We Are All Vampires
XIV — Vampiric Excess and Materialism
← Karl Swainston / We Are All Vampires
The vampires exude excessive admiration for themselves and their deeds. They will exploit any individual that can further this self-admiration.
Vampires are very impressed with material ownership and show. They relish external signs of success: the grand abode, the big car. They must be seen with these possessions as they feed their appetite for self-aggrandisement.
This type of vampire will go out of its way to being seen with successful people if they have yet to gain success themselves. They are veritable leeches within a company, worming their way to the top. The vampire will feed off the boss’s power and begin to share that power. The boss, in this case, is nothing more than a cuckoo for the feeding vampire.
What is remarkable about this type of vampire is that the boss will still think of themselves in control and make all the decisions independently and of their own volition when the contrary is true. Because of the many stratagems and machinations this vampire is embroiled in, it will be difficult to be relaxed in the environment.
Look carefully, and you will see the shuffles, the twists and grimaces, avoiding eye contact. All these are unmistakable signs that the vampire is incredibly active in their attack. The vampire will exude blatant disinterestedness to all but the most important personages. The vampire will express a low opinion of those who ‘do not matter’ to them.
The vampire will magnify all the trivialities and express and highlight them as grievous faults that will be the undoing of either the company or a relationship.
In business, vampires will cherish and nurture their interests, and if they hold the higher echelons of power, they will even sacrifice the company to fulfil their desires. The vampire is incapable of acting in the interests of others. They only have one interest: themselves.
We have looked at some successful vampires, but not all vampires are successful. Society has unsuccessful vampires as well. These are the most violent and dangerous vampires. The ugly and obnoxious is one such unsuccessful vampire.
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About Karl Swainston
Karl Swainston is a writer and storyteller whose work is forged from a life lived across the North of England and far beyond. Growing up on a Leeds council estate in the 1960s, Karl's journey was anything but linear. By the age of thirty, he had already lived a dozen lives: from the rigors of grammar school to a degree in Latin, a stint as a fishmonger, a period of discovery living in Marseille, and a return to the hustle of London. Whether working as a postman, a builder, or competing as a county-level chess player, he was, above all, an avid reader—constantly documenting the world around him. This restless spirit continued into his professional life. Karl later taught in Bradford, where he ran a specialist unit for 244 of the most excluded students from across the region—young people whom even the local Pupil Referral Units could not accommodate. Working alongside his old friend Malcolm, Karl spent his days navigating the volatility of Bradford's most aggressive and dysfunctional teenagers. Throughout his life, Karl has been an avid runner and has always shared his home with a rotating cast of beloved dogs and cats—companions who have been constant witnesses to his work. As a writer, Karl's range is as expansive as his history. He works across a wide breadth of genres, including fiction and short stories, autobiography and memoir, biography, non-fiction, and metaphysical writing, as well as providing sharp commentary, opinion, analysis, and essays. Whether writing about his years managing the Harrogate Arms or offering insights from his current adopted home in South East India, where he lives in a simple village with his dog, Bambi, Karl's voice reflects the full, untidy, and deeply human breadth of life. He continues to draw on the rich, decades-long tapestry of his experiences to tell stories that matter, proving that no matter where you live, the human story remains the same.
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