Skinwalkers: Revisited

Skinwalkers, Revisited

In 2012, I wrote a short piece for Skeptical Briefs called Navajo Skinwalkers. 

Since then, that little brief has taken on a life of its own. It's in college course packs. It's on EBSCO's research starters. It's in the show notes for podcasts. It gets copied every time Skinwalker Ranch trends.

That's why I wanted to revisit it. Not because the folklore has changed. Because the world has.

There is little documented information about the details of witchcraft among the Navajo - or Diné, as they call themselves. What is relatively well known is their term "Skinwalker," or yee naaldlooshii, which means "with it, he goes on all fours."

Navajo tribal beliefs include the concept of living in harmony with nature, which is anthropomorphized as "Mother Earth." The beliefs also involve two different types of beings: the "Earth People" and the "Holy People." Medicine men are thought to be the bridge between Earth People and the spirit world. Skinwalkers are really just another type of Navajo witch; or more specifically, they are considered to be practitioners of what is called the "witchery way."

I am revisiting it now because the story has been taken out of that context and turned into something else entirely. The question I used to get was about resources. Now, the question is about TikTok.

To be clear, I am not out searching the internet looking to debunk myths. I am simply trying to get people to think for themselves and become just a little more skeptical. But when I say skeptical, I don't mean cynical. I mean scientifically-skeptical.

The Skinwalker in the Anthropology Books

While there are many self-published books and websites that offer some insight into this world of Navajo witchcraft, much of the information is obscure and does not provide any sort of real account for how these stories and their details came into being. In Navajo cultural beliefs, witchcraft itself is regarded as a taboo subject because it deals with concepts and objects surrounding death. Therefore, Navajo people are strictly prohibited from even speaking of such things.

In a comprehensive attempt to categorize this, Clyde Kluckhohn, in his 1944 book Navajo Witchcraft, published by Beacon Press, states that witches are actually divided into four different groups: witchery, sorcery, wizardry, and frenzy (Kluckhohn 1944, 22). The distinguishing characteristics between these different variations are in the details. For example, one specific type of witch relies on the usage of objects to transmit curses, referred to as the "frenzy way." However, in most contemporary accounts, Skinwalkers often possess certain supernatural abilities that encompass multiple types of Navajo witch.

There is generally a common theme of the number four showing up in both the Navajo and Apache belief systems. Stories usually have spans of four days, tell of four beings, or contain four elements as part of the theme.

United States Army surgeon Washington Matthews is historically known for his ethnographic study of Native American cultures. In one of his early accounts, witchcraft gets first established in the Navajo emergence story "Creation of First Man and Woman," reported by Matthews in 1894. He wrote that the gods may have taught them the awful secrets of witch-craft. Witches always use masks, and after they returned, they would occasionally put on masks and pray for the good things they needed - abundant rain and abundant crops.

While it is frequently mentioned that the Skinwalker possesses the ability to assume the form of any animal, it is most often reported in the forms of a few key carnivorous animals: a coyote, a wolf, a fox, an owl, or a crow.

That is the academic record. It is careful. It is incomplete on purpose, because the culture protects it.

The Witch Purge and Why This Matters

There is one other account that rarely gets discussed that involves the origins of the Skinwalker legend: the Navajo witch purge in 1878.

As A. Lynn Allison wrote in the introduction of her article "The Navajo Witch Purge of 1878," which appeared in the Arizona State University literary magazine Paloverde:

"The words 'Navajo Witch Purge' might at first call to mind the similar phrase 'Salem Witch Hunt' and all the lurid imagery that goes with it. A bit of investigating, however, produces a cultural and historical picture of the Navajo and their tradition of witchcraft profoundly different from anything ever imagined by those early New England Puritans."

This reported incident is said to come from the days of the Long Walk of the Navajo, the deportation to Bosque Redondo (Fort Sumner) of the Navajo people by the U.S. Government. In an attempt to describe some of the conditions that Navajo people were being exposed to while at the Bosque Redondo in 1878, Raymond Locke states in The Book of the Navajo that "They were convinced that their gods - even the benevolent Changing Woman - had deserted them" (Locke 1976, 365).

Some people, like Ruth Underhill, think that it was these tragic events that left a void in Navajo societies and ultimately lead to the resurgence in accusations of witchcraft: "The indigenous cultural reality and the jealousy that the new rules caused, as well as unexpected sickness that killed both people and livestock, cumulated in an age-old Navajo response: accusations of witchcraft" (Underhill 1956, 160).

I bring this up because superstitious thinking isn't harmless and has real world consequences. When we stop questioning authority, we leave ourselves open for them to take advantage. Then, the people don't run the government, the government runs the people. This is how you get a witch purge.

The Commodified Skinwalker

When I was a guest on Squaring the Strange, Episode 121, I talked about how Native lore is an ever-present theme in skeptical topics; the varied nature of these legends, coupled with their existence mainly as oral tradition and reluctance to discuss taboo subjects, makes native culture an easily misinterpreted, commodified, and exploited landscape. From herbal remedies to horror films to Skinwalker Ranch (tm), we look at examples and see what we can learn.

That (tm) is intentional. The ranch in Uintah County, Utah is on Ute land. It is not Navajo. The name was given to it by writers who wanted to sell a story about a cursed ranch. Now it is a television franchise.

In a recent article for Skeptical Inquirer about Not Deer, fellow writer Autumn Sword reached out to me. The characterization of Not Deer as something trying to imitate a deer has led some to begin conflating Not Deer stories with creatures from Native American belief systems. I told her what I will tell you here:

"Skinwalkers have a specific meaning. Like Chupacabra, it often gets called anything shape-shifting. However, depending on the tribe, witches can only change into certain forms. I have never heard of an animal-human mix that Not Deer sightings have that resemble Skinwalkers. The real fear of Skinwalkers isn't their appearance; it is the dark magic they use. We are not even supposed to talk about it."

That is still my position. I do not believe they are related, but happens to be a similar concept of seeing something in the wild under strange circumstances.

On TikTok, a skinwalker is now anything with forward-facing eyes or legs that are jointed wrong. It is a folk cryptid built for video, not for teaching. Everybody has their story about it, but those stories are told purely for entertainment.

The problem with combating these types of things, is that they get emboldened when ridiculed. It's easy to condemn and come off condescending in the process. Have you ever been persuaded by being ridiculed?

People would rather be wrong on their own, than be ridiculed and proven wrong by someone else.

Progress, Not Victory

The point of an argument or debate should be progress, not victory.

I wrote at the start of this blog that this is what science, critical thinking, and skepticism have done for me. These tools are proven to be the best ways for vetting new information and attaining knowledge. They can even act as a self-defense system for your brain!

My focus went from studying the things we don't know, to the things we are pretty certain about. I started my journey thinking that science was all about math and facts. Cold, complex, and boring. Along the way, I found out that it was much more than that, it was "a way of thinking." Now, I see it as being humbling, awe-inspiring, and elegant.

Carl Sagan said, "Science is more than a body of knowledge. It is a way of thinking; a way of skeptically interrogating the universe. If we are not able to ask skeptical questions, to be skeptical of those in authority, then we're up for grabs."

If someone on the internet tells you they can summon a skinwalker with a song, ask a skeptical question. Who benefits? Who told them? What does the Diné community actually say?

You don't change people's minds, you give them the tools to decide on their own.

If I could leave a trail for others to follow like bread crumbs, that would be fulfilling. Whether it is through a story or shared experience, the end result is finding some common uniting factor and building upon it.

This is the difference that I would like to make in the world.

References:

Allison, A. Lynn. 2001. The Navajo witch purge of 1878. PaloVerde 9(1).

Docsity (n.d.). Navajo Witchcraft and the Legend of Skinwalkers - Study notes. Doc header lists: Native Skeptic / Noah Nez / Skeptical Briefs Volume 22.1, Spring 2012. https://www.docsity.com/en/docs/skinwalkers/8985933/

EBSCO (n.d.). Skinwalker (mythology) | Research Starters, Religion and Philosophy. Definition entry includes "yee naaldlooshii, which translates to 'with it, he goes on all fours.'" https://www.ebsco.com/research-starters/religion-and-philosophy/skinwalker-mythology

Kluckhohn, Clyde. 1944. Navajo Witchcraft. Boston: Beacon Press.

Locke, Raymond Friday. 1976. The Book of the Navajo. Mankind Publishing Co.

Matthews, Washington. 1897. Creation of First Man and First Woman.

Polidoro, M. (n.d.). La leggenda dei diabolici SKINWALKER. YouTube. Description references: "Skeptical Inquirer, article by Noah Nez on Skinwalkers:" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=97JFuuj9uaE

Underhill, Ruth M. 1956. The Navajos. University of Oklahoma Press.

Noah Nez is a Native American skeptic living in Arizona; he is a member of the Phoenix Area Skeptics Society (PASS) and author of Native Skeptic, a blog that looks at critical thinking from a Native American perspective.

The Empire Strikes Back -Part 2

If Part 1 was the "why we're losing," Part 2 is the battle plan for taking the empire back. Here are  four defensive strategies to help you hold down the fortress. 

Put a name to the invader. Just spot the 3 fallacies that run most of the feed; Appeal to Nature, Bandwagon, False Authority. You don't have to win the debate, just flag it in your head. Follow the money, not the claim. Who profits if you believe this without thinking? That cuts through packaging faster than fact-checking. Inoculate, don't isolate. You can't avoid the virus of the mind, you build immunity by picking apart bad arguments on purpose. Occupy your own empire — the Stoic drill: What did I believe today because it felt good, not because it was true? What did the algorithms want me to want?

1. Man The Walls - Name The Invader

You don't need to memorize a textbook of Latin to defend your mind. You need to spot the invasion when it's happening. In real time. On your feed, in the ad before your video, in the conversation at the grocery store.

Most of it runs on three common tactics.

Appeal to Nature. If it's all natural, chemical-free, ancient remedy — it must be good for you, right? Nature also made arsenic and rattlesnakes.

Bandwagon. Ten thousand people already switched. Your friends are already doing it. If everyone believes it, you don't have to think. That's the point.

False Authority. A guy in a lab coat selling you immune gummies. A former athlete selling you crypto. The costume is supposed to do the thinking for you.

Your job isn't to win a debate with these people. Your job is to flag it in your own head the second you hear it. Name it. "Ah, that's bandwagon." The second you name the invader, it loses half its power. It goes from invisible influence to obvious tactic.

2. Cut The Supply Line - Follow The Money, Not The Claim

Don't start by arguing the claim. Start by asking one question: Who profits if I believe this without thinking?

Follow that money. If the answer is the person telling you to be scared, to buy now, to distrust everyone else — you just found the motive. That cuts through packaging faster than any hour of fact-checking. Claims are cheap. Incentives don't lie. Cut the supply line and the fortress holds.

3. Fortify The Mind - Inoculate, Don't Isolate

You cannot avoid the virus of the mind. It's in the cracks every single day. If your strategy is to hide behind the walls and never open the gate, you will lose. The algorithm will find you.

You build immunity the same way your body does. A small dose on purpose.

Deliberately expose yourself to bad arguments and pick them apart. Watch the ad and spot the fallacy. Read the miracle cure post and ask where the evidence is. Teach your brain what a weak argument feels like when you are in control, so you don't get breached when you are not.

Isolation makes you fragile. Inoculation makes you dangerous.

4. Hold The Gate - Occupy Your Own Empire

An empire isn't occupied just once. It has to be patrolled. Every day.

This is how you patrol the perimeter of your brain, and it takes two minutes.

At the end of the day, ask yourself:

What did I believe today because it felt good, not because it was true?

What did the algorithms want me to want today?

That's it.

That's the patrol.

Keep the patrol and the walls hold on their own. You stop being an easy target. You go from being the weak point in the line to being the reason it holds. You start to actually live in your own head again, instead of renting space to whoever shouts the loudest.

Someone will always try to invade your empire. The question is whether you will be there to defend it.

Who taught you how to think?

The Fight for the Empire Between Your Ears

Every day, in between the cracks of our reality, superstitious thinking creeps into our lives. Like a virus of the mind. An idea that becomes infectious, that can ultimately lead to death. If you're asking what this has to do with you, I can bet you're already a victim to one of these.

Pseudoscience sells. The advertisements all around us tell us. Look at the health and beauty industry — much of it relies on packaging and marketing. Anything that has a claim like "supports the immune system" must be healthy, right?

Rhetoric is not new to everyday language. Socrates warned of this in ancient Greece. In school, we teach identifying logical fallacies in psychology classes for a reason — because they work.

The algorithms of social media have already predicted what you are going to want. The decline of critical thinking has left people vulnerable to online predators for the picking. It is a perfect storm.

The odds are stacked against you. That is the bad news. The good news is that we know the counterattack. It is called self-defense for your brain. The Stoics used to say the most important empire to occupy is the one between your ears.

For we are not speaking of some small skirmish. This is for control of the whole kingdom. Someone is always trying to invade your empire. This is how you take it back.

Let's turn the tide and the tables, and get back in the fight.

Who taught you how to think?

Build a Better Tomorrow Today: Using Science and Skepticsm

Everyone is focusing on what is wrong with the world, when we should be turning our attention to what is great about it, and how we can make it better. That starts with becoming better thinkers and decision makers. Then, we can become leaders in anything we choose to do. 

"The point of an argument or debate should be progress, not victory." 

The initial intention behind the start of this blog was to help other people who were like me and felt lost amongst all of the spiritualness in the world. I could not find my place, but knew I was part of something bigger than just myself. Was I Apache, Navajo, or Hopi? Was I white? Where did my answers lie? In one of those tribal religions or perhaps in the white mans' religion? 

I am not trying to change people's minds about their beliefs just because I don't agree with them. I am not out searching the internet looking to debunk myths. I am simply trying to get people to think for themselves and become just a little more skeptical. But, when I say skeptical, I don't mean cynical. I mean scientifically-skeptical. A large portion of science and scientific skepticism is open-mindedness. That tenet should always be clear and present in the forefront of our minds. In order to understand science, you have to get to know skepticism. This is what makes us better critical thinkers. 

"You don't change people's minds, you give them the tools to decide on their own."

This is what science, critical thinking, and skepticism have done for me. These tools are proven to be the best ways for vetting new information and attaining knowledge. They can even act as a self-defense system for your brain!

My focus went from studying the things we don't know, to the things we are pretty certain about. Why are we here? What is the purpose of life? What is the meaning of these patterns I see in nature? These questions began to seem less relevant to me as my brain was now infatuated with learning as much as I could about the universe and our place in it. 

I started my journey thinking that science was all about math and facts. Cold, complex, and boring. Along the way, I found out that it was much more than that, it was "a way of thinking." Now, I see it as being humbling, awe-inspiring, and elegant.

"Who is making all the decisions about science and technology that are going to determine the kind of future our children will live in?" (Sagan 1996) 

 

Carl Sagan on Charlie Rose in 1996.

Lastly, and perhaps most importantly, are the implications to our civic duties. Socrates used to stress that it wasn't enough for the  people of Rome to vote. They needed to be well informed voters. Because, when we stop questioning authority, we leave ourselves open for them to take advantage. Then, the people don't run the government, the government runs the people. Thomas Jefferson was also a big fan of questioning authority because of these same reasons. 

Who will govern the governors?" There is only one force in the nation that can be depended upon to keep the government pure and the governors honest, and that is the people themselves. They alone, if well informed, are capable of preventing the corruption of power, and of restoring the nation to its rightful course if it should go astray. They alone are the safest depository of the ultimate powers of government. (Jefferson 1903-04)

Benjamin Franklin has been quoted as saying, "It is the first responsibility of every citizen to question authority." I hold a similar belief. Socrates believed that ordinary citizens were not fit to govern themselves. He didn't believe that the general public was informed enough to make big decisions and often voted against their best interests. But, I have more hope for people and would like to see a world where more can think for themselves and are not afraid to question authority or the status quo. A place where we can argue constructively and find progress, despite any differences. The aim isn't to win debates, but to be just a bit more skeptical. About as much as you would be when buying a car from someone. It is especially important when we are most vulnerable. 

This is the difference that I would like to make in the world. If I could leave a trail for others to follow like bread crumbs, that would be fulfilling. Whether it is through a story or shared experience, the end result is finding some common uniting factor and building upon it. 

Original Artwork by Noah Nez.

Sources: 

Sagan, Carl. 1996. Charlie Rose. YouTube. Can be accessed online at: http://youtu.be/d8O1e_TZHZo.

Jefferson, Thomas. 1903-04. The Writings of Thomas Jefferson. Thomas Jefferson on Politics and Government. Memorial Edition (Lipscomb and Bergh, editors). 20 Vols., Washington, D.C. Can be accessed online at: http://famguardian.org/Subjects/Politics/thomasjefferson/jeff0350.htm.

Review: NYC Epicenters: 9/11 to 2021 1/2

 

I just watched the first episode of the Spike Lee joints on HBO, “NYC Epicenters: 9/11 to 2021 ½”. Here are some of the initial thoughts and feelings about the two-hour long episode. Firstly, it was such a relief to feel acknowledged by the past I experienced as being real. Sometimes, the past year can seem like it was a bad nightmare. This felt like an acknowledgment of all the feeling and emotions I had being validated. The betrayal of the government handling of the pandemic to the protest against police brutality and injustice around the world. This felt like a validation that it actually happened. It wasn't a dream. I was there. Here is the footage. It's want what the media presented at the time, from ANY side. It was peaceful, lovely, and inspiring. Honestly, I feel sorry for you if you didn't get to experience that global movement like most of humanity did during that time. Once again, I am so glad Spike documented and presented so it is immortalized as it happened.

 

Some may try and change that narrative, like it wasn't as magical as it was, like the global agreement acknowledging systematic racism and injustice under the law around the world didn't happen. But, it did. And it was just as glorious as Spike Lee depicts it. My memory doesn't have the same soundtrack, but the spirit and emotion of his score fits to what I felt during those first, uneasy moment of the COVID19 Pandemic.

 

The film reminds us of our own experiences in the unfolding of a contagion. Namely, the bad. For it wasn't until it got really bad that Americans took notice. The failure of leadership across the board leaves you dizzy trying to blame every level of government. But, ultimately I couldn't help thinking of Socrates and how we elect every person fumbling the ball now. For he did not think the “ordinary people [of Rome] were fit to govern themselves.”

 

That might sound offensive to read. But, his explanations were reasonable and convincing. I used to be one of these contrarian, hipster wannabe, armchair scholars watching YouTube thinking I was smarter than the entire scientific, and medical establishment. I get it. In a world of Dr. Oz selling BS on daytime TV, it can be tough for the lay person to follow. Now, when we see the general public science literacy every year, I get it and I agree. The question of whether the Earth rotates around the Sun or if ghosts are real should not be controversial. Certain scientific facts like evolution, get politicized. However, modern biology and medicine wouldn’t make sense without it, therefore they would not exist.  

 

Carl Sagan used to inspire me and leave me in a state of wow. Now, his words mostly just haunt me...

 

“A world built on science and technology, which no one understands it…is liable to blow up in our faces.” A recipe for a perfect storm of disaster.

 

Now, social media and the internet provide so much information that the BS is indistinguishable from the truth. There is no better example relevant than the misinformation, fear mongering, and conspiracy theories surrounding the COVID19 vaccines.

 

Turns out the modern age didn't give us flying cars, jet packs, and hover boards. The future made processing power smaller and more powerful. So, we get computer phones and digital cameras in our palms. You can thank space exploration and telescopes like the Hubble for technology in the phone you are using now. The spinoffs are not calculable.

 

But, this comes back to how it all works against us. Access to information quicker, also means access to disinformation quicker. Once I heard the question, if you were asked to prove the world is not flat, could you? Without the use of the internet, but sheer logic and experiment. I knew this was an important aspect because I couldn't do it. Ancient people could do it. What knowledge did they have that I did not?

 

Instead, I learned how all those ages ago, someone measured the angles of the shadows from a sun dial in two different locations at the same time. The results are what proved the truth of the universe as we know it today, the world is indeed not flat. They could even find the circumference of the Earth with the results they found with incredible accuracy.  

 

According to the Oxford dictionary, the definition of the word “epicenter”, means the central point of something, usually unpleasant or a difficult situation. New York City often serves as the center of many situations that we tend to forget about. We get examples of how the pandemic helped bring people closer together in certain ways and pushed us apart in others. Not just in a physical sense, but in a personal, psychological sense.   

 

When we get saved from this global pandemic, remember that it is not because of any politician or world leaders. You give credit where it is due, to the health care workers on the frontline and scientists developing new technologies such as the vaccinations that will help us win this war. Never has there been a time that peoples attention and interest should be in science. This is our moonshot. As Americans we should rally behind the efforts to find solutions and support the healthcare workers. We have a common enemy in the virus killing indiscriminately, whatever your beliefs might be. It is killing Republicans, Democrats, Independents, and even germ deniers all the same. During the moon missions, people complained about the cost of sending men to the moon. I am sure people asked how much it would cost to shut down St. Louis during the Flu of 1918, but the opening back up before it was safe, would cost them more than they could ever imagine.

 

I am sure there were people saying they overreacted in St. Louis closing the city down during the Flu of 1918. But, all of those people soon felt like assholes when the virus had a second wave worse than the first, and a third when science deniers protested the disease into each others uncovered, open mouths. I am sure most people have not heard of this, because those who do not know history, are doomed to repeat it.

 

Original Artwork By Noah Nez 

*Series is available on HBOMAX now