Oct 1 - Werewolves

I think the werewolf became such a real terror in the sixteenth century because it gave people a way to make sense of something even scarier: the fact that ordinary humans are capable of horrible things. The articles describe people accused of brutal crimes as werewolves, almost as if their actions were too terrible to be human. I think calling someone a beast creates a comfortable separation between “us” and “them.” If they are fundamentally different from us, we do not have to confront the possibility that, under completely different circumstances, any person could become someone they never imagined being.

That is why the idea of a “wolf in sheep’s clothing” is so interesting to me. The scariest part is not the wolf itself, but that it looks human and you cannot easily protect yourself from it. I think humans separate themselves from beasts through our sense of higher purpose, which gives us ideas about morality, empathy, and self-control. Yet fear and survival can make those things disappear. During the werewolf trials, people searched for scapegoats and tortured the accused into confessing. That part really stood out to me because if torture only ends when someone confesses, there is really only one possible outcome. It is ironic that in trying so desperately to identify the “beast” in other people, they could lose some of the qualities they believed made them human.