In August, one of President Trump’s aides, Sebastian Gorka, claimed the Obama administration invented the term “ lone-wolf terrorist, ” saying that every attack deemed terrorism was connected to ISIS or Al Qaeda. More recently, attacks carried out by a single person have often been labeled as “lone-wolf” attacks, whether they were inspired by a terrorist group or, like the Las Vegas attack, seemingly independent. RELATED: The phrase journalists used to describe Vegas shooter, and the ‘unspoken implication’ Soon the thieves themselves were “lone wolves” if they weren’t part of a gang. Tillotson book How to Be a Detective : “Occasionally the police run across Panhandlers known as ‘lone wolves’ -that is they do not mix with others of their class.” Publish your results.” The novelist Steven Crane called war correspondents “lone wolves” in his 1899 novel, Active Service.ĭetectives were soon on the case: Zimmer cites a series of 1914 novels where a jewel thief turned detective is called a “lone wolf.” The Oxford English Dictionary says the figurative usage showed up in the United States in 1909 in the F.H. Wells’s The Invisible Man, published in 1897, as the invisible man is being urged: “Don’t be a lone wolf. Zimmer noted that a human “lone wolf” appeared in H.G. The figurative use of “lone wolf” can be traced to popular fiction. Not unexpectedly, Native Americans had some legendary chiefs or warriors named “Lone Wolf,” though, as members of tribal communities, they were not really “lone wolves.” ICYMI: Site sparks uproar on social media with Vegas massacre headlineĪs Ben Zimmer wrote in The Wall Street Journal, “lone wolves” have been with us for centuries. (The meme of the mass killer as “such a quiet guy” was turned into a 2007 movie, with a twist.) Merriam-Webster defines “lone wolf” as “a person who prefers to work, act, or live alone.” That certainly seems to describe Paddock, who news reports called a “loner,” someone not outgoing or friendly to neighbors. The “lone wolf” is sometimes an outcast who has to hide from the main pack, but they’re actually rare. The implication is that there’s something wrong with a “lone wolf.” After all, wolves are very social animals that usually run in packs. While the term “lone wolf” has been used for centuries, it is increasingly being co-opted for political and polemical reasons. In the Las Vegas attack on a country music festival, the gunman, Stephen Paddock, was quickly labeled a “lone wolf,” meaning he acted alone.
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