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We just can’t have nice things.  I might eventually wrangle this column about Being a Furry back toward actual comics criticism, but  journalists continue to report on furries to you, the humans of the species, as if you are all idiots.  A mission of this column is to talk to you, the elusive normal-human-reading-this-who-has-no-unsavory-sex-hangups-about-Scar-from-the-Lion King, as if you are an adult.  So I have to drag my Furry Scold cap out of its hatbox in the attic and once again scurry to countermand whatever half-baked copy some under-paid keyboard jockey hastily scooped under their deadline like litter under the bed.  This week’s furry-punching detritus comes from Gawker Media, under the subheading Weird Internet.  The headline reads “Tony the Tiger Can’t Tweet Without Furries Begging Him for Sex.”

Kellogg’s introduced a new social media campaign to promote their cereal Frosted Flakes and they gave their cartoon Tiger brand ambassador, Tony, a Twitter account.  Tony treats us to a bunch of mock cartoon Instagram photos with candid moments of him just living his best life in various states of undress, all thanks to the energizing boost of a balanced breakfast.  It is impossible to calculate exactly what is going on in the fevered, unbalanced minds of the advertising executives behind this campaign, but the implicit message in these images is “let’s make him a hunky dad.  let’s make him conspicuously hot.”

Furries naturally took notice.  Some even wondered if this giant corporation had even identified us as a demographic.  Reading through Tony’s feed is a truly bewildering experience. But tons of us have responded to Tony’s new public platform with variations on *ahem* “I wouldn’t mind a little of that tiger in MY tank.” Twitter user @crucifalex picked up a few of these mentions and their tweet mentioning the “hidden gems of Twitter: the replies to Tony the Tiger’s tweets from furries” took off.  The Gawker article basically attempted to alley-oop off of its popularity.

So considering that headline, I’m going to raise my paws flat to either side of my face to get your attention, and I am going to look you in the eye.  We all know, of course, that Tony the Tiger is not a real entity that can tweet.  “The Social Media Intern Who Tweets Under the Guise of Tony the Tiger Can’t Tweet Without Furries Begging Him or Her for Sex.” is far too long.  Tony the Tiger, as a fictional brand mascot, has no agency or inner life and cannot tweet. We’ve gotten that far.  But can you follow me further through this conceptual bramble bush?  You know that we’re fucking joking, right?

Most of the replies highlighted are clearly jokes, antagonistically arch jokes at that.  The author gets a giggle out of the term “cummies” which is used in furry slang that represents a satirical tone when joking about sexuality.  The post isn’t openly hostile to furries, however the whole endeavor approaches furry twitter with a very self-conscious credulity.  If readers are in on the joke, then no harm done.  If they have a prejudice against us as deviant freaks, they can have a nice reassuring chuckle at our expense.  The tittering is in part a balm for the readers’ normalcy (heterosexuality), as the coded imagery in the Tony tweets are clearly homosexual, and the jeering horny furry tweets come mostly from homosexuals.  Furry culture is often coded as gay, and is as a result a safe outlet for coded anti-gay prejudice.  “It sure is not a normal thing to engage with a brand in a way that the brand didn’t anticipate!  How naughty!  I engage with brands in a healthy way, which is not what these folk are doing.”

I mean of course we would fuck Tony, right?  Maybe until we remember he’s a brand mascot, and as such is REAAAAALLY high maintenance.  But a part of some of this engagement in an aggressively sexual way is a response to that style of marketing.  By making uncomfortable overtures we are registering our discomfort with a cereal for children flirting with us.  To see the eyes of clever marketers sizing us up as a potential demographic, possibly maybe.  “Nerd” “culture” is a giantic tchotske factory (blocks my Captain Benjamin Sisko Xmas ornament from your view, wildly gesticulating). There’s a transgender beer for heaven’s sake.  Many of us don’t want our culture chewed up and spit back out and sold to us when we have enough trouble maintaining an internal community economy.  Inappropriate flattery is our sincerest form of mockery.

We see you.