and how you present it feel different, there's the medusan term which means you're basically alterhuman4alterhuman, and some LGBT+ (or neurodivergent for that matter) people come to identify as nonhuman because of how society is about LGBT+ people and they take on the voidpunk label (though not every voidpunk considers themselves alterhuman).
There's too many personal experiences to list and we haven't experienced all of them because we're just one system, but I hope that's helpful anyway!
hey I’m having trouble with soulbonding any advice?
Hey, sorry for the late response!
We personally have written a guide on soulbonding in our own way if you'd like to check it out--it's helped people before and trying different methods for soulbonding generally tends to help.
You can also check out the Sparks System's method which I got them to post for this ask. I don't know of any other methods that have been posted but if anyone else has their own, feel free to share!
I'd also recommend this blog and tag. They have some good info in there and giving a read through some of it might be of assistance. If not, you can always send an ask to them as well!
Hi, I'm not alterhuman myself, but am creating a story where the protagonist is alterhuman (specifically angelhearted) and could also include another alterhuman or two (or five).
The world it's set in is very close to ours (but in the future), but is derived from the Sonic universe. It has superpowered people appearing every generation, and supernatural creatures including eldritch beings dubbed "deities" exist here. Do you have any tips on incorporating alterhumanity into such a world?
(also the protagonist is technically silver but that's superfluous at this point)
Honestly we have no idea how to write at all, so we wouldn’t have many tips. Maybe someone following might be able to help?
I can’t find this anywhere but can copinglinkers shift? I seem to be in a Kagamine Len Shift most of the time, Or is shifting just a fictionkin thing?
Honestly, most--if not, all--types of alterhumans can experience shifts, including copinglinkers. It’s not just a fictionkin thing at all. You don’t even necessarily have to be alterhuman to shift, cameo shifts are also a thing that happen sometimes!
sorry, i can't seem to find an answer anywhere about this and i hope i'm not botheting you. do you have to be a (member of a) system to be otherkin? can singlets be otherkin?
im trying to figure myself out, i feel like im a winged kin but i'm not a system...
You're not a bother at all!
Singlets can definitely be otherkin, or basically any other alterhuman identity that doesn't involve strictly being plural.
