By Light Unseen
The Original (slightly updated)
Real Vampires F.A.Q.

Based on questions from e-mail sent by readers of "Real Vampires" and The Real Vampires Home Page.


I keep having dreams about vampires. What do they mean?

Dreams, as a general rule, never are really about what their surface images depict. They are highly symbolic and metaphorical, and they're also very self-referential--the dream symbols have a special meaning to us alone. Dreams tell us what we're feeling and thinking about something in our lives. I tend to believe that almost no vampire-related dreams have anything to do with actual vampires. To give a comparison, I often dream about tornadoes. I'm fascinated with tornadoes, but I've never seen one in real life. However, I've had incredibly vivid dreams about them, dreams that left me feeling physically shaken. Once I dreamed of huddling under furniture in a room while the room was ripped to pieces around me, and in another dream I was sucked out a window by the tornado and dropped on the ground! But the point is, these dreams never related to any real life storms--they weren't precognitive or literal. Tornadoes, to my subconscious, represent a primal, uncontrollable, overwhelming force for change that I feel is encroaching on me in my life. When I'm feeling threatened by something, I dream about tornadoes. And just about all vampire dreams seem very much the same. Many of the vampire-related dreams I have heard about seem to be based in anxiety about something or some person that is threatening the dreamer in real life, or pressure to "join" or commit to something that the dreamer feels ambivalent about.

In a very few cases, people have reported vampire-visitation dreams or experiences that seemed similar to the "nighthag" or related paranormal phenomena. Others are convinced that they are encountering a true entity or intelligence of some kind during their dreams, and since I have been visited by the dead in dreams, I can't discount the possibility. Martin V. Riccardo's Liquid Dreams of Vampires is a useful resource for those seeking perspective on vampire-related dreams.


If I have unusually long canine teeth, does that mean I'm a vampire?

No, it just means you're an alpha primate. Lots of people naturally have long, sharp canines. You'd see them much more often, except that orthodontists typically cap or remove such teeth because they supposedly interfere with chewing and cause too much wear on the other teeth. Vampiric people are no more (or less) likely to have "fangs" then ordinary people, and you virtually never hear of them in folklore. Early fictional vampires seemed to be described as having long teeth as a way of emphasizing their animalistic nature. But the real identification of vampires and fangs started with the 1958 movie Horror of Dracula, the first English-language film in which a vampire had a pair of big pointy canine teeth.

The reason that fangs impress people so much is because people are primates. An open-mouthed, fangy snarl is the classic aggression/dominance/threat sign for all primates and apes, humans included. Christopher Lee's snarl would send a chimpanzee or gorilla running for the hills! Humans are hard-wired to be impressed by fangs. But they're totally impractical for drinking blood. True blood drinking animals, like vampire bats, bite with their incisors, and very gently (they fan their "victims" with their wings to lessen the sensation of the bite). They also lap the blood with their tongues, instead of sucking it--which is also what most blood-drinking humans do. Serious blood drinkers never bite their "donors"--in fact, they often don't touch their mouths to the donor's skin at all. They (or their donors) use sterilized needles, lancets or stainless steel blades for blood-letting. While some vampire-identified people enjoy wearing prosthetic fangs, they're really just for fun.


I have impulses to bite people and I like to be bitten. Does this mean I'm a vampire?

Biting is a very common human impulse and need not be vampiric in any way. Aggressive human bites are the second most commonly treated bite in hospital emergency rooms, after dog bites, and biting during erotic love play is almost universal. Almost every baby and toddler has to be taught that it's not okay to bite because biting is so pleasurable (both empowering and sensuous). So, feeling impulses to bite, whether in anger or during love-making, has nothing to do with vampirism. Blood drinking vampiric people don't bite their "donors."


When I cut or scrape myself by accident, I lick the blood from the cut. Does this mean I'm a vampire?

Not at all. All animals, including humans, instinctively will lick their own bleeding cuts and wounds. Saliva has mild antiseptic properties, and licking a bleeding wound encourages it to bleed slightly more and therefore helps protect against infection. It exposes the wounded tissue to the antigens in blood and to oxygen, and helps clean out foreign particles and dirt. We'd all still lick our cuts if we weren't thoroughly conditioned by a lifetime of hygiene classes, Bactine commercials, anti-bacterial soaps and universal precautions. Feeling an urge to lick your own bleeding scrapes and cuts has absolutely nothing to do with vampirism whatsoever.

Feeling an irresistable compulsion to lick other people's cuts and scrapes is another story, but not necessarily an indicator of vampirism. If this happens to you often, or is an especially strong impulse, read the article on Sanguinarians, and check out the websites listed at the end for further information.


Aren't all vampiric people predators?

According to the Modern Vampire Myth, it's currently popular to think of vampires as predators on the human race, always killing their victims and disappearing into the night. The books of Anne Rice have encouraged sympathy with a vampire subculture that has its own history, one in which human beings are little more than walking snacks. Vampires are even romanticized by some as "culling" the human population of criminals and other undesirables.

But vampiric people are far more parasitical than they are predatory. Both in folklore and among blood-drinking vampiric people, the vampiric person cultivates a relationship with his or her human "donor." Even vampiric people who depend on animal blood don't need to kill (unless they're relying on something the size of gerbils for their meals) and doing so is wasteful and messy. In nature, a parasite that kills its host outright tends to be inefficient, even though it's true that most hosts of parasites do not thrive under the arrangement.

A far more constructive model for the role of vampiric people is that of symbiont. The vampiric person develops a relationship with the donor to the point of an equal exchange, a give-and-take of mutual dependency. A True Vampire can trade healing and revivifying power for blood, and even Sanguinarians can provide warmth, companionship and great sex. Most vampiric people's needs are more than satisfied by practices that require no living thing to die for their benefit. This is the farthest away from a "predator" that you could get.

The predator model of vampirism is a dangerous one to rationalize and defend, and vampire-identified people who attempt to live it out have crossed the boundary into sociopathology. (See the article about Human Vampire-like Predators.)


Do vampiric people worship the devil?

No. There is absolutely no ideological, religious or philosophical requirement or implication in being a vampiric person. Human or non-human, we are not possessed by demons, minions of Satan or condemned to Hell. I personally know vampiric people who are devout Christians, Pagans, Wiccans, Taoists, Satanists and atheists. I happen to be a Pagan with a Masters of Divinity degree who preaches regularly in Unitarian-Universalist churches.

While there are some "vampire religions" of different types, and a few of them have origins in forms of Satanism, these "religions" are strictly options for any vampiric person. Some vampiric people, especially Sanguinarians, are quite stern in asserting that vampirism has nothing to do with religion at all, and that self-proclaimed "vampire religions" are misleading and pernicious. The notion that vampirism is some sort of "cult" rather than a state of being is probably an overlap from witchcraft folklore. I first recall it being mentioned in the 1962 Hammer film, "The Brides of Dracula," in which Van Helsing describes vampirism as a "cult" and "a survival of one of the old Pagan religions." (I'll stretch even further and guess that the Hammer screenwriters borrowed that idea from the British occult popularizer and novelist, Dennis Wheatley, who tended to equate many occult concepts with "devil-worship.") Since then, the idea has gradually developed, and has been meshed with the "vampire clans" ideas from role-playing games. But being a vampiric person no more involves a "cult," or a religion, than having a particular color of hair and eyes does.


Can vampiric people get HIV/AIDS and other diseases from blood?

All vampiric people are organic lifeforms and are vulnerable to human ailments, including AIDS and other blood-borne diseases. However, drinking blood is not the easiest way to contract HIV. Blood-borne diseases are transmitted by direct contact between infected body fluids and the recipient's bloodstream. They cannot be contracted through ingestion (drinking) alone. Unprotected oral sex, including fellatio, is the lowest risk form of unprotected sex. This does not mean NO risk. You can contract blood-borne diseases orally if you have any kind of open sore, abrasion, or cut in your mouth which allows an infected body fluid direct contact with your bloodstream. If you have bleeding gums, or if you ate a bag of potato chips recently, your risk will be higher. Barrier protection is still strongly advised for oral sex. Similarly, experienced blood drinkers strongly recommend that "donors" be people known to you, and that they undergo testing for HIV, hepatitis, and other blood-borne diseases.

I am not stating this fact in order to encourage people to be reckless. However, there are factions who might be tempted to accuse blood drinking vampiric people of endangering the public health through the spread of disease, especially AIDS. Such accusations are baseless and inflammatory. Blood drinking is significantly less likely to create a vector for HIV transmission than unprotected anal sex (the most high-risk sexual activity). With proper precautions observed--and blood drinkers are no more interested in dying than you are!--vampiric people present no greater danger to the public welfare than anyone else.


Is there really a Chosen One or a Slayer?

I understand that it can be tempting to believe that an exciting fantasy television show might be based on fact. However, let me state this for the record: everything in the television show (and movie) "Buffy the Vampire Slayer," including the Slayer, the network of Watchers, the information given about vampires and demons, vampires that conveniently vanish into a poof of dust when killed, all the specific characters, and all the books, artifacts and magical devices shown, are completely and entirely the fictional creation of Joss Whedon, "Buffy's" creator, and the writing staff on the show. I am sad to say that "Buffy" is absolutely, positively, as far away from being authentic in its presentation of real-life magic, vampires, demons and the occult as it could possibly be. There are no secret traditions that Joss Whedon happened to stumble across and use as a basis for his show. It's all just entertainment. If you are a young person wondering if magic, vampires, werewolves or witchcraft really behave like they do on the show, you're in for, at best, a major disappointment. This same general disclaimer applies to all fantasy fiction, including the kind that is cleverly disguised to look like "fact." No fiction author is revealing hidden mysteries or secret knowledge--if they were, they wouldn't be alive to do a sequel. Wish-fulfillment fantasies have their place, but don't abandon critical thinking and be played for a sucker.

Incidently, all of you "Slayers" who e-mailed me to explain that you're the "Chosen One" will just have to get together on your own and duke it out for the title.


How can I become a vampire slayer?

I can never quite understand what impels someone who wants to be a "vampire slayer" to ask the author of a vampire website how they can learn to kill vampires. (You actually think I'd tell you the truth?) I've also noticed that before 1998, when the TV show "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" hit its stride, I was getting correspondence from alleged or would-be "vampire hunters." Now I hear from practicing, former, or aspiring "vampire slayers." But whatever that means, I feel that this strange desire some people have to feel like they have a heroic mission to kill vampires should be addressed.

Many people feel a powerful need to get out and do something important in the world, and for some of them, everyday good deeds just aren't enough. They yearn after the kind of unequivocal grandiosity that Stephen King talks about in his vampire novel, Salem's Lot:

But Callahan was neither a new priest nor an old one ... he wanted to lead a division in the army of--who? God, right, goodness, they were names for the same thing--into battle against EVIL. He wanted issues and battle lines and never mind standing out in the cold outside supermarkets handing out leaflets about the lettuce boycott or the grape strike. He wanted to see EVIL with its cerements of deception cast aside, with every feature of its visage clear. He wanted to slug it out toe to toe with EVIL, like Muhammed Ali against Joe Frazier, the Celtics against the Knicks, Jacob against the Angel ... but there were no battles. In fact, he was being forced to the conclusion that there was no EVIL in the world at all but only evil--or perhaps (evil).
That's how a lot of people feel. That's why "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" is so popular, and all the endless vampire stories in which the vampires are the bad guys and the heroes are the ones wielding the crosses and stakes. That's why people read super-hero comic books.

But it's kid stuff. Vampiric people are no more likely (or unlikely) to be unethical or criminal than any random human, and they certainly aren't "evil." They're your fellow beings on this planet. Killing them is murder, plain and simple. And there's no justification for it. You're performing no great act of heroism by slaughtering another intelligent being, no matter how you rationalize it. You'll pay for it in this lifetime, by being caught and punished, and you'll pay for it karmically, as well. You won't get any credits for killing someone just because you don't like what they are. History has given us some pretty unpleasant names for people who do so.

If you truly feel called to join the front lines, Fight the Good Fight, slug it out with the dark side of the Force, there's plenty of work out there for you to do. It's not as glamourous as slinking around in leather pants or a duster with stakes and crossbows and books full of esoteric knowledge, but it needs doing. You can fight racism in the inner city, build affordable housing with Habitat for Humanity, train yourself for a career in law enforcement, join the Peace Corps, become an environmental activist, teach school on Indian reservations, become a priest or a Franciscan, volunteer in a shelter or a food pantry or a day care center. There are hundreds of thankless, low-paying or unpaid jobs you can do to help humanity and battle "evil." There are millions of people living lives of desperation who could use your help. There are a thousand ways you can be one of the Good Guys.

But trust me. "Slaying vampires" isn't one of them. It's time for all you "vampire slayers" to grow up and join the real world.


Is it okay to cut myself and drink my own blood?

Here is the short answer: NO. And if you're cutting yourself just to see, feel and taste your own blood, you really, really need to stop. There are a number of reasons for this.

I understand the impulses that might lead a vampiric person to cut him- or herself just to feel and see blood. I'm very familiar with the total fascination, the sense of getting high, the momentary easing of hunger that completely makes you forget that you're hurting yourself. When I was a teenager, cutting myself was just one of the dubious things I did to experience my own blood--and when my parents found out, there were consequences that didn't make me very happy. Now I realize clearly what a pointless and harmful exercise shedding your own blood is for a vampiric person.

First: when you cut or hurt yourself to get blood, you're only ending up with a net loss. Not only are you stealing blood, nourishment and energy from your own system, but you're placing stress on your body, as well. Physical pain causes stress, and your body's healing mechanisms are put into full gear to stop the bleeding, fight the introduction of microorganisms into your system, and repair the wound. You're only draining yourself of energy and life, and the "high" or satisfaction you're getting from the blood is a complete illusion. Drinking your own blood is like trying to stave off starvation by eating your own fingers. What would you gain? You only make the hunger worse.

Second: you're in danger of seriously hurting yourself, no matter how careful you think you are. Even if you're using stainless steel surgical tools (are you?), sterilizing them with every use (are you?) and sterilizing your skin before you cut (are you?), there is still a significant chance of infection. Your immune system might be lower than usual; there might be disease organisms in the environment. Even hospitals can't prevent infections in their patients, so how can you? And infections can have very serious consequences, including loss of a limb by amputation, and death. This is especially true if you don't get medical attention because you're afraid of having to explain how you got cut. In addition to this, accidents happen. Have you studied anatomy? Can you be sure that you won't sever a tendon or an artery? Veins and arteries under your skin will move around due to scar tissue forming, if you cut in the same place more than once. Every individual has a unique body structure, and you might perfectly well have an artery where one "isn't supposed" to be. Cut an artery, and the next question is, how fast can you dial 911, and how close is the ambulance driver? If you sever a tendon, you may lose the use of a finger or hand permanently. When there are sharp blades involved, nothing is predictable. Pets jump on you, phones ring unexpectedly, hands slip or jerk without warning. You never believe it would happen until it happens to you, or unless you read some of the collections of accidents and "strange deaths" compiled and published by Forteans. Trust me--NO accident is impossible.

Third: If you're a minor (and even if not), things like cutting yourself tend to be misunderstood by others if you are discovered. You will probably be assumed to be attempting suicide, and at the very least, your psychological stability will be questioned. Chances are high that you'll be placed in an institution for evaluation and possibly medicated. No one (except another vampiric person) will understand or believe why you did what you did. A little blood isn't worth losing your freedom and the trust of those around you.

IF you are an over-21, consenting adult who is careful, informed and knowledgable, and you choose to engage in certain activities with other careful, informed, knowledgable adults in a setting where you are not alone and help can be quickly called if needed--that's one thing. I am not judging the choices of informed, consenting adults. But if you are a minor... or if you are of any age, but are cutting yourself alone, secretly, just to have contact with blood...

Please stop. You're hurting yourself, not helping. There are better and safer ways to meet your needs as a vampiric person than by harming yourself or any unconsenting living thing. Read the article on Sanguinarians, and check out the websites listed at the end for more help on this topic.

© 2007 By Light Unseen Media. All Rights Reserved.



Updated 9/1/07