R u 1?

[Wolf Gal]

some people are werewolves but i think that some people just say that for fun.

but me, myself we all have a werewolf insde of us waiting to be triggered.

me mine is already triggered. any else who has been triggered send me an email.

[Gevaudan]

I don't want to be that guy, but this isn't a website devoted exclusively to werewolf spirit beliefs. We appreciate all aspects of werewolves: legends, fiction, anatomy, science, beliefs, art, etc. We're nothing more than a fan-base, and I think that we should remain so. Am I saying that people who believe in werewolves are not welcome here? No. What I am saying is that we already have a multitude of threads about this topic, and those who believe are just as welcome as anyone else. We need to come together not as a therian community, but as a werewolf community, and I just feel that we're losing sight of that.

This may just be me ranting about having nothing to talk about now that Freeborn has slowed to a imperceptible crawl, but I just wanted to put my opinion out there.

[IndianaJones]

Therian and Werewolf can both match.

[Gevaudan]

Therian and Werewolf can both match.

I know, I'm just wondering what happened to the werewolf side of things. Maybe they escaped out the window when AB left.

[Berserker]

What really annoys me are therians who call themselves werewolves. There are people on other forums who do this. I'm glad there are none here!

[Cyberwatt]

some people are werewolves but i think that some people just say that for fun.

but me, myself we all have a werewolf insde of us waiting to be triggered.

me mine is already triggered. any else who has been triggered send me an email.

Perhaps a better question would be, 'Who was triggered yet didn't send an email lest they be exposed?' Hmm...

If I may quote from the master, Mr. Lovecraft:

"To say that we actually believed in vampires or werewolves would be a carelessly inclusive statement. Rather must it be said that we were not prepared to deny the possibility of certain unfamiliar and unclassified modifications of vital force and attenuated matter; existing very infrequently in three-dimensional space because of its more intimate connection with other spatial units, yet close enough to the boundary of our own to furnish us occasional manifestations which we, for lack of a proper vantage-point, may never hope to understand.

...

In any case such a monster must of necessity be in our scheme of things an anomaly and an intruder, whose extirpation forms a primary duty with every man not an enemy to the world's life, health, and sanity."

Such is the point of view of all who have not yet felt the burning, transforming light of Luna.

Cheers,
CW

[Nightmane]

Let me just start out by saying... that we as a race, cannot hope to comprehend the things that run in the night. Having sayed that, i myself believe there out there. Would I love to meet one? Of Course! but I respect the fact that they may just wish to left alone, if they exsist at all, and as a race we can nether prove nor disprove the fact that they exsist. This is of course my own beliefs on the subject, no more no less.

[Kavik]

If I may quote from the master, Mr. Lovecraft:

"To say that we actually believed in vampires or werewolves would be a carelessly inclusive statement. Rather must it be said that we were not prepared to deny the possibility of certain unfamiliar and unclassified modifications of vital force and attenuated matter; existing very infrequently in three-dimensional space because of its more intimate connection with other spatial units, yet close enough to the boundary of our own to furnish us occasional manifestations which we, for lack of a proper vantage-point, may never hope to understand.

CW, what is the source of that quote? It sounds familiar, but I can't place the book I read it in.

Oh, and to stick with the original theme of the thread, much as I want to, I sadly do not believe in werewolves, though I do believe in therians.

[Cyberwatt]

CW, what is the source of that quote? It sounds familiar, but I can't place the book I read it in.

It's from HPL's "The Shunned House." A very good read.

[Vagrant]

We need to come together not as a therian community, but as a werewolf community, and I just feel that we're losing sight of that.

I have to stress here that that reads in a horrible way, I'll illuminate a little: It sounds like anyone with a therian preference who also happens to be a werewolf fan making this board impure and taking away from its initial purpose.

How can that be? In fact, why were therian beliefs highlighted here? A therian is not someone who believes werewolves to be real, if you're going to make a stab at something then please at least make sure you're making a stab at the right thing.

A therian is someone who, yes, has a spiritual connection with animals and, yes, has shamanistic inclinations. A real therian would not even try to promote the idea of werewolves as something that everyone should believe in, so no one has any business tying therians into this.

I just wanted to highlight that: If you really feel the need to rant at someone for believing in werewolves, then do that. Don't pick a random system of belief and assign it to them just because it seems apt. :/ I'm a therian and I'm not sure if I believe in werewolves even (all I know is that I'm tired of anyone who feels the weird urge to rabidly try and disprove their existence, but that doesn't mean I believe in them either).

[Gevaudan]

We need to come together not as a therian community, but as a werewolf community, and I just feel that we're losing sight of that.

I have to stress here that that reads in a horrible way, I'll illuminate a little: It sounds like anyone with a therian preference who also happens to be a werewolf fan making this board impure and taking away from its initial purpose.

How can that be? In fact, why were therian beliefs highlighted here? A therian is not someone who believes werewolves to be real, if you're going to make a stab at something then please at least make sure you're making a stab at the right thing.

A therian is someone who, yes, has a spiritual connection with animals and, yes, has shamanistic inclinations. A real therian would not even try to promote the idea of werewolves as something that everyone should believe in, so no one has any business tying therians into this.

I just wanted to highlight that: If you really feel the need to rant at someone for believing in werewolves, then do that. Don't pick a random system of belief and assign it to them just because it seems apt. :/ I'm a therian and I'm not sure if I believe in werewolves even (all I know is that I'm tired of anyone who feels the weird urge to rabidly try and disprove their existence, but that doesn't mean I believe in them either).

I'm sorry. I was a bit angry when I wrote that. I didn't mean to offend anyone. I honestly don't want to "purify" the board of any beliefs of anything, and I apologize if my wording made my message seem insulting. I guess I wasn't specific enough, and I realize that I stereotyped the word "therian." I mean no harm, and I'll try to explain the essence of my message without resorting to name-calling or blind fury.

I always try to be tolerant and friendly with anybody who has any shamanistic, spiritual, therian, furry, or werewolf beliefs. In fact, I'm occasionally willing to incorporate their worldviews into my own.

What I am a bit peeved at are people on The Pack who, without any provocation or visible motive, consistently try to force their belief in werewolves on others. They aren't being made fun of nor do they have much support from the community, but for some reason unknown to me they keep trying to find others who believe in werewolves just as passionately as they do, and make many unnecessary posts to prove their point. Because of their persistence, everyone else either loses interest or becomes angry at them, like I did in my first post on this thread.
That is why I've got my knickers in a bunch.

I would be fine with them if they would just pull back the reins a bit. I'm a theist, but you don't see me posting everywhere saying "Do you believe in God?" and "How has God affected your life today?" and "Post here if you love God as much as I do!"

I'm not mad at them specifically, because I'm sure if I met them in person they would be friendly people that could easily strike up an interesting conversation. I just view what they're doing as attention-grabbing, and I would very much appreciate it if they could build up their reputation in a more productive and less "in-your-face" way.

That being said, in my post I was simply proposing that we look at werewolves themselves once again. Recently, all I've seen in the "Building the Ultimate Werewolf" forums are posts that wonder about the existence of werewolves. I was only saying that I think we've had enough recent posts about their existence, and that we could start looking at what they would be like as a character model, fictional or not. People will always have disagreements, but I want to see disagreements over werewolves specifically, rather than their existence in our reality.

Hopefully my message didn't come across as caustically as my first post in this thread. To be honest, this is really only a minor issue, and if it were not cleared up, I could still tolerate it.

[Berserker]

What I believe Gevaudan was talking about is a phenomenon where therians gravitate towards areas of discussion involving werewolves or anthropomorphic characters, at first harmlessly, but eventually resulting in a kind of community dilution.

As the number of therians grows, eventually, a few outspoken posters start to intentionally blur the line between traditionally understood definitions of "werewolf" and their personal spiritual beliefs, even going so far as to call themselves werewolves, whether they can physically shapeshift or not. Or, they simply fail to distinguish their spiritual ideas with some of the very post-modern concepts of werewolves that we're familiar with, and unfortunately, this results in a muddling of the key distinction between the two concepts, so that impressionable people will read descriptions of what is really spiritual therianism and think they're reading about werewolfery/lycanthropy. (alt.horror.werewolves anyone?)

Consequently, word gets out that the community is a harbor for "real" werewolves, and it attracts a slew of people eager to attribute random personal spiritual and physical experiences to the idea of being a werewolf (i.e. "I have weird reflexes sometimes and I can smell things that other people can't," "I dream I'm a wolf at night and it seems real," "I have sharp canine teeth and I really like steak," etc.) The end result is a place full of people who have created some kind of fantasy world where the meaning of the term "werewolf" is so contentious and divorced from anything really meaningful, that critical discussion about it becomes infected with sheer obnoxiousness.

The same thing has occurred for communities for discussing things like "witches" and "vampires." It is a phenomenon almost completely exclusive to the Internet.

So when Gavaudan warns against us becoming a community of therians, what he's really warning against is the idea of werewolves becoming so diluted that it ruins the experience for the rest of us.

[outwarddoodles]

I'm with Gevaudan and Berserker on this, and I'm very appreciative Gev for being 'that guy.'

It's a strange dilemma and, admittedly, hard to effectively draw the line between fandoms and beliefs. But I always veiwed the PACK as a gathering of primarily Fictional werewolf FANS -- the steak and the potatos consisting of core media and opinions, whereas the side dishes consisting of those stray discussions concerning therianthropes and the larger questions regarding the existence of werewolves. It's fiction and imagination; not conspiracy and belief.

It's not that anyone on the PACK is against these sorts of discussion -- it's just not our core focus. It's like talking about video games on a bodybuilding forum.

A therian is someone who, yes, has a spiritual connection with animals and, yes, has shamanistic inclinations.

You're totally disregarding the therians who veiw themselves as having a physiological/psychological abnormality; or the majority of those that DON'T hold shamanistic paradigms. /nit picky

(But I, likewise, agree with the rest of your post.)

[Grey]

Well here it's still fun to belive we are really were wolves. Though some more then others. But there's nothing wrong with that. I mean heck, there are times I do feel my wolfish side welling up enough to influance how I act.