Is it normal that my aunt had a fear of monkeys when she was younger?

16 Comments

She told me once that, when she was about 4 years old, she was playing outside in front of her apartment by herself. I think she was born in Missouri, if I remember correctly.

She had a neighbor that had a "pet monkey". Keep in mind that this was back in the 60's most likely. Plus it was Missouri...who the Hell even knew what a "pet monkey" was back then and over there...It COULD'VE been a service animal, I guess. I mean, who would know? I sure as Hell don't.

Anyway, as she was playing by herself, the monkey basically ran out of her neighbor's apartment and then proceeded to beat her up.

I think that's why she always had a fear of monkeys, probably. I personally love monkeys, but chimpanzees freak me out. I'm sure that most chimpanzees are probably pretty nice once you actually get to know them personally, but they just kinda scare me.

Is it normal that my aunt had an intense fear of monkeys, considering the fact that she went through all of this as a small child?

Yes 10
No 1
I don't know. 1
Maybe? 1
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Comments ( 16 )
  • CountessDouche
    2 years ago

    Everyone should fear monkeys. It's a rational fear.

    Especially drunk monkeys. Those guys are terrifying.

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    • Anonymous Post Author
      2 years ago

      I agree. Probably the most terrifying thing that I can imagine would be a drunk orangutan, personally. Those guys are pretty chill usually, so imagining an orangutan swinging through the forest with a fucking whiskey bottle in hand does indeed sound pretty terrifying.

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      • CountessDouche
        2 years ago

        Fuckin' right!!??

        There are sober chimpanzees who have degloved peoples mf faces. I do not want to meet a fucking drunk monkey. Fuck that shit.

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        • dude_Jones
          2 years ago

          Well okay. But, we humans have always had problems with inhibitions, despite our adherence to the Ethics of Assholeism. Our primate cousins have no shame. Their obliviousness to the concept of judgement looks liberating to me. Why not get together with your friends and go swinging in trees? Kids do it all the time. Stomp in mud puddles with bare feet, lick the morning dew off a leaf on a tree. Why does everyone get so preoccupied with booze, sex, and venereal disease?

          Your wisdom is needed.

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  • donteatstuffoffthesidewalk
    2 years ago

    humans are very fragile and weak compared to other primates

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  • PurpleHoneycomb
    2 years ago

    I would imagine it's similar to people with other phobias. A negative experience with the subject manner at a young age can cause life long fear.

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  • Cuntsiclestick
    2 years ago

    Yes its normal to have fears after a bad experience. Some monkeys are much stronger than humans and will literally rip the skin off their bodies if they're pissed off enough.

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  • Ummitsstillme
    2 years ago

    Is this.. allegory?

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    • Anonymous Post Author
      2 years ago

      lol no, true story

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  • RoseIsabella
    2 years ago

    Primates are terrifying! I'd certainly rather have a mountain lion than a chimpanzee.

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    • idolomantis
      2 years ago

      Oh definitely, me too. Cats are far cuter and more predictable than most primates. I do like small primates, though. Emperor moneys are adorable :D Mouse lemurs are even cuter

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  • have_a_good_day
    2 years ago

    Yeah black people are da worst

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    • Anonymous Post Author
      2 years ago

      I tend to agree, it just depends on your definition of "da worst"...Honestly I think they're hilarious, but some of them go too far at times. Cat calling can genuinely be scary as fuck, it just depends on the particular "language and culture" of where you are. In fact, there's a creepy af area a bit down the slope from me that I nicknamed "the gateway to Hell" for a variety of atrocious reasons. Fortunately nothing that bad actually happened to me, but the way I was treated was completely repulsive nonetheless. Higher standards and less objectification are clearly key here. Just because I look like a fucking "toy" doesn't mean that I am one, obviously.

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      • have_a_good_day
        2 years ago

        Bitch I didn't want yo life story. Goddamn. You got issues.

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  • Boojum
    2 years ago

    Young chimpanzees are cute, but no sensible person would keep one as a pet, and only someone who was a total idiot would try to keep an adult chimpanzee as a pet. Contrary to what some people want to believe, chimpanzees in their native environment don't spend their days lazily swinging around in trees, eating bananas and chilling with each other. There are some horrific films of gangs of chimps working together to hunt smaller primates and using their greater intelligence to corner them, then literally rip them apart while alive. There's also a well-documented case of a chimpanzee war, where a group of chimpanzees in Tanzania decided to eliminate a neighbouring group and, over a period of four years, systematically killed every male in that group.

    CountessDouche mentions chimps who have literally ripped the faces off people and degloved their hands. I don't know if there are multiple cases of this, but it sounds like the infamous Travis case.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Travis_(chimpanzee)

    If your aunt was attacked by a mature - or even a juvenile - chimpanzee when she was only four, it's likely that she wouldn't have survived without permanent physical scars - if she survived at all. So I suspect that she was most likely attacked by a squirrel monkey, which can also be vicious little bastards.

    Up until at least the 1970s in the States, you were able to order squirrel monkeys by mail. One of the places where the ads for monkeys regularly appeared were in the weird little ads in comic books. So, as you can imagine, there were a lot of stupid kids who saved up $25 (or around that) from their paper routes, sent off their money order and then got a shoebox-sized shipping box containing a wild animal which was very intelligent, had very sharp teeth, could run very fast, had an amazing ability to climb almost anything and was generally thoroughly pissed off about the shit that humans had subjected it to during in its short life.

    https://boingboing.net/2008/11/03/mans-account-of-orde.html

    https://www.npr.org/2014/04/25/306868280/monkey-madness?t=1626469270755

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  • Somenormie
    2 years ago

    Yes.

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