Halloween is just around the corner, so what better thing to do than talk about monsters?
Specifically, what has motivated humanity to create them, talk about them, fear them and love them across time and across culture.
Monsters are generally linked with our sense of fear. Fear is an adaptive emotion that is built in us to protect us from threats. It's how we generally know not to punch this thing:
And we need to train fear out of us to do this:
Fairy tales have monsters and traditionally served as cautionary tales for kids. Little fables that would teach children not to play near the lake side or do silly things and end up falling in a well or roam away from the house or in the forest and get lost. All good things for survival, aided by scaring the kids away from these places.
So monsters have always been important to society exactly because they serve as a concrete way to symbolize different kinds of dangers. Different types of monsters represent different dangers that we personify and thus make manageable.
Fear of an avalanche is a lot less controllable than fear of a yeti. It's better to have a vampire to kill than be forced to deal with issues of sexual or societal deviance (whatever that might mean depending on the era and the culture) or the fear of death or what comes after.
And so we create monsters, love to fear them, love to conquer them, and love to think about them.
That's how different types of monsters rise in popularity depending on what a society is generally afraid of on a cultural level: Godzilla peaked during the fear of nuclear disasters. Zombies were all the rage in the 60s, the 80s, and the 2000s when overconsumerism and being slaves to an insatiable thirst for goods was being discussed.
A monster helps us fight the feeling of helplessness against a threat, existential or not, and gives us the chance to work things out internally. It's a catalyst and a purging of stress mechanism that releases that fear in a cathartic manner.
What are your favorite monsters?
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The Psychology of Monsters
Tantz_Aerine at 12:00AM, Oct. 26, 2024
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bravo1102 at 3:41AM, Oct. 27, 2024
There's a 1970s movie called "The Monster Club" where a human walks into the monster club looking to join in with the vampires, ghouls and werewolves. They're about to kill him and he tells them a few stories about humans are the greatest monsters of all. Humans are the greatest monsters of all.
dragonsong12 at 12:13PM, Oct. 26, 2024
I've always had the issue of not being particularly afraid of monsters. I always find them more interesting than scary. So my view of monsters is more just as "outsiders" than as threats and I tend to use them that way in my writing. Humans, as always, are FAR more terrifying! XD (Though they can really work as a more existential threat if the thing the monster is a stand-in for is more readily apparent.)
usedbooks at 5:51AM, Oct. 26, 2024
I always enjoyed Halloween family movies. I didn't watch horror genre at all. So, I liked/like the Addams Family and Hocus Pocus, Halloweentown. The "monsters" I grew up with were literally Muppets. Instead of representing the scary things of the world, they were personified as misunderstood as "weird" but not bad. Honestly, maybe that is the better lesson for modern society. My childhood "monsters" taught me not to fear the unknown but to find out more. Modern kids are unlikely to encounter literal wolves and dangerous animals, so they don't need that fear instilled. -- On the other hand, stranger danger is very real, so stories with human villains are good lessons too...
usedbooks at 5:17AM, Oct. 26, 2024
I think about the Beauty and the Beast fairy tale sometimes. It was originally told to little girls to prepare them for the realities of arranged marriage. Tbh, I find that so much more horrifying than the story of being wed to an actual monster. In the tale, the protagonist eventually submits to the monster and gets the man of her dreams. Telling little girls to accept their fates and love men who are horrible to them is nightmarish. The real monsters don't become princes. So, yeah, that monster story definitely is used to explain a terrifying reality but also to manipulate the next generation of women. Scary stuff.
marcorossi at 3:50AM, Oct. 26, 2024
Years ago I read a non fiction book by Stephen King, and he wrote that there are only 4 kind of monsters, iirc the vampire, the ghost, the werewolf and the haunted house, this based on 4 different basic fears, and that other monsters are just variations on these themes, but I don't remember the exact fears though (also this leaves out Lovecraft).
PaulEberhardt at 1:19AM, Oct. 26, 2024
Seriously, making fun of monsters is a great way of dealing with them, along with what they stand for.
PaulEberhardt at 1:17AM, Oct. 26, 2024
Fairy tales were also a way of communicating things not meant for kids' ears under their radar, back when families spent evenings in one large room together (like "The Star Money" as an actually quite disturbing parable on prostitution). Totally 100% agreed: monsters are a code and give more abstract fears a name. Once you know its name you can fight it. My favourite monsters are still the ones that never fully reveal themselves or even then retain a shroud of mystery - probably for that very reason. Sea monsters of yore and Lovecraftian aliens are good candidates for this. And dragons, for their large variety. And I like Pier Xanthony's take on Ogres, but that's a different kettle of... well, let's not think too much of what's in the kettle. :)