No-"were" Man=Wuss?
UnaSeal
This is REEEAAALLY bothering me, and its probably only because I'm tired, but
I have to ask...
Through-out history, it seems that whenever a person or group desired power,
dominence, and victory, they've always turned to their "were" side.
Examples-
The Nazi elite airforce of "WereWolves."
The Black Panther Party
Multiple football teams on all levels in the U.S. <Ex- "The Bears">
WWII Rallying cry, "Tora, Tora, Tora"
I need some input here...To what degree has our society abused their
"weresides"? Are the above examples, in your opinion, an abuse of the
weresides at all? Does anyone think that man, when left to his own devices
ALWAYS uses "weresides" for powerplays and dominence games? What makes us
different? Is it merely a matter of choosing to use the wereside for
empowerment or as a mentor rather than as a destructive force? Is this
phenomenon, illustrated in the examples above, caused by the man leading the
wereside, making it his slave, or is the wereside in full control in these
instances?
Enquiring minds want to know...sleepy minds just want to go back to bed...:(
<>< UNA <><
Zepp
In article <50oe96$3kg...@equine.onramp.net>,
Well, to me, none of the examples listed above have to do with weresides, so
much as humans desiring to emulate what they see as desirable animal
attributes. The Nazis wanted to inspire fear, so they took the name of a
greatly feared creature. Football teams admire the tenacity and strength of
the bear, and hope to invoke it into themselves. The Panthers came from a
group who had felt powerless; the image of the sleek and deadly panther,
feared by all else, embodied what they wished to become, a force to inspire
the rest of the downtrodden. Tora is Japanese for "tiger", and similar
reasons to the panthers' name choice, I think. All this is of course IMHO,
but it's what seems true to me.
Humans, left to their own devices, always get into power plays and office
politickin'. Nature o' the beast, I s'pose. But then again, some of us do
the same, as witness the endless dreary flamewars between about four or five
folks who genuinely seem to loathe one another. That shit I mostly ignore
nowadays -- they have a right to do it, and I have a right to ignore it.
So rather than such things coming from a wereside, I believe that it is just
a natural expression of one facet of human nature, one among many.
My 2 pfennigs...
Greywolf the Wanderer, borrowing zepp's account
Wyvern Enterprises
UnaSeal (abo...@terravirtua.com) wrote:
: This is REEEAAALLY bothering me, and its probably only because I'm tired, but
: I have to ask...
: Through-out history, it seems that whenever a person or group desired power,
: dominence, and victory, they've always turned to their "were" side.
: Examples-
: The Nazi elite airforce of "WereWolves."
: The Black Panther Party
: Multiple football teams on all levels in the U.S. <Ex- "The Bears">
: WWII Rallying cry, "Tora, Tora, Tora"
As Greywolf stated in his message, it's just a human thing to try to
identify with various beasties.
Of course, there are some very real were related stuff - the berserkers
were clearly weres. The troops aimed the berserkers in the direction of
the enemy and got them into a raging frenzy; afterwards the regular
troops went in and cleaned up the pieces. :P
After all the wars subsided the berserker cult was quietly dismantled as
they were uncontrollable and liable to go into a rage over a simple
argument and kill people - something that couldn't be ignored once peace
was established.
: I need some input here...To what degree has our society abused their
: "weresides"? Are the above examples, in your opinion, an abuse of the
: weresides at all?
I wouldn't say it's been abused, so much as used towards very specific
ends. There's no denying the terror we can inspire sometimes, that's
been used again and again to win an edge in battles. Of course, as with
the berserkers - that becomes a two edged sword that cuts both ways.
Flenser
Moonchild
Padding up to UnaSeal, Moonchild looks and sits down.
Apparently, something important was written, and marked as "<50oe96$3kg_
0...@equine.onramp.net>", at Fri, 6 Sep 1996 - 05:53:42....
It reads:
>This is REEEAAALLY bothering me, and its probably only because I'm tired, but
>I have to ask...
>
>Through-out history, it seems that whenever a person or group desired power,
>dominence, and victory, they've always turned to their "were" side.
<BUZZ> no wereside here, my dear man. just a use (or is it abuse?) of
animals...
>
>Examples-
>
>The Nazi elite airforce of "WereWolves."
The Nazi's tried to find a thing that was the scariest at the time...
and that was probably one of the most horriffic things to use...
Werewolves were a great "fright" in those days, so why not use it ?
And then again... the predatorial spirit and the common belief that
wolves (and werewolves even more) were ravenous beasts killing and
tearing all around without remorse made it an even more usable thing...
>The Black Panther Party
Which one is this ? (and is it were?)
>Multiple football teams on all levels in the U.S. <Ex- "The Bears">
Hmmzzz... no weres too... just animals, as an undeniable part of the
country is made up from animal life probably :)
>WWII Rallying cry, "Tora, Tora, Tora"
>
>I need some input here...To what degree has our society abused their
>"weresides"?
Oh probably as much as everything else is abused (which is quite a
lot)...
> Are the above examples, in your opinion, an abuse of the
>weresides at all?
I wouldn't think so. As for someone who looks at this "namecalling" an
abuse of a wereside... It's an abuse of words probably yes, but no abuse
of weresides...
What *I* would call an abuse of weresides is for folk in here pretending
to be what they aren't, and thus troubling lot's of folk and making them
loose trust in eachother and the group.
> Does anyone think that man, when left to his own devices
>ALWAYS uses "weresides" for powerplays and dominence games?
Man, when left to his own devices, wll use *ANYTHING* for powerplay and
dominance. From bales of straw to nuclear bombs, from simple threats to
advanced psychological strategies...
>What makes us
>different?
You should know that yourself.
> Is it merely a matter of choosing to use the wereside for
>empowerment or as a mentor rather than as a destructive force?
[Moonchild shakes his head sadly] You obviously don't understand....
> Is this
>phenomenon, illustrated in the examples above, caused by the man leading the
>wereside, making it his slave, or is the wereside in full control in these
>instances?
>
The examples above are poor examples IMHO,but i see your point. Still i
don't think things like this are chosen or anything...
>Enquiring minds want to know...sleepy minds just want to go back to bed...:(
>
> <>< UNA <><
^ ^
# #
Signed : ^ ### ### ^
# ### ### #
### # # ###
### ###
# #### #
########
###########
###########
(Moonchild) ### ###
NEW HOMEPAGE LOCATION!!! http://www.wolfden.demon.co.uk/
Tom Bubenik
Also, the Black Panters were black humans. It was a group back in
the sixtes. I belive, I'm not sure, they were just a violent cival
rights group.
Peace,
Katie "Wakko!" Bubenik
I've GOT to learn to spell
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Member of the AHWW cyber-pack and reminder of the Kent State Massacure
Kininigin
[Also, the Black Panters were black humans. It was a group back in
[the sixtes. I belive, I'm not sure, they were just a violent cival
[rights group.
[Peace,
[Katie "Wakko!" Bubenik
Well, like all "factions". There are Factions within factions. There are
the Black Panthers who believe in Passive resistance, and there are those
that believe violence is the key to achieving civing rights. There's
always someone who gives something a bad name... It can be seen
everywhere. Same goes for Muslims. There are factions within factions,
the original key in Islam is peace, love, and harmony, it's just that one
group gives the other group a bad name. (And we must not forget that
wonderful media, telling you what they want you to believe in!!!)
[I've GOT to learn to spell
Naw, that's what they pay editors for!!!
Kininign...
A great many people think they are thinking when they are merely
rearranging their prejudices.
-- William James
ora...@ellijay.com
WE MUST ASSUME, ANIMALS ARE MORE POWERFUL THAN HUMANS, YET, SHOULD
-WE- GET A BIG HEAD?
-ORACLE
KatmanDu
Moonchild <Moon...@wolfden.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>>The Black Panther Party
>Which one is this ? (and is it were?)
the Black Panthers were a 60's/70's group with a rather varied and
checkered history... basically formed to prevent oppression of blacks
in LA by the authorities, and whose tactics sometimes left a sour
taste in both sides of the issue...
Huey Newton, Eldridge Cleaver and Bobby Seals were the leaders; Huey
Newton is dead but I believe both Cleaver and Seals are still alive
and on a lecture circuit... at least, both lectured here a couple of
years ago.
KatmanDu
ze...@snowcrest.net (Zepp) wrote:
>Well, to me, none of the examples listed above have to do with weresides, so
>much as humans desiring to emulate what they see as desirable animal
>attributes.
Yah... there's a difference between what humans perceive as an
animal's attributes and what those attributes really are. Example, the
wolf... how many people still think of it as an irrational,
bloodthirsty killer, and have nver tried to view its mindset
objectively? Or, on the flip side, assumed a wild animal that acted
friendly towards them was somehow "domesticated" and wondered why it
took their arm off when they reached for a cub...
Zepp
Hee, hee! Around here we call that 'evolution in action', otherwise
expressed as 'my, the human gene pool certainly could use a little
chlorine!'
I like what someone else said about the berserkers, though. I can totally
relate to that, for I've a streak of it in my own nature. Came in handy at
school, when ten or fifteen human kids would decide to trash one solitary
wolf cub -- but it got me in a lot of trouble, too, for what the adults saw
as unjustified ferocity. Me, I didn't care. It was war, there were LOTS of
them and only one of me, and I was *determined* to survive and stay free.
By the fourth grade my nickname was 'Animal", and the bigger kids were
telling the younger ones, 'watch out for that one's teeth!"
Biting, apparently, was against the rules, though ambushing and mass attacks
were not. Humans are weird sometimes, ya know?
Zepp
Ron Orr (& Tirran, sometimes)
<ora...@ellijay.com> wrote (in all caps again <sigh>):
> WE MUST ASSUME, ANIMALS ARE MORE POWERFUL THAN HUMANS, YET, SHOULD
> -WE- GET A BIG HEAD?
"We" as animals or "we" as humans? Or "we" as a combination of
the best (we hope) of both?
But that's a good point. A ceratin humility lends perspective.
In moderation...;)
Ron
lots to be humble about
KatmanDu
ze...@snowcrest.net (Zepp) wrote:
>Hee, hee! Around here we call that 'evolution in action', otherwise
>expressed as 'my, the human gene pool certainly could use a little
>chlorine!'
Heh! "The worst thing about the gene pool is that there's no
lifeguard"
MegaDog the Nettweiler
In article <50skfe$o...@news.paonline.com>, ora...@ellijay.com (ora...@ellijay.com) writes:
>WE MUST ASSUME, ANIMALS ARE MORE POWERFUL THAN HUMANS, YET, SHOULD
>-WE- GET A BIG HEAD?
Hmmm... i don't assume anyone is "more powerful" than anyone else,
'cause it depends how you define "power".
Surely the skill of existence is to identify where your strengths can
complement the strengths of others, where your strengths can be of help
to those who have a weakness, and where the strengths of others can
balance out your vulnerabilities.
The ability to offer unconditional, no-strings-attached, support to
someone else in need is surely one of the best ways of showing how
much you care for them.
"No man is an island" as someone far more erudite than me once said.
!Raised Tails! -:MegaDog:-
"Are you pondering what I'm pondering?"
UnaSeal
>I have to ask...
Lemme explain where I *THINK* I was going with this sucker when I started it
during a strage sleepless night a few moons back...
>Through-out history, it seems that whenever a person or group desired power,
>dominence, and victory, they've always turned to their "were" side.
>
>Examples-
>
>The Nazi elite airforce of "WereWolves."
Adolf Hitler was, himself, a bit of a magician, albeit one of the "Black
Arts," some scholars believe. During the 20's-30's while he was conjuring up
his plans for establishing the Nazi Party, there weren't a whole lot of folks
running around fearful of werewolves, either in Europe, or in The States. If
we are to accept the idea that he was a knowledgible enough magician to
understand the symbology he used <i.e.-the swastika turned "widdershins,"
et.al.> then there had to be an express purpose for the use of the symbology
of "Werewolves," for his elite airforce. It seems to me that since the planes
were not decorated thus, and that the whole concept of the werewolf-airforce
link was not widely publisized, there might have been some sort of Fraternal
organization linked with the air force, or possibly, the connection was a
private association in Hitler's mind. I was thinking, though, if there WAS
some form of ceremony and fraternal ties to the symbol, then possibly, the
men who made up the airforce were ordered to, through magickal means, get "in
touch" with the destructive aspects of their weresides to use as a means of
defeating the opposition. Openly, to the people of Germany and the rest of
the world, Hitler hid behind a Christian mask, though it's been said that the
governments of Great Britain and the U.S. employed Pagans and High Magicians
to help combat the German forces. I was wondering, since I haven't had the
chance to read the books or to see the PBS special on this specific topic, if
anyone of you out there could shed some light on the issue and extent of
Hitler's magical interest in werewolves.
>The Black Panther Party
Yup, here's another story I don't have the complete details on. I imagine
that Huey Newton, Bobby Seale, and Eldrige Cleaver were all inspired to some
extent or another by Marcus Garvey. Assuming this is true, then I would also
imagine that atleast one of these men had an interest in African culture,
history, and lore. To that end, I must ask, What significance did the
"panther" hold for these men? Did it arise from ancient stories from their
forebarer's homelands? In what way did they hope to strengthen themselves by
being referred to as "Panthers"? Did religion play any part in their
decision? Any insight would be helpful on this.
>Multiple football teams on all levels in the U.S. <Ex- "The Bears">
>WWII Rallying cry, "Tora, Tora, Tora"
Has anyone ever noticed the "ritual" of football, or other professional
sports? The next time you watch football on t.v., try picturing the stadium
as a colloseum, the "pigskin" as actual pigblatter, the two competative teams
as soldiers acting out the dramas of the battlegrounds instead of merely the
playingfield, note the psychological terror evoked from staring straight on
into a "painted face" besmeared by colorful sunblocker, view the dancing
cheerleaders as the youthful, beautiful, witches evolking power though dance
and song, supported by cheering, chanting fans raising and focusing the energy
on the two teams. Ironic, then, isn't it, that the teams should be associated
with "mascots" which are generally fierce, brave animals. Note the
expressions, "We're gonna eat you for breakfast!" Where EXACTLY did this
custom originate? Do we, as a society really have a way of accurately
telling, or is recorded history really "far back enough" to catelog such
tradition?
The Japanese fighter piolots in WWII definately had a heavy association with
tigers...but to what ends? What does Japanese lore say about the tiger? I
think this goes beyond psychological terror-inducing tactics. It must be
deeply rooted in the Japanese tradition. If the Chinese "Monkey King" is the
guardian of wisdom, what does the tiger mean to the Japanese? If you were a
contestant on Jeapardy, and you didcovered your opponent was a Chinese man who
was a student of the Monkey King, would you still want to play? See where I'm
getting, here?
I thought this was important to bring up so that we could all benefit from a
possible exchange on a side of weredom that we may not want to look at, but
probably need too. Especially those interested in PS-ing, or those who have
trouble when their weresides take control of certain situations best handled
by their human sides. How far can we explore our inner weredom before we hit
a snag and need a check that may or maynot be covered in our religions?
Hopefully you can better see where I was coming from now. My intentions were
good, albeit the outcome garbled due to lack of sleep. :) In closing, I
thought of one other addition to the list...Serial killers often claim that
they have were-awareness or some sort of vampiriristic side. Many claim it
stems from dabbling in religious practices that they weren't too sure of what
they were doing when they did it. Ex-- "the Vampire Killer", Ted Bundy , <
No religious link with him that I know of> Jeffrey Dahmer,et.al.
Coyote Osborne
> Hee, hee! Around here we call that 'evolution in action', otherwise
> expressed as 'my, the human gene pool certainly could use a little
> chlorine!'
LOL!!! <G>
> Came in handy at
> school, when ten or fifteen human kids would decide to trash one solitary
> wolf cub -- but it got me in a lot of trouble, too, for what the adults saw
> as unjustified ferocity.
> Biting, apparently, was against the rules, though ambushing and mass attacks
> were not. Humans are weird sometimes, ya know?
I always got amazed by that... I was always relatively small as a kid..
smaller than the other kids I mean. Yet whenever someone decided taht they
wanted to pick on me, they always got together a little herd of
like-minded kids.
I vividly remember an incident during PE in 3rd grade... a little jerk
tried to get me to hand over my lunch money during art class... he said'
he'd "get" me in PE. he and four friends decided to beat me up.
Now when these four surrounded me... the PE teacher was standing about 20
feet away, watching. I never hit first back then. I did not like fighting.
I asked him to please make the kids stop harrassing me. He said that I
should fight my own battles.
Anyway, when the kids saw that they could proceed unhindered... they
started throwing dirt on me, and shoving at me. One of them hit me with a
shoe.
Well... I kind of went real red... I started beating the living crap out
of them. After a few moments, one was on the ground doubled up because I
had kicked him in the solar plexus... and the rest were running away... I
was chasing the one who had hit me with the shoe, when the PE teacher
grabbed me.
He sent a note home to my parents saying that I had vicously attacked some
other children and that I should get psychological help.
I remember after that asking him the next day why it was okay for those
other kids to harass me and beat me up and he didn't do anything, but when
I beat _them_ up (all five) there was somethign wrong with me.
He told me that I ought to learn to be a "sport".
And that kicking and lawing and biting and hitting in the solar plexus or
"below the belt" were "dirty fighting".
And I asked "and five big kids ganging up on one small one is not?"
He responded that if I'd play more sports that I'd have more friends (the
preceding week, I had asked not to play "dodgeball" because, frankly, I
hated it.
The thing that aggravated me the most was that everyone;'s attitude,
teachers, faculty, my stepfather... was essentially that _I_ must have
done something wrong to "make" those kids not like me and want to beat me
up, and that when I was more physically vicious than they were, that it
was "proof" that I had something wrong with me.
I suppose that if I had let them beat me black and blue that I would get
to be "normal".
Coyote
--
---
Coyote Osborne;1085 NE 179 Terrace;North Miami Beach, FL 33162
email: coy...@miami.mindspring.com
Christopher Eric Hughes
FoxWolfie (ga...@moose.erie.net) wrote:
: On 9 Sep 1996 19:03:26 GMT, coy...@mail.miami.mindspring.com (Coyote
: Osborne) wrote:
: > I always got amazed by that... I was always relatively small as a kid..
: > smaller than the other kids I mean. Yet whenever someone decided taht they
: > wanted to pick on me, they always got together a little herd of
: > like-minded kids.
: This story is very familiar to me. For me, it wasn't being smaller than the
: other kids that was a problem, but having to wear really thick glasses
: They would assume that I couldn't see them well enough to fight back. In
: reality, I just wasn't they type to go after a fight or to throw the first
: punch. In PE, a small herd of kids would form a start harrassing me. This
: went on even in front of the gym coach's eyes.
For me, it was slightly different. I've always been overweight, even since
infancy (10lbs, 4oz at birth *whew*). And I skipped over second grade, which
basically means that until my parents moved from one side of town to the
other and I changed schools, I had NO friends in school.
Anyway, in fourth grade one day, I wound up having to sit next to one of
the more vocal antagonists I had at lunch (we had these big fold-out tables
and benches we had to sit at, and we all had to sit at one table, so there
wasn't an option of moving). He started up, and along about halfway through
lunch I screamed "I CAN'T TAKE THIS ANYMORE!" loud enough to be heard in
the front office, slammed both hands into the table hard enough to rattle
its hinges on the wall, turned to the kid next to me and proceeded to
choke the lifeblood out of him. I think if the principle and my teacher
hadn't pried my hands off of him, I'd've killed him and not cared a whit.
But the moral of the story is that I got punished for "passing the invisible
line between 'kids will be kids' and doing grievous damage to someone's
person" and the kids that made my life hell got off scot-free. Pretty
effed-up system. *shrug*
--
In the name of the best within us, A is A
Christopher Eric Hughes Either-Or
hug...@cs.unt.edu Non-Contradiction
"By the essence and nature of existence, contradictions cannot exist.
If you find one, check your premises; you'll find that one of them is
wrong." Hugh Akston, Professor of Philosophy, Patrick Henry Univ.
Jeff Ruppel
Unity listens to all of the stories about how adults encourage the children to
become bullies and mobs, but how they punish the victims who actually stand up
for themselves and fight back, calling them insane....
rrrrrrrRRRRRRRRRRRRRROOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWWWWWWRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!!!!
It's taking all of the willpower I HAVE to resist trashing my room as I read
these stories!
However, my experiences with such childhood traumas worked out a little bit
differently...
There were some bullies I could NOT successfully defend myself against.
Sometimes standing up to a bully doesn't work.
The white wolf starts to cry...
I wish to God it had worked. :(
The other times, I did successfully defend myself from my assailants. It was at
these times that my wereside became evident. Especially when I would leap on
top of a desk and growl at the bully.
However, I never got punished. In fact, everyone pretended that the fights ever
happened, and never told anyone about them. The students, the teachers;
everyone. I never understood why.
Howls,
--
Jeff Ruppel
A.K.A.: HuggyWolf, Unity
E-mail: Hugy...@ix.netcom.com
Ben Goodridge
ze...@snowcrest.net (Zepp) wrote:
(Oops, snipped too much.)
> own nature. Came in handy at
> school, when ten or fifteen human kids would decide to trash one solitary
> wolf cub -- but it got me in a lot of trouble, too, for what the adults saw
> as unjustified ferocity. Me, I didn't care. It was war, there were LOTS of
> them and only one of me, and I was *determined* to survive and stay free.
> By the fourth grade my nickname was 'Animal", and the bigger kids were
> telling the younger ones, 'watch out for that one's teeth!"
>
> Biting, apparently, was against the rules, though ambushing and mass attacks
> were not. Humans are weird sometimes, ya know?
>
> Greywolf the Wanderer, borrowing zepp's account
Amazing the human reaction to being bitten by another (apparently)
human. Especially if the bite draws blood, no matter how well
deserved. You hit them, they hit back. You kick them, they knock
you down. You BITE them...
They scream, cry, wave around whatever you bit, run to Mommy or Teacher,
sometimes get taken to the hospital for a tetanus shot or even
stitches, and you're standing there with blood on your mouth and
a cheeseating grin. And hell, this is in high school.
For some reason, no one fights back after being bit.
No one is more surprised than the fighters when the tormented fights
back against three, or five, or, in your case, fifteen. They thrive
on the suffering of the weak, and fold when the "weak" don't suffer.
In high-school I had the standard weenie reputation, and in that time
period I damn near castrated one kid and spread general humiliations
around to several others. A major contributing factor to my
lycanthropy was "wolfing out" in front of some of the biggest jerks
in high school
Of course, one doesn't have to bite. My mother quite well remembers
the story (although it has lapsed from my mind) of the time when one
of the school bullies came into the bathroom while I was doing my
business (I was in Kindergarten at the time) and started laying into
me, as bullies do, and without a single word I turned around and pissed
all over him.
Man, I wish I could remember the look on his face. Mother tells me
to my eternal amusement of going in to see the principal (who was this
totally cool guy) who told her that "Ben was in a lot of trouble,
Mrs. Goodridge," while trying extremely hard not to laugh. This was
(snk) after all (snk hee hee) a very serious and solemn charge (ha ha
ha).
Just marking my territory...
Ben Goodridge
bgoo...@maine.maine.edu
http://maine.maine.edu/~bgoodr61
AHWW--Gene pool cleaners
Zepp
In article <515b7d$1l...@sol.caps.maine.edu>,
Ben Goodridge <bgoo...@maine.maine.edu> wrote:
>ze...@snowcrest.net (Zepp) wrote:
>
>(Oops, snipped too much.)
>> By the fourth grade my nickname was 'Animal", and the bigger kids were
>> telling the younger ones, 'watch out for that one's teeth!"
>>
>> Biting, apparently, was against the rules, though ambushing and mass
attacks
>> were not. Humans are weird sometimes, ya know?
>>
>> Greywolf the Wanderer, borrowing zepp's account
>
>Amazing the human reaction to being bitten by another (apparently)
>human. Especially if the bite draws blood, no matter how well
>deserved. You hit them, they hit back. You kick them, they knock
>you down. You BITE them...
>
>They scream, cry, wave around whatever you bit, run to Mommy or Teacher,
>sometimes get taken to the hospital for a tetanus shot or even
>stitches, and you're standing there with blood on your mouth and
>a cheeseating grin. And hell, this is in high school.
>
>For some reason, no one fights back after being bit.
Yeah, I know -- I never did understand that, but I was quite willing to take
advantage of it. What the hell, outnumbered that badly, you need all the
help you can get!! And boy, do they ever leave you the hell alone after
that!
>No one is more surprised than the fighters when the tormented fights
>back against three, or five, or, in your case, fifteen. They thrive
>on the suffering of the weak, and fold when the "weak" don't suffer.
>In high-school I had the standard weenie reputation, and in that time
>period I damn near castrated one kid and spread general humiliations
>around to several others. A major contributing factor to my
>lycanthropy was "wolfing out" in front of some of the biggest jerks
>in high school
Likewise me. By the time I was 14, my dad sat me down one day and told me
that I would *have* to learn to control my temper, or I'd end up in jail soon
after turning 18. Scared the hell out of me, but he was right. A number of
years later I told him so, and thanked him. Only fair -- I never *have*
actually murdered anyone, though not from lack of wanting to, sometimes! ;-)
>Of course, one doesn't have to bite. My mother quite well remembers
>the story (although it has lapsed from my mind) of the time when one
>of the school bullies came into the bathroom while I was doing my
>business (I was in Kindergarten at the time) and started laying into
>me, as bullies do, and without a single word I turned around and pissed
>all over him.
>
>Man, I wish I could remember the look on his face. Mother tells me
>to my eternal amusement of going in to see the principal (who was this
>totally cool guy) who told her that "Ben was in a lot of trouble,
>Mrs. Goodridge," while trying extremely hard not to laugh. This was
>(snk) after all (snk hee hee) a very serious and solemn charge (ha ha
>ha).
>
>Just marking my territory...
>
>Ben Goodridge
>bgoo...@maine.maine.edu
>http://maine.maine.edu/~bgoodr61
>AHWW--Gene pool cleaners
<giggle, snort!> Wow, man, I never thought of that -- I *bet* that must've
freaked the little bastard out. And I bet he never fucked with you after
that, did he? <big evil grin>
What ho, maties -- to arms!!
Greywolf the Wanderer, borrowing zepp's account
-----------------------------------------------
"Cry Havoc! and let loose the dogs of war!" --Shakespeare, 'Henry V'
UnaSeal
In article <Pine.SUN.3.95.960910...@eskimo.com>, "Robert G." <sn...@eskimo.com> wrote:
>On Mon, 9 Sep 1996, UnaSeal wrote:
>
>Howdy,
>
>> to help combat the German forces. I was wondering, since I haven't had the
>> chance to read the books or to see the PBS special on this specific topic, if
>
>> anyone of you out there could shed some light on the issue and extent of
>> Hitler's magical interest in werewolves.
>
>"wolf-rune" as one of their rank symbols. The wolf-rune was popular
>during the Middle Ages and was reputed to repel werwolves. Pagan magickal
>practices were used by both sides; Himmler was into black magic and set up
>Wewelsburg Castle to practice such. Hitler was not into magic though, he
>tolerated those such as Himmler who were loyal to him but also put others
>(such as some popular rune magicians) in the camps. The British employed
>the services of Aleister Crowley more than once during the war.
Ahhh, Crowley, hmmm? Thank you for your input on this thread, Polar, this
topic was buzzing in my ear a few nights ago, and I was lost in it, because I
just didn't have enough information of the subjects--I could see interesting
parrellels, but that's as far as I got. I seemed I heard that Hitler was into
astrology to some degree, and there's that swastika problem as
well...Himmler's idea? Was Hitler an atheist? A Christian? A Christian with
Kabalistic interests, knowledge, or leanings? Did Hitler incorporate any of
Himmler's knowledge into his cause?
>> I thought this was important to bring up so that we could all benefit from a
>> possible exchange on a side of weredom that we may not want to look at, but
>> probably need to. Especially those interested in PS-ing, or those who have
>> trouble when their weresides take control of certain situations best handled
>> by their human sides. How far can we explore our inner weredom before we hit
>
>> a snag and need a check that may or maynot be covered in our religions?
>
>I think all of the examples here are perhaps good examples of old
>were-lore being practiced in the modern age. Albeit without full
>knowledge of the implications of identifying with an animal totem.
<Shrugs> Thats why I was looking for input. :) I thought maybe we could all
pitch in and do our homework together. :)
>I personally see this as a neutral force that can be used for either good
>or ill. Ill in the case of the Nazis, good or ill for the Black Panthers
>depending on your political views :), and good in the case of professional
>sports.
In so far as "outcome" I agree, but it could also be argued that using magick
or even psychological associations to the end of trying to establish dominence
and enriching physical, mental, and emotional power of any sort, never mind
the end result or the original purpose could be constued as a misuse of these
avenues of enrichment. All value judgements aside, I thought we'd begin by
examining the nature of the "totem as mascot" phenomenon and progress from
there, but again, I didn't have the key information that brought about the
desires in the listed groups to identify themselves with a particular animal.
The trend I had noticed itself was fascinating to me.
It is entirely possible that some of the animal powers *do*
>manifest themselves in, for example, a football team - perhaps without
>them even realizing it. I find this whole concept intriguing.
Same here. I'm not usually a football fan, but I can make myself sit without
squiming through a game I'm watching if I go searching for the archetypes at
play ather than the home vs. vistors teams at play. :) It definitely seems
that our prent societies tend toward linking animal nature with cheifly with
aggression and domienence, yet here on AHWW, we have discovered other aspects
of the animal natures that surpass this onesided view through our personal
explorations, so our spiritual evolution may, infact, bring about a global
tremor of enlightenment, and, in the future the personal were-aspect will
finally be recognized universally as being much more multi-fasceted.
Er--that's in theory, anyway...:)
>I'm not familiar with whether Jeffrey Dahmer, Ted Bundy etc. claimed to be
>weres. I hadn't heard anything like that. If they did, I would be more
>inclined to believe that there are some mentally unstable people out there
>who cannot handle wereness (or many other things), and would guess that it
>is this mental instability and not an animal side that is ultimately to
>blame.
agreed. On that topic, it's a bit scetchy all around, and admittedly my
examples were poor on that one. The primary multiple-murderer association
seems to be vampires, not generally speaking werewolves, but there are cases,
say for example, the case of mythomania described early on in the book __The
Beast Within__. Bundy made the mention that, "Sometimes I feel like a
vampire," and Dahmer had been a dabbler in Black Magick, so I assumed that
possibly he could make a good connection somewhere, having canabalized his
victims. In truth, I believe Dahmer was more using the ideology of ingesting
the entrails of his victims the way warriors used to ingest the hearts of the
defeated opponent to gain his strength and courage. In Dahmer's case, I think
he saw himself as "unloveable" and was possibly using the technique to gain
whatever it was that others "seemed" to have that he did not to make him a
"worthy partner in a relationship." Still, if you enjoy cheesy "grocerystore
literature," the book __Cannibal Killers__ explores this association a bit
better that I can, not having ready examples here in front of me.
>Another area I am currently researching is the appearance of animals on
>family crests, and in family names. I believe that it is likely that
>power animals (and by extension, wereness), followed some families and
>were passed down the generations - and thus wound up being incorporated
>into last names and family crests. Comments or insights on this, anyone?
again, the only aid I can be in this, as in stands, is in conceptual
suggestions. My own geneology might have some sort of benefit in this
although presently, with the scant bits of information I currently have on my
family history, the diiging for more clues proves tiresome, and I often lay
these things aside for quite awhile out of sheer frustration. :)
I can offer up the possibility of Franz Kafka. His father claimed that the
family crest bore a thrush, which is what the name Kafka was supposed to
translte from in older Czechoslovakian. Franz' father even went so far as to
have the family's stationery encrested with a thrush image, and again I have
to wonder about the psychological parallel that might have come into play in
the first-person narrative of Kafka's called _Metamorphesis_, where the main
character experienced rejection, loathing, and disgust at the hands of his
family. His beloved sister made the statement, to paraphrase, that "If THIS
is what he has become, then he is no longer himself, and we should abandon him
now." The short story ends with the main character imagining that he is
being left to die, whilst his family is no longer concerned about him in this
state and moves on, having already grieved for what he once was, and not
caring about what he has become.
The interesting parrellel image may be visualized in a family of thrushes
"pecking to death," an insect or "Vermin" as the character called himself.
Again, questions arise-- In his adult years, did Franz Kafka recieve
considerable nagging, disgust, and finally rejection from his family? Did he
percieve it this way? How did he feel about his Family name? Was he less
impressed with it than his father? How did he, if at all, use images of birds
in his literary compositions? Did he claim in any way to identify with the
dreamlike character in __Metamorphesis__, or did he elaborate on a portion of
an older story, merely interjecting themes familiar to him? Were these images
in the story directly brought about by an experience with a psychoactive, or
did it come about later, during dreamstate? A good book on Kafka's life would
probably answer these questions., if only I wasn't engrossed in other right
now. :(
Tom Bubenik
Of course, letting your wereside/s do the fighting isn't always a
good idea. My freshman year so seniors and juniors were picking on
me and a friend because we were protestion something unjust. The
last straw was when the only boy their hurled an insult at us, and I
belived it to be at my friend. I turned and ran at them, he, in
turn, hid. I faced three girls, reading the laughter in their eyes.
We ended up in student services (where the dean stays and disiplinary
problems are taken care of), and after three days we talked with some
administrators. The main girl told them how I attacted them with my
nails, which couldn't have been true, if I was that enraged I would
have draw blood, but I couldn't tell that to the others no one would
belive me. She also said that they were totaly inocent and had no
idea what was going on. I knew differnt, but wolf, who is the one
that usually comes out when I'm mad, couldn't tell the humans about
it. Eventually I just told them it was 'my time of the month' and
couldn't help what I was doing. I still wish that I could have had
some way to tell, but no one would belive me. Like they would belive
that these little nails of mine could draw blood.
Peace,
Katie "Wakko!" Bubenik
Ron Orr (& Tirran, sometimes)
UnaSeal <abo...@terravirtua.com> pondered:
> >The Black Panther Party
> Yup, here's another story I don't have the complete details on... I must
> ask, What significance did the "panther" hold for these men? Did it arise
> from ancient stories from their forebarer's homelands? In what way did
> they hope to strengthen themselves by being referred to as "Panthers"?
> Did religion play any part in their decision? Any insight would be
> helpful on this.
Lessee...
My sources don't show the panther as being of especial interest
to Africans at all (could be wrong; _are_ there panthers in Africa?) All
the symbology I've found has been Egyptian and European, as well as
Algonquin and Ojibwe (evil) and Cherokee (sacred.)
I can only assume that it's the animal's colour, along with the
usual Big Cat power attributes, that they wished to infer with that
name.
> The Japanese fighter piolots in WWII definately had a heavy association with
> tigers...but to what ends? What does Japanese lore say about the tiger? I
> think this goes beyond psychological terror-inducing tactics. It must be
> deeply rooted in the Japanese tradition.
In the Far East the tiger holds the place of the Lion as King of
Beasts, and is always a power symbol. More than that, it seems to hold a
place just below that of the Dragon in early Asian animal mythology.
"Although mythical in Japan...it is used to symbolise courage
and the qualities of warrior heroes." (From the "Dictionary of Symbolic
and Mythological Animals" by J.C. Cooper)
> ... How far can we explore our inner weredom before we hit
> a snag and need a check that may or maynot be covered in our religions?
This has been puzzling me a bit, too. After all, like it or not,
the Other Me doesn't seem to be a 'real' critter at all; so what is the
mechanism that connects me with him? What level does this connection
exist on? Is it symbolic? Mystical? Magical? Is it psychological, and
I'm just kidding myself?
And is this true for other weres? Is your wereside a real
animal, or a symbolic one?
> ... In closing, I
> thought of one other addition to the list...Serial killers often claim that
> they have were-awareness or some sort of vampiriristic side. Many claim it
> stems from dabbling in religious practices that they weren't too sure of what
> they were doing when they did it.
Hmmph...in cases like this, I'm more inclined to think it's just
an excuse for their behaviour, so they can duck responsibility for being
what they are. And in these credulous times, it's easy to convince the
ignorant & uninformed that some mindless, evil beast is really the
killer. It keeps them from having to face the fact that humans can & do
do these things to each other...
Us
in one of Those Moods again
Wanderer
Robert G. <sn...@eskimo.com> wrote in article
<Pine.SUN.3.95.96091...@eskimo.com>...
My guess is that people have recognized this, again on the
> subconscious level, over the years and that is why you see teams like the
> Bears, Rams, etc.. Well, there's also names like Saints, Raiders, and
> Jets which are not animal related. ^^^^^^^
>
That's what you think ... at First Baptist, our mascot was a Saint
Bernard.:>
Yours animalistically,
The wolfish,
Wanderer
wand...@why.net
wand...@whytel.com
James Harrion III
UnaSeal (abo...@terravirtua.com) wrote:
: In article <50oe96$3kg...@equine.onramp.net>, abo...@terravirtua.com (UnaSeal) wrote:
[clawswipe]
As far as the Black Panthers were concerned, I think I saw on a
documentary or news show that one reason they chose the name was because
it was an animal that would fight back at whatever cornered it.
And as far as Panthers in African lore is concerned, I don't have much
information on that, except that I think that they at least in one
example, they were related to divination somehow.
Football as a pagan ritual...heh...something new to shock the fundies
with. :)=
And as far as serial killers are concerned, I know I risk starting
an entire new argument about this (and that's never stopped me before)
but I personally find the concept of gaining 'power' over one's victim,
imprisoning them, so on, to be more vampiric than to have anything
to do with being were.
--
***********************************************************************
Winterdreamer ez04...@ucdavis.edu
AHWW pack member
James Harrion III
Coyote Osborne (coy...@mail.miami.mindspring.com) wrote:
[big snips]
: The thing that aggravated me the most was that everyone;'s attitude,
: teachers, faculty, my stepfather... was essentially that _I_ must have
: done something wrong to "make" those kids not like me and want to beat me
: up, and that when I was more physically vicious than they were, that it
: was "proof" that I had something wrong with me.
:
: I suppose that if I had let them beat me black and blue that I would get
: to be "normal".
"Normal" is doing the same thing to someone else, and then turning around,
"growing up", and instead of using fists being the guy in the office
next to you scheming to steal your job.
My question after reading a lot of these stories is the following:
How did a lot of your parents react when you defended yourself?
Mine screamed and yelled at me for a couple of hours, told me that I was
humiliating them, as black people, in front of the whites who wanted to
see me fail, told me that I was heading towards inevitable
self-destruction, and then if I said anything back hit me until I
got too big for that, and too potentially destructive back to them.
UnaSeal
In article <1996091123...@nor106.vianet.on.ca>, griz...@vianet.on.ca (Ron Orr (& Tirran, sometimes)) wrote:
>UnaSeal <abo...@terravirtua.com> pondered:
> Lessee...
> My sources don't show the panther as being of especial interest
>to Africans at all (could be wrong; _are_ there panthers in Africa?) All
>the symbology I've found has been Egyptian and European, as well as
>Algonquin and Ojibwe (evil) and Cherokee (sacred.)
> I can only assume that it's the animal's colour, along with the
>usual Big Cat power attributes, that they wished to infer with that
>name.
<Nods> Yeah, the word "panther" refers to leopards and mountain lions, and it
seems like maybe cougars as well...<shrugs> It seems to be a catch-all "big
kitty" word, but it apparently DOESN'T refer to lions and tigers. Oh,
well...to answer the question, yes there are panthers in Africa, although if
we ever all go there together, don't put me in charge of pointing them out!
:)
The Egyptian symbology for the panther--what is it? You needn't look any
further for African panther-lore than right in good ol' Egypt. :) Oh, by the
way, I just thought I throw in this side note. I saw "Panther" on tv last
night. Well, most of it, anyway. I missed the first part of it where it
might have TOLD me where the inspiration came from for the "panther"
symbology. <Siiiigggghhhh> Ah well, it was enjoyable to watch, none the
less.
> In the Far East the tiger holds the place of the Lion as King of
>Beasts, and is always a power symbol. More than that, it seems to hold a
>place just below that of the Dragon in early Asian animal mythology.
> "Although mythical in Japan...it is used to symbolise courage
>and the qualities of warrior heroes." (From the "Dictionary of Symbolic
>and Mythological Animals" by J.C. Cooper)
Woo-woo! Ding! Ding! Ding! All Right! Yeeeesssss! <chuckles> Okay, I'm
calmer now. :) THANK YOU! So the tiger symbol is one of courage of warrior
heroes. It very well then does seem to have been used in it's traditional
sense even in as modern times as WWII. I love it when it looks like I have a
chance at being right about something. <Chuckles> <blush> Again, thank you.
:)
>> ... How far can we explore our inner weredom before we hit
>> a snag and need a check that may or maynot be covered in our religions?
>
> This has been puzzling me a bit, too. After all, like it or not,
>the Other Me doesn't seem to be a 'real' critter at all; so what is the
>mechanism that connects me with him? What level does this connection
>exist on? Is it symbolic? Mystical? Magical? Is it psychological, and
>I'm just kidding myself?
> And is this true for other weres? Is your wereside a real
>animal, or a symbolic one?
Errr...that's hard to say, exactly, for me at least. Mine is the seal...and,
at the same time in the same way, it's the Selkie. My wereside is both real
and symbolic. It's psychological, mystical, and magickal as well. :)
<shrugs> It's a long story--takes forever to explain, I even cut corners and
wimped out on telling it all on my werecard, because it really -does- take
forever to explain. :) Basically, the seal is my wereside, the selkie is my
archetype.
>> ... In closing, I
>> thought of one other addition to the list...Serial killers often claim that
>
> Hmmph...in cases like this, I'm more inclined to think it's just
>an excuse for their behaviour, so they can duck responsibility for being
>what they are. And in these credulous times, it's easy to convince the
>ignorant & uninformed that some mindless, evil beast is really the
>killer. It keeps them from having to face the fact that humans can & do
>do these things to each other...
<nods vigorously> You have a point there. The "Son of Sam" Killer, David
Berkowitz, originally made the claim that a 4,000 year old demon lived inside
his neighbor's barking dog, and the barking dog would give him the orders to
kill. Later one sharp FBI agent told him during an interview, "Look, David, I
really came to get some answers from you, but if it's the dog I need to talk
to I'll go down and interview the dog right now." Berkowitz cracked a smile,
and then told the agent that that atleast the "talking dog" story somewhat
justified in people's minds why he had done what he had done.
>Us
>in one of Those Moods again
Me
lives in this mood...;)
UnaSeal
In article <518oo8$m...@mark.ucdavis.edu>, ez04...@bullwinkle.ucdavis.edu (James Harrion III) wrote:
>UnaSeal (abo...@terravirtua.com) wrote:
>: In article <50oe96$3kg...@equine.onramp.net>, abo...@terravirtua.com
> (UnaSeal) wrote:
>
>[clawswipe]
>
>As far as the Black Panthers were concerned, I think I saw on a
>documentary or news show that one reason they chose the name was because
>it was an animal that would fight back at whatever cornered it.
Makes sense. Thanks for the input.
>And as far as Panthers in African lore is concerned, I don't have much
>information on that, except that I think that they at least in one
>example, they were related to divination somehow.
Hmmm...Well...The Black Panthers were certainly masters of their own
fate...:)...but that's more like fortune-telling than actual divination. ;)
>Football as a pagan ritual...heh...something new to shock the fundies
>with. :)=
Well, certainly, I don't want to take football away from the Fundamentalists.
:) so, I back off of that one. I recall once in a chat situation, a
Fundamentalist entered the chat forum and threw down the gauntlet immediately
by saying," The school systems are entirely too Pagan!" To that, I answered,
"Yes, I see your point, and perhapse you're right, but if we were to remove
the teachings of: the alphabet, the numerical system, algebra, trig, calc,
simple arithmatic, poetry, a great deal of the classical literature, music,
art, philosophy, government class, some of the execises and sports in physical
ed, biology, botany, psychology, anatomy and physiology, and physics, what
would be left to teach in school, and what would be the point in going?" :)
Sometimes it sucks being "right." :) I felt bad about it not too much later.
I just saw a similarity..a connective link somehow between football and Pagan
rituals, but certainly, I'm not out to ruin the sport for the Fundamentalists.
:)
>And as far as serial killers are concerned, I know I risk starting
>an entire new argument about this (and that's never stopped me before)
>but I personally find the concept of gaining 'power' over one's victim,
>imprisoning them, so on, to be more vampiric than to have anything
>to do with being were.
I can't forsee any arguements coming about over this statement. :) If the
vamps want to lay claim to serial killers, I don't think anyone here is going
to fight with them over that. Furthermore, it appears that going back over
some of my serial killer "reading material," the serial killers themselves are
in total agreement with you. There might be some slight connections between
werewolves and cannibalism, but it seems like, even then, most cannibals tend
to make the mental connection to vampyrism even then. A few mention
werewolves, but not many.
Crystal
In article <518o4u$m...@mark.ucdavis.edu>, ez04...@bullwinkle.ucdavis.edu
(James Harrion III) wrote:
> Coyote Osborne (coy...@mail.miami.mindspring.com) wrote:
>
> [big snips]
>
> : The thing that aggravated me the most was that everyone;'s attitude,
> : teachers, faculty, my stepfather... was essentially that _I_ must have
> : done something wrong to "make" those kids not like me and want to beat me
> : up, and that when I was more physically vicious than they were, that it
> : was "proof" that I had something wrong with me.
> :
> : I suppose that if I had let them beat me black and blue that I would get
> : to be "normal".
>
> "Normal" is doing the same thing to someone else, and then turning around,
> "growing up", and instead of using fists being the guy in the office
> next to you scheming to steal your job.
>
> My question after reading a lot of these stories is the following:
>
> How did a lot of your parents react when you defended yourself?
Hmm, I seem to have missed a few things here. Like all of the
aforementioned "stories."
My parents never knew about the few times when I defended myself. They
were too busy with their own lives and I was such a coward in grade- and
high school that no one ever chastised me for the time I punched Rich
Byrne in english class or the time I backhanded Crystal Wulfrum on the
bus... I think the authority figures were all so shocked that I'd stood up
for myself, they didn't want to discourage me.
The general attitude of adults around me when I was picked on mercilessly
and completely unable to defend myself except by telling whoever it was to
"shut up" a million times was... exasperation and disgust, I'd say. They
seemed to think it was my fault that I didn't fight back and make the kids
leave me alone. That's a fine philosophy, but it has this one little flaw
in it: I didn't have the first clue how to do that. The only thing I ever
learned about conflict at home was to shut up and take it or I'd get
worse.
It was only after I left home, moved off into a world and a life of my
own, divorced myself from my father, limited my exposure to my mother and
entered a new environment where nobody knew anything about me or my past
that I was finally able to start learning to be a new, strong person.
Somebody at work told me jokingly today that if I didn't come pick up a
package today or tomorrow, there'd be "hell to pay." I told him to come
right upstairs and try it if he thought he had the balls.
I've certainly come a long way from the fraidy-cat who spent most of 7th
grade avoiding Dawn Milo because she'd threatened to beat me up (because I
punched her friend Chuck when he sat with me on the bus and wouldn't get
out of my seat when I told him to).
Crystal
Pinky
In article <00002dfd...@msn.com>, Buben...@msn.com (Tom Bubenik) writes:
|>Of course, letting your wereside/s do the fighting isn't always a
|>good idea. My freshman year so seniors and juniors were picking on
|>me and a friend because we were protestion something unjust. The
|>last straw was when the only boy their hurled an insult at us, and I
|>belived it to be at my friend. I turned and ran at them, he, in
|>turn, hid.
I've done that my share of times, sometimes its hard to hold
the old dog back, esp. when it comes to the mate :>
I faced three girls, reading the laughter in their eyes.
|>We ended up in student services (where the dean stays and disiplinary
|>problems are taken care of), and after three days we talked with some
|>administrators. The main girl told them how I attacted them with my
|>nails, which couldn't have been true, if I was that enraged I would
|>have draw blood, but I couldn't tell that to the others no one would
|>belive me. She also said that they were totaly inocent and had no
|>idea what was going on. I knew differnt, but wolf, who is the one
|>that usually comes out when I'm mad, couldn't tell the humans about
|>it.
Yeah id hate to rip the admins face off >:)
Eventually I just told them it was 'my time of the month' and
|>couldn't help what I was doing.
And yes ive used that excuse before as well, and yall from
irc know that ;>
I still wish that I could have had
|>some way to tell, but no one would belive me. Like they would belive
|>that these little nails of mine could draw blood.
|>
Thats why you have us, we how hard it is to deal with stupid humans,
and their laws >:)
Peace,
|>Katie "Wakko!" Bubenik
|>~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
|>Member of the AHWW cyber-pack and reminder of the Kent State Massacure
|>
heh animaniacs are taking over, a Pinky and a Wakko :>
/\__/\
\/ \/
/|oo \
( | / )
\`@/_/\ |\
| | \ / |
|Pinky| \_/ /
|__ __| / \_/
(_/(_|(____/
The WereWoof
--
KatmanDu
abo...@terravirtua.com (UnaSeal) wrote:
><Nods> Yeah, the word "panther" refers to leopards and mountain lions, and it
>seems like maybe cougars as well...<shrugs> It seems to be a catch-all "big
>kitty" word, but it apparently DOESN'T refer to lions and tigers.
Yup... technically, there are no panthers, as such... black panthers
being melanistic leopards (in Africa) or jaguars (in South America);
and florida panther being one of a zillion names for the cougar..
Zepp
In article <518o4u$m...@mark.ucdavis.edu>,
ez04...@bullwinkle.ucdavis.edu (James Harrion III) wrote:
>"Normal" is doing the same thing to someone else, and then turning around,
>"growing up", and instead of using fists being the guy in the office
>next to you scheming to steal your job.
>
>My question after reading a lot of these stories is the following:
>
>How did a lot of your parents react when you defended yourself?
>
>humiliating them, as black people, in front of the whites who wanted to
>see me fail, told me that I was heading towards inevitable
>self-destruction, and then if I said anything back hit me until I
>got too big for that, and too potentially destructive back to them.
My dad didn't get mad if I didn't get too crazy, but the times I got
suspended from school he was pretty bent about it. That was when he told me
that if I didn't get control of myself I would end up in jail one day. And
he was right, though I didn't think so at the time... ;-)
What DID really get me in trouble, though, was throwing rocks, once, and
another time using my next door neighbour's old hockey stick as a weapon. He
pointed out that I could have killed someone, and how stupid that would be,
and I got a good lickin' and was grounded for a month. Parents got *no*
sense of humour, ya know?
Rorschach
On Wed, 11 Sep 1996, Ron Orr wrote:
> > ... In closing, I
> > thought of one other addition to the list...Serial killers often claim that
> > they have were-awareness or some sort of vampiriristic side. Many claim it
> > stems from dabbling in religious practices that they weren't too sure of what
> > they were doing when they did it.
>
> Hmmph...in cases like this, I'm more inclined to think it's just
> an excuse for their behaviour, so they can duck responsibility for being
> what they are. And in these credulous times, it's easy to convince the
> ignorant & uninformed that some mindless, evil beast is really the
> killer. It keeps them from having to face the fact that humans can & do
> do these things to each other...
In principle I would agree, but I have seen people that contradict
this. There are some very bad people out there that are not neccesarily
all human. I am inclined to think that a wereside is essentialy a
neutral thing. It gives a connection to animal traits and can give a lot
of power. If this connection is used to link to the savagery that is in
some beasts then you can get some pretty ugly results.
We are what we are. If we are good people, then we are good weres. If
someone is an evil person, being were is not going to transform him into
a good were. No, I don't think that the animal side of these people is
entirely to blame, but I can't help but suspect that it contributes to
what they do.
Two last thoughts:
Being a were is a great responsibility as well as a great honor.
We ALL have a dark side.
. . Rorschach
| \ / |
|/ """ \? A stark pattern of Black and White
//,\ /,\\ Within it you can find images, reflections. Maybe Balance.
\ |_| / I walk a risky path: alone, yet not: whole, yet fractured.
`=' "NOW is the time to RAGE against the dying of the light!"
UnaSeal
Rorschach <o...@efn.org> wrote:
>We are what we are. If we are good people, then we are good weres. If
>someone is an evil person, being were is not going to transform him into
>a good were. No, I don't think that the animal side of these people is
>entirely to blame, but I can't help but suspect that it contributes to
>what they do.
>
>Two last thoughts:
>
>Being a were is a great responsibility as well as a great honor.
>
>We ALL have a dark side.
<Una nods> This was my point that I took multiple posts and zillions of words
to point out. I think I unintentionally distracted everyone with my
"examples," though. :) I'm thankful that Rorschach is not quite so wordy as
I, and can find the importance of a post amidsts the author's <my> ramblings.
:)
To some superficial extent, the above was dramatized for us in the Jack
Nicholson flick, Wolf. <Egads, here I go with another example! Oh, well..>
Jack Nicholson, the "good" were had claw-to-claw combat with the yuppie,
self-interested "evil" were. In the end, good triumphed over evil, but my
suggestion originally was that perhapse, in reality, conflicts similar in
nature to what was portrayed for pure enjoyment in the film have gone on in
the recent past and continue to do so, and that it would be to our credit to
recognise this and see how it applies to each of us, determined to fight the
"Good Fight" but possibly misdirrected in so far as that we may credit all of
our potential for aggression to the wereside, and thus may take no
responcibility for it on our human side, or, we may at some point of another
use our rare gifts and knowledge to fulfill very human self-serving desires.
Simply dismissing it all as something that "can't happen to me," is not the
way to insure that this is so. Does anyone have any coping stradegies to
offer up? Anything that you, personally use as a means of "centering"
yourself, or of keeping "all sides in check"?
Ron Orr (& Tirran, sometimes)
UnaSeal <abo...@terravirtua.com> wrote:
> The Egyptian symbology for the panther--what is it? You needn't look any
> further for African panther-lore than right in good ol' Egypt. :)
"...the panther was an ideogram relating to the appearance of
life, and that by extension it became, in certain circumstances,a symbol
of strength and of resurrection.
"...the Egyptians regarded the panther's skin as a powerful
source of emanations of a higher kind, and their preists believed in its
magical and spiritual effect."
From "The Beastiary of Christ" by Louis Charbonneau-Lassay
Some background clipped; this is just the summary.
> >... Is your wereside a real animal, or a symbolic one?
>
> Errr...that's hard to say, exactly, for me at least...
> ... It's a long story--takes forever to explain, I even cut corners and
> wimped out on telling it all on my werecard, because it really -does- take
> forever to explain. :)
So? _I_ went into detail, eventually. GIVE, already!
Ron
way too curious
Ron Orr (& Tirran, sometimes)
Robert G. <sn...@eskimo.com> wrote:
> Another area I am currently researching is the appearance of animals on
> family crests, and in family names. I believe that it is likely that
> power animals (and by extension, wereness), followed some families and
> were passed down the generations - and thus wound up being incorporated
> into last names and family crests. Comments or insights on this, anyone?
>
> Polarbear
"Likely?" Power animals of some kind or other have always been
integral to heraldry. The animals in question are pretty rigidly
defined, too, with certain physical characteristics given specific
meanings.
A lot of the symbolism derives from Christian symbology, too.
The Bestiaries have done a great disservice to animals over the
centuries, and some of the results hold up the crests of ancient
families all over Europe.
There should be some books on heraldry out there that go into
some detail. Been meaning to look for Net sources, too, when I can save
up some server time...
Ron
Ron Orr (& Tirran, sometimes)
KatmanDu <katm...@negia.net> wrote:
> abo...@terravirtua.com (UnaSeal) wrote:
> ><Nods> Yeah, the word "panther" refers to leopards and mountain lions, and it
> >seems like maybe cougars as well...<shrugs> It seems to be a catch-all "big
> >kitty" word, but it apparently DOESN'T refer to lions and tigers.
>
> Yup... technically, there are no panthers, as such... black panthers
> being melanistic leopards (in Africa) or jaguars (in South America);
> and florida panther being one of a zillion names for the cougar..
"Panther" seems to be a word coined during the Middle Ages. One
explanation is that it's derived from "pan" (all) implying that Christ
came to save the whole world.
The lengths the bestiaries went to, to paste Christian symbology
on things...
Ron
Zepp
In article <51cbt8$2p8...@equine.onramp.net>,
Repeat after me this Holy Mantra of Self-Preservation: "The bastard's NOT
worth going to jail for!!" <not-entirely-joking grin>
Rorschach
On Fri, 13 Sep 1996, UnaSeal wrote:
> >Two last thoughts:
> >
> >Being a were is a great responsibility as well as a great honor.
> >
> >We ALL have a dark side.
snip
> To some superficial extent, the above was dramatized for us in the Jack
> Nicholson flick, Wolf. <Egads, here I go with another example! Oh, well..>
> Jack Nicholson, the "good" were had claw-to-claw combat with the yuppie,
> self-interested "evil" were. In the end, good triumphed over evil, but my
> suggestion originally was that perhapse, in reality, conflicts similar in
> nature to what was portrayed for pure enjoyment in the film have gone on in
> the recent past and continue to do so, and that it would be to our credit to
> recognise this and see how it applies to each of us, determined to fight the
> "Good Fight" but possibly misdirrected in so far as that we may credit all of
> our potential for aggression to the wereside, and thus may take no
> responcibility for it on our human side, or, we may at some point of another
> use our rare gifts and knowledge to fulfill very human self-serving desires.
> Simply dismissing it all as something that "can't happen to me," is not the
> way to insure that this is so. Does anyone have any coping stradegies to
> offer up? Anything that you, personally use as a means of "centering"
> yourself, or of keeping "all sides in check"?
Thank you for giving me an opening for an example that I wanted to use in
the previous post, but couldn't quite get to fit right.
An example that I greatly liked (Gotten from Joseph Cambell actually)
likens a person's darker desires to a caged beast. What many people try
and to is pretend that the beast does not exist. But the beast is there,
and if ignored, it starves and gets angry. As it gets angry it starts to
struggle harder and harder to get out, and the person must put more
energy into keeping this beast that they are ignoring caged. Sometimes
that beast becomes strong enough to break out, and when it does it is
hurt and angry and hungry. There is not way to control it.
But there is another way. If you take control and admit that those
desires are there (yet not give in to them) it is feeding the beast. It
remains unhappy because it is caged, but it never gets angry enough to
break out. This is where I stand. It is a balance point. The beast is
there, and there are even times when I can let it out (In a fight or in a
forest or in a cry at the moon) but is a lot of the time that I must keep
those desires caged.
There are some people who throw open that cage and embrace the beast
within. The dark desires become them, in return they get a great
strength. These are people to be damn wary of IMO.
(In this crowd, maybe a beast is not such a great metaphor. I have not
come up with a much better on though. (Cause monster doesn't carry very
well either :) What the beast of this metaphor is though is the dark
desires that spring from both human conciousness and from animal.
Remember that killing for pleasure and pointless destruction are not
restricted to humans, but are found in the natural world as well.
Dennis Lee Bieber
On Sat, 14 Sep 1996 10:38:50 GMT in alt.horror.werewolves,
Robert G. (sn...@eskimo.com) declaimed:
> On Fri, 13 Sep 1996, Ron Orr (& Tirran, sometimes) wrote:
>
> > "Likely?" Power animals of some kind or other have always been
> > integral to heraldry. The animals in question are pretty rigidly
> > defined, too, with certain physical characteristics given specific
> > meanings.
>
> So, not just likely but fairly obvious in other words.
>
> > There should be some books on heraldry out there that go into
> > some detail. Been meaning to look for Net sources, too, when I can save
> > up some server time...
>
> Something else to look up when I get a chance...I can't seem to find the
> one book on heraldrly I have just now.
If you /can/ find it, Shield & Crest is a fun book to read.
The author describes some of the odder poses quite humorously.
As for attributions of animals to names... Well, the college
of arms does at times tend to punsters... picking up on anything in
ones name or lifestyle to use as a "key"... As I recall, "Swinton"
tends to have a lot of Boars in their arms...
However... My own name correlates with the Beaver... but I
do NOT feel very beaverish...
--
> ============================================================ <
> wulf...@netcom.com | Wulfraed Dennis Lee Bieber KD6MOG <
> news.dm.net | Bestiaria Support Staff <
> ============================================================ <
> PGP key: Finger wulf...@netcom.com <
> Home Page: ftp://ftp.netcom.com/pub/wu/wulfraed/wulfraed.htm <
UnaSeal
<Doubled-over in hysterics because she knows the truth in these words> I
can't COUNT the number of times I've used this "mantra" to advise a friend
or two, or three, or four...Enlightenment revealed this Holy Mantra to me only
after hours of deep meditation on things "most unholy." :)
<wipes away hysterical laughter tears> Thanks, Greywolf, for your input. :D
UnaSeal
In article <1996091323...@nor107.vianet.on.ca>, griz...@vianet.on.ca (Ron Orr (& Tirran, sometimes)) wrote:
>UnaSeal <abo...@terravirtua.com> wrote:
>
>> >... Is your wereside a real animal, or a symbolic one?
>>
>> Errr...that's hard to say, exactly, for me at least...
>> ... It's a long story--takes forever to explain, I even cut corners and
>> wimped out on telling it all on my werecard, because it really -does- take
>> forever to explain. :)
>
> So? _I_ went into detail, eventually. GIVE, already!
<Gilligan's Island theme playing> Sit right back, and you'll hear a tale,
(tail?)...
Okeeeyyy, here goes....
Once upon a time, there was this little girl who was entirely too shy for her
own good. I say "shy," but that's not true...she just couldn't relate to the
folks around her, and on those occaissions when she had to make an attempt at
it, she failed miserably, probably due to being out of practice. :) She
wanted siblings desparately, and, in fact, she had two of them, but those two
siblings were practically old enough to be her parents. ..Both were married,
and had kiddos of their own.
The little girl spent her hours reading to the family pet, a cat. She spent
all her time with him, and the two of them developed a bond that surpassed all
other bonds. He was her long-lost sibling. Her parents were in total
agreement with this, and would even have to try to explain to the occaissional
kindergarten and first grade teachers who would conference with them, asking
why their daughter claimed to be a close, blood-relative of a cat. :)
The kiddo grew and grew, but still never fully learned to relate with
people...cats, dogs, squirrels, etc being the preferred companions. She also
developed a close bond with plants and would rather tell her troubles to a
Boston Fern than to a gossipy, judgemental human. Her talking to the plants
helped them thrive and prosper, and it helped her, as well. Again, an
opportunity to nurture and relate to something non-human.
The girl's family held many secrets--some relating to her true ancestoral
heritage--which, she felt, contributed to the make-up of her identity. Now
fully grown, she has resigned herself to the fact that the family history will
never be known, and that the annimosities within the family developed long
before her birth, and that it had been pre-determined long ago that she should
be the designated newer generation "black sheep."
The little girl all her life had loved faerie stories and folklore, and she
loved to notice ironies and words, so for her, being the "black sheep" and the
"scapegoat" meant something deeper than it usually does for most people. :)
She knew that freedom was something like running through the chilly winds on
an autumn night, and she struggled with the inner feelings that she would one
day be able to enjoy freedom ALL the time, if it weren't for those binding
ties associated with people and with the pain and dread they bring with them.
In her dreams, she laughed and played with the seals. Sometimes, she even WAS
a seal, but the importance of that had not been fullly understood yet.
She thought that perhapse what would free her from the depression and the
longing would be to go someplace where seals were many and people were few,
but the opportunity never came up. One day, she decided that folklore held
the solution that would show her what the seals in her dreams meant. There
were many seals from mythology but the stories about the selkie--the fallen
angels who unlike man, never seemed to have any hopes of salvation, who were
hunted but helpless, who, once in human form, always gazed out to the sea and
longed for another life--spoke volumes to her.
Today, she's exploring this kindred spirit--with animals--with the
mythological creature--in AHWW, and is exploring her own inner-feelings and
longings to be free and wild in a society which frowns on naked seal-girls
playing on the beach by the sea. :)
Ta-Da! The end... :)
Wanderer
Ron Orr (& Tirran, sometimes) <griz...@vianet.on.ca> wrote in article
<1996091323...@nor107.vianet.on.ca>...
> Robert G. <sn...@eskimo.com> wrote:
>
> > Another area I am currently researching is the appearance of animals on
> > family crests, and in family names. I believe that it is likely that
> > power animals (and by extension, wereness), followed some families and
> > were passed down the generations - and thus wound up being incorporated
> > into last names and family crests. Comments or insights on this,
anyone?
> >
> > Polarbear
Lovell: A wolf's head. Lovell means 'young wolf'. It was generally
applied to those with short tempers.:)
Osborn: Bear. Also, the bear occurs in the city arms of Berne,
Switzerland.
Just a bit of info I happened to keep.:)
Yours heraldically,
The rampant,
Wanderer
wand...@why.net
wand...@whytel.com
James Harrion III
Rorschach (o...@efn.org) wrote:
: On Fri, 13 Sep 1996, UnaSeal wrote:
: But there is another way. If you take control and admit that those
: desires are there (yet not give in to them) it is feeding the beast. It
: remains unhappy because it is caged, but it never gets angry enough to
: break out. This is where I stand. It is a balance point. The beast is
: there, and there are even times when I can let it out (In a fight or in a
: forest or in a cry at the moon) but is a lot of the time that I must keep
: those desires caged.
None of this actually addresses though:
1) What actually _is_ the 'beast' (not in the sense of physical existence
but what sorts of things it leads to, so on)?
2) Why it is caged in the first place?
: There are some people who throw open that cage and embrace the beast
: within. The dark desires become them, in return they get a great
: strength. These are people to be damn wary of IMO.
Because they might possibly be stronger than you, or because of an
arbitrary moral reason?
: (In this crowd, maybe a beast is not such a great metaphor. I have not
: come up with a much better on though. (Cause monster doesn't carry very
: well either :) What the beast of this metaphor is though is the dark
: desires that spring from both human conciousness and from animal.
: Remember that killing for pleasure and pointless destruction are not
: restricted to humans, but are found in the natural world as well.
At what point is 'pointless destruction' no longer pointless?
To put this in the context of what UnaSeal had to say earlier, her example
of someone who gave into the 'beast' was the yuppie in Wolf. Yet in his
case, his actions were, from a certain perspective, not pointless, but
did show at least a certain amount of planning (although I wouldn't
have done them myself, or approved of them either).
UnaSeal
In article <51lo28$e...@mark.ucdavis.edu>, ez04...@dale.ucdavis.edu (James Harrion III) wrote:
>Rorschach (o...@efn.org) wrote:
>: On Fri, 13 Sep 1996, UnaSeal wrote:
>
>: But there is another way. If you take control and admit that those
>: desires are there (yet not give in to them) it is feeding the beast. It
>: remains unhappy because it is caged, but it never gets angry enough to
>: break out. This is where I stand. It is a balance point. The beast is
>: there, and there are even times when I can let it out (In a fight or in a
>: forest or in a cry at the moon) but is a lot of the time that I must keep
>: those desires caged.
>
>None of this actually addresses though:
>
>1) What actually _is_ the 'beast' (not in the sense of physical existence
>but what sorts of things it leads to, so on)?
I'd have to say, "The Beast" is most likely those points in time where the ego
is not separate from the "self" in the human psyche. According to Jungian
theory, elaborated and developed on since Jung's death, the psyche revisits
this state many times during the natural progression of self-growth. It is
the state we are born into, as depicted in the archetype of the serpent
consuming his own tail. At the point of birth, the human child's psyche has
an ego and a self that are not mutually exclusive, and his mental growth from
the start consists of pulling away from, and revisiting this state. He is
born, literally, "self-centered," and has a difficult time distinguishing
between his possessions and the possessions of others, for example. While
this awareness of "yours, mine, and ours" is not as important for say, a wolf,
who only needs to be able to dissern "his pack," "his mate," "his terratory,"
and "his offspring," while the very essence of human civilzation is based on
possessions and material bartering, thus--man NEEDS to make this initial
break. At the times he returns to this state, he has much more information
and knowledge than he did previously, so, for example, a man experiencing a
"mid-life crisis," does not experience a return to the misunderstandings
between what is "his" and what belongs to someone else...instead, he may
"covet his brother's wife," knowing full-well that such an action is not
"morally correct," and that although such an action may have repulsed him
previously, his desire--his Will--draws him to overlook the relationship of
his action to the potential upset of other involved parties, because his
personal materialistic gains take presidence over the potential sufferings
which may lay ahead for others. Morality, ethics, and laws are very
neccessary for mankind, considering his society, and very unncessary for the
wolf, due to the nature of his society, because the primary focus of the wolf
is to survive and function in accordence with the "gut reactions" of the pack,
while the primary focus for humans is to survive either within or outside of
the moral/ethical/legal aspects of his society set-up to secure his
possessions, and well as those of his neighbor, in a system that actually
assigns personal value/self esteem, comfort, security, control, and even
"good/bad" value judgements to material objects. Does the man make the tools,
or do the tools make the man? --It doesn't matter to wolves one bit.
>2) Why it is caged in the first place?
As developing young children, it is our personal responcibility at an early
age to learn to walk, talk, and interact sucessfully with others...We learn
early on in kindergarten, for example, that nose picking brings riddicule, and
through observation of the behavior of others, we figure out (hopefully) what
we can and cannot do to gain approval. Tis a very effective system of
dynamics, considering each one of us probably all had initial reservations
about publically submitting our werecards or delurking at one time or another,
simply because we feared possible condemnations from SOMEONE. The "Beast"
isn't necessarily aware of what is bad, unjust, or just plain publically
scandalous. This cage is perfect for mankind's society...worthless in wolven
society. As a side note, the Unabomber referred to "the cage" as
oversocialization, but in the societies that man has created, this
"oversocialization" can only be an asset, not a hinderence...thus, the
Unabomber touted a restructuring of our current society to be more lupine,
less human, to avoid what he considered the "downside" of humanity.
>: There are some people who throw open that cage and embrace the beast
>: within. The dark desires become them, in return they get a great
>: strength. These are people to be damn wary of IMO.
>
>Because they might possibly be stronger than you, or because of an
>arbitrary moral reason?
I see those who put "the Beast" in the driver's seat of their psyche as being
perfectly adapted to lupine lifestyles...but it's a terrible draw-back in
human society because of the threat of punishment. If a person runs out of
food, it may be the most practical thing he can do to go out and slaughter
another human to prepare the carcus for a meal, but the action itself is
understood in our society as being disrespectful of the other person due to
the fact that, against his will, you ended his life. Animals can afford to
sometimes be this "practical," but it doesn't work for us. Its been said
before that the mother of ethics was the fear that someone would commit a
specific violation against you before you can do it to them, thus, we in our
society have a "gentleman's agreement" not to cannibalize one another. The
testtesterone-ladden Unabomber, however seems to think this is the "cowardly"
way out.
>: (In this crowd, maybe a beast is not such a great metaphor. I have not
>: come up with a much better on though. (Cause monster doesn't carry very
>: well either :) What the beast of this metaphor is though is the dark
>: desires that spring from both human conciousness and from animal.
>: Remember that killing for pleasure and pointless destruction are not
>: restricted to humans, but are found in the natural world as well.
>
>At what point is 'pointless destruction' no longer pointless?
>
>To put this in the context of what UnaSeal had to say earlier, her example
>of someone who gave into the 'beast' was the yuppie in Wolf. Yet in his
>case, his actions were, from a certain perspective, not pointless, but
>did show at least a certain amount of planning (although I wouldn't
>have done them myself, or approved of them either).
I cannot think of even one example of "pointless destruction." There have
been ennumerable destructive acts I did not understand, did not approve of, or
could not relate to even with understanding, but every act on the part of man
and animal has a purpose that I can see-- Men kill for many reasons...many
serial killers say they do it for "recreational purposes." Animals kill to
defend, to eat, and sometimes as an act of "eliminating the undesirables," but
there's almost always a purpose. The "yuppie wolf" seemed to be merely
"eliminating the competition." <Self-centered desires> But the acts of those
closer to the "serpent eating his tail" archetype must be held in a "check and
balance," not to be ignored, nor embraced...to be a sucesssful, productive
member of human society. Again, for animals, its a whole different ballgame.
:)
My 2 Lincolns. Can anyone spare a dime? :)
Zepp
coy...@mail.miami.mindspring.com (Coyote Osborne)wrote thusly:
>In article <50tvto$k...@news.snowcrest.net>, ze...@snowcrest.net (Zepp) wrote:
>> Hee, hee! Around here we call that 'evolution in action', otherwise
>> expressed as 'my, the human gene pool certainly could use a little
>> chlorine!'
>LOL!!! <G>
>> Came in handy at
>> school, when ten or fifteen human kids would decide to trash one solitary
>> wolf cub -- but it got me in a lot of trouble, too, for what the adults saw
>> as unjustified ferocity.
>> Biting, apparently, was against the rules, though ambushing and mass attacks
>> were not. Humans are weird sometimes, ya know?
>I always got amazed by that... I was always relatively small as a kid..
>smaller than the other kids I mean. Yet whenever someone decided taht they
>wanted to pick on me, they always got together a little herd of
>like-minded kids.
>I vividly remember an incident during PE in 3rd grade... a little jerk
>tried to get me to hand over my lunch money during art class... he said'
>he'd "get" me in PE. he and four friends decided to beat me up.
(all too familiar story snipped for brevity)
>He sent a note home to my parents saying that I had vicously attacked some
>other children and that I should get psychological help.
Yeah, sounds about right. I remember my folks did take me to some
shrink a couple of times, but I don't think he was able to tell them
anything useful. I mostly ignored him, and played with the neat
fishtank full of sand and toy soldiers in the corner of the room.
>I remember after that asking him the next day why it was okay for those
>other kids to harass me and beat me up and he didn't do anything, but when
>I beat _them_ up (all five) there was somethign wrong with me.
>He told me that I ought to learn to be a "sport".
>And that kicking and lawing and biting and hitting in the solar plexus or
>"below the belt" were "dirty fighting".
>And I asked "and five big kids ganging up on one small one is not?"
Well, of *course* it isn't!! After a while, I decided that dirty
fighting was something the adults made up to hassle me with, and went
back to the idea of *whatever it takes to survive*...
>He responded that if I'd play more sports that I'd have more friends (the
>preceding week, I had asked not to play "dodgeball" because, frankly, I
>hated it.
I applaud yourr taste, o packmate. I always thought dodgeball sucked.
Or, as Calvin of Calvin and Hobbes once said, "Fifth period: studies
in contemporary state-sponsored terrorism -- otherwise known as P.E."
>The thing that aggravated me the most was that everyone;'s attitude,
>teachers, faculty, my stepfather... was essentially that _I_ must have
>done something wrong to "make" those kids not like me and want to beat me
>up, and that when I was more physically vicious than they were, that it
>was "proof" that I had something wrong with me.
>I suppose that if I had let them beat me black and blue that I would get
>to be "normal".
>Coyote
>--
>---
>Coyote Osborne;1085 NE 179 Terrace;North Miami Beach, FL 33162
>email: coy...@miami.mindspring.com
Hey, as somebody or other once said, "Y be normal?" <grin> Way I see
it, better to be a livre dirtyfighter than a dead good sport. Only
place I fight fair is in a ring by prior arrangment, and I don't *do*
that. Outside, who jumps me does so at their own risk! <fierce grin>
Greywolf the Wanderer, borrowing zepp's account
=========================================================================
OK, so Newt, always the crowd pleaser, has introduced legislation in the
House to allow commercial sponsors of our national treasures (HR3814).
Trent Less, in the Senate, has done the same (S1703). Like the GOP, this
idea deserves to go in the trash. But first, savor these possibilities.
Sequoia = Diamond Match National Park
Redwoods = Husquevana Chain Saws National Park
Great Smokey National Park - Benson & Hedges National Park
Trojans, proud sponsor of the Washington monument.
New motto: "Remember the Anusol Alamo!"
==========================================================================
James Harrion III
UnaSeal (abo...@terravirtua.com) wrote:
Do wolves also know that there is "not his pack", "not his mate", and "not
his territory"?
And can't possessions, or wanting them, be thought of in humans as kind of
a territorial act?
At the times he returns to this state, he has much more information
: and knowledge than he did previously, so, for example, a man experiencing a
: "mid-life crisis," does not experience a return to the misunderstandings
: between what is "his" and what belongs to someone else...instead, he may
: "covet his brother's wife," knowing full-well that such an action is not
: "morally correct," and that although such an action may have repulsed him
: previously, his desire--his Will--draws him to overlook the relationship of
: his action to the potential upset of other involved parties, because his
: personal materialistic gains take presidence over the potential sufferings
: which may lay ahead for others. Morality, ethics, and laws are very
: neccessary for mankind, considering his society,
So is it because of society than people need morality, ethics, and laws,
or would they come to exist no matter what in your view?
and very unncessary for the
: wolf, due to the nature of his society, because the primary focus of the wolf
: is to survive and function in accordence with the "gut reactions" of the pack,
: while the primary focus for humans is to survive either within or outside of
: the moral/ethical/legal aspects of his society set-up to secure his
: possessions, and well as those of his neighbor, in a system that actually
: assigns personal value/self esteem, comfort, security, control, and even
: "good/bad" value judgements to material objects. Does the man make the tools,
: or do the tools make the man? --It doesn't matter to wolves one bit.
I'd say it's probably a combination of both.
: >2) Why it is caged in the first place?
:
: As developing young children, it is our personal responcibility at an early
: age to learn to walk, talk, and interact sucessfully with others...We learn
: early on in kindergarten, for example, that nose picking brings riddicule, and
: through observation of the behavior of others, we figure out (hopefully) what
: we can and cannot do to gain approval. Tis a very effective system of
: dynamics, considering each one of us probably all had initial reservations
: about publically submitting our werecards or delurking at one time or another,
: simply because we feared possible condemnations from SOMEONE.
What this is essentially saying though, is that to a certain extent
society conditioned weres away from honesty.
Is this right or wrong?
The "Beast"
: isn't necessarily aware of what is bad, unjust, or just plain publically
: scandalous. This cage is perfect for mankind's society...worthless in wolven
: society. As a side note, the Unabomber referred to "the cage" as
: oversocialization, but in the societies that man has created, this
: "oversocialization" can only be an asset, not a hinderence...thus, the
: Unabomber touted a restructuring of our current society to be more lupine,
: less human, to avoid what he considered the "downside" of humanity.
Why can the oversocialization only be an asset?
: >: There are some people who throw open that cage and embrace the beast
: >: within. The dark desires become them, in return they get a great
: >: strength. These are people to be damn wary of IMO.
: >
: >Because they might possibly be stronger than you, or because of an
: >arbitrary moral reason?
:
: I see those who put "the Beast" in the driver's seat of their psyche as being
: perfectly adapted to lupine lifestyles...but it's a terrible draw-back in
: human society because of the threat of punishment. If a person runs out of
: food, it may be the most practical thing he can do to go out and slaughter
: another human to prepare the carcus for a meal, but the action itself is
: understood in our society as being disrespectful of the other person due to
: the fact that, against his will, you ended his life. Animals can afford to
: sometimes be this "practical," but it doesn't work for us.
Would you say that it works for larger groups of humans than the single
individual though?
Its been said
: before that the mother of ethics was the fear that someone would commit a
: specific violation against you before you can do it to them, thus, we in our
: society have a "gentleman's agreement" not to cannibalize one another. The
: testtesterone-ladden Unabomber, however seems to think this is the "cowardly"
: way out.
Actually the Unabomber (well the suspect anyway) hardly seems to be the
testosterone-laden type.
: >At what point is 'pointless destruction' no longer pointless?
: >
: >To put this in the context of what UnaSeal had to say earlier, her example
: >of someone who gave into the 'beast' was the yuppie in Wolf. Yet in his
: >case, his actions were, from a certain perspective, not pointless, but
: >did show at least a certain amount of planning (although I wouldn't
: >have done them myself, or approved of them either).
:
: I cannot think of even one example of "pointless destruction." There have
: been ennumerable destructive acts I did not understand, did not approve of, or
: could not relate to even with understanding, but every act on the part of man
: and animal has a purpose that I can see-- Men kill for many reasons...many
: serial killers say they do it for "recreational purposes." Animals kill to
: defend, to eat, and sometimes as an act of "eliminating the undesirables," but
: there's almost always a purpose. The "yuppie wolf" seemed to be merely
: "eliminating the competition." <Self-centered desires> But the acts of those
: closer to the "serpent eating his tail" archetype must be held in a "check and
: balance," not to be ignored, nor embraced...to be a sucesssful, productive
: member of human society.
Which human society though (since there's more than one)?
And if human society frowns on these acts so greatly, then why have they
become increasingly common throughout it's quarters of late?
UnaSeal
In article <51ph8s$p...@mark.ucdavis.edu>, ez04...@dale.ucdavis.edu (James Harrion III) wrote:
>UnaSeal (abo...@terravirtua.com) wrote:
>: In article <51lo28$e...@mark.ucdavis.edu>, ez04...@dale.ucdavis.edu (James
> Harrion III) wrote:
:
>: I'd have to say, "The Beast" is most likely those points in time where the
> ego
>: is not separate from the "self" in the human psyche. According to Jungian
>: theory, elaborated and developed on since Jung's death, the psyche revisits
>: this state many times during the natural progression of self-growth. It is
>: the state we are born into, as depicted in the archetype of the serpent
>: consuming his own tail. At the point of birth, the human child's psyche has
>: an ego and a self that are not mutually exclusive, and his mental growth from
>
>: the start consists of pulling away from, and revisiting this state. He is
>: born, literally, "self-centered," and has a difficult time distinguishing
>: between his possessions and the possessions of others, for example. While
>: this awareness of "yours, mine, and ours" is not as important for say, a
> wolf,
>: who only needs to be able to dissern "his pack," "his mate," "his terratory,"
>
>: and "his offspring," while the very essence of human civilzation is based on
>: possessions and material bartering, thus--man NEEDS to make this initial
>: break.
>
>Do wolves also know that there is "not his pack", "not his mate", and "not
>his territory"?
>
<Chuckles> One learns very quickly not to mess with the things that one gets
bitten for. :) It isn't necessary for the wolf to understand what belongs to
someone else, as long as he understands that he'll be punished for partaking
in what is not "his."
>And can't possessions, or wanting them, be thought of in humans as kind of
>a territorial act?
>
It's true, humans are all together territorial, however, their sense of
"territory" is rather skewed in comparison with the wolf's due to the fact
that in Capitalistic societies, the concept of "money" defines one's
boundaries, in Socialism, the concept of "privelaged elitism" defines one's
boundaries, and in actual, realized Communism, one's boundary is the amount of
space one's butt covers when one is seated. :) Wolves merely have to fight
to accrue what is theirs, which is far removed from the abstract concepts
humans constuct concerning government and economics. Whether humans want to
admit it or not, the economic system they live under defines certain
characteristics of their personalities which are integral in everything from
problem-solving skills on a personal and interpersonal level to providing
personal justifications or arguements for/against State diplomatic policies
and not-so-diplomatic military manuevers. Wolf packs don't have to have a
"Camp David" or a U.N. :) The "Us agaist Them" thing is entirely different
for wolves.
> At the times he returns to this state, he has much more information
>: and knowledge than he did previously, so, for example, a man experiencing a
>: "mid-life crisis," does not experience a return to the misunderstandings
>: between what is "his" and what belongs to someone else...instead, he may
>: "covet his brother's wife," knowing full-well that such an action is not
>: "morally correct," and that although such an action may have repulsed him
>: previously, his desire--his Will--draws him to overlook the relationship of
>: his action to the potential upset of other involved parties, because his
>: personal materialistic gains take presidence over the potential sufferings
>: which may lay ahead for others. Morality, ethics, and laws are very
>: neccessary for mankind, considering his society,
>
>
>So is it because of society than people need morality, ethics, and laws,
>or would they come to exist no matter what in your view?
The way I see it, it's not a "society" thing, it's a "human" thing. Mankind
is made of of "systems builders." Some fascets of "systems building" are
technical, some are more "people-oriented"--spiritual, economic-trade
oriented, etc. This is one of the main flaws in the "Unabomber" <renamed:
Humaninst> Manifesto. He/they assert that there is a psychological need in
mankind to achieve and accomplish on a personal level, and then states that
the way to go about this is to eradicate all of society's growth, so that man
can feel fulfilled, to put it simply, "toiling the soil for an honest day's
work". If this was instituted, the natural inclination of man would be,
eventually, for someone to come up with an "easier" or "better" way to toil,
because, as the Manifesto correctly states, stagnation leads to deterioration.
To place this more in the realm of what we're talking about, I can see the
possibility of retarding progress for a time, but that would involve yet
ANOTHER typically human element of systems building--the people-oriented one.
Examples are religion, (The Manifesto suggests that this is "okay,"> such as
what holds together the Amish or what had sustained many other agrarian
communties--Native American, IndoEuropean Paganism, et al.>, or a government
structure of some kind which forbids technological growth, or some other
outlet for human creativity which involves morality, ethics, or laws. The
minute technology DOES arise, there will be moral and ethical outcries <Think
of the Industrial Revolution and the "Cyberporn scare" of the Inet> and these
beliefs must inevitable be backed by a "higher" belief, such as religion, and
of course laws will have to be passed to uphold man's ideas of property, thus
necessitating a ruling body of some kind. ("This shovel is Og's. Me use
it--no one else. No kill me with it either!") It's all a human "catch 22"
that wolves don't bother with, because psychologically, it's unnecessary for
them. :)
> and very unncessary for the
>: wolf, due to the nature of his society, because the primary focus of the wolf
>
>: is to survive and function in accordence with the "gut reactions" of the
> pack,
>: while the primary focus for humans is to survive either within or outside of
>: the moral/ethical/legal aspects of his society set-up to secure his
>: possessions, and well as those of his neighbor, in a system that actually
>: assigns personal value/self esteem, comfort, security, control, and even
>: "good/bad" value judgements to material objects. Does the man make the
> tools,
>: or do the tools make the man? --It doesn't matter to wolves one bit.
>
>I'd say it's probably a combination of both.
<Nods in complete agreement.>
>: >2) Why it is caged in the first place?
<snip>
>What this is essentially saying though, is that to a certain extent
>society conditioned weres away from honesty.
>
>Is this right or wrong?
Individuals may be varying degrees of honesty and dishonesty...with
themselves, and with others. Since societies are made up of folkways and
mores that often do not and cannot represent individual interests in every
aspect of his being, it remains the responcibility of the individual to engage
in self-fulfillment and self-discovery at the times and on the levels he is
most able. The individual's responcibility is to be prepared at all times to
suffer any consequences resulting from any possible deviation he may make from
society's accepted norms, folkways, mores, and laws. The society, itself, is
a body composed of individuals that must answer to, in some cases, a different
set of perimeters in it's relationship with other socities. However, while a
government may have certain obligations to its people, the society at large
has no obligations and is often unforgiving in relation to the individuals who
make it up. Admittedly, it's a rude awakening for all individuals, and even
more a blight in the lives of those who cannot reconcile it due to their
"revisits" to the original ego-self centered states defined in the Jungian
model.
> The "Beast"
>: isn't necessarily aware of what is bad, unjust, or just plain publically
>: scandalous. This cage is perfect for mankind's society...worthless in wolven
>
>: society. As a side note, the Unabomber referred to "the cage" as
>: oversocialization, but in the societies that man has created, this
>: "oversocialization" can only be an asset, not a hinderence...thus, the
>: Unabomber touted a restructuring of our current society to be more lupine,
>: less human, to avoid what he considered the "downside" of humanity.
>
>Why can the oversocialization only be an asset?
My personal feeling in the matter. I do acknowledge the downsides of the
oversocialization factor myself, but quite frankly, the Unabomber did not
provide a workable solution to the overall problems of society. He didn't
think it through to the end, and his solution involved a restructuring of
society as opposed to the current set-up we have now of trying to strengthen
and empower the individual so that he can readily "deal with" society through
psychology, religion, education, or other "socialized" means. While society
is undergoing his proposed changes, the individual psychologically suffers,
and the suffering is not amended in his society realized. Man, essentually,
would become something else entirely. Whether this is good or bad doesn't
matter, because the model that the Manifesto constructs is, as I've said
earlier, incomplete and flawed.
<snip>
>: I see those who put "the Beast" in the driver's seat of their psyche as being
>
>: perfectly adapted to lupine lifestyles...but it's a terrible draw-back in
>: human society because of the threat of punishment. If a person runs out of
>: food, it may be the most practical thing he can do to go out and slaughter
>: another human to prepare the carcus for a meal, but the action itself is
>: understood in our society as being disrespectful of the other person due to
>: the fact that, against his will, you ended his life. Animals can afford to
>: sometimes be this "practical," but it doesn't work for us.
>
>Would you say that it works for larger groups of humans than the single
>individual though?
Oh, well, sure..for awhile. It's easier to justify one's actions if
"everybody's doing it," but because of man's nature, eventually opposition to
this norm will arrise out of the self-aware survival instict in combination
with the empathy for others that comes from the uniquely human yours, mine,
and ours awareness and the "systems builder"factor of "Lets rise up together
to protest this norm collectively to insure the safety of our loved ones from
the current practices of cannibalism we have been practicing, against those
who still deem it necessary and desired."
> Its been said
>: before that the mother of ethics was the fear that someone would commit a
>: specific violation against you before you can do it to them, thus, we in our
>: society have a "gentleman's agreement" not to cannibalize one another. The
>: testtesterone-ladden Unabomber, however seems to think this is the "cowardly"
>: way out.
>
>Actually the Unabomber (well the suspect anyway) hardly seems to be the
>testosterone-laden type.
True. If he IS guilty, it makes me wonder how he could muster the strength to
do the cross-country dirty work.. he seems rather frail to me.
>: >At what point is 'pointless destruction' no longer pointless?
>: >
>: >To put this in the context of what UnaSeal had to say earlier, her example
>: >of someone who gave into the 'beast' was the yuppie in Wolf. Yet in his
>: >case, his actions were, from a certain perspective, not pointless, but
>: >did show at least a certain amount of planning (although I wouldn't
>: >have done them myself, or approved of them either).
>:
>: I cannot think of even one example of "pointless destruction." There have
>: been ennumerable destructive acts I did not understand, did not approve of,
> or
>: could not relate to even with understanding, but every act on the part of man
>
>: and animal has a purpose that I can see-- Men kill for many reasons...many
>: serial killers say they do it for "recreational purposes." Animals kill to
>: defend, to eat, and sometimes as an act of "eliminating the undesirables,"
> but
>: there's almost always a purpose. The "yuppie wolf" seemed to be merely
>: "eliminating the competition." <Self-centered desires> But the acts of
> those
>: closer to the "serpent eating his tail" archetype must be held in a "check
> and
>: balance," not to be ignored, nor embraced...to be a sucesssful, productive
>: member of human society.
>
>Which human society though (since there's more than one)?
All societies. Each society of man has unique qualities, but there are
certain qualities, like those I've been pointing out, that continue thoughout
different cultures and time periods.
>And if human society frowns on these acts so greatly, then why have they
>become increasingly common throughout it's quarters of late?
>
These things have always been present, however, through out time, our
societies experience trend cycles that dictate certain levels of advesity and
prosperity in all facsets of life. Few seem to want to recognize that
illigitimate births constituted 1/3rd of the children born during the
Victorian Era. We are too focused on the illigitimate births of today, citing
them as a "downfall" in current society. Maybe, but the cycle continues. We
often like to think that there were no social problems in yesteryears, but in
truth, social problems increase and decrease in proportion to population and
in occurance with the influences of the times. I cannot honestly say that,
looking back over history the American street gang phenomena was any less
sever at the turn of the century than it is now. In fact, the recent influx
of people from different cultures experienced then brought about a need for
tolerence in the lifestyles of these new Americans, but with the overcrowding
and human "fear of the unknown," we still today have such reminders from our
past like an early 1900's flyer, issued on the streets of New York by street
gang members giving the current prices for drugs, hitman services, and
prostitution. Talk about BOLD! Strangely, even folks who "survived" the
1950's are shocked by films like "Dangerous Minds" where the kids' educations
and lives are at constant risk, yet they forget the historical perspective and
importence of 50's films like "Rebel Without A Cause" or "Blackboard Jungle."
Oh sure, "Dangerous Minds" seems more bleak and has lots of grotesque images
and curse words, but film makers of the fifties were limited in the amount of
"grim reality" they could portray legally, and the popularly acceptable themes
of the era...you only get "pollyanna" when "Pollyana" is "cool" with the
general public.
Coyote Osborne
In article
<Pine.SUN.3.91.960913212...@garcia.efn.org>, Rorschach
<o...@efn.org> wrote:
> An example that I greatly liked (Gotten from Joseph Cambell actually)
> likens a person's darker desires to a caged beast. What many people try
> and to is pretend that the beast does not exist. But the beast is there,
> and if ignored, it starves and gets angry. As it gets angry it starts to
> struggle harder and harder to get out, and the person must put more
> energy into keeping this beast that they are ignoring caged. Sometimes
> that beast becomes strong enough to break out, and when it does it is
> hurt and angry and hungry. There is not way to control it.
The beast would not _be_ struggling and unhappy if it were free of cages
and were well-fed....
See, this analogy, is... I think... related to the problems I have with
much of humanity... they seek to force somethign that is "other" than they
to obey their rules of convenience (Note that "other" is arbitrary... it
can even be their own inner desires).
The beast would not _BE_ a beast were it not caged, abused, neglected,
circumscribed, starved and mistreated... people's beasts become, in
essence, insane... the result not IMHO, of a natural "badness" about the
"beast", but because it si mistreated. They mistreat their own souls...
they cage their own feelings... and they seek to put the same shackles on
everyone else by demanding a conformity to the arbitrary standarsd that
make up the rules of a society.
> But there is another way. If you take control and admit that those
> desires are there (yet not give in to them) it is feeding the beast. It
> remains unhappy because it is caged, but it never gets angry enough to
> break out. This is where I stand. It is a balance point. The beast is
> there, and there are even times when I can let it out (In a fight or in a
> forest or in a cry at the moon) but is a lot of the time that I must keep
> those desires caged.
But... IMHo... the reason you must keep the beast caged is _not_... repeat
_not_ because the beast is bad... it is because the world around the beast
would destroy it... it would be perceived as inimical... it would be
feared, it would be caged or killed.
> There are some people who throw open that cage and embrace the beast
> within. The dark desires become them, in return they get a great
> strength. These are people to be damn wary of IMO.
Really? <grin> are you wary of me?
I _am_ my beast... and as such, I rarely have trouble with myself. I know
how I feel... I control my actions in order to survive in this world...
but no-one ever said a beast had to be stupid, vicious and unthinking. In
other circumstances, I might react to my environment (in a survival sense)
by hunting and killing my food with tooth and claw. I survive in _this_
current world byt _not_ choosing to growl and bite the Code Enforcement
officer who claims that I leave my trash can too close to the curb.
> (In this crowd, maybe a beast is not such a great metaphor. I have not
> come up with a much better on though. (Cause monster doesn't carry very
> well either :) What the beast of this metaphor is though is the dark
> desires that spring from both human conciousness and from animal.
> Remember that killing for pleasure and pointless destruction are not
> restricted to humans, but are found in the natural world as well.
I think that the "beast" you are referring to, might be the "Shadow"
described by Jung... it sure sounds like it... it's made up of all the
stuff taht we hide away because we think it is evil.
That does not mean it is... it merely means that to accept it, we might
have to look _very_ closely at what we consider our morality.
I think the reason most people have a "beast" is because they have been
_taught_ that certain things are "wrong"... ranging from sex, to anger, to
a host of other things that might make them something _other_ than a
little drone of society.
I think... if there is somethign that is dark and bad... it's not the
beast. Not mine anyway... my beast and I... we see eye to eye. I don;t
believe in lying to myself... if I have to lie to the rest of the world or
be destroyed, that is bad enough... but I won't EVER be fool enough to
hate any part of me. If I am evil... then I'll be evil and be true to
myself. That, I feel, is better for me, than pretending to be good when
you really aren;t.
And, I believe atht Good and Evil are relative to your point of view. I
don't believe in them as absolutes. Not even a little. I could cheerfully
strangle Zarathustra for inflicting the concepts on humanity. What a mess.
Coyote Osborne
> To put this in the context of what UnaSeal had to say earlier, her example
> of someone who gave into the 'beast' was the yuppie in Wolf. Yet in his
> case, his actions were, from a certain perspective, not pointless, but
> did show at least a certain amount of planning (although I wouldn't
> have done them myself, or approved of them either).
Actually... I believe that the PRIME example of someone that gacve into
his beast was Jack Nicholson's character in that movie... and his beast
was NOPT evil... it was pure, and right. It was better than who he had
been... it was freedom and love and strength to do what is right and
defend what one cares for.
The other guy was not ruled by his "beast"... he was an asshole to begin
with... he merely continued to exercise his power to be a shitty person...
and got all heady with the fact that he could now physically accomplish
things he would have always cheerfully done had he not been a wimp.
He did not give in to the beast, IMHO... he was merely a chickenshit until
he felt some small power... and then he immediately abused it.
Jack's character was hiding in a tiny, weak shell... he merely was let free.
No... I thnik the beast was the good guy in that movie.
Skeezix88
In article <cvf2-12099...@128.253.82.195>, cv...@cornell.edu
(Crystal) writes:
<snip>
> no one ever chastised me for the time I punched Rich
>Byrne in english class or the time I backhanded Crystal Wulfrum on the
>bus... I think the authority figures were all so shocked that I'd stood
up
>for myself, they didn't want to discourage me.
>
>
Now *there* are some authority figures with uncommon good sense.
Throughout elementary school, I was fairly popular because I was eager to
help the other kids grasp concepts that were tough for them... I was
nicknamed "Einstein", but affectionately so.
Come junior high (my Ninth Circle of Hell), I was the target for quite a
bit of abuse, mainly because most of my friends from 6th grade went on to
a different Jr. High. I avoided most confrontations, however. I sailed
pretty inconspicuously through 7th-12th grades, mainly by only being
noticeable to the teachers. One would note that I'd gotten the highest
score any student had ever received on his final, and I'd hasten to tell
him to clam up about it. I didn't need exposure of that sort. My grades
were my business. (Kinda like salaries today.)
To paraphrase Stephen King, I went beyond black sheepdom and became
totally gray. If you didn't know me, you never saw me.
-Blue Methuselah... a coyote in a Cougar!
Skee...@aol.com
"I have a pipe and a drum to play...
I whistle along on the seventh day..." -I. Anderson
Zepp
Rorschach <o...@efn.org> orated thusly:
(slice, claw -- bits about weresides)
>In principle I would agree, but I have seen people that contradict
>this. There are some very bad people out there that are not neccesarily
>all human. I am inclined to think that a wereside is essentialy a
>neutral thing. It gives a connection to animal traits and can give a lot
>of power. If this connection is used to link to the savagery that is in
>some beasts then you can get some pretty ugly results.
I'll buy that for a dollar! To me that is exactly the nature of it.
Wereishness is a quality like any other, like empathy, or
extraordinary strength, or clairvoyance... I have known empaths who
qualified as saints, for all the pain they feel, and the work they do
to help people in pain. I have also known empaths who used their
extra awareness as a tool, either to help them con people more
effectively, or even worse, to dump their headcrap on others, and
waltz away feeling better... Then there are those like myself, who
fairly often can't do anything useful with it, and who spend most of
our time heavily shielded, to get a little mental privacy. A
wereside, it seems to me, must function in much the same way. I find
mine to definitely be a survival advantage, but it has its drawbacks,
like extreme twitchiness in crowded situations, a tendancy to go
berserk in a fight, where cool calm agression might be far more
useful...
My 2 cents, anyhoo...
>We are what we are. If we are good people, then we are good weres. If
>someone is an evil person, being were is not going to transform him into
>a good were. No, I don't think that the animal side of these people is
>entirely to blame, but I can't help but suspect that it contributes to
>what they do.
>Two last thoughts:
>Being a were is a great responsibility as well as a great honor.
>We ALL have a dark side.
True, and true!!!
> . . Rorschach
> | \ / |
> |/ """ \? A stark pattern of Black and White
> //,\ /,\\ Within it you can find images, reflections. Maybe Balance.
> \ |_| / I walk a risky path: alone, yet not: whole, yet fractured.
> `=' "NOW is the time to RAGE against the dying of the light!"
Greywolf the Wanderer, borrowing zepp's acocunt
<looks innocent> Of course I've had my rabies shots, Officer. See my dog tags?
Crystal
In article <5204pu$b...@newsbf02.news.aol.com>, skee...@aol.com
(Skeezix88) wrote:
> In article <cvf2-12099...@128.253.82.195>, cv...@cornell.edu
> (Crystal) writes:
> <snip>
> > no one ever chastised me for the time I punched Rich
> >Byrne in english class or the time I backhanded Crystal Wulfrum on the
> >bus... I think the authority figures were all so shocked that I'd stood
> up
> >for myself, they didn't want to discourage me.
> >
> >
>
> Now *there* are some authority figures with uncommon good sense.
Unfortunately, they're the same authority figures who denied a young,
enthusiastic teacher tenure because when her social studies class did
group presentations on discrimination, one of the groups presented on
discrimination against homosexuals. They passed out pamphlets full of
facts & figures. One of the kids took it home and cried to her daddy, who
was a local preacher. Next thing you knew, the teacher was accused of
trying to turn her students into "faggots."
Grr.
Crystal
Zepp
cv...@cornell.edu (Crystal) polluted the cyberspace with this:
(slice)
>Unfortunately, they're the same authority figures who denied a young,
>enthusiastic teacher tenure because when her social studies class did
>group presentations on discrimination, one of the groups presented on
>discrimination against homosexuals. They passed out pamphlets full of
>facts & figures. One of the kids took it home and cried to her daddy, who
>was a local preacher. Next thing you knew, the teacher was accused of
>trying to turn her students into "faggots."
>Grr.
>Crystal
Grrr, indeed. Damn. Knew it sounded too good to be true. Seems like
that's almost always how it ggoes, too. Some hidebound old fossil who
hasn't had an original thought since FDR died gets tenure, and keeps
teaching years after they're basically brain-dead, while the now and
enthusiastic one have to let the life be beaten out of them if they
hope to stay employed. And then they wonder why so many of us hated
school!!
I love reading, and learning; I hope to continue learning my whole
life. And yet in elementary and high school I was so bored, most of
the time, it was painful! I remember perhaps a handful of classes
that were actually interesting; perhaps half a dozen teachers who
actually seemed to give a shit. The rest were just marking time...
I wonder what the answer is.
Greywolf the Wanderer, borrowing zepp's account
Cat Prickett
Crystal (cv...@cornell.edu) writes:
> In article <5204pu$b...@newsbf02.news.aol.com>, skee...@aol.com
> (Skeezix88) wrote:
>
>> In article <cvf2-12099...@128.253.82.195>, cv...@cornell.edu
>> (Crystal) writes:
>> <snip>
>> > no one ever chastised me for the time I punched Rich
>> >Byrne in english class or the time I backhanded Crystal Wulfrum on the
>> >bus... I think the authority figures were all so shocked that I'd stood
>> up
>> >for myself, they didn't want to discourage me.
>> >
>> >
>>
>> Now *there* are some authority figures with uncommon good sense.
>
> Unfortunately, they're the same authority figures who denied a young,
> enthusiastic teacher tenure because when her social studies class did
> group presentations on discrimination, one of the groups presented on
> discrimination against homosexuals. They passed out pamphlets full of
> facts & figures. One of the kids took it home and cried to her daddy, who
> was a local preacher. Next thing you knew, the teacher was accused of
> trying to turn her students into "faggots."
>
> Grr.
>
> Crystal
Oh. How pleasant. A fun fact for all of you, and the reason that
you'll never see/hear me use the word "faggot" without quotation marks:
back in the good ol' days of witch-burning, they used to toss a few gays
onto the woodpile to whet the crowd's appetite and heat up the fire for
the witch. Hence, "faggot" from "bundle of sticks or other fuel".
--
"Listen to the fool's reproach! It is a kingly title!"
-- William Blake
Christopher Eric Hughes
Cat Prickett (bw...@FreeNet.Carleton.CA) wrote:
: Oh. How pleasant. A fun fact for all of you, and the reason that
: you'll never see/hear me use the word "faggot" without quotation marks:
: back in the good ol' days of witch-burning, they used to toss a few gays
: onto the woodpile to whet the crowd's appetite and heat up the fire for
: the witch. Hence, "faggot" from "bundle of sticks or other fuel".
Hence the term "flamer" as well, I'd imagine. *shrug* *sigh*
I swear, some days there has to be a god, because it's obvious that SOMEONE
is out to get me. *grin*
Not much more foreign to mainstream America I could get beyond being a
gay atheist werebear. Well, I suppose if I weren't caucasian that'd work,
but even still, I'm just about as far out in left field as one can get
and still be classified as part of the same genus/species.
--
In the name of the best within us, A is A
Christopher Eric Hughes Either-Or
hug...@cs.unt.edu Non-Contradiction
"By the essence and nature of existence, contradictions cannot exist.
If you find one, check your premises; you'll find that one of them is
wrong." Hugh Akston, Professor of Philosophy, Patrick Henry Univ.
James Harrion III
UnaSeal (abo...@terravirtua.com) wrote:
: In article <51ph8s$p...@mark.ucdavis.edu>, ez04...@dale.ucdavis.edu (James Harrion III) wrote:
: >UnaSeal (abo...@terravirtua.com) wrote:
: >: In article <51lo28$e...@mark.ucdavis.edu>, ez04...@dale.ucdavis.edu (James
: > Harrion III) wrote:
: :
: >: >: On Fri, 13 Sep 1996, UnaSeal wrote:
[snip]
: <Chuckles> One learns very quickly not to mess with the things that one gets
: bitten for. :) It isn't necessary for the wolf to understand what belongs to
: someone else, as long as he understands that he'll be punished for partaking
: in what is not "his."
So "not yours" does not necessarily mean the same thing as "someone
else's."
: >And can't possessions, or wanting them, be thought of in humans as kind of
: >a territorial act?
: >
: It's true, humans are all together territorial, however, their sense of
: "territory" is rather skewed in comparison with the wolf's due to the fact
: that in Capitalistic societies, the concept of "money" defines one's
: boundaries, in Socialism, the concept of "privelaged elitism" defines one's
: boundaries, and in actual, realized Communism, one's boundary is the amount of
: space one's butt covers when one is seated. :) Wolves merely have to fight
: to accrue what is theirs, which is far removed from the abstract concepts
: humans constuct concerning government and economics.
Couldn't government and economics though be thought of as highly
complicated means of fighting at this point? (In some cases, more
physically violent than others?)
Whether humans want to
: admit it or not, the economic system they live under defines certain
: characteristics of their personalities which are integral in everything from
: problem-solving skills on a personal and interpersonal level to providing
: personal justifications or arguements for/against State diplomatic policies
: and not-so-diplomatic military manuevers. Wolf packs don't have to have a
: "Camp David" or a U.N. :)
They can't blow radioactive fallout across the world if they screw up. :)
: > At the times he returns to this state, he has much more information
: >: and knowledge than he did previously, so, for example, a man experiencing a
: >: "mid-life crisis," does not experience a return to the misunderstandings
: >: between what is "his" and what belongs to someone else...instead, he may
: >: "covet his brother's wife," knowing full-well that such an action is not
: >: "morally correct," and that although such an action may have repulsed him
: >: previously, his desire--his Will--draws him to overlook the relationship of
: >: his action to the potential upset of other involved parties, because his
: >: personal materialistic gains take presidence over the potential sufferings
: >: which may lay ahead for others. Morality, ethics, and laws are very
: >: neccessary for mankind, considering his society,
: >
: >
: >So is it because of society than people need morality, ethics, and laws,
: >or would they come to exist no matter what in your view?
:
: The way I see it, it's not a "society" thing, it's a "human" thing. Mankind
: is made of of "systems builders." Some fascets of "systems building" are
: technical, some are more "people-oriented"--spiritual, economic-trade
: oriented, etc.
I'm not really sure if this is true though, except for a very brief
portion of human history, and in certain places (although it's been
expanding rapidly for the last 2000 years).
This is one of the main flaws in the "Unabomber" <renamed:
: Humaninst> Manifesto. He/they assert that there is a psychological need in
: mankind to achieve and accomplish on a personal level, and then states that
: the way to go about this is to eradicate all of society's growth, so that man
: can feel fulfilled, to put it simply, "toiling the soil for an honest day's
: work". If this was instituted, the natural inclination of man would be,
: eventually, for someone to come up with an "easier" or "better" way to toil,
: because, as the Manifesto correctly states, stagnation leads to deterioration.
Which isn't, in itself, the problem.
The problem comes from the fact that as this happens, it eventually
becomes cheaper/easier to have people who are basically doing nothing,
than to have people doing something productive.
: To place this more in the realm of what we're talking about, I can see the
: possibility of retarding progress for a time, but that would involve yet
: ANOTHER typically human element of systems building--the people-oriented one.
: Examples are religion, (The Manifesto suggests that this is "okay,"> such as
: what holds together the Amish or what had sustained many other agrarian
: communties--Native American, IndoEuropean Paganism, et al.>, or a government
: structure of some kind which forbids technological growth, or some other
: outlet for human creativity which involves morality, ethics, or laws. The
: minute technology DOES arise, there will be moral and ethical outcries <Think
: of the Industrial Revolution and the "Cyberporn scare" of the Inet> and these
: beliefs must inevitable be backed by a "higher" belief, such as religion, and
: of course laws will have to be passed to uphold man's ideas of property, thus
: necessitating a ruling body of some kind. ("This shovel is Og's. Me use
: it--no one else. No kill me with it either!") It's all a human "catch 22"
: that wolves don't bother with, because psychologically, it's unnecessary for
: them. :)
Governmental structures though typically aren't very good at limiting
technological development: just restraining it for a while, which almost
guarantees it's expansion when the restrictions are lifted.
What if, past a certain point, a certain level of technology wasn't
profitable though? Or is technology inherently profitable in some aspects.
[snip]
: >What this is essentially saying though, is that to a certain extent
: >society conditioned weres away from honesty.
: >
: >Is this right or wrong?
:
: Individuals may be varying degrees of honesty and dishonesty...with
: themselves, and with others. Since societies are made up of folkways and
: mores that often do not and cannot represent individual interests in every
: aspect of his being, it remains the responcibility of the individual to engage
: in self-fulfillment and self-discovery at the times and on the levels he is
: most able. The individual's responcibility is to be prepared at all times to
: suffer any consequences resulting from any possible deviation he may make from
: society's accepted norms, folkways, mores, and laws.
This then sounds to me like a problem that the *society* has, not the
specific individual.
That statement brings me to the main objection that I have to calling one
part of the animal within 'the beast' and trying to figure out ways to
placate it without really placating it:
What you are essentially saying is that you're willing to change parts of
yourself, or at least how you see yourself, to please the same group of
people who really don't want to see or hear about any 'beast' at all.
What's the point in that really? I know we all do it to some extent,
myself included, but isn't that a large portion of what's wrong with
humanity as it is now?
The society, itself, is
: a body composed of individuals that must answer to, in some cases, a different
: set of perimeters in it's relationship with other socities.
Which is why societies can get away with atrocities that would get most
individuals, or small groups of individuals set to the gas chamber...
[snip]
: >Why can the oversocialization only be an asset?
:
: My personal feeling in the matter. I do acknowledge the downsides of the
: oversocialization factor myself, but quite frankly, the Unabomber did not
: provide a workable solution to the overall problems of society. He didn't
: think it through to the end, and his solution involved a restructuring of
: society as opposed to the current set-up we have now of trying to strengthen
: and empower the individual so that he can readily "deal with" society through
: psychology, religion, education, or other "socialized" means.
Perhaps because at least the three possibilities you mentioned above may
have been corrupted, at least in some cases, a long time ago.
While society
: is undergoing his proposed changes, the individual psychologically suffers,
: and the suffering is not amended in his society realized.
How so?
[snip]
: >Would you say that it works for larger groups of humans than the single
: >individual though?
:
: Oh, well, sure..for awhile. It's easier to justify one's actions if
: "everybody's doing it," but because of man's nature, eventually opposition to
: this norm will arrise out of the self-aware survival instict in combination
: with the empathy for others that comes from the uniquely human yours, mine,
: and ours awareness and the "systems builder"factor of "Lets rise up together
: to protest this norm collectively to insure the safety of our loved ones from
: the current practices of cannibalism we have been practicing, against those
: who still deem it necessary and desired."
Do you see empathy as connected to the survival instinct in any way?
And if it's true that opposition to the norms arise when people know that
something is being done that they're either uncomfortable with, or
consider unhealthy, doesn't the oversocialization that you discussed
earlier actively inhibit positive changes?
[snip]
: >Which human society though (since there's more than one)?
:
: All societies. Each society of man has unique qualities, but there are
: certain qualities, like those I've been pointing out, that continue thoughout
: different cultures and time periods.
Yes, but I think a lot of those societies are the ones that I certainly
wouldn't want anything to do with.
Talk about BOLD! Strangely, even folks who "survived" the
: 1950's are shocked by films like "Dangerous Minds" where the kids' educations
: and lives are at constant risk, yet they forget the historical perspective and
: importence of 50's films like "Rebel Without A Cause" or "Blackboard Jungle."
: Oh sure, "Dangerous Minds" seems more bleak and has lots of grotesque images
: and curse words, but film makers of the fifties were limited in the amount of
: "grim reality" they could portray legally, and the popularly acceptable themes
: of the era...you only get "pollyanna" when "Pollyana" is "cool" with the
: general public.
I think this is because certain periods, and groups in the past, are
idealized, while others aren't. This is imho a pretty effective inhibitor
to learning.
Zepp
hug...@ponder.csci.unt.edu (Christopher Eric Hughes) polluted the
cyberspace with this:
>Cat Prickett (bw...@FreeNet.Carleton.CA) wrote:
>: Oh. How pleasant. A fun fact for all of you, and the reason that
>: you'll never see/hear me use the word "faggot" without quotation marks:
>: back in the good ol' days of witch-burning, they used to toss a few gays
>: onto the woodpile to whet the crowd's appetite and heat up the fire for
>: the witch. Hence, "faggot" from "bundle of sticks or other fuel".
>Hence the term "flamer" as well, I'd imagine. *shrug* *sigh*
>I swear, some days there has to be a god, because it's obvious that SOMEONE
>is out to get me. *grin*
>Not much more foreign to mainstream America I could get beyond being a
>gay atheist werebear. Well, I suppose if I weren't caucasian that'd work,
>but even still, I'm just about as far out in left field as one can get
>and still be classified as part of the same genus/species.
Ah, well, not to worry -- ye're no wierder than the rest of us, and
let's face it: given the nature of what currently passes for
"mainstream America", who the hell would WANT to be a part of that?
<grin> No thanks. They can keep their fuckin' wannabee Puritan
bullshit. Me, I'm a crazed Wiccan werewolf, mad drummer,
semi-Rastafarian dreamer... And damned proud of it!!!
>--
>In the name of the best within us, A is A
>Christopher Eric Hughes Either-Or
>hug...@cs.unt.edu Non-Contradiction
>"By the essence and nature of existence, contradictions cannot exist.
>If you find one, check your premises; you'll find that one of them is
>wrong." Hugh Akston, Professor of Philosophy, Patrick Henry Univ.
Greywolf the Wanderer, borrowing zepp's account
Nahual apprentice
UnaSeal wrote:
(snipped a lot of interesting stuff)
>She also developed a close bond with plants and would rather tell her >troubles to a Boston Fern than to a gossipy, judgemental human. Her >talking to the plants helped them thrive and prosper, and it helped >her, as well.
(snipped a lot of interesting stuff)
> Ta-Da! The end... :)
Bravo! LOL! Thank you, specially for the line above! =D
See ya at the other side of the night!
Ekbalam.
Christopher Eric Hughes
Zepp (ze...@snowcrest.net) wrote:
: hug...@ponder.csci.unt.edu (Christopher Eric Hughes) polluted the
: cyberspace with this:
: >Not much more foreign to mainstream America I could get beyond being a
: >gay atheist werebear. Well, I suppose if I weren't caucasian that'd work,
: >but even still, I'm just about as far out in left field as one can get
: >and still be classified as part of the same genus/species.
: Ah, well, not to worry -- ye're no wierder than the rest of us, and
: let's face it: given the nature of what currently passes for
: "mainstream America", who the hell would WANT to be a part of that?
: <grin> No thanks. They can keep their fuckin' wannabee Puritan
: bullshit. Me, I'm a crazed Wiccan werewolf, mad drummer,
: semi-Rastafarian dreamer... And damned proud of it!!!
Oh, who said anything about "wanting to be a part of mainstream America"?
I'm proud of who and what I am. I just get so damn frustrated when the
rest of the country acts like I'm not really a person, just some sort
of whipping-boy for their panic and fear.
UnaSeal
>: >UnaSeal (abo...@terravirtua.com) wrote:
>: >: In article <51lo28$e...@mark.ucdavis.edu>, ez04...@dale.ucdavis.edu (James
>: > Harrion III) wrote:
>: :
>: >: >: On Fri, 13 Sep 1996, UnaSeal wrote:
>
>So "not yours" does not necessarily mean the same thing as "someone
>else's."
Sort of, yes. It's along the lines of, "What's mine is mine because I fought
for it and that's all that counts." This works perfectly for those who do not
have "built-in greed." Animals usually take only exactly what they need--a
mate, a terratory, and food. Once they've fought over and won these key
things they are happy and their survival is insured. People are very strange
animals--oftentimes they base their identities on their possessions. i.e.--
"the food/terratory/mate I have is less than what Joe has, thus, I am
poor/inferior/weak/stupid/guillible/"less manly/womanly." Weird. Human
animals aren't just happy with having possessions, they must be utilitarian
about these possessions, and base their worth on this "value system."Communism
was designed to free people from such mindtraps and provide a different way of
life for people, and it does seem to work to a certain extent, although it has
never been allowed to blossom into "Communism Realized to it's ultimate
potential" because of the human psychological needs that it denies must be
replaced by others to insure continuity. i.e.- "We cannot have "status
symbols" which denote class and rank, so we institute an *elite* opolice force
to keep stealing and other rebellion minimized and an *elite* "provisional
government" to legislate and regulate until the time when these folks can
handle it on their own." In every living example of national Communism we've
had, the police never go off-duty, and the "provisional government" has been
anything but "provisional."
>: >And can't possessions, or wanting them, be thought of in humans as kind of
>: >a territorial act?
Sure, but it's the OUTLOOK that's important. Human terratories DEFINE humans,
WOLF teratories SUSTAIN wolves. Take a look at these examples:
"I grew up on the streets, so I learned to fight and survive. I never had it
easy, but it's made me the man that I am." Implications: Lack of
possessions (in comparison with others' possessions) and harsh suroundings
have defined me and made me physically stronger, keener in intellect, and more
"masculine," than other men in other situations.
"Being 'To The Manner Born,' I was privelaged enough to never have known
hunger. The things around me I take for granted bring me comfort, and I do
all I can to bring comfort to the needy when possible." Implications:
Possessions of a certain number and quality bring about an enviable position;
privelage. "the Needy" are those defined as having less possessions, and
scarcer basic need resources, thus they deserve pity and charity. The wealthy
man may feel "good" and gain self esteem from sharing his possessions and
basic resources with others.
"In our commune, we share love, peace, haapiness and brussle's sprouts!
<Laughs> I'm much happier to be here than I ever was before, because when I
gave up the 'rat race,' I was enriched by the goodness of my fellow man."
Implications: Struggling to gain bigger and better aquisitions is a "rat
race," and is a self-defeating endevor. Being with people who are willing to
give up their possessions in exchange for communal sharing brings happiness,
and fulfillment that personal possessions cannot.
"I fought for everything I've ever had in life, and I'll be damned if I'll
share it with those no-count pikers who want to free-load instead of do an
honest day's work. We'd all be alot richer and save the country if there
weren't so many folks out there looking for excuses to be poor."
Implications: Everyone who is without the level of possessions that this man
has refuses to work at all, and has taken to financial support from the
employed. By definition, employment and hard work equates sucess to this man.
Not having possessions denotes sloth and "freeloading.'
"while growing up on the reservation, I learned many useful and wonderous
things I would otherwise never have learned in public school. It's a shame
everyone can't benefit, but too often, people get ensnared in the "fastlane,"
and either can't or won't, due to fera of the unknown, step back for a moment
and take a look at their lives and the gifts one is given for free."
Implications: Nature has more "value" than the lifestyle of the stuggle for
aquizitions. There is pity shown for those who cling more to the material,
and less to the natural and spiritual.
Result: All those above define themselves within, or atleast in relation to,
the lifestyles of aquisition of material goods. There are set beliefs in each
person as to what is "enough," and what is "not enough," and these people
define themselves according to their lifestyles and territories. It's not
just the clothes that make the man, it's the upbringing, the current
lifestyle, and how much he has, needs, wants, doesn't want, clings to or shuns
in relation to others.
A wolf example: "I'm hungry." "I lost the fight, and I'm still hungry." "i
now have food for myself, my mate, and my children. I am satified."
non-example: "But hey, that worf I lost the fight to is a real cocky schmuck.
I bet I could show him up by driving past his territory in a BMW. Oh,
well..I don't have opposible thumbs, anyway, and besides, it's those stupid
humans who want to show off and pollute the environment with their smelly
cars, anyway. Sheesh. I'll just go back to bed and try to come up with some
other material possession or unique lifestyle to show him up. Heh..any wolf
can kick butt, but how many bad ased wolves do you know with a cellular
phone? Yeah, I'll show up that bully who kicked sand in my face...I'll have
penial enlargement and get all the babes."
>: space one's butt covers when one is seated. :) Wolves merely have to fight
>: to accrue what is theirs, which is far removed from the abstract concepts
>: humans constuct concerning government and economics.
>
>Couldn't government and economics though be thought of as highly
>complicated means of fighting at this point? (In some cases, more
>physically violent than others?)
Sure, but we define ourselves in relation to our governments and economics
systems too. Example of two friends talking:
Joe: Who does that dictator think he is, talking to our president that way?
We ought to nuke him right off the face of the earth and show the rest of the
world who's boss."
Moe: Nah, I wish our government would stay out of this kind of thing for
once. The conflict wasn't ours to start with. It just makes us look like
idiots everytime we step in where we don't belong."
Joe: But I don't want to back down to a bunch of Commies.
Moe:Oh, sure...like our system works so much better than theirs. Sheesh!
Each time I get laid-off at contract time, I end up digging ditches for less
than minimum wage until the company desides to take me back THIS time. Try to
tell me that's a better lifestyle than "over there."
>
>They can't blow radioactive fallout across the world if they screw up. :)
<chuckles> Noooo...and they don't seem to have the ego-suffering that goes
along with not being able to, either. Their power is strictly
autonomous--teeth and claws...that's all they need. Some animals are tool
users, and some, like monkies, use the tools in combat. (i.e.--literally
throwing rocks, feces, etc.) but since the animals have proven ability to
adapt, to formulate ideas on using the tools for combat, and the lifestyle
that has always BEEN about combat, as opposed to human posturing and
intellectualism over "society" and how to keep it "civil," then why haven't
the animals, who often admire prettyshiny objects like gold, coins, and rings,
<magpies, dogs, cats, and monkeys, especially> taken to developing concepts of
communities based on barter, conquer, rape and pillage, instead of remaining
solely hunter/gatherers? The most "primative" recorded civilizations of man
always had some form of barter or conquesting going on along with the hunting
and gathering, thus humans recognize them as being human civilizations, as
upposed to animal ones, even as "barbaric" as these human civilizations can be
at trimes. I maintain theat animals are capable of such lifestyles, but do
not and have not adopted them into their societies, because, psychologically,
animals needs are different than ours. They are incapable of identifying
their self worth with the pretty shiny rocks they may find, whereas humans are
incapable of separating themselves entirely from the ego=pretty shiny rock.
Therefore, who is more evolved? If wolves ARE self-aware, is the fact that we
have no scientific data on that self-awareness based entirely on the fact that
we have no observable indicationsthat they, like us, have this basic ego flaw?
How Ironic.
>Which isn't, in itself, the problem.
>
>The problem comes from the fact that as this happens, it eventually
>becomes cheaper/easier to have people who are basically doing nothing,
>than to have people doing something productive.
That certainly is a major concern.
>
>Governmental structures though typically aren't very good at limiting
>technological development: just restraining it for a while, which almost
>guarantees it's expansion when the restrictions are lifted.
>
>What if, past a certain point, a certain level of technology wasn't
>profitable though? Or is technology inherently profitable in some aspects.
>
>[snip]
>
>: >What this is essentially saying though, is that to a certain extent
>: >society conditioned weres away from honesty.
>: >
>: >Is this right or wrong?
>:
>: Individuals may be varying degrees of honesty and dishonesty...with
>: themselves, and with others. Since societies are made up of folkways and
>: mores that often do not and cannot represent individual interests in every
>: aspect of his being, it remains the responcibility of the individual to
> engage
>: in self-fulfillment and self-discovery at the times and on the levels he is
>: most able. The individual's responcibility is to be prepared at all times to
>
>: suffer any consequences resulting from any possible deviation he may make
> from
>: society's accepted norms, folkways, mores, and laws.
>
>This then sounds to me like a problem that the *society* has, not the
>specific individual.
Yes, that's very true. Individuals, as functioning members within a society,
must learn, however to develop certain strengths in order to survive in
society. It's sort of like when, as a member of a family, you, the individual
must learn a way to deal with or understand what your role is in the family.
Perhapse you choose to show tolerence and undertanding towards other
individuals in the family who make things difficult, perhapse you might decide
it's best to ignore the pre-existing quarrels and qwuibbles, maybe you think
it's best to take sides, or maybe you decide it's best to disassociate
entirely from your kin. You might even choose to alternate amonst these
methods, but none-the-less you've developed a strategy for survival in
relation to the family unit, whether consciously or sub-consciously, and
hopefully you're strategy will fascillitate your own personal growth and
well-being, in some cases, inspite of certain conflicts and frustrations in
your family unit at times. Society is like that, too. If I choose to
disassociate from the coflicts between Aunt Gracie and Aunt Paula, but choose
to defend my father against the slights of Uncle Ned, then in society as well,
I can choose to ignore the reprocussions of racial tensions while taking steps
to defend the environment against nuclear waste--but just like in families,
you can only ignore a problem for so long before you are moved in some way,
somehow to make a decision on it,( "Aunt Gracie's an idiot, Racists are the
plague of Mankind,") and somtimes act out of desparation, <Uncle Ned better
not threaten my dad anymore--if that's the way he wants to playit, so be it!
I just DARE those biohazzard buffoons to build their plant near the
reservation!" Sometimes, you eventually give up on an issue. "Aunt Gracie
and Aunt Paula have always fought--who am I to get involved? Uncle Ned is too
stupid to do anything to dad--dad can defend himself. AcK! The neighborhoods
are filled with racists and nuclear powerplants! Maybe I'll move to
Antarctica or just learn to live with it."
>That statement brings me to the main objection that I have to calling one
>part of the animal within 'the beast' and trying to figure out ways to
>placate it without really placating it:
Well, again, I see a person's "bad side" as their "shadow aspect," and the
shadow aspect exists in humans, animals, and weres. I do see a greater
potential for understanding and inner-strength in those who are weres, and
anytime one is given the ability to accomplish more "Good" in some areas, the
"Shadow aspect" also has the power for accomplishing more "Bad." Therein lies
the responcibility I believe all weres have...the need to ensure that stong
resolutions are made within to guard against "corruption," if you will. As
for defining what exactly *IS* the "Shadow Aspect" that lies in animals, My
human side can't tell you, but I do urge and require for myself the
exploration of this possibility. In effect, if you do not want to, say, kill
and eat your children, all aspects have to be explored and understood, and all
aspects need to be in agreement on this issue. Again, I remind you, power
corrupts, humans don't have the same value systems as wolves and other animals
do, and everyday "decent people" have erred because their value system and
fragile ego-states makes rationalization and justifications sometimes the
strongest intellectualisms to justify a means that may only be a simple "whim"
or "act of revenge."
>What you are essentially saying is that you're willing to change parts of
>yourself, or at least how you see yourself, to please the same group of
>people who really don't want to see or hear about any 'beast' at all.
>
>What's the point in that really? I know we all do it to some extent,
>myself included, but isn't that a large portion of what's wrong with
>humanity as it is now?
>
> The society, itself, is
>: a body composed of individuals that must answer to, in some cases, a
> different
>: set of perimeters in it's relationship with other socities.
>
>Which is why societies can get away with atrocities that would get most
>individuals, or small groups of individuals set to the gas chamber...
Exactly.
>: My personal feeling in the matter. I do acknowledge the downsides of the
>: oversocialization factor myself, but quite frankly, the Unabomber did not
>: provide a workable solution to the overall problems of society. He didn't
>: think it through to the end, and his solution involved a restructuring of
>: society as opposed to the current set-up we have now of trying to strengthen
>: and empower the individual so that he can readily "deal with" society through
>
>: psychology, religion, education, or other "socialized" means.
>
>Perhaps because at least the three possibilities you mentioned above may
>have been corrupted, at least in some cases, a long time ago.
<Nods> but we still "need" them, psychologically.
> While society
>: is undergoing his proposed changes, the individual psychologically suffers,
>: and the suffering is not amended in his society realized.
>
>How so?
The change-over is more than just a lifestyle change, it would mean redefining
what it means to be human on a global scale. I don't belive that ultimately,
Mankind is up to that challege.
>[snip]
>
>: >Would you say that it works for larger groups of humans than the single
>: >individual though?
>:
>: Oh, well, sure..for awhile. It's easier to justify one's actions if
>: "everybody's doing it," but because of man's nature, eventually opposition to
>
>: this norm will arrise out of the self-aware survival instict in combination
>: with the empathy for others that comes from the uniquely human yours, mine,
>: and ours awareness and the "systems builder"factor of "Lets rise up together
>: to protest this norm collectively to insure the safety of our loved ones from
>
>: the current practices of cannibalism we have been practicing, against those
>: who still deem it necessary and desired."
>
>Do you see empathy as connected to the survival instinct in any way?
It's connected by way of the identification process. "Joe is mortally
wounded. If I was in that position, I wouldn't want to be alone. I must go
do what I can to comfort him as he lies dying."
>And if it's true that opposition to the norms arise when people know that
>something is being done that they're either uncomfortable with, or
>consider unhealthy, doesn't the oversocialization that you discussed
>earlier actively inhibit positive changes?
Yup. That's one of it's biggest shortcomings. Do you have an alternate plan
for human relations? Is it wholly feasible?
>: "grim reality" they could portray legally, and the popularly acceptable
> themes
>: of the era...you only get "pollyanna" when "Pollyana" is "cool" with the
>: general public.
>
>I think this is because certain periods, and groups in the past, are
>idealized, while others aren't. This is imho a pretty effective inhibitor
>to learning.
>
Very true. I agree.
Zepp
hug...@ponder.csci.unt.edu (Christopher Eric Hughes) orated thus:
>Zepp (ze...@snowcrest.net) wrote:
>: Ah, well, not to worry -- ye're no wierder than the rest of us, and
>: let's face it: given the nature of what currently passes for
>: "mainstream America", who the hell would WANT to be a part of that?
>: <grin> No thanks. They can keep their fuckin' wannabee Puritan
>: bullshit. Me, I'm a crazed Wiccan werewolf, mad drummer,
>: semi-Rastafarian dreamer... And damned proud of it!!!
>Oh, who said anything about "wanting to be a part of mainstream America"?
>I'm proud of who and what I am. I just get so damn frustrated when the
>rest of the country acts like I'm not really a person, just some sort
>of whipping-boy for their panic and fear.
Ah. Quite.... Down south I was free to list my religion as Wiccan on
fomrs that came my way; I routinely asked for the Solstices off work
at the hospital, as religiousholidays, and was given them, no
questions asked. To do that up here would be to speedily become
unemployed, I suspect -- though of course, the records would show it
was for poor performance ;-(
OTOH, here I'll probably never end up in jail for manslaughter ;-) So
it has its benefits, living here. So it goes.
I guess in the end, I settle for just being gald I'm NOT one of the
horde...
Greywolf the Wanderer, borrowing zepp's account
>--
>In the name of the best within us, A is A
>Christopher Eric Hughes Either-Or
>hug...@cs.unt.edu Non-Contradiction
>"By the essence and nature of existence, contradictions cannot exist.
>If you find one, check your premises; you'll find that one of them is
>wrong." Hugh Akston, Professor of Philosophy, Patrick Henry Univ.
<looks innocent> Of course I've had my rabies shots, Officer. See my dog tags?