Zebras and Horses
Horses look a lot like zebras, don’t they? Four powerful legs ending in one single toe, long muzzles, deep chests, manes gracing their necks. They look related, they look like they function the same way. When you look at how a horse moves and how a zebra moves side by side, you can compare them easily.
This doesn’t mean horses are like zebras. No matter how similar they look on the outside, taking a peek behind their eyes will reveal a different truth. Horses have strong family bonds. A horse will follow the head of its herd to the ends of the Earth because horses are wired to stick together. Zebras? They don’t care. They hang out in herds as a survival strategy but they won’t care if another zebra is taken from the herd. If they don’t want to follow the herd, they just… won’t. This change in how their brains are wired dramatically impacts the human relationship with each animal. Humans can connect with horses, communicate well with them. Humans and horses get each other in a way that allows them to work together. That isn’t the same way for humans and zebras.
I’m, as far as I know, a member of the species Homo sapiens sapiens. I look pretty much like any other 50something human man. I dress in a manner that is obviously strange, but the appearance of my body does not distinguish me. I could blend into this world quite easily, if not for the fact that my wiring is painfully, painfully wrong. In the culture my body belongs to, there’s certain things humans just aren’t supposed to do or be.
Humans do not perceive live animals as food. In fact, if an animal is presented as food with its head visible, humans are expected to turn their nose up at it. Humans do not jump to violence as a way to resolve disputes with their peers. Humans are good communicators, and they can always call upon an authority figure if violence must be applied. Humans are not a part of the ecosystem or food chain. Humans have evolved beyond this, developed technologies to set themselves apart. Any identification with the world around them must be from a distance, as an outside observer. Humans are not governed by instincts. Humans are logical beings, who can discard these thoughts and act in a well-reasoned manner to achieve their goals.
I can’t live up to these expectations, I can try my very hardest and I can slip into the role of Modern Human In Suburban Florida. If nobody looks at me too hard, it sometimes even works! They see a human doing human things from across the street and I completely blend into the background.
But it’s an act, it’s all an act. The way I move my body is all wrong. I keep my back a bit too straight and my eyes dart across my field of vision a bit too often. When I feel threatened, I whip around and reach for my hip. The way I view the area around me is all wrong. I scan my surroundings for sources of food, water, and shelter. I take note of where someone malevolent could be concealed, and of where someone benevolent would have stashed supplies for lost travelers. I can’t remember that the road to my house was laid one day for cars to drive on, I think it’s a river meant to carry the steady, measured thud thud thud thud of human boots. The way I get ready for my day is all wrong. I forget my keys and remember shelf-stable foods, a supply of fresh water, a bandana to cover my face from prying eyes. The way I view myself is all wrong. I cannot see myself as separate from every other thing. The alligator outside is more powerful than me and he could tear my flesh from my bones if he chose to. The deer are possible sources of sustenance. The roads are my nervous system, the rocks and dirt are my bones. When I die my body will feed all life around me, as all life feeds me today.
People who get to know me on a deeper level start perceiving this wrongness. I’ll react inappropriately or say something everyone perceives as too morbid, too aggressive. They’ll start to wonder why I flinch when no one flinches. Why I eat so much meat and why I don’t feel any dissonance about it. I fall into the uncanny valley the tiniest bit. I swear to God, people know what I am. They lack words for me but they perceive my habits. When they look at me they cannot see a mirror. They see my wiring, as distant and cold to them as that of a zebra.
When I try to remedy this by entering alterhuman communities, I can’t reach out and connect with folks there easily either. Even though the term “alterhuman” was always intended to include strange human experiences, I’m told I’m not nonhuman enough. I’m too close to normalcy. My flat face and feet stand out as I stand up on two long legs. The fire behind my eyes was lit by my hands using tools I crafted. I am not animal enough, not instinctual enough, not Other enough. I’m told to leave them to their safe spaces where they don’t have to deal with normal human beings. All they see is my skin, bare of stripes and solid, in the shape of a domesticated horse.
This leaves me in a strange between-state. Much too wild to be Human, much too human to be Animal. When others cast their gaze upon me, they search for whatever makes me most dissimilar to them, while ignoring the connections. These experiences have led me to conclude that, on some fundamental level, I am not of this world. None of us are of this world. We might not show it in long muzzles and fur and claws and sharp teeth, but the way we operate is somewhat alien to you! Everyone’s a product of their environment, and we aren’t an exception to that. The Wasteland has shaped us into something that cannot fit the human mold any more than a dragon or a tree could.