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Seeing Stars, Furry Stars
Jul. 16th, 2007 11:57 pmA few weeks ago I railed a bit about a newspaper feature piece about bears that seemed to be trying to find celebrities in the bear community in order to define what a bear is. It was my contention that the two people chosen by the author, writer Andrew Sullivan and former football athlete Esara Tualo may have bearish qualities, but they don't identify as bears, at least not consistently.
It was my opinion that the bear community is mostly made up of regular joes, not celebrities, and certainly to the outside world, most wouldn't know the names below. There's something about the community that seems to eschew the idea that there would be celebrities. Most times when we try to define "bear" to someone outside, we have to point out a bear-ish, but straight man to define the type, and even then, it's hard to say what is a bear.
But what makes a bear celebrity? There are many talented people in out community, from photographers like Chris Glass![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
chrisglass to writers like Dave White djmrswhite. We have actors like Neil Badders mrdreamjeans and musicians like Kendallkendallrants. Just a few among many.
We have people in new media like podcasting and website design and others who are comedians and broadcasters. And yes, there are porn stars. Perhaps there should be more porn stars on the list below, but how many are really "names"? Even bear porn seems to be more democratic, with many unpayed guys and less based on a group of well known players.
I don't want to explain it too much, you either know the name, or you don't.
The list below is definitely short a few people, and I left a spot to nominate another person or two. Sadly, LJ made me split the list into two, but it was in an attempt to put in as many as possible. I did include Andrew Sullivan, but not Esara, and I included Armistead Mauipn who many might not think of as a bear, but in his new book seems to acknowledge bear culture. It's your decision of who's a bear and who isn't.
[Poll #1022829]
Please pardon me for any misspellings of names, OK? this is also not to pit people against each other, just to see what people think, and who's known around these parts. Lord knows the list is a little heavy on LJ'ers, for one thing!
It was my opinion that the bear community is mostly made up of regular joes, not celebrities, and certainly to the outside world, most wouldn't know the names below. There's something about the community that seems to eschew the idea that there would be celebrities. Most times when we try to define "bear" to someone outside, we have to point out a bear-ish, but straight man to define the type, and even then, it's hard to say what is a bear.
But what makes a bear celebrity? There are many talented people in out community, from photographers like Chris Glass
chrisglass to writers like Dave White djmrswhite. We have actors like Neil Badders mrdreamjeans and musicians like Kendallkendallrants. Just a few among many. We have people in new media like podcasting and website design and others who are comedians and broadcasters. And yes, there are porn stars. Perhaps there should be more porn stars on the list below, but how many are really "names"? Even bear porn seems to be more democratic, with many unpayed guys and less based on a group of well known players.
I don't want to explain it too much, you either know the name, or you don't.
The list below is definitely short a few people, and I left a spot to nominate another person or two. Sadly, LJ made me split the list into two, but it was in an attempt to put in as many as possible. I did include Andrew Sullivan, but not Esara, and I included Armistead Mauipn who many might not think of as a bear, but in his new book seems to acknowledge bear culture. It's your decision of who's a bear and who isn't.
[Poll #1022829]
Please pardon me for any misspellings of names, OK? this is also not to pit people against each other, just to see what people think, and who's known around these parts. Lord knows the list is a little heavy on LJ'ers, for one thing!
