It’s one of those stories that no matter how many times it gets refuted, it keeps popping up. Especially in social media, and in particular on LinkedIn. It’s the story of the wolf pack and how it’s organized. I've written about it before, but the durability of the story never ceases to amaze me.
When obviously fake negative news stories are shared in social media, the people who have shared it sometimes react to the news that they're untrue along the lines of ”I don’t care that it’s a lie, it’s still terrible!”
The story about the wolves mirrors this sentiment, even though the context is positive and heart-warming. We so desperately want it to be true, that we continue to share it again and again.
Here’s the story, in case you missed it. It is centered around an image (the one you see in the header, with colors added to highlight the different "parts" of the pack):
“A wolf pack: the first 3 are the old or sick, they give the pace to the entire pack. If it was the other way round, they would be left behind, losing contact with the pack. In case of an ambush they would be sacrificed.
Then come 5 strong ones, the front line. In the center are the rest of the pack members, then the 5 strongest following. Last is alone, the alpha.
He controls everything from the rear. In that position he can see everything, decide the direction. He sees all of the pack. The pack moves according to the elders pace and help each other, watch each other.”
And here is what the fact-checking site Snopes had to say about this story already four years ago:
The photograph shown was taken by Chadden Hunter and featured in the BBC documentary Frozen Planet in 2011, with its original description explaining that the “alpha female” led the pack and that the rest of the wolves followed in her tracks in order to save energy:
A massive pack of 25 Timberwolves hunting bison on the Arctic circle in northern Canada. In mid-winter in Wood Buffalo National Park temperatures hover around -40°C. The wolf pack, led by the alpha female, travel single-file through the deep snow to save energy.
ฝูงหมาป่านักล่าขนปุกปุยสีเทาฝูงใหญ่ถึง 25 ตัวที่ไล่ล่ากระทิงในขั้วโลกเหนือ Arctic circle ทางตอนเหนือของประเทศคานาดา กลางฤดูหนาวในป่าสงวนแห่งชาติ Wood Buffalo National Park ซึ่งมีอุณหภูมิประมาณ -40’C องศา ฝูงหมาป่านำโดย alpha คือหมาป่าในตำแหน่งต้นขบวนเป็นตัวเมีย ผู้นำฝูงในการไล่ล่าเหยื่อตามลำพังที่ต้องเผชิญลุยหิมะที่ทับถมกันสูงแน่นหนาเพื่อเป็นการประหยัดพลังงาน
The size of the pack is a sign of how rich their prey base is during winter when the bison are more restricted by poor feeding and deep snow. The wolf packs in this National Park are the only wolves in the world that specialize in hunting bison ten times their size. They have grown to be the largest and most powerful wolves on earth.
The biggest reason why storytelling is such a powerful tool of persuasion is that it affects us on a number of levels, and very deeply at that. Stories can make us sad and happy at the same time, they can transport us across continents and centuries in an instant.
The story about the wolf pack affects us in many ways. It is in itself a wonderful tale of how a group can transform from individuals into something greater, of a leader that protects its flock, and of finding qualities we associate with the best of humanity present among animals. For generations raised on Disneyesque stories of animals behaving like humans, this one certainly has the ring of truth.