I was asked on another site about what the difference between furries and pet play was. So I decided to include my reply here to share with you all. :}
Definitions from wikipedia...
Furry: a person with an important emotional/spiritual connection with an animal or animals, real, fictional or symbolic. This can be acted out sexually as well as other areas of life. This can be combined with petplay.
Pet Play: a form of erotic sexual role-play where one or more of the participants takes on the role of a real or imaginary animal in character, including appropriate mannerisms and behavior, and sometimes a partner will act as another animal, or, in a sexual context, may take the role of rider, trainer, or caretaker (or even breeding partner).
The principal theme of human-animal roleplay is usually the voluntary or involuntary reduction (or transformation) of a human being to animal status, and focus on the altered mind-space created. The most common examples are probably canids (pup, dog, wolf), felines (cat, kitten, lion) or equines (pony, horse). Human-animal roleplay is also used in a BDSM context, where one person may be a 'slave', treated or used as an animal by their Mistress/Master.
And just to be complete, there is another one that I'd like to define that you may or may not have heard of.
Therianthropy: (my own definition) Where the person believes that they were a specific animal in a past life, such as reincarnation. They have a deeper connection to this "soul animal" and often experience mental, phantom limb, and dream shifts. In mental shifts, they take on the mentality of the animal, phantom shifts include the feeling of having a tail, ears, or even wings in some cases (depending on the animal) that are not really there. Dream shifts are when you actually take on the form of your animal in dreams. There are people who speak of physical shifting...but so far that seems unattainable, despite what some people may try and tell you.
I consider myself a therian, with some pet play thrown in. I also do enjoy "furry" artwork, both drawing and viewing it.
Basically, furries generally choose what animal they wish to portray. Therians are "born with an animal soul" and have no choice as to which animal.
-- Edited by silversnowleopardess at 16:14, 2008-11-12
I'd like to add...furry is a very loose, general term. It's like calling yourself a hippy, everyone's definition is different, and the most that can be said about anyone calling themselves a furry is that they enjoy being part of the furry culture. Indidiviually, that person could call themselves furry out of a liking of furry artwork, a strong connection to animals, being spiritually influenced by animals, etc.
As a therian, I'd much rather explain it than call myself something I am not. While I can appreciate some furry things...anthropomorphic art, etc. I just cannot call myself one. My connection with snow leopard is much deeper and profound than that. I feel that I would be selling myself short doing so.
well i think im more spiritually in tune with a house cat they seem to love me even strays a bunch of my friends called me a big kitty with a hard exterier so i think its alittle bit of both worlds i love being a furry but i also put some therian touch with it but we call it lifestyling and i dont care if i want to mew when im sad and meow really loud when im happy or purr when my friends start fires then i will