Dogpatch Press

Furgeddaboutit is coming to New Jersey on May 2-4, 2025. Info: Furgeddaboutit.org. There’s also The Big One furmeet. More about this shortly…

Many New Jersey furries have been demanding more honest events while protesting Garden State Fur the Weekend, the corrupt convention with a history of favoring nazi-furries. This has new developments.

• How often does a community create not one, but two alternative events to make up for a toxic one?
• Ever seen a con struggle to deny a toxic reputation — while officially operating on a pro-nazi site?

How Garden State Fur the Weekend disgraced itself

The problems with Garden State Fur the Weekend go back to its founding in 2020. Their May 2024 launch could have been a chance to set things right. Instead, if you attended, you were exposed to the management escorting Fox News cameras while they filmed nazifurs praising Trump on national TV. This was a surprise to innocent attendees and performers on stage who were NOT happy to find themselves in the crosshairs of hate. GSFTW issued excuses, and critics were banned from con groups for complaining, but nazifurs are still welcome at the con today after boasting about this on Kiwifarms.

It was part of a parade of mismanagement with ongoing reporting:

• January 2024: First article before the con. GSFTW was engaged and had a fair chance to answer, but broke their promises.
• October 2024: During and after the con, there was more deception, like switching a Chair who “stepped down” to owner.
• December-now: Monitoring thread where the con will not stop lying. (LONG!)

Con staff tried in vain to hold management accountable and avoid endangering attendees. It led to repeated staff revolts, losing guests of honor and artists, resignation of two chairs, and condemnation by other cons, but nothing could bring honesty. Now GSFTW will always be Nazi Con to those who saw it happen.

Curious Florida and Indiana connections

After Garden State Fur the Weekend lost many staff, many of their key people come from Florida, for some reason. (Like their third Chair in a year.) They are still appealing to the community as if they are a typical local con that deserves support.

Cons raise funds for charity, and Furgeddaboutit picked Cedar Run Wildlife Refuge. The New Jersey-based charity displays a commitment to Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion on its home page.

Garden State Fur the Weekend picked a charity based in Indiana, for some reason. It has a mascot, @cryptogroundhog, who predicts cryptocurrency prices and solicits crypto payments.

Charity from Furgeddaboutit helps baby skunks in New Jersey — GSFTW would support a place in Indiana.

[Editor note: updated to omit a detail about websites that is calculated for drama that doesn’t deserve to be fed.]

Guest of (dis)honor

Garden State Fur the Weekend had to get replacement guests for ones who quit. NIIC the Singing Dog stepped up, bringing the same kind of baggage as GSFTW’s owner… NIIC had gone on the Furry Raiders podcast. That’s for nazis to reach other nazis, and nobody else; a very dubious move to excuse, especially when moving on to support a disgraced convention now.

If you might wonder if this nazifur stuff was mistakes or accidents, and you feel like excusing people for not knowing what they were doing over and over, check out what GSFTW did next…

Official alt-right channel on Rumble

Garden State Fur the Weekend just opened a channel on Rumble, weeks before their next scheduled con. It’s definitely them. It uploaded videos before or at the same time as their other official channels.

Rumble is alt-tech; a would-be YouTube competitor listed by Media Matters this way:

Rumble — Extreme, right-wing video-sharing and web services company

Founded by Canadian tech entrepreneur Chris Pavlovski in 2013 and backed by various high-profile right-wing figures, Rumble plays an important role in the alternative digital infrastructure that caters to the extreme right, including far-right figures that have been banned on mainstream platforms for misinformation and hate speech. The platform is rife with QAnon content and other dangerous conspiracy theories, harmful medical misinformation, misogynistic and anti-LGBTQ hate speech, and white nationalist and antisemitic rhetoric.

A pro-nazi platform. After a year of controversy about supporting nazis and denying it… what were they thinking?

As deliberate as a Hitler salute

Searches of Rumble found zero other furry conventions using it. Results for “furries” are full of hateful attacks labeled “freaks”, transphobia, etc. Most channels titled Furry are for scammy, clout-chasing reuploads. There is no sign of any legitimate fan presence on Rumble. GSFTW has 2 followers there.

Making the channel accomplishes nothing but aligning with outsider malice, and giving a Fuck You to people who oppose nazis. Instead of pretending to care about fixing the reputation, GSFTW embraces it as surely as going on stage and throwing a Sieg Heil.

Remember that they recently welcomed back the nazifur who praised Trump on Fox News and boasted about it on Kiwifarms.

You don’t need to be exposed to bad management when you can pick events that leave no doubt that nazis are not welcome.

CHOOSE BETTER: Furgeddaboutit.

Furgeddaboutit has unique bona fides named on their site. It may be one of the only cons created by multiple pre-established groups, joining together with a common cause for the community.

Two of their Guests of Honor are Gadget and Gizmo, New Jersey fursuiters who met through their jobs as character mascots, designed and built their fursuits, and use professional mascot experience to entertain.

Their charity, Cedar Run Wildlife Refuge, has long history. It was started in the 1950’s by Betty and Jim Woodford, dedicated conservationists. Generations later, the family legacy lives on in a team and network who don’t just nurse injured/orphaned wildlife back to health for release, they also provide educational opportunities. They worked with the furry fandom in 2016 by teaming up with fursuit makers to build a mascot, Scout the Red Fox, who will be at the con.

Learn more and register at Furgeddaboutit.org.

The Big One furmeet

A two day event where there will be panels, fursuiting, dances and more.

The Big One is a furmeet rather than a full-fledged con, and they aren’t in competition with Furgeddaboutit, the con supports them. The Big One is supported by the former staff artist of GSFTW and many New Jersey furs. It comes from Pawsouls, the former PR lead for GSFTW, who joined the second wave staff revolt and went on to make a new event as proof of commitment to community.

Learn more about The Big One here.

You have the knowledge and options, and now the rest is up to you.

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