“As Richard Slotkin has argued, frontier cultural forms that stressed regeneration through violence excused all kinds of nasty behavior. The myth freed colonists to chop heads, fire villages, and torture animals. This was wholesome, conservative brutality; atrocities committed in the name of order, authority, and decorum. Travelers’ tales and circle hunts made wildlife abuse socially acceptable. Regeneration through violence rested on the assumption (many times the delusion) of powerlessness. Wolves never threatened humans physically, but they devoured livestock, and colonists identified with their animal property.” MythologyEnvironmentalismFolkloreAnimal CrueltyWolvesColonizationViolence Against AnimalsLovestockRegeneration Through Violence Book:Vicious: Wolves and Men in America Source: Vicious: Wolves and Men in America
“The wolf legends demanded immediate revenge. Groups of colonists entered the forest, killed the predators, and restored their mastery over nature in a day… the legends offered a quick solution: regeneration through violence” HistoryEnvironmentalismFolkloreWolvesMythsViolence Against Animals Book:Vicious: Wolves and Men in America Source: Vicious: Wolves and Men in America
“To overpower savagery one must lash out savagely. In their stories Euro-American colonists invented and broadcast a vision of wolves as threats to human safety. They then modeled their behavior on the ferocity they perceived in wolves. Thus folklore explains not only why humans destroyed wolves but why they did so with such cruel enthusiasm.” HistoryEnvironmentalismFolkloreAnimal CrueltyWolvesMythsViolence Against Animals Book:Vicious: Wolves and Men in America Source: Vicious: Wolves and Men in America