How do you identify with the participants in hard vore?

[Eupeptic]

Basically, when you are looking at vore images, or RPing, do you see yourself eating, or getting eaten, as the actual animal involved, or as a human? Some people get really into their characters, and see themselves as the animal they are playing. Others might RP as an animal, maybe to attract a certain pred or prey, or just to get an RP, but are imagining the events in the RP (or the picture they're viewing) as happening to their human selves. Or, are you able to see it as something totally separate from yourself?

I do have a suspicion on what the most popular answer will be, but you never know. I am asking in the hardvore forum because hard vore is more "for keeps"... it might be fun to imagine yourself as a human in the belly of a dragon if you know you're going to climb right out (or reform) in an hour, but going in there and not coming out, ever, is a more serious proposition -- it might tend to make people want to have it happen to a character, rather than themselves.

This stems from a not-quite-vore-related conversation IRL with a friend.

Eupeptic

[SeruOmen]

The ONE choice you didn't put- sometimes pred, sometimes prey, sometimes human, sometimes inhuman. =P

[Ka-Atis]

Mostly I identify with the predator, in the rest it is none of them. It is never the prey.

I voted human predator, as my pred creatures are more like humans than animals. However, I can also identify with animals when watching real life documentary, for instance lions or wolves.

When it comes to RP (which I haven't tried out yet) however, I can imagine both pred and prey could be fun to play. I don't necessarily need to identify with what I am playing.

[PreyKill]

Short answer: In fantasy and role-playing I most often identify with the predator as a sentient but non-human animal (not one of the choices given.) A dumb animal is best equipped to perform the vore but it takes an intelligent mind to appreciate the sadism inherent in the act.

To truly enjoy the fantasy or role-play one ought to be able to imagine both ends of the act, the imaginary suffering of the prey as well as the domination of the predator. Hard vore play is a kind of extreme sado-masochistic fantasy.

[Eupeptic]

As of this post, the poll responses are as follows. [Note 1]

votes, percent, choice
1, 5.8%, With the predator, as an animal (non-human)
2, 12%, With the predator, as a human
4, 24%, With the prey, as an animal (non-human)
3, 18%, With the prey, as a human
5, 29%, Sometimes predator, sometimes prey, but always as an animal (non-human)
1, 5.8%, Sometimes predator, sometimes prey, but always as a human
1, 5.8%, I don't personally identify with the participants

N=17 Sum=100.4%

My Probability and Statistics professor would probably slap me if he knew how small a sample size I was working from, but here goes...

I thought the most popular answer would be "prey, animal"; while that was popular, it wasn't the most popular - "pred or prey, animal" was. My theory was that in general, preys seem to outnumber preds, and that people might prefer to think of a non-human animal as prey. I'll call the "animal" part of my answer correct, since that was preferred 10 to 6 (with 1 "abstention"), or about 59% to 35%. I can't really decide on the "prey" part of my answer, mostly because lots of people took the "pred or prey" option.

The ONE choice you didn't put- sometimes pred, sometimes prey, sometimes human, sometimes inhuman.

That's just one of the problems with poll/survey design; once you have more than one option, you have to decide whether to put all of the possible combinations and permutations in or not. :) Putting in the "sometimes pred, sometimes prey" choices also introduced the possibility that I wouldn't be able to get an accurate reading on pred vs prey, and the responses so far have proven that out.

Short answer: In fantasy and role-playing I most often identify with the predator as a sentient but non-human animal (not one of the choices given.)

That was the first choice given, actually. :) I wasn't using human/non-human as a shorthand for sentient/non-sentient; all I really meant was Homo sapiens sapiens [Note 2] or not?

A dumb animal is best equipped to perform the vore but it takes an intelligent mind to appreciate the sadism inherent in the act.

I might end up going in circles a little, but I'd say that an intelligent mind is absolutely required for the sadism to even be present. One way to define sadism is as "enjoying causing pain to another", and I don't think the enjoyment can happen if there's not an intelligent mind involved. The "what's your attraction to hard vore" thread currently going in the general forum also has some discussion in this direction.

To truly enjoy the fantasy or role-play one ought to be able to imagine both ends of the act, the imaginary suffering of the prey as well as the domination of the predator.

I think most people do indeed give some thought to both sides of it. I was driving at something maybe a little different. To take the example of RP, when someone posts as a lion unzipping a zebra, is he or she visualizing a lion's paw with claws extended, or is he or she visualizing a human hand? On the other side, is the person posting as the zebra visualizing wounds opening up on a horse-like belly with black and white stripes, or as wounds opening up on a human belly?

Hard vore play is a kind of extreme sado-masochistic fantasy.

I basically agree. I may post more on this later when I'm back home and can find the book where I read some comment on this.

Eupeptic

Note 1: The forum software appears to round the percentages down to integers (i.e., floor()), which is OK if you have tons of responses, but not so good if you don't have too many. The percentages I list here are to two signifcant figures. For comparison, the percentages reported by the forum right now are, in order, 5%, 11%, 23%, 17%, 29%, 5%, 5%; sum=95%.

Note 2: I'm just waiting for somebody to indignantly reply that this doesn't account for their favorite Cro-Magnon or Neanderthal vore. :)

[Lexifoxy]

I voted prey as animal because that came closest. I used to always be the prey as myself in my vore fantasies before I found this site. Since then I usually just focus on the prey and what the pred is doing to it.

[Ka-Atis]

Actually, these results surprised me. I was always thinking there would be more preds than preys when hardvore. I was wrong, obvioulsy..

Or - alternatively - many preds rather than preys didn't bother to vote..

[Jake_Foxx]

Personally, I'm VERY noobish when it comes to hard vore. I don't know why, but I'm very attracted to being a prey in this situation. Damn those sexy preds!

[Eupeptic]

As of this post, the poll responses are as follows. [See Note 1 to my previous post in this thread.]

votes, percent, choice
3, 12%, With the predator, as an animal (non-human)
2, 8.0%, With the predator, as a human
6, 24%, With the prey, as an animal (non-human)
3, 12%, With the prey, as a human
7, 28%, Sometimes predator, sometimes prey, but always as an animal (non-human)
2, 8.0%, Sometimes predator, sometimes prey, but always as a human
2, 8.0%, I don't personally identify with the participants

N=25 Sum=100.0%

The proportions haven't changed much from last time.

Hard vore play is a kind of extreme sado-masochistic fantasy.

I basically agree. I may post more on this later when I'm back home and can find the book where I read some comment on this.

Found it.

Many animal scenes are about predator tops and prey bottoms. [...] Wild animals do a lot of snarling, growling, biting, scratching and general rumpussing. Catherine once did a scene in which both she and her top were wild animals, and agrees to speak only in growls, shrieks, hisses, purrs and such (a great scene that cost them both sore throats for several days).

(From "The Bottoming Book", ISBN 9-9639763-1-1.)

OK, it wasn't a long quote, but it did mention predator/prey in the context of BDSM. That book is about S&M in general; it's not particularly about vore.

I was always thinking there would be more preds than preys when hardvore.

Another piece of data that was floating around in my mind was that I read a number (unknown source or accuracy) that suggested the ratio of "tops" to "bottoms" in gay (male) S&M was around 1 to 6. Again, I don't know how accurate that number is, but it seems to agree with my limited experience that there are more bottoms than tops.

Eupeptic

[Lexifoxy]

Another piece of data that was floating around in my mind was that I read a number (unknown source or accuracy) that suggested the ratio of "tops" to "bottoms" in gay (male) S&M was around 1 to 6. Again, I don't know how accurate that number is, but it seems to agree with my limited experience that there are more bottoms than tops.

Eupeptic

I always wondered about that. What about straight guys and straight gals? Aren't most straight guys on top?

[WolfSushi]

Nonhuman prey, mainly. Alltho I still often fantisize of my RL self being eaten.

[Ka-Atis]

I always wondered about that. What about straight guys and straight gals? Aren't most straight guys on top?

You mean on top physically, or playing the dominant role?

[Lexifoxy]

Either.

semi-related: in the movie Supersize Me, where Spurlock eats only McDonalds, his wife says it took such a hit on his health, that before when they had sex, he would always be on top. But when he was doing this, he had to be on bottom.

[HardVorePredatrix]

I always identify with the predator. F/F human is for me. I do cheer the animal predators that just want to take a nice gory bite out of some bitch in a movie when I watch movies though. "crocodile,(sunny) etc.

[Abraxa]

...

[Eupeptic]

As of this post, the poll responses are as follows. [See Note 1 to my previous post in this thread.]

votes, percent, choice
3, 9.7%, With the predator, as an animal (non-human)
3, 9.7%, With the predator, as a human
7, 23%, With the prey, as an animal (non-human)
3, 9.7%, With the prey, as a human
9, 29%, Sometimes predator, sometimes prey, but always as an animal (non-human)
4, 13%, Sometimes predator, sometimes prey, but always as a human
2, 6.5%, I don't personally identify with the participants

n=31 sum=100.6%

The proportions haven't changed much from last time.

Reducing it a little, on the pred-prey axis we have:
6, 19%, Predator
10, 32%, Prey
13, 42%, Sometimes predator, sometimes prey
2, 6.5%, Don't personally identify
(sum=99.5%)
It looks like people tend to identify with the prey more than the predator, but if there wasn't a "sometimes pred, sometimes prey" category, this could come out the other way around.

And on the human/animal axis, we have:
19, 61%, Animal
10, 32%, Human
2, 6.5%, Don't personally identify
(sum=99.5%)
On this it's much more clear that people identify with animals rather than humans.

No, I'm not a slightly-bored geek or anything... :)

Eupeptic

[Leonard]

I tend to agree with Abraxa.

You forgot the option of "both at once"! Often when I fantasize about vore situations, I like to imagine the sensations of both the one being eaten and the one doing the eating.

In my own personal vore fantasies I tend to switch prospectives back and forth between pred and prey. The contrast between the sheer terror of the prey on the verge of loosing it's life and the pred's delight in gaining a good meal is absolute. I couldn't imagine a situation where the contrast between point of view could be greater. I tend to shift back and forth untell the death of the prey then stay on the pred untell the meal is consumed.

In my fantasies both pred and prey have animalistic bodies but have full human cognition and sometimes share a common language.

[Eupeptic]

Since Leonard (nice avatar btw) resurrected this thread, I of course feel bound by the geek code of honor to update the statistics. :)

As of this post, the poll responses are as follows. [See Note 1 to my previous post in this thread.]

votes, percent, choice
6, 14%, With the predator, as an animal (non-human)
4, 9.1%, With the predator, as a human
10, 23%, With the prey, as an animal (non-human)
3, 6.9%, With the prey, as a human
12, 27%, Sometimes predator, sometimes prey, but always as an animal (non-human)
5, 11%, Sometimes predator, sometimes prey, but always as a human
4, 9.1%, I don't personally identify with the participants

n=44 sum=100.1%

On the pred-prey axis we have:
10, 23%, Predator
13, 30%, Prey
17, 39%, Sometimes predator, sometimes prey
4, 9.1%, Don't personally identify
(sum=101.1%)

And on the human/animal axis, we have:
28, 64%, Animal
10, 27%, Human
4, 9.1%, Don't personally identify
(sum=100.1%)

Eupeptic

[Dragonic_Wolf]

I wouldnt mind being the prey in hard vore... its hard to explain why from a hard voraphiles point of view, or my point of view. I noticed some Hard voraphiles though, look at hard vore as some kind of gore, and have little feel of the eating, swallowing and digestion involved.

I really dont know how to explain it though.

[Eupeptic]

CAUTION: egosearching leads to necroposting!

As of this post, the poll responses are as follows. [See Note 1 to my previous post in this thread.]

votes, percent, choice
8, 14%, With the predator, as an animal (non-human)
4, 7.0%, With the predator, as a human
13, 23%, With the prey, as an animal (non-human)
6, 11%, With the prey, as a human
14, 25%, Sometimes predator, sometimes prey, but always as an animal (non-human)
5, 8.8%, Sometimes predator, sometimes prey, but always as a human
7, 12%, I don't personally identify with the participants
n=57 sum=100.8%

The proportions on this one have changed a little from earlier results.

On the pred-prey axis we have:
12, 21%, Predator
19, 33%, Prey
19, 33%, Sometimes predator, sometimes prey
7, 12%, Don't personally identify
(sum=99%)

This one is still kind of inconclusive. "Predator" is less popular than "prey" but a lot of people go both ways.

And on the human/animal axis, we have:
35, 61%, Animal
15, 26%, Human
7, 12%, Don't personally identify
(sum=99%)

Animal/non-human is pretty clearly more popular than human.

Eupeptic