ON SHEEP

SHEEPDOGS

AND WOLVES

// by The War Father

If you’ve been around the internet for a minute, especially around manliness Twitter, you’ve probably heard the analogy about sheep, sheepdogs, and wolves.

If you haven’t, let me summarize—

In his book, On Combat, an excellent twin to his other opus, On Killing, LTC David Grossman explained a certain analogy to understand human nature:

If you have no capacity for violence then you are a healthy productive citizen: a sheep.

If you have a capacity for violence and no empathy for your fellow citizens, then you have defined an aggressive sociopath—a wolf.

But if you have a capacity for violence, and a deep love for others, then you are a sheepdog.

Grossman likens being a sheepdog to being a modern day warrior—someone who is “walking the hero’s path.”

Society—sheep—fear the sheepdog but rely on its protection. Being a warrior is a lonely path.

Wolves prey on the sheep and avoid the sheepdog.

It’s an interesting analogy.

But it never rang quite true to me.

After all my time in the military and special operations—my study of history, human nature, symbology, and psychology—

The sheep/sheepdog/wolves analogy seemed wrong.

Here’s why.

Is the dummy who brings a rifle to a protest and gets clocked with a brick a sheepdog? Seems like a sheep.

Is the Nazi soldier who follows orders and commits atrocities a sheepdog? Seems like a wolf.

Is a radical genius like Elon Musk a sheep?

The analogy didn’t seem wrong, per se, but seemed as if it was imperfectly describing society.

It’s a symbolic representation spread across a one-dimensional line, the “willingness to use violence” measure.

But humanity is more than that.

Then, it hit me—

There are sheep, sheepdogs, and wolves, but we’ve been thinking about it all wrong.

Wolves aren’t necessarily the bad guys here, and sheepdogs aren’t necessarily the heroes.

THE TRUTH ABOUT SHEEP, SHEEPDOGS, AND WOLVES—

Society is a structure. A formation of laws, cultural mores, socioeconomic practices, and commonly held beliefs.

Most people spend their entire lives living in that structure.

You drive on the proper side of the road. You hold open doors for people. You pay your taxes.

You’re a sheep. That’s OK. We’re all sheep to some extent. Life is a gated pasture; if we’re lucky it’s a lush field, and we reap the benefits of grazing.

Sheep live in the pasture.

Sheepdogs, on the other hand, maintain and protect the pasture, the structure of society.

Police, yes. But only in certain regards.

Also, CEOs, politicians, media icons.

Anyone who is in a position where their actions reinforce society, rather than just to exist within it.

A sheep does not impact society. He exists within its rules and limitations.

Sheepdogs don’t merely live in the pasture. Their power comes from its rules and they profit from it.

Moreover, they maintain the structure that benefits them.

Think of a politician who legislates bills that support Wall Street.

He’s doing maintenance on the same fence that’s always existed. Managing the system.

He’s not different than the CEO who makes the same kind of product that already exists.

Sheepdogs are powerful, but they’re comfortable in the pasture.

It’s been good to them, they admire its structure, and they raise their kids to be good and do the same.

They’re doctors, lawyers, financiers on one end, power brokers and most media icons on the other.

What’s critical is that they don’t change anything about society; they simply excel at it. Not for lack of ability, but desire.

Now, wolves...

Wolves are physiologically the same as sheepdogs. Smart and powerful, with one exception:

They hate the pasture.

It’s constricting, binding. Wolves have ideas, ambitions, and desires that extend beyond its walls.

Wolves are very frightening to sheepdogs.

Wolves threaten to upend society.

Elon Musk recreates the auto industry.

Steve Jobs creates a smartphone industry that never even existed.

Joe Rogan undermines the old media.

Bernie Sanders, yes Bernie, threatens the political way of life. Guess what, Trump, too.

This is not an analysis of what’s good vs what is bad. Simply, what is.

Sheep live in the system.

Sheepdogs maintain the system.

Wolves upend the system, for good or for bad.

Genghis Khan and Hitler were wolves as much as Gandhi and F.D.R.

A society filled with only sheep will fall apart.

With only sheepdogs, will never grow.

With only wolves, won’t exist to begin with.

So, you need all three.

Many of the people you see in this sphere of Twitter act as wolves.

They are reimagining the ways a person needs to make money, changing the game.

Many act as sheepdogs. They espouse deep, historical virtues of family and responsibility that we desperately need.

Human beings are complex. The reality cuts a lot of ways through each individual.

You could be a wolf professionally,

A sheepdog moral/ethically,

And a sheep intellectually (not necessarily a bad thing)

The key is whether you simply exist in the society, reinforce the society, or upend the society.

A sheep intellectually has gone to school and learned what was given.

A sheepdog, is a researcher who is advancing the field of knowledge.

A wolf, making new knowledge altogether.

A sheep: a cop, soldier, or bureaucrat who supports the law.

A sheepdog: a legislator, general, or politician who makes the law.

A wolf: a revolutionary or outsider who threatens the old system.

And yes, from Grossman’s perspective, on violence:

A sheep relies on society to do violence for him.

A sheepdog commits violence in a way that supports society.

A wolf commits violence in a manner that destabilizes society.

Professionally—

A sheep goes to work, gets paid, exists within the system.

A sheepdog excels at the system, is put in charge, makes lots of money, but doesn’t rock the boat.

A wolf reimagines industries, makes money online, doesn’t do “what he’s supposed to do.”

It’s worth spending time to evaluate your own life and whether you perceive yourself as a sheep, sheepdog, or wolf.

Personally, I want to be a wolf in manners of my professional and financial success—

And a sheepdog in manners of my culture and family.

If you liked this thread, please share if!

It could open somebody’s eyes.

/Thread