Are ponies the only ones cursed with the Windigoes?

[cider float 2,539]

I wonder how the dragons and yaks deal with them? You would think dragons would be in conflict with one another constantly. Or are the Windigoes only relevant to ponies?

[Kyoshi Frost Wolf 42,202]

I guess it depends on how far out Equestria goes, as it seems only Equestria had to deal with them, according to the stories. It does seem to focus entirely on the ponies though, which seems to make sense as the Windigoes were horses in appearance, but maybe they appeared to other species but they were in a different visual form for them?

[Concerned Bystander 2,905]

I would imagine that dragons have ways of dealing with ice spirits that would encourage such ice spirits to leave them alone.  As for the Yaks, what little we have seen of Yakyakistan would suggest that they are well suited to dealing with the cold in ways that ponies are not.

 

Alternatively, both of those races seem to lack any of the magic that ponies are known for, and perhaps the Windigoes are a magical manifestation of disharmony hat the other races cannot cause to come into being.

[Scootalove 10,692]

Depends on how far the Windigoes can travel from place to place, so they must have spread around any regions that even had a sliver or a mere speck of hatred in them.

[MLPFanatic34 3,241]

I'm sure other species in Equestria have ways of dealing with the wendigos aside from using magic like the ponies do.

Edited May 16, 2016 by MLPFanatic34

[Cwanky 17,755]

Well to be completely honest  we don't actually know if the Windigoes are actually real. The episodes where we do see Windigoes there appearance is entirely allegorical, told through legend or tales. For all we know Windigoes may be symbolic figuratively.

 

If they do actually exist, which of course in the world of Equestria anything goes, it may just seem like they enjoy preying upon ponies. Griffons as shown in Griffonstone, are notoriously greedy, tribal and selfish, hence their kingdom fell. Well if we accept The Lost Treasure of Griffonstone to accurately represent griffons.

 

The other races, despite some flaws aren't divided as the Equestrians were. Dragons were likely unified under Torch or another lord's reign. But since the Windigoes themselves are equestrian (horse-like) in nature like the ponies and they feed off of their anger and division, its not hard to imagine that the Windigoes are actually physical manifestations of the ponies' negativity.  

[Silver Letter 1,832]

It's hard to say, I would imagine. Do we even know why those winter spirits punish ponies? Was it before the ponies were connected to the Tree of Harmony? So was it about friendship or not? If not then punishing them alone would have no real purpose since it is possible that their superiority over all other creatures hadn't yet been established.

[SBaby 660]

If they do actually exist, which of course in the world of Equestria anything goes, it may just seem like they enjoy preying upon ponies.

 

It could be that they're compelled to do it too, possibly against their will.  Maybe disharmony between ponies is somehow painful to them and they are forced to get rid of the source of the disharmony by any means necessary.

 

 

 

It's hard to say, I would imagine. Do we even know why those winter spirits punish ponies? Was it before the ponies were connected to the Tree of Harmony? So was it about friendship or not? If not then punishing them alone would have no real purpose since it is possible that their superiority over all other creatures hadn't yet been established.

 

This does tie into a fun little theory I have about Equestria and the Elements of Harmony (as well as Harmony ITSELF).  Some time before the Windigos were known throughout Equestria, a being somewhere used the idea of Harmony as a means to control ponykind for some purpose.  It isn't clear what that purpose is yet, but to accomplish their goal, the being took measures to ensure that Harmony would be maintained in Equestria.

 

One of those measures was bringing out the Windigos whenever ponykind got too disharmonious, or disobedient as a way to keep things in check.  Things get too out of line, and the Windigos are sort of like the failsafe.  It is also very possible that disharmony might not be the only means by which the Windigos are released.  There could be other triggers that we don't even know about, since we know relatively little about them.  It's possible that they might show up if the ponies get too advanced, or start to question things too closely.

 

Another item used was the Elements of Harmony, which Celestia and Luna discovered, that would help whenever any kind of outside force tried to affect harmony in Equestria (or when something got too far out of control).  If something gets out of hand, the Elements can forcibly bring things back to the controlled harmonious state (much in the same way Domination in D&D can forcibly change a character's Alignment).  In a way, the Elements are probably the first line of defense, before the Windigos are brought in.  We never find out WHO created the Elements, only that Celestia and Luna discovered them (and presumably, Starswirl might have also come into contact with them at some point).

 

This explains why the Windigoes showed up in the past, as well as why they only seem to affect Ponies, even though there are other sentient races in the world that are even more disharmonious.  Ponies are the only ones affected, because they're the race that was chosen by the being to be put in the state of controlled harmony.

 

It also explains why Celestia was so quick to banish Luna to the Moon.  It wasn't because she was losing the fight.  She loves her sister so much that she would likely be willing to risk being killed if there was even the slightest chance of bringing Luna out of that state.  But she probably knew about the Windigos and didn't want that to happen to her citizens, so she had to make a choice quickly.

 

The title of the show is My Little Pony, which reflects that the ponies could be the puppets of this being, completely oblivious that they're living in a prison of sorts (the rest of the title and song meant to distract from this).

Edited May 17, 2016 by SBaby

[cmarston1 5,964]

The are the only species that the show cares about.

So it makes sense that only they would get any sort of detailed lore or legends such as the sirens and windigoes and whatever.