Why more males than females?

[IndianaJones]

I have seen some 'mainstream' movies or comic books. Like Marvel for example. I remember seeing a snapshot of the Adventures of Spider Woman. There is a issue about a female werewolf and the plot goes that Spider Woman's sister is missing most at night and there has been grisly rumors of people getting killed by a giant wolf-like monster. I saw the snapshots of the pages and I see this giant female werewolf with blond hair and brown furred body. The werewolf in that book has no breasts and a muscular manly-shaped body. Spider Woman fights with her and after she wins. The werewolf reverts to her human form. The transformation itself is not bad at all. After she reverts, she told Spider Woman that she is not her 'sister' anymore.

Also in White Wolf's Werewolf RP series. Female Werewolves are depicted as having no breasts in their werewolf forms and they are bit too muscular. Meaning that some of the artists like there female werewolves to be less you know, female. Like their breasts flatten when they shapeshift.

[Enir]

Well in truth it's all a matter of personal opinion. And in my opinion if your going to have a (female) werewolf character then she should have some female characteristics like there human female counterparts/other selves/form.Once again just my opinion and no iam not stateing this in an agressive way tword your comment.(Just to clarify )

[Shingmanituu]

Gender ratio in werewolves obviously favors the males.Here are my theories based on transmittion modes.

Through bites.

Men would be more likely to be out after dusk.Say to get wood,or hunting game,fetching car keys,pulling a late nighter,etc.Putting them in further risk of contact.Men can also be more willing to tangle with something,esspecially if the werewolf hasn't changed or is just starting to,not noticably a wolf.Survival of attacks may also be related not to mens ''stregnth'' but body size and speed.Men are typically larger than women,in general.More mass equals possibly more blood to bleed out,thus giving more escape time before bleeding to death.Men are typically faster runners than women(illustrated in gender speed times for the same race in olympic sprinters) giving a higher chance to get away and get medical attention for an animal attack.

As for genders being related to genetics(born werewolves)

females have an 'x' males are a 'y', females were the original genetic gender,males evolved from an X chromosome(why men have nipples,and no need for them type thing) and lost that genetic 2nd leg. the fact there are female werewolves concludes,that it is not only found in the male genome,but the female(mitochondrial) DNA as well,or it would be male genders only.
In canid populations,there are more males than females,as is the gender ratio in humans favored to males.It would be reason to believe that werewolves(human canid mix) would follow suite. My theory is that it takes 2 copies of mutated mitochondrial DNA,one inherited from each of the parents,to produce a ''werewolf''.Since many werewolves were killed,as demons, you have a bottleneck in genetic carriers for a ''wolf gene'',reducing the number of potential carriers.Genetic probability of the both pairs in a 2 parent carrier is 25%,or one out of 4 hit rate chance of throwing the mutation from both.Then you have to get 2 carriers together issue,to even create the chance of werewolf conception.With a gender ratio being higher for males,probability says that more males would be born than females.Hence,the higher male population.

[AngryGothChick]

Hm... lycanthropy posed as an STD? Well, I can't see why not. In some stories it could simply be another transmission method, perhaps in a tale where the Werewolves weren't violent, they use sex primarily (except for rare cases) to transmit the virus, and that could be why it's easier for males. Females might have to undergo a blood transfusion or endure a bite, which they may be less inclined to.

It's certainly an interesting thought, thanks for sharing, it'll be interesting to see what takes people have on that.

Lycanthropy std? Reminds me of Ginger Snaps.

[Morkulv]

Also I thought I could make out a second set of smaller breasts under the first

Could be, but it depends on wether the female werewolf can have a litter of pups or not.

[WilkoWolf]

I think the whole 'don't want to see a woman as a hairy beastie' theory is quite plausible. Look at vampires, their numbers seem much more equal. Why? Because they can be made alluring and sexy easily.

As for the whole boobs thing, I'm sure shots can be taken that don't show anything.

[RedEye]

While there may be some folks who don't want to see a woman as a "Hairy Beastie", I would refer you to Sugarpoultry's art as a counter argument.
Her Femme Werewolves are not only beautiful and sexy, they can be stark naked and not show a thing, thanks to their coat of fur.

There is another potential reason for the excess of male werewolves that has nothing to do with cuteness; Males are traditionally the "physically violent" types in both real life and in fiction. Since the general blather about werewolves always seems to make them violent, making them male is a sort of mental reflex. "Guys bust things up, werewolves bust things up; so werewolves must all be guys."

This works in the case of the "Curse" scenario, but means the likelyhood of a "biological" scenario is rather remote; and forget the idea of a population of werewolves anywhere.

Hmmm...an idea: Might Lycanthropy be a gender-selective situation, like Haemophelia? Both genders carry the gene, but it only goes active in males.
In females it's a recessive inactive genetic problem. That could apply to Lycanthropy as well, perhaps.

[Noir-Okami]

Hmmm...an idea: Might Lycanthropy be a gender-selective situation, like Haemophelia? Both genders carry the gene, but it only goes active in males.
In females it's a recessive inactive genetic problem. That could apply to Lycanthropy as well, perhaps.

True. Then female werewolves would have to have both their mom and dad having the gene, which would, in turn, also mean that the dad was a werewolf, too.

...

Which would be kind of funny. The daughter thinks that the dad's going to give her 'the talk,' and he starts talking about werewolves instead of sex. Of course the daughter would think he's insane... And if it was the son, then if one of the parents is a werewolf, they're kind of stuck.

(I love the Edit button.)

[DarkOriaes]

I know this was mentioned already earlier on in the posts. But my thoughts on the reason why we don't have as many female werewolves as we do with the men may be the change itself. It also would depend on the situation. Like for instance if the woman was bitten and then just ran out and doesn't get any help what so ever. She might have a very painful change that could either end up getting her killed or would have her led up to getting killed (Lets say she was close to exposing werewolves entirely and they go out to kill her without a second thought?) On the other hand, she might be lucky enough to find someone who will help her with the change. It would be funny if the said person that bites her was embarrassed and came up and said

"Hey...sorry about biting you earlier."
"What are you talking about?"
"I'm the mangy dog you were mentioning to your sister that you ran into."
"...!?!?!"

From what happens next it all depends on the guy or whoever was unfortunate to get mixed up in the situation of her getting bitten.

One other thing, for me, I can only imagine that when you get bitten--whether your a man or a woman. That bite would be rather savage..so they might not even be able to live after the bite and just die quickly by it. But again, just theories and ideas on my part on this.

[RedEye]

There is also the possibility that there are just as many females as males, only they really don't want people to know about it. And as a werewolf, they would be able to make their anonymity stick.

I like Dark's idea...where a young lady discovers that she and her whole family get fuzzy from time to time; although how her parents could have kept her from finding out has me scratching my head trying to figure how it might happen.

Then too; women might just be smart enough to believe the signs saying "Stay out of the forest: Werewolf season" while a man might decide to go after one.

Third potential: Female werewolves are more morphologically stable and far less likely to shift than males.

There are lots of potential reasons...

[DarkOriaes]

What about the fact that in stories or movies we just don't get to SEE any female werewolves? Are we too consumed on the fact of what the female werewolf would like after the change? Cause if we really really think about it, I don't think she'll be keeping her *ahem* boobs after the change. They are supposed to look more like a she-wolf. But then again, we have such a far out creative mind on what we think should be the typical werewolf look. That people probably think that the female werewolves keep that particular asset and wouldn't want to show it in the movies. After all, they would have to make it rated R with all the flashing lol

[blodyglass]

female wolves are more dominant and more conflict can happen. males usually sit around unless its the alpha...

[KamenRex]

I know I wanna see more female werewolves. Truth be told, when looking into wolf structure, a pack will more likely than not consist of mostly females as male of sexual maturity typically leave the original pack in order to form their own. That's not to say that werewolves have to follow true wolves 100%, but from a natural perspective it would make more sense to have more female werewolves. As for females not being strong enough to handle a werewolf bite, it would have to be pretty intense. Yes, the typical woman is not as resilliant as a man but it's not like women just up and die when trauma is done to them. As both a woman and someone who has been bitten by a dog, I can tell you that it hurts but it honestly wasn't the worst thing to have happened to me. It would depend on what the "bite" was. If it was a single bite to a non vital area (as most werewolf transfer bites tend to be) then it is very likely that almost everyone woman would survive it. If the werewolf outright attacked teh person, then it doens't matter if they are male or female, chance are their throat was attacked and they bled to death. Wolves in general hoenstly aren't all that aggressive In the fact the better way to look at wolf to human comparison through a werewolf would most likely be that being half human would make the wolf side more aggressive, instead of the other way around.
It's not like I am an expert on werewolves, but I would enjoy more females. I do think it's interesting to think of natural born lycanthropy as being a sex-linked trait (to clarify, that's not an STD it's an inheirited trait that is attached to the X chromosome), certainly a neat point but I woudl rather see more strong female werewolves than further the male stereotype. I suppose media tends to use males because they are affraid to show nude females or the beastly aftermath... but then again it's not like female werewolfs HAVE to have breasts in their were-form. Just altering the appearance of certain features can make a werewolf lok more feminine than masculine, and if need be one can always opt for breast completely covered by fur and therefore no "inappropriate" parts showing. They aleady do this for mal werewolves... anyone who has seen a nude man or a male canine can tell you that, theoretically, a male werewolf would have much worse "inappropriate" parts showing. The fact that they already edit that to just be a fur patch with no buldge and absolutely no canine sheath says that they can and actively WILL edit the were-form to be appropriate for most ages. By this logic, I feel that saying that female werewolves "can't be shown" due to their breasts is a problem only cuased by the fact that they WANT to keep her breasts apparant.

That's just my take. I'm all for more females, especially since wolf logic woudl dictate that a pack would consist of more female werewolves than males. I've personally had a very strong werewolf character, her were-form had no visible breasts. She was created for a tabletop RPG, ended up being the effectivly leader of the adventuring party (though everyone else was a human and typically uncomfortable about her being a werewolf). I think as humans we are quick to give the actiony parts to males because they're big and strong and typically dominant, but it gets old very quickly. Not to mention that when we DO see a fem werewolf she's usually just a subordinate and has almost no mind of her own... this doesn't come from wolf social structure.. this is just the human perversion of what we want it to be.
(By the way, I'm not trying to start fights. This is my opinion. I enjoy female werewolves more than males, but I also enjoy more developed werewolf characters over all as opposed to blood-thirsty creatures that seme to have no intelligence and jsut like killing everything they see.)

[Silvermane]

I think a lot of this depends where you are looking. If you are looking at horror films there are way more males than female leads. Though movies like The Howling and American Werewolf in Paris try to change this a bit by having a very dominate female character. In modern literature there are quite a few female leads that are werewolves, the Kitty Norville novels spring to mind instantly and the ratio of males to females in these books seems to be pretty much balanced. Beyond that I would say that the overall trend is male. Why? Aggression, I have a hard time picturing a werewolf that's rampaging through the woods on a killing spree leans towards male. Can females do it? Sure would be very different as well, but I think it's just harder for people to imagine.

Also think about it in this manner. A werewolf could be liken to a serial killer in horror elements, how many serial killers do you see that a female? The ratio to crazed killers being male lends itself to we can imagine males being that way just naturally. Where as females well they can be aggressive but I think that it's not as common. Much easier to imagine females as being more cruel I think. Going back to the Howling, Marsha is completely in control, perhaps even implied an Alpha female, her word steers a lot of the werewolves in the film. Whose more evil, the loads of aggressive males, or the female leading them all?

I do agree there needs to be more balance as far as the female werewolves out there. We are after all in the 21st century not the 19th now.

[Uniform Two Six]

In modern literature there are quite a few female leads that are werewolves, the Kitty Norville novels spring to mind instantly...

Don't forget both of Patricia Briggs werewolf series.

[Trinity]

Violence is linked in some major ways to testosterone. The Bull Shark, one of the most vicious sharks on record, has insane amounts of testosterone. Bull elephants, when they hit what's called "musth"(sp), is when they become overly aggressive testosterone pumping breeding behemoths!

It may not be the /only/ factor. However it is a strong one.

[Silvermane]

In modern literature there are quite a few female leads that are werewolves, the Kitty Norville novels spring to mind instantly...

Don't forget both of Patricia Briggs werewolf series.

Damnit how could I forget her books they are so awesome!