What is Fluff?

I was not really sure where to ask this but what is considered fluff on this board?

The two things I wanted to say I can't XDDD

Fluff is a loose term for information, claims or relation of experiences that are most likely fanciful or false or a combination of the two.

It mostly comes down to phrasing and explanation of it.

Fluff: "I am the Great Dragon Lord of the 9th Kingdom."

Non-Fluff: "I have had experiences which lead me to the belief that I was a lord in a feudal society of Dragons in a nation that I have come to call, the 9th Kingdom."

The first one makes a direct claim, the second expresses a belief and leaves room for margin of error. so long as the second statement is open to questioning and honest answering, things go very smoothly. When the questions are met with a reply of either heightened emotions, ridiculous claims or threats, or any such activity that breaks the forum rules. The claim becomes viewed as progressively more fluffy.

Additionally there are some things that are claimed to have happened, which would be fantastic and will require evidence to back it up.

Fluff: "I am a werewolf and can physically shift at the full moon, last time I went into a blood frenzy and killed three people."

This claim defies many, many laws of physics to begin with. It is stating right out that you have done what is considered physically impossible (shapeshifting your physical body). It also leads to the wonder that, if you killed three people, there would be an investigation, which would either lead to you, or to a wolf-like monster and thus hit the news. If you have done this multiple times, given the efficacy of law enforcement, by all odds you would be arrested by now. Additionally, such a claim as this is admitting to a major crime, and usually would be followed by the person claiming it to condone such actions. This forum (or any forum that has common sense) should not, and can not condone illegal activities. If there was some case in the news about a wolf creature killing people, I'm sure someone in the Otherkin community will eventually find it and post the articles, after seeing this, the staff here would forward your ip information and all contact information to the proper authorities.

Terro Wrote:so long as the second statement is open to questioning and honest answering, things go very smoothly.

Is there any reason for why things wouldn't go smoothly? That explanation just seems like you are adding twice the amount of words to get the same point across.

Terro Wrote:Fluff is a loose term for information, claims or relation of experiences that are most likely fanciful or false or a combination of the two.

It mostly comes down to phrasing and explanation of it.

Fluff: "I am the Great Dragon Lord of the 9th Kingdom."

Non-Fluff: "I have had experiences which lead me to the belief that I was a lord in a feudal society of Dragons in a nation that I have come to call, the 9th Kingdom."

The first one makes a direct claim, the second expresses a belief and leaves room for margin of error. so long as the second statement is open to questioning and honest answering, things go very smoothly. When the questions are met with a reply of either heightened emotions, ridiculous claims or threats, or any such activity that breaks the forum rules. The claim becomes viewed as progressively more fluffy.

How you say something does not make you any less of a fluff. How you deal with feedback is what makes you a fluff. If in your "Fluff" example they are confronted in a polite manner and are like "WTF are you talking about?!" and they say it was a reference to a DND game, not to Otherkin - then that wouldn't be fluff.

Whereas with your Non-Fluff example, if the person defends their claims with rhetoric (as described here) rather than discussion, that makes them a fluff.

I could say "I think I control hurricanes, and I think I'll flood New Orleans because man... I'm really angry... or maybe that's not true" - which by your definition is not fluff, but in my definition would be if I were to seriously defend such claims.

Fluff is not defined by statements, but by reactions.

the problem is, you are not getting the whole point across. I can say to you that I am a Human, that means I'm a Human. I can say to you that I am a US Citizen, that says I am a US citizen.

If I say to you that I am an Angel, it says that I am an Angel, thereby stating that behind my computer is, quite literally, an Angel with big feathery wings and robes and armor typing away at a keyboard.

If I say that I believe I am an Incarnate Angel, it states that I am a Human that believes (but does not know) that I have within me an Angel, rather than a Human soul.

It does not say anything more than I know, because after all, I could still be very, very wrong and souls could not exist at all, or any other number of options. It specifically states what I believe and signifies in those few words the specific nature of being that I believe i exist in.

however, if you said you believe you can control hurricanes, we'd ask you what leads you to that belief. We cannot fault you in those thoughts, can't argue that you believe them. We can only argue whether or not you actually can control them.

We also could not condone an attempt, no matter how vain it may be, to commit harm to another.

Terro Wrote:If I say to you that I am an Angel, it says that I am an Angel, thereby stating that behind my computer is, quite literally, an Angel with big feathery wings and robes and armor typing away at a keyboard.

If I say that I believe I am an Incarnate Angel, it states that I am a Human that believes (but does not know) that I have within me an Angel, rather than a Human soul.

But, substantively, in the context of an Otherkin forum, what is the difference between you saying you are an Angel or believe yourself to be an Incarnate Angel? Do you believe actual Angels are living on Earth, have access to the internet and with such access feel compelled to post to internet forums? Or do you think reasonably and rationally?

What if you take "I am" to mean in soul? I am not my body for example, I am inside my body but my body is not me. My soul is me. So if I said "I am a shadow demon", that would be the truth from my point of view.
So, if I added a bunch of words in and said "I believe that my soul may be a shadow demon, in reference to shadow possibly being an entity made up of dark energies and demon meaning one that is chaotic, but this is completely open to discussion and not at all the objective truth", that would automatically make my claim valid?

Assuming that others thing reasonable and rationally serves only to further ourselves from the basic points of what we are saying.

I am of the belief that Otherkin will become mainstream. The mark, at least as I see, of a fluffy forum is one that will say whatever they please on the "given" that everyone understands that we're all Human and can't actually do in this life what we claim on a fluffy forum. Now once we get to that stage, not only can you not differentiate from the person who is saying that in a past life they had, let's say, control over fire, and a person who is saying they have control over fire right now.

To the newly awakened person coming in, or to the curious onlooker who is new to this, they will not see rational discussion, they will see a bunch of odd people that are saying they are great and mighty Dragons who are revered and battle hardened from their centuries of war experience, not people discussing strange experiences and hoping to convey their understanding of it in hopes to get other inputs from other rational people.