this post was submitted on 12 Oct 2026
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The Vampire, by Philip Burne-Jones, 1897
A vampire is a creature from folklore that subsists by feeding on the vital essence (generally in the form of blood) of the living. In European folklore, vampires are undead creatures that often visited loved ones and caused mischief or deaths in the neighborhoods they inhabited while they were alive. They wore shrouds and were often described as bloated and of ruddy or dark countenance, markedly different from today's gaunt, pale vampire which dates from the early 19th century.
Vampiric entities have been recorded in most cultures; the term vampire was popularized in Western Europe after reports of an 18th-century mass hysteria of a pre-existing folk belief in the Balkans and Eastern Europe that in some cases resulted in corpses being staked and people being accused of vampirism.[1] Local variants in Eastern Europe were also known by different names, such as shtriga in Albania, vrykolakas in Greece and strigoi in Romania.
In modern times, the vampire is generally held to be a fictitious entity, although belief in similar vampiric creatures such as the chupacabra still persists in some cultures. Early folk belief in vampires has sometimes been ascribed to the ignorance of the body's process of decomposition after death and how people in pre-industrial societies tried to rationalize this, creating the figure of the vampire to explain the mysteries of death. Porphyria was linked with legends of vampirism in 1985 and received much media exposure, but has since been largely discredited.
The charismatic and sophisticated vampire of modern fiction was born in 1819 with the publication of "The Vampyre" by the English writer John Polidori; the story was highly successful and arguably the most influential vampire work of the early 19th century. Bram Stoker's 1897 novel Dracula is remembered as the quintessential vampire novel and provided the basis of the modern vampire legend, even though it was published after Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu's 1872 novel Carmilla. The success of this book spawned a distinctive vampire genre, still popular in the 21st century, with books, films, television shows, and video games. The vampire has since become a dominant figure in the horror genre.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vampire
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one of the things that's frustrating about trying to argue with conservatives is that they roughly fall into one of two groups, people who are in it for the bloodlust, and people who are in it out of a sincere (which is distinct from legitimate) fear of the unknown. the bloodthirsty people will cynically pretend to be one of the fearful ones to justify their violent worldview, while the fearful ones will uncritically side with the bloodthirsty ones no matter what because the social structure they offer is already somewhat familiar to them due to being the status quo
Are you sure the bloodthirsty ones aren't just further along in the process? I think they all choose evil knowingly. I have this theory of a working model of the conservative mind, where fear comes first, bloodlust later. And while I think fear is always primary, it's more the fear of losing privilege. Fear of unknown isn't needed from the start, but might show up later.
It goes like this and the starting point may surprise you: (1) they first notice they are trapped in an unjust system that exploits them and is getting worse. They correctly deduce that development could make them lose some real material privileges. This rational fear is almost approaching class consciousness.
They then (2) turn around and instead of showing solidarity, decide to lick some boots in the hopes that they might tread on someone else. Hey, that could be their motto:"Please tread on someone else, sir". In turn for this betrayal they get to enjoy their privilege for a little longer, while racialized people are over-exploited for their benefit and the patriarchy provides free/cheap reproductive labor.
Only then, after having consciously chosen evil for selfish reasons, they then (3) feel cognitive dissonance because they want to think of themselves as good people. That's why they proceed to seek out propaganda that stokes new fears (including of the unknown, to obscure the true motive of loss of privilege). The propaganda, which is readily supplied by hegemonic forces, validates their choices after the fact and explains why the over-exploited people deserve it. This is why their propaganda is always so bad and contradictory. They already decided to believe it before consuming it, it doesn't need to be good.
This lessens the cognitive dissonance somewhat and makes them feel better at the cost of (4) partly numbing their ability to feel empathy like normal humans. They literally lose part of their humanity. That's what makes them, finally, bloodthirsty.
This model has the advantage of:
The fear does come first and it's been proven scientifically!
pretty solid follow up tbh, no notes
i will say tho that i noticed some never fully lean into the bloodlust while others go full boar pretty quickly, idk why
Thanks! One reason might be because of different amounts of contact with victimized people. More contact can lead to less hate (not always but maybe under circumstances that aren't too hierarchical). Even if they try, most can't shut off their empathy completely. Direct human connection and friendship is a potent antidote and might happen by accident.