I'm pretty much the only senior in my highschool who still rides the bus, since I don't have my drivers license yet. The bus I ride carries middle schoolers as well as high schoolers because my district's middle school and high school are right next to each other. I ride the bus home.
There's a group of middle schoolers who sits across from me on the bus---kids about twelve or thirteen if I had to guess, two girls and one boy. They chat, and since I sit by myself looking out the window, sometimes I overhear thinks they chat about.
Yesterday, one of the girls made a joke about killing furries. It got my attention. I turned away from the window and said, "I'm right here."
I figured it would be fun to let them know that the person they were making fun of was in fact right next to them.
The girl's smile faded. "Are you a furry?" She asked me nervously.
"Yeah," I nodded calmly.
"So, do you think you're an animal?" One of the others said.
"Furries don't think they're animals," I corrected.
The first girl frowned. "They don't?"
I shook my head. "Nope."
"So...do you think you're like, half human, half animal?"
I probably smiled. "They mostly just like to draw animals."
"Oh, okay," the girl said. "That's fine."
"Therians think they're animals," I explained.
"Do you support that?" The boy asked.
Forgive me, therians. I had to think for a moment about what to tell this kid. "Well, I don't understand it," I decided, "but that doesn't mean it's bad."
The middle schoolers shake their heads and grumble about how it's weird and not right to believe you're an animal.
"But," I said, "talking about committing violence against anyone you don't like really isn't good."
The girl mumbled something about how she didn't really mean it, it was just a joke.
"I know you were just joking," I sympathized, "but those kinds of jokes can turn into harassment and bullying really easily, and you might not realize you're hurting someone around you."
The boy said a sarcastic agreement and the two girls glared at him. They went back to chatting, and a minute later the girl who had made the joke that I had corrected got off the bus.
I'm not sure if those kids took me seriously, but they didn't argue with me. The one girl seemed to genuinely absorb my explanation when I corrected her. Middle school is a tough age. You're dealing with new complex emotions and you're still developing empathy for those around you. You've not quite mastered the skill of choosing which people and things are worth getting upset over. I know that most anti-furry kids will grow out of the phase eventually, but I don't think it hurts to gently encourage them to start practicing empathy and being okay with those different from you.
