Wolves/werewolves: part of our racial memory?

[Berserker]

By "racial memory" I mean the collective unconscious.

I might have touched on this briefly in other threads, but I wanted to summarize my thoughts.

Why is it that modern Westerners are attracted to the wolf? Why does the wolf (and werewolf) appeal to us on so many different levels?

I don't think it merely has to do with how beautiful or free they are, or how much they remind us of our dogs. I think it comes from something deeper. I read somewhere (I wish I could cite the source) that early human tribes for thousands of years modeled a great deal of their behavior after wolves, whom they considered mutual hunting partners. That could offer some insight to my next position.

I think our conflicted history with the wolf (for hundreds of years we hated and feared the beast, even during the most romantic and most artistically inspired eras of the last 1000 years) was a semi-conscious, widespread backlash against our own racial memory; humans wanted to feel alone in their glory, and subliminal connections to a more primal world were forcefully cut to preserve moral imperatives. By demonizing or killing human connections to the wolf, our artificial, ethical elevation over nature was easier to grasp.

I believe that wolves might be part of our blood, and that they appeal to us naturally due to the collective unconscious. I think in a modern society where the wolf is not seen as a direct competitor, our genetic memory gets morphed from something negative to positive, with the result being a widespread love of wolves. (Thus we get forums like this one and books like "Never Cry Wolf.") Our racial memory of wolves might also explain why we have an inclination to combine them with ourselves in the form of werewolves. We have to be close to wolves, and the werewolf is the strongest representation of this unconscious appeal.

Thoughts on this?

[Night_Hunter]

yes i think that we are drawn to wolves because in some old life our ancestors were being hunted by wolven creature

and because of the genetic memory infused with fear the wolf/werewolf has become a symbol of power and nature

[Berserker]

yes i think that we are drawn to wolves because in some old life our ancestors were being hunted by wolven creature

and because of the genetic memory infused with fear the wolf/werewolf has become a symbol of power and nature

But if our genetic memory is that of a creature that hunted us, and that we feared, where does the appeal, or even love, of wolves come from?

The answer: they didn't hunt us. We created that fear ourselves, which in reality, was a fear of a positive subconscious aspect of humanity, an aspect we were desperate to repress in the name of civilized progress.

[Night_Hunter]

OHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

So your saying the image of the wolf/werewolf is like a need or a yearning to express a lost uncivilized part of yourselves.

[Berserker]

OHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

So your saying the image of the wolf/werewolf is like a need or a yearning to express a lost uncivilized part of yourselves.

Ehh sort of. I'm offering several positions. I'm saying that:

1) We're drawn to wolves through racial memory. As a result, their appeal is different from most other animals.
2) Mass historical fear/hatred of wolves may have been an attempt to repress innate racial memory, a repression at least subconsciously promoted by the desire to expand the human state of being above nature.
3) Werewolf legends are an example of that racial memory manifesting or projecting itself.

A definition of genetic memory from Wikipedia:

In psychology, genetic memory is a memory present at birth that exists in the absence of sensory experience, and is incorporated into the genome over long spans of time. It is based on the idea that common experiences of a species become incorporated into its genetic code, not by a Lamarckian process that encodes specific memories but by a much vaguer tendency to encode a readiness to respond in certain ways to certain stimuli. It is invoked to explain the racial memory postulated by Carl Jung, and differentiated from cultural memory, which is the retention of habits, customs, myths, and artifacts of social groups. The latter postdates genetic memory in the evolution of the human species, only coming into being with the development of language, and thus the possibility of the transmission of experience.

[Dreamer]

Interesting theory, but there is a flaw in it. Other cultures don't really have werewolf myths. They do however have WereTiger myths, WerePanther Myths, WereShark myths, ect. I think it would be more due to the fact that cutures really wanted to be as powerful as those preadators, each the domanint ones for that area in which they lived, and that the church perverted the european variety of those myths into somethign that they considered evil.

It seems like a lot of your thoughts are based around the idea that "Technology is evil and raping the planet, and we should abandon it after society inevitably crumbles and go back to nature", despite the fact that nature is nowhere near as idealised as you think it is. That might make you the evil twin to Scott Gardner, whom sees technology (Specifically the gentic kind) as a way for us to connect themselves back to nature and whom I agree with.

And yes I know our environmental situation sucks, and I know people don't care. But blame the poluting corporate bastards who will rape the earth just to make a buck and whom are paying off the asshole politicians whom are more concerned about campaing donations rather than actually DOING SOME f*** GOOD. And I know that people don't care, but that's more because we Americans are f*** APATHETIC ABOUT EVERYTHING!! They still give a s*** about politics over in Europe, but nobody protests anymore over here thanks to that f*** backlash from the Sixties thanks to Regan and Pals (Which also spawned the abomination known as Abstinence Education). Plus, we don't know what to get angry about anymore since the news never tells us anything anymore, especially about the environment thanks to their Corporate Overlords whom are the ones doing the raping. And when they do, they interlace it with corporate bullshit like "Global Warming is a myth" or "We care about the environment!".

God we need some f*** Capaign Finance Reform.

So get it through your head that technology is neutral, it can be used to good or bad effect, it cna be clean or rape the environment, it just depends o nthe people weilding it, which i nthis case are the corporate overlord MOTHERFUCKERS!

Rant Done. Now I think I'm going to have a rage-induced heart attack.

[Berserker]

Where in the thread did I mention technology? I don't think I did... in fact nowhere have I said that "technology is evil."

I hypothesized that Western humanity's particular path to expand it's footprint in the world was likely aided by repression of certain aspects of the collective unconscious, which for Europeans could have contributed to an overly fearful attitude towards wolves; and which in post-modern society we can see this attitude beginning to reverse, as civilization has peaked and therefore the collective unconscious can reassert itself (albeit in a disjointed way, given the now-fragmented nature of our sociology.)

I have on occasion asserted that the Western zeitgeist of quantity over quality, which moved in parallel to industrialization, was detrimental; but this is not the same as an indictment of technology. On the contrary, what I've espoused comes far closer to condemning those "corporate overlord motherfuckers" than anything, although I view corporations not as a particular cause of our problems, but more as a symptom.

I'm also not sure I understand the flaw you pointed out. Cultures with legends about weretigers, weresharks etc. may not have followed the same historical path as Europe, and therefore may not have seen the same tampering with their own nature.

[GvnDarklighter]

I'm not sure if I agree with all of your premise. It think that humans in general have an innate attraction to the superhuman power of animals, and that the Indo-European and Native American affinity for wolves is no different than, for example, the South American tribes' affinity for the jaguar. Whatever the dominant predator is in a region tends to become mythologized; thus, lions, hyenas, and crocodiles in Africa, tigers in India, sharks in Polynesian cultures, etc.

I think that the main reason that cultures who live alongside wolves (or against them, as the case may be) can identify with wolves more than other animals because of their communal nature and their willingness to bond with humans. I do agree that wolves seem to be unusual among most predators in their ability to tolerate humans, and I do wonder why that is. I also agree that their social structures are remarkably like ours in some ways, and certainly their hunting tactics would have been possibly inspirational to our ancestors. However, as correlation does not prove causation, I do not believe that our unique relation with wolves (and now their domesticated descendants) has anything to do with a common memory outside of the fact that we have always lived near one another. Influenced each other, sure; common cultural memory, sure, but not a common blood.

In some ways I think it is odd that we have begun to react as strongly positively to wolves in modern times as we have. After all, wolven society is very much more of a warrior culture, where the strong take power and the weak suffer, whereas Western society has moved towards the innate rights of all individuals, weak and strong. I think our current cultural memory of wolves is rather romanticized through the fact that almost no one actually lives with them anymore, so the majority of people tend to see them as big, strong, beautiful wild dogs. Not that I mind; I'd rather the average joe love wolves for the wrong reasons than hate them and kill them.

[outwarddoodles]

Ahhh, Dreamer? Just for a note, collective unconciousness was a term coined by Carl Jung, and truely has a theoretic basis behind it. Berserker's muse is more a psychological/anthropology outlook to it, not an angstangstworldsucks kind of thing.

I think your "Flaw" furthur emphasized Beserker's point -- Not every culture has wolves, but we ALL have a respect for powerful creatures. At least, powerful creatures that have no direct competition with us (The Europeans may have hated wolves, but didn't they glorify animals such as lions?). A romantic notion of the wolf in particular may not be an innate trait in us, but our love for paticular creatures such as lions, wolves, tigers, etc (I swear, I know at least four different schools near me with a Tiger as the mascot, not to mention the Cincinnati Bengals.) is still a fascinating subject. Obviously, there's something there that causes this in us.

Of course, not everyone glorifies the wolf as much as we do (I do! anyway.). Infact, a lot of people don't give a damn. But we have some Red Wolves at the Zoo near me, and I swear, something there just CLICKS to all the onlookers. Everyone wants to see the wolves, and they all agree they're beautiful.

I wish to study psychology and social sciences as I grow older, but for now, I'm not too well enlightened on the subject. I'll think about this later and post again, 'kay?

[Berserker]

outside of the fact that we have always lived near one another. Influenced each other, sure; common cultural memory, sure,

I believe that given enough time, this is all that is necessary to build genetic memory. For example, wolves in the wild demonstrate genetic memory very clearly: even a wolf with 0 knowledge of human beings will be skittish around people. This is an example of racial memory rather than cultural memory, since the behavior wasn't learned by the individual or gained through stimulus.

Conversely, will a human being of European heritage with 0 knowledge of wolves feel drawn to them, or have some subconscious feeling about what wolves are and what they're like? Definitely a hard claim to measure, even harder to prove. But I think it's likely.

In some ways I think it is odd that we have begun to react as strongly positively to wolves in modern times as we have. After all, wolven society is very much more of a warrior culture, where the strong take power and the weak suffer, whereas Western society has moved towards the innate rights of all individuals, weak and strong.

This is exactly what I'm trying to explain. That the European collective unconscious includes those wolfish feelings, that warrior culture, and that it was this very aspect that Westerners lashed out against and repressed in their effort to construct the modern, egalitarian tenets of our society. Unfortunately, I believe this process was like a subliminal self-hate that eventually got projected onto the living symbols of those feelings: the wolves themselves.

Now that the "warrior culture" is ancient history, and those inclinations are no longer a genuine threat to the stability of moral construction, the wolf in our subconscious can come out of hiding. This is the shift from negative to positive that I mentioned in my original post. Nowadays, we have a safe catharsis for our appeal to that primal, wolfish outlook: we make and enjoy werewolf stories. Don't Westerners delight in the werewolf-as-monster, just as they delight in the wolves on National Geographic?

[Berserker]

something there just CLICKS to all the onlookers. Everyone wants to see the wolves, and they all agree they're beautiful.

YES, yes, and this is one of the reasons why I support my premises. (I should also stress that I support my idea merely as a hypothesis and not as something that I can prove with citeable research.)

[Dreamer]

Where in the thread did I mention technology? I don't think I did... in fact nowhere have I said that "technology is evil."

I hypothesized that Western humanity's particular path to expand it's footprint in the world was likely aided by repression of certain aspects of the collective unconscious, which for Europeans could have contributed to an overly fearful attitude towards wolves; and which in post-modern society we can see this attitude beginning to reverse, as civilization has peaked and therefore the collective unconscious can reassert itself (albeit in a disjointed way, given the now-fragmented nature of our sociology.)

I have on occasion asserted that the Western zeitgeist of quantity over quality, which moved in parallel to industrialization, was detrimental; but this is not the same as an indictment of technology. On the contrary, what I've espoused comes far closer to condemning those "corporate overlord motherfuckers" than anything, although I view corporations not as a particular cause of our problems, but more as a symptom.

I'm also not sure I understand the flaw you pointed out. Cultures with legends about weretigers, weresharks etc. may not have followed the same historical path as Europe, and therefore may not have seen the same tampering with their own nature.

Well then, that makes a whole lot more sense than what I was thinking you thought.

Although I knda think the anti-wolf backlash could probably be considered more anti Pagan than anything else.

[RedEye]

Perhaps not so anti-Pagan as simple greed.

Example: Wyoming has instigated a "Kill-on-sight" plan for Wolves, even in Yellowstone park...and that's Federal land.

Fact is, Wolves need to eat, and what they eat is what we like to eat or hunt. So, we kill the competition; simple as that.
There aren't enough Wolves to even make a dent in most livestock/wildlife populations, but there are some rather well connected people who don't want even one antelope or cow to die unless they can profit from it.

Considering I support both the NRA and Defenders of Wildlife, you might say I'm conflicted; but I can see where they both want the same thing even if they won't admit it. Again, it's greed: "all my way and none of yours" at work.

As to Wolf-related genetic memory; both man and wolf share many many traits; we see ourselves in them and try to emulate what we think we see in them. Our ancestors did make a covenant with Wolves once; that's where all the Lupus line of domestic dogs come from. Perhaps it is that memory we share, the Wolf as our companion after many generations of selective breeding.

Now, there are people who seem to only want us to have memories by killing off the source of those memories.

I'm getting bitter here, time to close...

[GvnDarklighter]

To Red-Eye: I definitely agree that nowadays our fear of wolves has mostly profit to blame. I find it funny that we think we need to regulate nature to keep it in balance when our method of regulation is generally to kill to keep numbers low. Rather arrogant to think that we know how to regulate nature anyways.

As for Berserker, now that I'm pretty sure I see where you're coming from, I agree somewhat. It does seem like species do have an innate and perhaps genetic ability to pass on the fear or lack thereof of another species. However, I don't know that persecuting wolves was a cultural backlash entirely. I think it's more that when we moved away from a warrior society we simply lost that sympathetic respect that the Vikings and others had for them. In other words, I don't think it was so much an active backlash as a loss of the barrier or bond that stopped us from fearing/hating them. Because after all, once we stopped thinking of them as similar, they were only competition, and added to the fact that every small once and awhile they would attack people, the only reaction we really had left was fear.

[Scott Gardener]

Thanks for this topic; it's a great one.

I think it's ingrained into the human brain, because humans and wolves have lived together for so many hundreds of thousands of years. Throughout most of the existence of Homo sapiens as a species, we were hunters and gatherers. Wolves have been likewise. Yes, there was competition, and in the last few millennia, we kind of got the upper hand, with the overwhelming majority of wolves getting converted by humanity into secondary companions. (Yes, the symbiosis of humans and dogs is two-way, but one must acknowledge that for the most part, humans have been the dominant partner in the relationship--sometimes generous, sometimes outright abusive.) But, there have also been times along the way in which humans drew inspiration from wolves. Most archaeologists agree that ancient human hunters employed rituals and techniques in which the hunter emulated another animal that was good at hunting, and wolves likely were a top choice. Thus, there was a time when being a "werewolf" was a regular profession that put food on the table (only it wasn't a table back then). Add to that that wolves and humans are both very sociable animals, and it's certain that at some point, wolves and humans approached each other and interacted. By comparison, since humans are rather plodding, loud and obnoxious, and smell funny, most other animals run away if we try to go near, while the remaining few tend to attack on sight.

Wolves by comparison are willing to say "hello" and overall have a similar outlook--similar enough that we and they seem willing to incorporate each other into our respective social structures. Again, we humans tend to do so in a rather one-sided way, but we still do it. Humans frequently reference "thinking of dogs as children," and both dogs and wild wolves will respond to humans as they would to fellow canines, rather than treating us as if we were lunch animals or a Dalek invasion force. Isn't it interesting that a dog will assign people places within a perceived pack heirarchy, but won't similarly assimilate a cat so easily? Wolves involved in captive breeding programs such as the ones that reintroduced wolves to the wild in the Yellowstone area have likewise demonstrated a tendency to incorporate humans into the pack, though they're not as quick or as continuously willing to let the human be in charge.

Sure, there's differences--humans get a broader spectrum of colors and great cognitive skills sometimes paired with an annoying know-it-all attitude, while wolves get much better hearing and smell. But, given the planet as a whole and considering the bulk of the timeline the two of our kinds have been around, we've been exposed to each other so much that it's hard not to notice what we have in common and draw from it. To that end, werewolves are an almost inevitable idea.

I'm just looking forward to the day when technology reaches the point at which we can finally cross the gap altogether and make shifting physically possible. It would be an eloquent full circle, bridging our ancestral upbringing with what our intelligence is really capable of doing, provided we can pull it off drawing from the re-emerging Earth spirit consciousness idea rather than from the "us or them" attitude that's almost begging to be made into a horror film about how tampering with nature and trying to advance the cause of transhumanism seems to lead inevitably towards dead mad scientists followed by general body counts.

[shiftergirl]

i agree with most of you but what i think is that all humans are realted to an animal no mater if its blood or not. all animals come natureal to us because we share things with them more then we think. what im trying to say is if you were to be born in a family of people who belive in god and jesus but you belive in something else like budda or egypt god then that you but also that you were born with it, each person is born with an animal that is part of them. this animal is eather smart or dume, fast or slow, preditor or prey. lets say u see yourself as a deer and someone esle sees them self as a lion, then maybe they are what they say they are. if you all remember when we were all cavemen and woman we hunted from what we say preditors do, wolves, lion, leopards, hyenas, and crocs. we are the animal we see ourselves. i see myself as more then wolf but also more then human. i also see myself as a panther, i could be both or just one, i don't know but its there.

(The soul, according to many religious and philosophical traditions, is the self-aware essence unique to a particular living being. In these traditions the soul is thought to incorporate the inner essence of each living being, and to be the true basis for sapience, rather than the brain or any other material or natural part of the biological organism. Some religions and philosophies on the other hand believe in the soul having a material component, and some have even tried to establish the weight of the soul. Souls are usually considered to be immortal and to exist prior to incarnation.
The concept of the soul has strong links with notions of an afterlife, but opinions may vary wildly, even within a given religion, as to what may happen to the soul after the death of the body. It also shares as a PIE root of spirit.)

(The term animism (from Latin anima (soul, life) commonly refers to belief systems that attribute souls to animals, plants and other entities, in addition to humans. Animism may also attribute souls to natural phenomena.)

(Werecats are creatures of folklore, fantasy fiction, horror fiction and occultism that are generally described as shapeshifters who are similar to werewolves, except that they turn into creatures that are based on some species of feline instead of being based on a wolf.The species involved can be a domestic cat, a tiger, a lion, a leopard, a lynx, or any other type, including some that are purely fantastical felines. Typically, an individual werecat can only transform to one unique feline, not to a number of different species, and each individual type of werecat may be known by a more species-specific term such as "weretiger". The word "werecat" was not coined until the late 19th century, so it was not directly used in legends from earlier eras, only by later folklorists' commentary.)

[Midnight]

both dogs and wild wolves will respond to humans as they would to fellow canines, rather than treating us as if we were lunch animals or a Dalek invasion force.

* is now trying his best to ignore a "Daleks vs. werewolves" plot that's trying to form in his head *

[Scott Gardener]

I do not often go into my own metaphysical beliefs (OK, maybe I do), but my own working theory is that the soul is something independent of incarnation form--that is, not all humans are the same type of soul, and souls can incarnate as many different things. Thus, some of us human in this lifetime have been other things. As close as I am to wolves, I'm pretty confident based on childhood interests that I've been a cat at least once.

I suspect that, even if I'm right, I'm underestimating the complexity of the matter. Souls might not be as discreet and well-defined in their realm as biological organisms are in the material realm. But, an analogy I often use is that of role-playing games, with the souls as players and incarnations as their characters, with God as the Dungeon Master. Again a blatant over-simplification, as I don't see God as a single easily defined and self-contained consciousness necessarily separate from the players and roughly equal to them in intelligence and overall status in life outside of the gaming context. But, it's a useful analogy for this philosophy, as it explains how one can have running at the same time several incarnations in different periods in time or even in different universes, as we are "playing" in different "campaigns."

[RedEye]

Howzabout: The Soul is eternal. The Personality is the clothing style that soul wears in a given life. New life, new Wardrobe.

[outwarddoodles]

"You don't have a soul. You are a Soul. You have a body."
C. S. Lewis

RedEye: I utterly agree with you (except that I'll argue souls become "imprinted" with their previous lives, making them more likely to become the same type of creature again. But then again, I'm not quite sure of that eitherr! Spirituality eludes me!).

We're all getting a little sidetracked, I just didn't know how wonderfully spiritual some of you people were.

Edit: Insane typos! What was I on?!

[RedEye]

"You don't have a soul. You are a Soul. You have a body.
C. S. Lewis

RedEye: I utterly agree with you (except that I'll argue souls become "imprinted" with their previous lives, making them more likely to become the same type of creature again. But then again, I'm not quite sure of that ethier! Spirituality eludes me!).

We're all getting a little sidetracked, I just didn't know how wonderfulyl spiritual some of you people were.

Oh, I quite agree there. I still have some of my Seventies stuff that I wear to annoy my housemate (usually... ) and even a pair of the old platform shoes from back then (and they still fit!).

In Wulfen Blood; the "place between" is where Lunara's children go after their mortal lives are over to think about what they've learned; and what they want to learn next. In one sense; the Soul is a somewhat different being than the Personality it wore; in that it has a multitude of lifetimes to incorporate and learn from apart from the life it just led in the World. Sometimes a Wulf-soul will choose a Smoothskin life for its next lilfe as a growing experience. More often though; it chooses a new Fuzzy life-task and returns to the World as a Werewolf again...so to a degree, the "imprinting" may be considered as "preferred life-task" in my stories.
And C.S. Lewis was a great writer and philosopher...

[punxnotdead]

Alot of this is way over my head, but I do seem to agree with Beserker. It seems pretty logical and quite in-depth.

[Black Claw]

yeah i mean people dream of them and if they think about it enough they believe its real and it becomes part of their lives and how they act. But if there is legible proof that they exist then it becomes reality for others and not just themselves.

[Berserker]

if they think about it enough they believe its real and it becomes part of their lives and how they act.

What you're describing is learned behavior. That's very different from racial memory.

[shiftergirl]

whatever you say, i still belive in what i said earlyer.