Otherkin. A concept that has been documented since the late 1960s. A word that has been thrown around without much care as of 2011. An experience that brings the best, and the worst, out of humanity.
But what is otherkin? Many people can (and still do) argue about what the exact definition is. Personally, I peg it as “a human with a non-human identity”. My definition is short and simple, people may say it needs expanding on and I do agree with them (for the past year I’ve been writing a long essay all about the concept of otherkin after all). As many people know (or should know), a definition of a group of people leaves out certain things, it misses the ‘essence’ of otherkin.
So instead of boring you with strict definitions, let’s talk about this ‘essence’ thing.
First off, otherkin is a contradiction. A human that, for whatever reason, thinks it’s not human. I believe being keenly aware of such a contradiction is key to being otherkin.
Otherkin, like life, is a journey, not a destination. ‘Discovering’ your identity is just one step of the way. Currently, the journey is infinite, otherkin is a contradiction that still, as of yet, cannot be put to rest by science. A contradiction like this cannot be currently ‘undoubtedly’ solved. Unless something about the initial statement is changed, it will continue to jut out. In other words, we need more information.
Otherkin is bizarre, we believe ourselves to have non-human ‘feelings’/‘instincts’/’traits’/whatever but at the same time, our ‘otherkinity’ is filtered and processed through our human brain. We are having a human experience and for some reason, whatever it may be, we believe we are not. The closest thing I can liken it to right now (which sadly holds a negative connotation) is a delusion with psychiatric insight. We know we’re human, but that knowledge doesn’t change the way we feel.

But hey, onward to my own experiences! Because that’s clearly what a lot of people would read this for. Personally, I don’t think I’ve ever had (what I classify to be) any overly profound experiences, mostly because I’ve felt this way my whole life so there’s never been a noticeable change from my norm. If I have felt something really ‘out there’ it’s been lost to time. I’ve also never had an experience I couldn’t legitimately explain away as a human thing, it may be an unlikely human thing, but it could still be a human thing nevertheless. I’ve yet to encounter someone that had an ‘otherkin experience’ that legitimately couldn’t be explained away as a human thing (and trust me, hallucinations and different states of mind are more common than some people think).
I blame my horrific memory for my lack of ‘profound otherkin stuffs’, it’s the reason why I write so much and do these essays, I’ll forget and never remember my analytical progress.
But on the subject of stuff like anecdotes, while I don’t have many I remember (big surprise), there are a few I know of. Whether or not they are directly related to being otherkin is up for debate but hey, we can all laugh at my reactions either way.
I remember one time, and this was within the year, I was in my garage pulling the garage door down (it’s old-fashioned like that) and there was a gust of wind. In hindsight I should’ve noticed the wind but I didn’t so now I have a funny story to tell. So I looked down at my feet (because I’m always looking at me feet I swear) and I saw something scuttle real fast across the floor (this was like, at 10pm or something so it was hella dark) and I freaked. I full on jumped like 3 feet into the air, if humans had hackles mine would’ve be raised to high heaven, and all my limbs were frozen and straight. I just went “yip!” and whoosh, I’ve cleared 2 meters of ground in a second. Like I was on high alert, my mind was completely empty of thoughts let alone actually caring about what I looked like. It took me a few minutes of being frozen, staring unblinkingly at the thing to realise what it actually was. I probably initially though it was a huge spider (it’s pretty common where I am) but uh no, it was just a dead leaf and hoo boy I felt stupid after that. I just skulked inside without another word. Like wow, big strong independent human adult scared like a cat as small leaf skitters across floor. Watch out kids, the foliage is gonna bite your ankles!
I’ve had my stupid moments that’s for sure but damn, sometimes can I not act an animal even though I am one?

But yeah, moving on from my embarrassment…
Phantom limbs are cool! And when I say they’re ‘cool’ I mean please make them stop. Why is it that whenever I feel my limbs it’s always at a time when I don’t want to. Trying to sleep? Wings making my sleeping position uncomfortable! Trying to ‘publicly’ speak? Hello snout making human words nearly impossible to pronounce! Going on a run? Human legs are wrong start galloping like a weirdo! I mean, they’re just plain weird. Well they feel ‘normal’ but I’m also acutely aware that it is not normal human anatomy and that is what I’m supposed to be now. Like, feeling paws instead of hands, or feeling paws superimposed over your hands, weird as. I just sit there like “where are my thumbs, I’ve just spent over a decade with them being apposable, why are they now not?” And don’t even get me started on feet. My ankles are not meant to touch the floor, I don’t care what my science and art books say, my feet shouldn’t be doing that but they do.
Anyways, thankfully I don’t really get ‘mental shifts’. Like sure I can get ‘feral’ and stuff but so can humans. Society may ignore and condemn the basic human instincts but that doesn’t mean they don’t exist. Just because humans (or at least the majority on the internet) live in an environment of their own creation does not mean we suddenly no-longer have the same animal brain as before. But yeah, basically I want to climb and perch like a gargoyle on top of anything higher than my hips, also I want to hiss and growl at stuff, swipe at anything that swings or moves through the air (like pendulums, stray leaves, dust, etc.) and get incredibly protective over stuff that’s designated as ‘mine’. There’s more but still; all of those things, while not ‘typical’, can still be explained as human behaviour.
And, uh, moving on. Again. Memories! Memories are cool! Just like phantom limbs! I’m joking, they’re not as bad but I do scrutinise them a lot more than feeling supernumerary limbs. Personally I don’t think they hold much weight (just like everything else when it’s alone and separated), most of the time I consider them to be something my brain just makes up because they’re ‘missing’. I also tend to think the same of ‘phantom limbs’ and, sometimes, ‘mental shifts’ (I actually rely most on my ‘mental shifts’ to discern what I am). Sure I remember stuff, but I know from firsthand experience that your brain can, will and has changed/altered/outright made up ‘memories’. I can’t trust my memories, I can’t trust a lot of things, but I can log them and revisit them later to see if there are any trends and potential reasons (other than because of being otherkin) why I ‘remembered’ it.

So let’s talk about my awakening. You’d think that, as a god or whatever, my awakening was grandiose and spectacular. Well, as I’ve said before, I’ve felt this way my whole life, there was no cliché ‘awakening’. What I like to call my ‘awakening’ was when I discovered the word otherkin and thus discovered that I am not alone in these experiences. It was boring, and anticlimactic. I saw the word ‘catkin’ on an online pokemon fan game and googled it. Found some trashy quotev quizzes, they said I was angelkin, demonkin, therian, vampire etc. Decided to find some forums and definitions (it peaked my interest as something with substance by this point). Did some thinking, made mistakes, and now here I am. Seriously though, I used to think I was some big blue shiny dragon, boy was I wrong. I got fur and cat-like paws babe!
Luckily I actually stayed away from Wikipedia and (whatever people believe in these days forbid) tumblr. I also stayed away from the majority of the otherkin communities, I am after all, a hermit through and through. I think my first community was reddit (r/otherkin) and then a discord (the r/otherkin ‘unofficial’ discord server). Personally I’m not a huge fan of the ‘open’ communities since they attract and ungodly amount of trolls and fluff, but at the same time, I don’t like the typical elitism of the ‘closed’ communities. Tumblr has, in classic tumblr fashion, warped the public’s view of otherkin and spawned many incredibly unnecessary words like ‘kinnie’ and ‘kinning’. This is a public service announcement; kin is not a verb. You do not say “I am kin with…”, “I kin…” etc. you say “my kintype is…”, “I am…” etc. Otherkin is not ‘with’, it is ‘am’. ‘With’ denotes a clear separation between you and the other thing, your identity is not separate to you it is you. If your identity is separate to you, you are thus saying your identity is not you (and therefore it is not your identity). But yeah, hoo boy I have problems with the tumblr community, but tumblr isn’t the only one with echo-chambers, snowflakes/fluff and trolls, reddit and discord can be bad too. I tend to keep my distance from communities, again I am a hermit. I think of otherkin as a very personal thing, but I also like to check in from time to time, compare myself to other otherkin, and see how the communities are chugging along.
The perfect community (or at least a pretty damn good one), in my opinion, needs to be one that encourages healthy skepticism and critical thought. One that will assist in introspection and will hand out the names of good books and other sources to aid in research, but doesn’t just dump it on the ‘questioner’ so that they don’t have to do any work. Being otherkin isn’t easy, it’s no walk in the park, it requires years of research, scrutiny and critical thinking, and it never ends.

So I guess this is it huh? There is so much information, personal analysis, rampant skepticism and sheer amount of thinking I’ve missed out of this essay. There is also much I do not know, so much I am unsure of. I’ll acknowledge that, I won’t hide it and I will wear my “student of everything” badge proudly. I know I don’t know everything, I know I am no expert on this. My knowledge of my ‘ignorance’ allows me to be humble. We are all stumbling like blind children in this strange existence. I will embrace my lack of information and understanding, and I will endeavour to turn it into one hell of a learning experience.
“The most elementary and valuable statement in science, the beginning of wisdom, is ‘I do not know.'” — Data, Star Trek: The Next Generation, “Where Silence Has Lease”