To call hellgremlins the cancer that killed the fandom would be an exceptionally literal description for them. They have caused the fandom to collapse twice to the point where all the original artists and authors had left, booru was considering shutting down due to inactivity, and everyone was despondent that there was simply nothing left to do with fluffies anymore. Both times the healing could only begin once hellgremlinists themselves got bored of angering themselves on purpose and left, letting the original fans to slowly trickle back in. It’s a miracle the fandom is still alive.
So, if you see oldfags hate the idea of depicting fluffies as evil, there’s an extremely good reason for it. Hellgremlins are like communism: Once in a while someone thinks it would be a good idea, but they have no idea how much damage it would cause.
You can vote yourself into hellgremlinism, but you have to shoot your way out?
In a more metaphorical sense, precisely so. It’s easy to catch attention with rage-inspiring pictures, but much harder to get rid of the hellgremlin ideas once new fans join in thinking they’re part of the fluffy lore. It’s either gatekeeping to keep the fandom strong, or letting it gradually turn into an unlikable cesspit of hate and then die a third time.
I strongly prefer the option that doesn’t lead into a two-year collapse, ruin the public idea of fluffies for new prospective fans, and leave the fandom struggling to rebuild itself from scratch. I have seen it two times too many already.
Thank you for clearing this up for me. I find the whole hellgremlin thing a bit to extreme and a bit unsubtle (I am a hugboxer, but I am not opposed to karmic retribution and justice being dished out) but I wondered why people are reacting so negatively to it.
I have expressed it before on the discord, and I remain strongly of the opinion that over-abundance of abuse, as well as a general air of negativity, cynicism and toxicity was what plagued the fluffy fandom, and was responsible for the booru’s decline. But I do agree that hellgremlins are part of the problem, as it fed into the vicious cycle of abusers using the hellgremlin depiction of fluffies to justify their hatred of them, which led to more abuse and so forth.
I’m going to guess I discovered the booru during a hellgremlin phase, because that’s what I remember reading first on the booru proper. The idea that some fluffies are glotched to the point they become murderfodder is kind of entrencehed for me. I try to balance it with the idea that it is only some of them, but I really love evil Smarty comeuppance. (and cannibal fluffies and puffy griffons and anything by Deadweight. I’m a simple girl with simple desires.)
I’ll try to limit the amount i write into my stuff, but that’s a hard headcanon to shift.
Doomguy is needed to rip and tear these fucking hellgremlins
I personally subscribe to the idea that fluffies can run the gamut between these two extremes. Some really are exactly how they were meant to be, but some are just bad apples. I’ve always thought the baby ranking bit made sense in ferals, what with them usually having limited resources.
ow come one man don’t blame it just on hellgrim
there is not “just and only” “black and white” there are so many grey shades plus in many many arts, stories, etc. were both existing and interacting with another
pretty much anything can corrupt when given too much power or getting too spoiled
i would recommend you to read THE FLUFFY SINK by Fluffus, that was inspired by science
there has been cruel/egoistic animals before … though most have been manipulated to that or became that way cause of their past (which could also happen to any fluffy)
the community probably will never be free fom hellgremlins but also hellgremlins won’t be the only reason, when things go down in the fluffy community, many vansihed arists mentioned other reasons, when they left or went on a hiatius (most personal reasons, burned out or bored)
demanding a fluffy community without any hellgemlin would also pretty much limit the art and creativity
just let things coexist, there is not just one headcaonen/lore that should be used/followed
plus the fluffy community was never complete) dead or collapsed, we recently just lost a site, that had a lot troubles with moderation
Please chill bruh. A man’s entitled to his headcanon. And Fox has been around for a looong time to the point where Hellgremlins showed up after he began his fluffy career. The hellgremlin period also brought a lot of trouble to the fandom, to be very fair. But that’s a story for another day.
Please enjoy yourself on this site, and be nice.
You must be really new here if you think losing the booru was anything but a bump in the road!
The hellgremlin apocalypses happened exactly the same way both times: Newfags started drawing more and more art that makes you angry, because outrage is the easiest way to attract attention. People who didn’t want to spend their time on a site more likely make them angry than happy started leaving, leading to a vicious cycle that made the fluffies more and more evil until making you mad was said to be the entire point of the fandom. Eventually even the hellgremlinists themselves grew sick of the masochistic self-aggravation, declared that fluffies were done, and left the booru a ghost town. If you think it wouldn’t happen a third time, you’d have to give some helluva convincing arguments to prove otherwise!
As for egoistic animals, fluffies aren’t animals. They’re biotoys, purpose-built for kindness. But the in-universe arguments one way or another don’t even matter - them being cute and friendly is the whole point of the fandom! If you like small animals that are just as evil and corruptible as humans, you’re not enjoying fluffies anymore. You’re enjoying hellgremlins. Or more likely, just being triggered into responding to them.
So in a nutshell, no, fluffies and hellgremlins cannot coexist. We’ve seen it before. It’s like allowing an unwashed, incontinent scatophile into a hot tub and then being surprised when only other filthy people want to use it anymore.
“It’s like allowing an unwashed, incontinent scatophile into a hot tub and then being surprised when only other filthy people want to use it anymore.”
You have an erudite, albeit disgusting, way with words, Fox.
You can’t except people to ignore or even disagree with science and especially psychology!
They are “smarter creatures” that are even capeable to talk you can’t really think science or psychology wont affect them at all!
There are kind of rabbits, when they encounter another rabbits family offspring unattended, what do they do? → They bite them in their neck, killen or crippeling them instantly! Why do they do this, to give their own offspring a better chance in survival. Transfered logical to fluffies this would end up something like “my babbehs bettah” or “my babbehs shoud suwive”.
And that is just one small example, there is a ton of offspring killing in the nature and other things that when you look at them they kinda seem hellgremlinish. And when fluffies go feral, it is just logical/natural for smarter creatures to adept some of this instincts/habits, to actually to “survive”.
Maybe then you can discuss in “how” the fluffies are made, and there are different approaches in the different headcannons/lores and yours obviousely are made without any animal instincts and perfectly created without any flaws.
And what i wanted to say is, that there was “just” a site lost, by removing a site you don’t/can’t delete the whole community/idea, it will always prevail and wait for other ways to share their “ideas” and this site maybe can be the next big thing for it.
But to be realistic you can’t win the fight for “no hellgremlin at all” everyone will post thei own art on their own thoughts and headcanons, no matter if you like it or not. You also can’t remove “every bad person” from the internet.
Let us just agree, that we disagree and just let other artist do what they want (in the frame of the sites guidelines).
This is the last time i will answer to this.
But to have a special ending and something relevant to my point, though it is quite easy to make a “smarter creature” at least “angry”.
Proof:
(cool links are allowed and work here ^^ … though this obviousely shouldn’t be overdone ^^“”")
Personally speaking, I prefer the approach of treating fluffies as “animals marketed as toys”. I know a few artists and writers who have taken this approach, and doing so allows exploration of the themes of Life being privatized or treated as a corporate product. Its a common theme in cyberpunk/genepunk, and with the level of genetic engineering fluffy ponies suggest, I think making them more animalistic and giving them animal traits allows one to explore natural instincts, whether they’re good or bad.
That said, I am not against a treatment of fluffies as pure biotoys. By pure biotoys I am thinking of the replicant from Blade Runner, which was the approach people like Meh and Ferroter went with. It is an approach that I have explored in Muthu, and I think there is some merit to exploring a canon where fluffies are a synthetic lifeform incapable of negative traits and have to rely on a programming, the type that would need tech support.
The reason why I share Fox’s opinions on hellgremlins, even though I do like to explore “fluffies as animals” is because there was enough instances of people gatekeeping and pushing a certain hivecanon of fluffies “as being the worst aspects of humanity” to the extent that they kept harassing other content creators including hugboxers. Granted, I also blame this on an overabundance of abuse, but I suppose the real problem was a general lack of civility in the culture of the booru.
The way I see Fox’s post here is that it is critique. All too often, and perhaps even now, abusers will post a picture showing how hugboxers are wrong, or why fluffies are really undeserving of any love or sympathy. Thus, Fox’s picture here shows how hellgremlins are a deliberate exaggeration of the negative aspects of fluffies, made to be something genuinely hated. That said, and given a recent discussion I’ve had a discord, I think people are free to have whatever headcanon or preferences they have with fluffies - they just need to be civil about it and not harass others. (And yes, this may apply to both sides, but I’m pretty sure abusers were more likely to harass hugboxers)
Sorry to butt in, but I don’t see how screeelord’s comment is aggressive in any way. Fox’s comment is more aggressive than screeelord’s. 
To be fair, after a word with Mister-Shitrat, i edited my comment to less aggressiv and more topic.
Ah, okay.
As I only write, I much prefer having the ability to add flaws and personalities to the fluffies rather than have them all be varying shades of sunshine and rainbows. But overall, as long as people aren’t screaming that “your canon is stupid and wrong” at each other I enjoy varying interpretations of the fluffies. In general, though, I believe they are far more good than evil
I am grateful, thank you.