Zombie

It began to worry me the way they wandered around with glazed eyes, scarcely smiling or laughing, working jobs they hated, spending their free time running errands and attending to ceaseless obligations, and then home in the evening to inhale a take-out or processed frozen dinner, before settling down in front of the television to waste the last hours of leisure before bed. They seemed wholly absorbed in their own problems, and did their best to avoid contact with each other, adopting the same mechanical attitude toward social life as working life, blending the two so that both had become unpleasant chores. When they did participate in some activity or interact with others, it was by necessity of economic transaction, or for motive of blatant self-promotion and status mongering. What they claimed for meaningful conversation was confined to pop culture trivia, references to materials goods, and mechanical recitation of the dates and facts of current events. At such a time, it was rare indeed to hear a sincere exchange of feeling, a metaphysical discussion, or an exploration of creative ideas. Such people filled every waking hour with activity, never stopping to enjoy the moment or reflect on where their lives were taking them. And then the horror revealed itself to me: I was surrounded by zombies.

In film we’ve been led to believe that zombies are bloodthirsty monsters that stop at nothing to hunt down and devour their human victims. They have been presented as an outside threat, when in fact the danger lies in becoming a zombie oneself: for zombies are individuals who have died and been brought back to life without speech or free will in order to serve the needs of their masters. Zombies are therefore tools, like machines, performing the tasks required of them without reason or purpose.

In the modern age, materialism has killed off the soul and consciousness of the individual and resurrected him as a zombie for the pursuit of material comfort. The zombie will gladly spend an extra ten or twenty hours a week tapping inanely at the keyboard to market products no one needs, develop land that should be left pristine, or charge for services that were once free, just for the pleasure of driving to and from the workplace in a luxury car he can scarcely afford. He will buy things he does not need and take on new debts to stay within the status quo of his zombie peers because he lacks free will and the courage to express his opinion and make his own choices, until one day he no longer has an opinion. What is truly hideous about the zombie, is that his often professional appearance is merely a camouflage to hide the decay of his internal spiritual, creative, and emotional life. If you pay close attention you will note the empty gaze, plastic smile, and recycled, insincere conversation of a monster. The zombie is primarily concerned with productivity and efficiency: his aim is the make money as quickly as possible so that he may take refuge from society behind the protective walls of his gated community, and find distraction from the lack of meaning in his life through luxury goods, meaningless status parties, mindless entertainment, and travel without purpose. Nevertheless, most zombies end up living from paycheck to paycheck with futile dreams of becoming the bokor, or great sorcerer, of zombies to come. The zombie minion has been duped into believing that soul crushing, mechanical, meaningless, and often immoral or unethical work is justified if it is part of a hazing operation, or due paying, of professional advancement in which the satisfaction lies in becoming master over others and stripping them of their humanity to make them zombies like oneself. But really the modern zombie lives beyond his means, spends his life chasing the abstract dollar, wastes precious time and energy pursuing the latest fads, losing his culture and humanity in the process. As a result the zombie world is one of strip malls, cookie-cutter subdivisions, mass produced poor-quality products, devastating externalities of industrial waste and pollution, social anomie and neuroses, and economies of scale that destroy community life, and local enterprise. This zombie vision has for many years been the United States largest export.

If you notice yourself or someone you love becoming a zombie, don’t despair. The first step is to recognize the problem. Here are some general symptoms and warning signs of the zombie:

1. Motivated by fear
2. Submissive to authority
3. Lacks original thoughts, ideas, and opinions
4. Intolerant of conflicting beliefs, values, and opinions
5. Unable to adapt, change, and grow
6. Works only for a paycheck
7. Lives beyond means and in debt
8. Preoccupied with appearance, status, and material goods
9. Sacrifices values and/or ethics for self-advancement
10. Not accountable for actions and behavior
11. Lacks interest in cultural or artistic activities
12. Exercises infrequently or not at all
13. Lacks understanding and respect for nature
14. Wasteful
15. Poor diet
16. Sleeps poorly
17. Has trouble being alone
18. Must always be busy
19. No sense of humor
20. Poor communication skills
21. Lacks compassion
22. Distrusts and exploits others
23. In free time, engages in hedonistic and self-destructive behavior
24. Obsessed with pop culture and mindless entertainment
25. Believes he/she is a normal and/or healthy individual

The zombie is a victim-perpetrator. While his environment may condition him to exhibit any number of the above-mentioned symptoms, ultimately he becomes an active protagonist in reproducing this inhuman and degraded form of life. This occurs often when he has some form of power over others, and represents an internalized insecurity and fear, which causes him to try to be exemplary in his obedience and lack of humanity. However, in the case where the zombie is not fully under the status quo spell, the doubts he may have about his personal health and that of his community, and of society as a whole, may result in paralysis given the overwhelming scope of the problem and the number of people affected. In this case, he may simply lose hope and faith in humanity, and resign himself to masquerading as a zombie.

Clearly, there are many types of zombies. Possession of a few of the above-mentioned traits and attitudes does not a zombie make; however, it is slippery slope, the danger of which should be recognized and remedied at an early stage. The ability to recognize the mutation in ourselves indicates that we can still recover our humanity. It is more difficult with our peers and those we love, for they may take offense to our desire to help; they may be living in denial of the facts. Zombies in advanced stages often cannot be helped at all and are best managed through legal means, or, if at all possible, avoided, so that they do not infect us with their antisocial and dogmatic worldview.

In short, the best defense against zombification is a critical, curious and creative mind, a compassion for others, the desire to make a contribution to the community through quality work that reflects positive values and is ethically sound, and most of all, to dream and to support and encourage the dreams of our friends, peers and family.


For those who want to know more, here are some interesting zombie links:

Zombie by Fela Kuti
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fela_Kuti

In 1977, Fela and the Afrika 70 released the hit album Zombie, a scathing attack on Nigerian soldiers using the "zombie" metaphor to describe the methods of the Nigerian military.

The Serpent and the Rainbow by Wade Davis
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wade_Davis

The Serpent and the Rainbow, published by Davis in 1985, is a nonfiction work investigating folk preparations implicated in the creation of zombies in Haiti.