Let Me Talk About Werewolves for a Second
Why is it that every werewolf book is this weird testosterone fueled alpha male/female romance thing?
Like guys. Werewolves are family groups. They are basically big ol’ dog families. Your werewolf family wouldn’t be made up of alpha males fighting each other for dominance and subjugating females.
If there was a werewolf in your neighborhood, they’d be that family of 10 kids always roughhousing outside and their house is the one all the neighborhood kids go to hang out at because Mr. Werewolf and Mrs. Werewolf are the Cool Parents that their kids find really embarrassing.
“Wait…Emily? Aren’t she and her whole family…you know?”
“Don’t believe everything you’ve heard; worst thing that’s ever happened over there is the twins teething on visitors’ shoes.”
Here’s the thing, though.
While the notion of the “alpha wolf” is indeed misguided, being based on observations of wolves in captivity, the dominance thing does happen. And it’s not just the adult males; adult females do it too - but it’s only a thing when wolves who aren’t related by blood end up sharing a habitat.
So consider: by some happenstance, two unrelated werewolf families end up living across the street from one another. Of course they’re not going to start brawling in the streets - they’re civilised people, after all - but that urge to show the other pack who’s boss comes out in other ways, resulting in the two clans getting, like, weirdly competitive about everything.
Imagine the Hallowe’en displays.
“Wow…the Phelans and Ochoas both really went all-out with the decorations. Are those real bones?”
“That’s just how they are; they’ll find absolutely any excuse to showboat at each other like that. And they’re definitely real—right down to the toothmarks.”
Something to think about though: Do you know what would be for all intents and purposes the *EXACT CIRCUMSTANCE* where wolves are shown to display the classic Alpha/Beta dominance behavior? ie A bunch of unrelated (usually ‘unmated’) young adults forced into close proximity in competition for unnaturally distributed resources? Where their actions are being observed and controlled by “impartial” and ignorant authorities? Where they are forced to be at crowded events when their “cycles” are flaring up?
SCHOOL
Regular public school, college, even and especially boarding school meet all the criteria to force young, undeveloped werewolves into an intensely unhealthy situation.
Of course the parents would know this, they would take steps to ensure their children were not stressed out.
Conclusions: Werewolves are homeschoolers.
That big, rowdy family whose science projects make the local news, who only shows up at school to ace the standardized testing once a year, who spends weeks at a time out on family hunting trips, whose innumerable uncles and aunts are always dropping in with food. Those are the werewolves.
