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| Don't know what happened to it's unique design. It used to have a style for it's title. |
The general motto is "furry food for thought", which is based off "food for thought".
Is Flayrah really an interesting furry site that considers "food for thought" to a lot of people though? Is it a healthy site for communities to be treated as welcoming people? Does it have a fair system for debate? And is the news usually about interesting furry stuff?
No, no, no, and... kinda? For the "kinda" part, it's not exactly what you would expect.
Some Is Interesting, Many Aren't
Many parts of the website does indeed talk a lot about furry stuff, after all, it's a furry focused site, which includes four-legged anthropomorphic characters.
However, I do not agree that just showing a furry art piece is itself interesting, and the sad problem about the site is that most of the posts are usually reviews, news of random crime, and possibly other things with little to no interesting information.
Perhaps maybe at least most of the reviews can have interesting content in them?
Sadly I so far failed to find any interesting criticism in a review I think.
One of the worst reviews I've seen was an Alpha and Omega review (the first movie's) which clearly stifles creativity by trying to call out the designs because it's not the person's thing. One of the worst parts about such review is this:
"Most characters don't stand out on their own in any way; the exceptions are sometimes for the wrong reasons. Eve (Kate's mother), for example, stands out for having a nose at least twice the size of anyone else in the film."Even though, many movies has always had "wacky" designs on different characters of the same species before. The reason is likely because if you make them look too similar, they won't look as unique.
Many parts of the review does nothing but insult the creator's creativity and then suggesting a message which stifles creativity instead. There is nothing "food for thought" about the review, it's just a person who is being biased and unfair.
Speaking of "biased", another person made another review with a title in reaction to me talking about the subject of "biased" here. Was that one an interesting message? Well, it sounded nothing new, that argument is based upon what most people would think.
I think this should be considered food for thought for example: https://another-realm.deviantart.com/journal/Objective-of-Critiquing-Exists-725881839
Even though it's my article, I still argue it's a good argument despite me not being that good at writing. The article (or journal) linked argues a main belief that has barely been addressed and attempts to show something a lot of people may have never thought of before. It's *ahem*... something to think about, isn't it?
There are some articles that at least try to give criticism, but does that automatically make it food for thought? Are they alone interesting?
The Main Community
What counts as the main community? That would probably be anyone who comments and has an account. Guests might however count too especially if they have an account already. On here though, we may depend on the majority for this one and who is more known and is active. It's really impossible for a website to have everyone who is part of the community to behave the same. There may always be that one person who does disruptive behavior.
When it comes to many active and more known people commenting, it's not so good. Most of the time, it's one sided, and anyone who attempts to criticize a point may cause emotional uproar just like an average social media site where a questionable opinion is more popular than the other and anyone who disagrees will get bashed. In fact maybe, some people act like I wasn't allowed to disagree with a point in a review because they think reviews can't be questioned maybe. This emotional problem can cause drama, and if there is such system, some may attempt to rate comments to a low score out of an irrational mindset instead of an rational one. Some systems can have a "hide" system within it, and many good interesting comments can be hidden while irrational garbage comments gets praised instead. This tries ruins a good healthy relationship within the community.
Another problem is that some members are clearly assholes, as some are more for personal insults.
Yet, another problem is that the site tries to give this illusion of "reputation" and possibly another sense, making many users feel scared of possibly posting interesting criticism. This is perhaps one of the most depressing feelings to ever have on this site, and the main issue here is that some of the major problems mentioned in this sub section of the article may cause such bad feeling.
It's also possible some furries have left the site due to the community problems.
Some Pictures
NEW UPDATE 12/3/2018:
2cross2afflication straight out spreads dangerous false information.
I'm talking about that area with the claim that I am defending something horrible.
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| Reacting to a comment that had nothing to do with defending having sex with children. |
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| And there are many people on this website who is part of the agenda that promotes ruining a person's life. |
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| A user leaving due to Flayrah's problems. I do not want to mention who, and I ask anyone else to not speak of the person's name as I assume the person doesn't want that due to a post I've seen. I do not want to drag this person into drama, thanks. |
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| According to the user (2cross2affliction), I've somehow been rude for... having my own criticism? |
Also, to be safe, here is a comment from me regarding that porn:
"And it's not that I "defended" child porn, I was making arguments more around it and some that MIGHT sound a little for it, but I never blatantly defended it.
I just wanted to question stuff like "It creates a demand", "it hurts the victim" and/or that it's treated like it's "rape", all in terms of possession alone. Why? Because those arguments can be bad and compared to a LOT of things that may be legal. Those arguments are horrible and dangerous alone. And hell, I even said I hope the person doesn't possess child porn again."
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| My comment on top, insulting comment below my comment. |
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| Reaction (bottom comment) to my comment. |
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| Telling me to leave. Possible hypocrisy in comment. |
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| 2cross2affliction being a complete dick now on another thread. |
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| Part of one of 2cross2affliction's comments. |
Speaking of this person (2cross2affliction), he's admitted he's rude, but I don't know if I'm wrong but to me it's as if he gets to be rude, but I can't... While that's stupid, I still argue many of the things he said is "rude" isn't rude. Anyway, this guy is seriously causing a lot of problems. He even said I'm "no victim" as if that's always the case for his mistakes just because of a mistake I could of done on there for example.
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| Bottom comment. |
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| Insulting me as a writer. |
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| Again, another insult. Coming from a Pokemon fan who gives direct links to Pokemon pornography on Deviantart. |
The Rating System and Why It's Flawed
In some snapshots here on this article, you may noticed a row of stars in the count of 5. It's the rating system, a system that allows members and even guests to vote on a comment and/or article. One star is considered the poorest, and five stars is considered "Awesome".The problem with this system is that it usually allows others to consider interesting criticism to be considered "poor" while terrible comments get praised. When it comes to emotional subjects, it gets rather abused heavily. If someone for example tried to question the popular belief among the majority of the site, the comment will likely be rated as "poor" (one star), even if you give out good links to studies. When it comes to pages like that, a lot of people there seem to be more irrational than rational. That type of behavior attempts to bash anyone who dares question some beliefs, not only reacting badly, and rating the comments down, but when a comment is rated very down, the comment will be "hidden", and you would have to click on it to actually see it, making it easier to miss the comment, and that's censorship.
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| Note: I probably voted my own comment because of how unfair it was. |
"Poor" votes can also happen due to just hatred for the person and I might be a victim of that too.
Why do we even have a rating system in the first place? It's unfair, and by unfair, I mean in this general problem I'm already trying to address. This rating system can also cause others to be scared to post their opinions and/or good solid points. It's mainly a tool to hide others, a tool that causes fear, and a tool that gets used in an attempt to abuse good points, and/or things that may be interesting in a good way.
The only good thing about it, is that it can also be used as a way to recommend good comments and/or comments not good or bad.
- Ditched the "low ratings" and make a "like" system instead: Have comments have a "liked", or similar function instead.
- Ditched any rating system.
- Allow others to disable the ratings on their comments and article, publicly. Youtube does this for videos, by the way.
Of course, the only time I'm for deleting a comment entirely is if it was illegal.
Here is something GreenReaper (owner of website) partly said in a comment to me:
Yes, a consequence which causes multiple problems. Fear is one of those things. There can be some pretty bad arguments that is emotionally supported on the site, but due to ratings, some people are afraid to address it. Backlash can also be an issue."It is also not a zero-sum game: in my experience everyone is able to post comments which are considered good enough not to be folded; but often they choose not to. The rating system provides a consequence to that choice."
For example, there is an argument claiming something of "Possession of certain porn creates a demand!" and that argument alone is itself a problem. I could say something like:
"That argument is based upon fear, and if merely possessing such porn "creates" a demand, then what about violence in video games? Doesn't that "create" a demand too? What about fictional certain porn? Won't that "create" a demand as well? What if the person possessed it for crime report? After all, the person DID view it after all, which must of effected the view count, "creating" a demand. I find that demand claim to be a poor argument. Demand should be literally mean what it means if I'm thinking right, not fear."
And what happens then? The comment will likely get 1-stared, then folded, and some making empty claims will get praised. I'm also sure 2cross2affliction will call that "wrong" and "evil" because that's what he does. He doesn't respect free speech (or rather naturally since the website may have legal rights to censor it), and he calls that type of disagreements "evil" and "wrong".
There wasn't really any attempt to make any interesting points back in such likelihood example.
Just recently, I wanted to add a bit more stuff GreenReaper very much said recently in 2019 (note: pasting might make layout slightly off):
I think you're trying to say there's an objective measure of quality, based on the construction of argument, and therefore if you're making well-reasoned, well-constructed arguments, you should be rated highly. But you're way off base. Quality is in the eye of the beholder. If they don't agree with your argument, they'll consider it to be a poor comment, or at best OK; certainly not great.Not only I argued that quality is not in the eye of the beholder, but even another user went in and stand against the idea that it is in the eye of the beholder.
If essentially everyone disagrees with a comment, it's terrible and doesn't require further consideration except by the masochistic. That's what folding tries to do: eliminate suck. Non-controversial comments don't suck, or at least not enough to deserve folding. Even controversial ones tend not to fold - just fade, to represent the weakness of their support by the community.
You can probably guess what happened to comments in terms of ratings system.
I got spammed and censored with the effects of low ratings, no matter how well I try to argue why quality is not in the eye of the beholder.
The News
The news is perhaps slightly interesting. Though is that an excuse to judge it, though?
Well, first many news don't seem to offer any interesting points I think.
But at usual, it does it's job at reporting some furry related stuff. The odd part is that I often see crime reports involving children and I'm not so sure if reporting someone for possessing certain porn because the person is a furry does it's job right.
I also think certain news can rather promote harm to the individuals who need help. It's almost as if Flayrah is expecting a furry to be "perfect" and if not, they expose it like it's breaking news.
Conclusion
It's not a healthy furry site. It's more rotten in general. The community in general is poor, especially how part of the community acts to those who disagree with popular opinion, many "food" in some articles is more rotten, the ratings system is unfair, and creates an unhealthy sense by causing fear. The news is perhaps the only slightly thing useful, but even that has problems sometimes.
The worst part about the site is probably the community. Not everyone is doing bad behavior, of course.
2/10
Terrible
Also I don't think I'm so good at article editing. However I hope my article comes out clear enough. Article may get updated and has already been updated at times.
