i have a question for the mod, does anyone irl know you’re fictionkin?
I often advocate for people NOT to tell people IRL in their lives that they’re fictionkin. At least, not to tell people who are not into more ‘out there’ things themselves, whether that means being in the kin community, the occult, or just a hardcore weeaboo (or whatever).
When people come to terms with being fictionkin people often suddenly feel like they need to ‘come out’ to friends and family. This isn’t necessary. Unlike your sexuality or your gender, being kin is a purely internal experience. It doesn’t affect your rights, or your social interactions in a way that people ‘need to know about’, so there is no reason to risk it harming a social connection with someone you know. Like a politics, or a religion, there’s no harm in telling interested people in an appropriate discussion, but bringing it up out of the blue is a little rude and pushy.
That said, there are people in my life who know that I’m kin.
My best friend/QPP/moirail/blood-brother, who I have known for 17 years of my life, since we were both in 7th grade, knows that I am kin. He was the first one that I ever told. I don’t even remember the conversation any more. We were probably just talking about fiction, and what it means to us. Either way, he told me that he felt that way too. He’s not very active in the community, but he’s kin.
My best friend’s partner knows that I’m kin. He’s otherkin, and has known he was kin for many years, even if he finds the current community distasteful.
My fiancee, who is my partner of 4 years, knows that I’m kin. I told her almost jokingly at first, quite embarrassed by the entire thing. But of course once we got close it was impossible to hide my kin blogging. I refused to talk about it for a long time, and played it off as a joke because it made me uncomfortable to talk about. I worried about being judged. I finally stopped worrying about that at the beginning of this year, when my fiancee discovered she was kin as well.
Those are the good experiences. Here’s the bad one.
My toxic ex-friend knew I was kin, and never stopped rolling her eyes about it. She prided herself on being an atheist and a skeptic, so I should have known better than to tell her. She made her derision, and lack of respect known. It was clear she believe I was “smarter than that” and should know better.
