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A teacher from Salt Lake City, America has shared her real passion - being a furry.
When she's not teaching, Flint, aged 22, loves nothing more than creating homemade costumes that represent her 'fursona'.
She identifies as a Dutch Angel Dragon, but feels like she needs to hide that side of herself because of the negativity associated with the subculture.
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Furries, known for dressing up as cartoon-style animals, sometimes do so as a sexual fetish, but others use it as a fun way to escape from the mundanity of human life.
“I don’t talk about it very much,” Flint said. “Just because there is unfortunately still a negative connotation to the hobby.”
Flint has gotten so good at making 'fur suits' that she even makes costumes for other furries and sells them online
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Flint has been dressing as a furry for almost three years.
“I picked up the hobby in the winter of 2020, but ever since I was 12, I’ve done cosplay and made costumes,” she explained.
“I’ve always made clothes for myself; my mom taught me how to sew very early on, but I wanted to challenge myself, so online, I was looking around, and I saw other people making these things."
Flint herself initially thought being a furry was "really weird", but she is now embracing the label and wanted to go public with the hobby she loves so much.
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“I began to reflect on myself and realized that I was probably a furry, because I wanted one of the costumes,” Flint explained.
“So, I just dove in and made myself a character because I just wanted to give it a try, and now that I’m here, I’m just kind of figuring it out and having a lot of fun doing it.”
“From the very beginning of the fandom, there has been misinformation. TV and media have not understood what our hobby is and then assumed and projected other things onto us,” says Flint.
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Like humans, Furries come in all different shapes and sizes. There's even a Japanese man who's spent over $15,000 USD to look like a border collie that goes by the name of 'Toko'.
The dog costume is incredibly realistic, meaning the man can even walk on all fours like a dog would. So realistic in fact that if you were stood across the road from him, you probably wouldn't bat an eyelid if someone told you it was their dog.
Toko enlisted a Japanese company to make the costume which took 40 days to complete.
Topics: Film and TV, Anime, US News, Education