Are feral children for real?

[JAR]

I saw an episode a while back of the show "Unsolved Mysteries", which is noted for giving misleading information. This episode was about feral children, who are children that have been raised by animals.

Are feral children for real, or are all cases either unproven or proven to be hoaxes?

[Captain_Snort]

There was quite a big article on feral children in the 'Fortean Times' some months back (sorry can't look it out as I just moved house) Their website should have links to some details.

If you look at some of the street kids in some of the larger cities in the 'poorer' parts of the world, is it such a big step for them to become feral?

[Dancing David]

err, arr, grr,arr

[daver]

They had talked about feral children in some of my classes in college as if they were real. I expect they never were common, and are less common now than previously.

[UnrepentantSinner]

Two books on the issue with reviews that might provide further data points for googling.

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0571201393/102-5408656-2960135?vi=glance

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0374384312/102-5408656-2960135

[JeffR]

You guys never heard of Tarzan? Jeez! :rolleyes:

[sorgoth]

Actually, I'm pretty sure they ARE real. Very rare, of course, but I think it HAS happened a few times.

[EdipisReks]

there was a French child who had been abandoned in the 18th (i believe) century. he couldn't speak, and was put under the charge of a scientist. the scientist tried to teach the boy language, and he had a hard time of it. this helped to develop the idea that once you get past a certain age that language becomes more difficult to learn. or so my psych prof told me ;)

[Jeff Corey]

I'm too lazy to do links here, but you could google:
Jean-Mark-Gaspard Itard
Le Fauve D'Averyon
The Wild Boy of Averyon

[Denise]

I don't think an infant could survive being taken care of by wild animals. An older child? Perhaps, but most cases of feral children have been victims of neglect by the parents from what I have seen.

There does seem to be a narrow window of opportunity in learning spoken language as we have seen with deaf children. The earlier the intervention with hearing aids and such, the better they are able to communicate orally.

[BobK]

I've known children that were raised by animals, and wouldn't you know it? They turned out just like their parents.

[Cinorjer]

I've never read a convincing case of a feral (raised by animals from a baby) child. The stories tend to be "this child stumbled naked out of the forest and acts like an animal, so what else could it be?" variety. It could be a child recently abandoned or wandered off and with mental deficiencies.

The baby of the human species is totally helpless for much longer than wolfs, apes, and whatever other animal is claimed to have adopted the child. In particular, the wolf mother is driven by instinct to wean the babies long before a child is capable of feeding itself. I'd have to insist the feral child must be a myth without compelling evidence.

[Bluegill]

There's a pertinent article in This week's Onion (http://www.theonion.com/)

Wolf Pack Fails To Raise Orphaned Infant

GRAND MARAIS, MN—A pack of timberwolves failed to adopt and raise a human infant abandoned in Pat Bayle State Forest, local rangers reported Monday. "We found the baby starving and near-death in a part of the park with a substantial wolf population," ranger Warren Olafson said. "You'd think one of the wolves would lovingly pick up the child by the nape of the neck and bring it back to the woods to raise it like one of her own, but I guess it just didn't happen that way." Any parents missing an infant are advised to check near the cluster of downed maples midway up the eastern canoe portage.

[Genghis Pwn]

Boy adopted by chimps


KANO, Nigeria: A disabled Nigerian boy believed to have been adopted and raised by chimpanzees for 18 months is in care in a specialist children's home in this northern city.

Named Bello by nursing staff at the Tudun Maliki Torrey home in Kano, he was brought to them six years ago by hunters after being found with a chimpanzee family in the Falgore forest, 150km south of Kano, staff told AFP.

Believed to have been aged about two when he was taken in, Bello is probably the son of nomadic ethnic Fulani people who travel through the region, Abba Isa Muhammad, the home's child welfare officer, said.

Mentally and physically disabled, with a misshapen forehead, sloping right shoulder and protruding chest, he was probably abandoned by his parents because of his disabilities, Isa Muhammad said.

Such abandonments of disabled children are common among the nomadic Fulani, a pastoralist people who travel great distances across the west African Sahel region, and in most instances the children die, specialists told AFP.

[Bearguin]

Originally posted by JeffR
You guys never heard of Tarzan? Jeez! :rolleyes:

Anyone ever read the original book? I guess it was the era, but the book is so slanted towards the white Europeans, it was incredible.

[EdipisReks]

Originally posted by Gods Advocate


Anyone ever read the original book? I guess it was the era, but the book is so slanted towards the white Europeans, it was incredible.

it's pretty standard for its time period.

[Crossbow]

Originally posted by Gods Advocate


Anyone ever read the original book? I guess it was the era, but the book is so slanted towards the white Europeans, it was incredible.

I have read several of the original Tarzan books and I have a couple of first editions!

While the books are quite thoughtful and exciting, they are also full of racism and nationalism. In other words, they were certainty appropriate fro their time.

[JAR]

Originally posted by Gods Advocate
Anyone ever read the original book? I guess it was the era, but the book is so slanted towards the white Europeans, it was incredible.
I've read the book. Its not that slanted. The director Werner Hertzog was accused of racism for his portrayal of negroid people in his movie "Cobra Verde." I've seen the movie and I can say it that it is not racist. He portrayed many people of negroid stock as slaves and others as being non-slaves in Africa.

If you have negroid people at all in your book or motion picture and they're not portrayed as Harvard educated intellectuals, you will be accused of racism.

[jimlintott]

Feral doesn't mean raised by wild animals. It refers to animals that were once domesticated but are now living wild. About 200k north of where I am the community has a terrible problem with feral dogs. They have killed a couple of children.

Think about it, cross species parenting is pretty rare. Omnivores and carnivores would tend to be driven by instinct to eat the child. A human baby left in the woods has very little chance of survival. The crows alone would probably eat it. I'd be very sceptical of the child raised by wild animals claim.

[JAR]

Originally posted by JAR

I've read the book. Its not that slanted. The director Werner Hertzog was accused of racism for his portrayal of negroid people in his movie "Cobra Verde." I've seen the movie and I can say it that it is not racist. He portrayed many people of negroid stock as slaves and others as being non-slaves in Africa.

If you have negroid people at all in your book or motion picture and they're not portrayed as Harvard educated intellectuals, you will be accused of racism.
To say more on the subject. The worst thing about it when people accuse portrayals of negroid peoples in tribes to be racist is that it implies to white people who already are racist that people who are in tribes are racially inferior to those who are not.

[DrMatt]

Originally posted by JAR
I saw an episode a while back of the show "Unsolved Mysteries", which is noted for giving misleading information. This episode was about feral children, who are children that have been raised by animals.

Are feral children for real, or are all cases either unproven or proven to be hoaxes?

Yes! Here I am! :D

[DrMatt]

Originally posted by BobK
I've known children that were raised by animals, and wouldn't you know it? They turned out just like their parents.


Unfair... :mad:

but funny! :D

[Dancing David]

Originally posted by JAR

If you have negroid people at all in your book or motion picture and they're not portrayed as Harvard educated intellectuals, you will be accused of racism.

I disagree , respectfully, while the race card is ofetn played by the ethnic african community, I am curious, in Victorian era literature, or Tarzan for that example. Are the africans called 'brutes', 'savage', 'uncivilized', 'as animals', 'lacking in...'.

It seems that in certain generes the non whites are usually portryed as something inferior to the whites. Even if you look at old movies , you will see that non whites are portrayed as child like and stupid.

I haven't heard anyone complain that 'Training Day' was racist, and to say the least it does not portray inner city life in a flattering fashion.

Respectfuly

[JAR]

Speaking of Tarzan, Gore Vidal said concerning the author of Tarzan stories, Edgar Rice Burroughs:

"Not one to compromise a vivid unconscious with dim reality, he never set foot in Africa."

I got that quote from the Introduction by Gore Vidal from my Signet Classic copy of "Tarzan of the Apes."

The introduction is titled "Tarzan Revisited." It was part of "Reflections upon a Sinking Ship" by Gore Vidal which appeared originally in "Esquire."

[Larspeart]

With no exposure to human language by age 4, it is highly likely the subject will have severe problems with speech and human interaction for the rest of their life.

After 7 years of age, it is highly UNlikely the subject will ever be able to speak in any way that woudl be considered intelligent or understandable.

There have been several cases (nearly always the result of severe child abuse) where a child was locked in a cage or closet for years, and never learned to speak or understand.

As far as 'feral children' I think the term is being used too loosely. Think feral pig. domesticated pigs escape 4-5-6 generations ago, and revert both mentally and physically to their wild state. Their appearance changes, their size changes. The meat goes from white to very dark. They have far greater amounts of hair.

THAT is feralization.

[Frostbite]

I'm a feral child. I was raised by prairie dogs. They taught me everything from surfing to using an internet browser.

[daver]

Originally posted by Crossbow


I have read several of the original Tarzan books and I have a couple of first editions!

While the books are quite thoughtful and exciting, they are also full of racism and nationalism. In other words, they were certainty appropriate fro their time.

Burroughs seems quite a bit more racist than, for instance, H. Rider Haggard.

[kedo1981]

We have feral children in our neighborhood,; you hear them at night rummaging through the trash looking for discarded playstation games and half empty bottles of retalin.

Tarzan filled the void of my pointless youth, that is until I discovered Hustler magazine.
EGB seemed to feel that animals were much more noble than Negroes, after a few books however he seems to have seen the light and let Tarzan find a “good” tribe of Africans.

[Dancing David]

I think that feral children are up there with spontaneous combustion of human beings.

[Jeff Corey]

Originally posted by daver
Burroughs seems quite a bit more racist than, for instance, H. Rider Haggard.
Remember, Tarz was the son of Lord and Lady Greystoke. He possessed those superior aristo genes, which enabled him to learn to read from the books they left without instruction.

[aggle_rithm]

I think sociologists consider any child who is somehow separated from the socialization process to be feral. This would include children whose parents lock them in the basement and throw them scraps every now and then.

[Checkmite]

Larspeart....I agree completely with your post, I just had a semantic point to raise...

Originally posted by Larspeart
There have been several cases (nearly always the result of severe child abuse) where a child was locked in a cage or closet for years, and never learned to speak or understand.


Nearly always? Ever heard of such an incidence which could not be called severe child abuse? ;)

[Dancing David]

Children who are raised by parents who can't speak would be one example.

[Checkmite]

Originally posted by Dancing David
Children who are raised by parents who can't speak would be one example.

They lock their children in cages?

[aggle_rithm]

Originally posted by Dancing David
I think that feral children are up there with spontaneous combustion of human beings.

Maybe the feral children have all spontaneously combusted, and that's why we have no evidence of them? :confused:

[DrMatt]

Originally posted by Jeff Corey
I'm too lazy to do links here, but you could google:
Jean-Mark-Gaspard Itard
Le Fauve D'Averyon
The Wild Boy of Averyon

or
l'enfant savage

[DrMatt]

Originally posted by Larspeart
With no exposure to human language by age 4, it is highly likely the subject will have severe problems with speech and human interaction for the rest of their life.

Interestingly enough, this comes up in the education and upbringing of deaf kids. Deaf adults generally say this is why starting them off on sign language right away gives them a better rather than worse chance of mastering reading, writing, and even speech.

[SRW]

Originally posted by daver


Burroughs seems quite a bit more racist than, for instance, H. Rider Haggard.

I think it is unfair to apply today's standards to people who lived back in that era. When I was in sixth grade back in the sixties there was a movment to ban that "raciest book" Huck Fin.

[zakur]

http://www.feralchildren.com/

[daver]

Originally posted by SRW


I think it is unfair to apply today's standards to people who lived back in that era. When I was in sixth grade back in the sixties there was a movment to ban that "raciest book" Huck Fin.

Agreed. Haggard was offered more as a counterexample to the "everyone did it" generalization.

I remember them trying to ban Huckleberry Finn. I didn't have much respect for the banners then, i have even less for them now.

[Denise]

Originally posted by DrMatt


Interestingly enough, this comes up in the education and upbringing of deaf kids. Deaf adults generally say this is why starting them off on sign language right away gives them a better rather than worse chance of mastering reading, writing, and even speech.

I've seen both sides of the issue discussed. On one side are the parents who think it's more important to use as little sign language as possible because the child will be in a mostly hearing world. On the other side, especially with deaf parents, they think it's more important to use the easiest method of communication (sign language) and focus on that.

There seems to be some controversy on having a cochlear (sp) implant put into a child and a kind of deaf pride thing going on. Some parents prefer that the child remain deaf, and some prefer that the child learn as much about hearing as possible in order to get along in the hearing world.

As I have not spent much time with deaf people, I think I wouldn't have any problem having an implant in my child if she were born deaf, but I do understand why deaf parents want their child to learn the easiest method of communication if their child is also deaf.

I read an interesting story by an author who was born hearing who had deaf parents. She had learned a lot of her speech from the television, and although she lived in the South she spoke with a Northern accent because many of the programs had actors who used that accent. She talks about going off to college and her parents rented a hotel room but she knocked on the door and they couldn't hear it. She couldn't phone because they would not hear that either. Interesting story. I wonder if it's available on the web?

[Hazelip]

Just a little something (http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=reverend+singh+kamala) for the discussion.

The second link contains a reference to a page devoted to feral children of the same site. On that page, there is a claim that only 40 cases have been documented since the 1600s, indicating that it is indeed a very rare occurrence.

[The Whether Man]

Originally posted by Bluegill
There's a pertinent article in This week's Onion (http://www.theonion.com/)



That is worrying. That child could grow up to be another Evil Roy Slade (http://www.badmovieplanet.com/unknownmovies/reviews/rev288.html)

[asthmatic camel]

Originally posted by DrMatt


or
l'enfant savage

I have a copy of Harlan Lane's "The Wild Boy of Aveyron" ISBN 0 586 08303 0. A fascinating read, get hold of a copy if this subject interests you.