It seems that America is on the verge of a zombie apocalypse.
First, Ronald Poppo had most of his face eaten off by Rudy Eugene, and now, Alexander Kinyua reportedly killed his roommate, Kujoe Bonsafo Agyei-Kodie and then ate his heart and part of his brain.
Is it just coincidence that this spate of violent attacks comes when the county's fascination with zombies is at its height, or is there a connection?
From movies to video games, zombies are the big ticket these days. The undead top the media charts, gnawing and clawing their way into the forefront of our imaginations. Move over vampires, zombies are the new black.
It's hard to say if the pop culture popularity has influenced similar copycat killers, or if the zombie craze simply has made us more sensitive to similar real-life stories. Either way, both the fictional tales and actual news items may speak to something going on in our collective imaginations.
At the risk of over-analyzing (that's kind of my thing anyway), there are two common themes between both the popularity of both vampires and zombies in mainstream media:
As for the second point, I tend to think this points to the mentality of our nation ever since the events of Sept. 11, 2001. Whereas, in the days of the World Wars, the "good" and "bad' guys were clearly delineated, the current state of international conflict is much more opaque. The Enemy could be the person right next to us. The threat is everywhere.
Combine these two phenomena with our perpetual desire for pop culture distraction, and you have the resurgence of vampires and zombies in the zeitgeist.
Since I'm a "God Nerd," I suppose the implicit question now is: Where does faith, church and/or God enter into all of this?
For starters, there is a common thread among nearly everyone who finds their way to a community of faith these days. They're not looking for absolution from their sins. They're not looking for a golden ticket to eternal salvation. They're looking for the very things I mentioned above that are lacking: meaning, belonging, connection.
At its best, faith communities provide just this. We offer the world an authentic experience with something greater than ourselves and a community of support that multiplies our joys and shares in bearing our grief. We help orient one another toward hope and bear witness to one another's lives. We dream of being famous, wildly successful and universally adored, but really, we want to know that our lives matter.
Second, we offer an antidote to an epidemic of fear that plagues our daily life. From our health and waistlines to climate change and terrorism, there's plenty to obsess about. It's easy to convince ourselves that everything is falling apart, but deep down, we long to be liberated from that fear.
My favorite sentiment in this regards actually comes from Buddhism. It says, "If there's a problem and there's something you can do about it, don't worry about it. If, on the other hand, there's a problem and there's nothing you can do about it, don't worry about it."
But our default mode is "worry." Living with contentment and peace is often a discipline that must be practiced rather than something that comes naturally. And again, at our best we offer such liberating practices.
But just in case, you might want to keep a healthy supply of garlic, wooden stakes and zombie spray handy. You know, just as a precaution.
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Carole Bienaimé-Besse: Zombie Apocalypse
The bible is full of zombies. Lazarus and Jesus are the first two to come to mind, but then there were graves opening up all over the place at the resurrection.
Heaven knows what happened to all of those zombies. They may still be around.
All joking aside, abnormalities such as a rabies virus or the Lesch- Nyhan Syndrome genetic disorder affects the Striatum, Thalamus, and Brain stem that can create psychopothy and schizophrenia, control cognitive and "limbic"reactions, the inner workings and most primitive part of our brains. Its not suprising that we could relapse to a more primal function because of "microscopic demons" possessing our mental and physical control. In a sense, YOU ARE NO LONGER YOU! But an infectious animalistic "ZOMBIE" and not in the sense of brain devouring corpses that rise to wreak havoc. But "ZOMBIE"- a dormant cell, a former de-evolved self patiently waiting to reclaim an out of control species, not in the shadows, and not for our brains... but inside them
In scientific testing of controlled groups of mice, they will quarter off, segregate and seperate in attempts of "weeding out" the weak, diseased, and unhealthy, much to natures normal reaction of a darwin law. BUT....even at their best attemps in doing so when the populations of these mice (or any species for that matter whether it be mammalian, avian, aquatic, or insectas) grow to expediential numbers, "CHAOS" inflicts the group. Attacks that seem random with sudden spurs of aggression and yes even cannabalism will come to pass. Random mice will just start dying off or eating each other. This iS due to genetic abnormalities and viral complications.
There seem to be a lot of those in our society.
cannibalism?
Nah, but seriously, folks fear/fascinate over the zombie apocalypse when they fear/fascinate over a nation being encouraged to be mindless drones in shambling condition, also known as threshhold poverty; conversely, they garner interest in vampires when the subconscious concerns are of their "life's blood", i.e. their hard work, is being drained from them, in a wealth-capable economy that slowly drains their energy/drains their funds/removes them from the ability to "see daylight"
Not for religion or politics, but for both - if you note, vampires are traditionally warded off by religious icons, and in a time of peak interest in zombie flicks, the political atmosphere is generally heavily conservative, while [check timelines on it] vampires as blockbusters favor a democratic political atmosphere.
Odd enough, I'm sure. Make of it what you will.
Why do I imagine that Jesus character?
As in: "He's Back From The Dead! And He Wants To Eat Your Brains!"
Coincidence. How many people were not committing these egregious acts?
Matthew 27:52-53
And the graves were opened; and many bodies of the saints which slept arose, And came out of the graves after his resurrection, and went into the holy city, and appeared unto many.
2. Religion is working just as intended with respect to death... a pacifier meant to comfort you from the fear that we have of our own mortality. You article is rich in example of this.
"we offer an antidote to an epidemic of fear that plagues our daily life"... you know what else is a good antidote regularly used by humans? Denial and lying...
I need continually to remind myself that I have never been here before and will never be here again. And by "here" I mean at whatever place I happen to be occupying at the moment. That is to say, every moment is new. Some likely find that threatening, because it requires us to be open to whatever happens to us or we make happen.
We do not have a consensus on ways to greet the new moment, so it becomes easy to fall back on what has already been done. Looking for spooks has already been done. Treasuring every new moment has not been done, at least not widely. Using the moment to take advantage of others has come to infect our American imaginary. If everyone is doing it, we tell ourselves it must be OK.
So let's choose our companions carefully. We tend to imitate what we think we see going on around us.
Not sure what you do for zombies...but if the garlic is working out for you, I'd say stay with it.
I usually use juniper berries. And a cross-bow. Only two false-positives so far.
from slavery to viewing non-whites as human,
from not permitting women to vote to more women usually voting than men,
from using children as slave labor to being willing to be taxed to educate children,
from not finding rape to be something women should just lie back and enjoy to making it a crime
from watching people starving to being willing to have our tax dollars spent to feed the hungry
from not caring about helpless animals to making animal abuse a crime
and a list of our improvements as a society -- as a nation --- that goes on and on and on-- as non-stop as a zombie.
Which is not to say we do not have problems that, like zombies, do not seem to die. The gullible, "follower class" seem to be with us forever.