(We apologize for our ridiculously long delay in updating this blog, but it was not out of neglect. Final exams in school, family plans and overall more important stuff is to blame. Again, we sincerely apologize for our inconsistency... though we previously warned you about it.)
And then, there is the unpleasant Dawn of the Dead - the end of times in which we're all eaten up by brain-and-flesh-hungry zombies. Could it really happen?
One day, you wake up to find the little girl next door in your hallway. She just stands there, quietly looking at you. You rub your eyes and begin to ask her what's up. But then... she jumps yous.
And hugging you is not her intent. To your bewilderment, she buries her teeth deep into your neck. Blood gushes all over the place, and you had just cleaned that hallway. You die. But then again, you don't. A few seconds later, you kind of wake up again. You're unable to speak or think. Your personality (if you had such thing, to begin with) is gone, locked away behind the gates of death. all that remains is a walking, decaying, bad-breathed corpse that used to be you. A deep roar escapes from your lips. Your so... hungry!
Pretty soon, the world is overrun by zombies just like you. There are living dead in the streets.Living dead in the shops. Living dead in every hose. Living dead in your living room. Living dead in your soup. Living dead gathering around every last band of normal humans. On the internet, there's a pretty amazing computer simulation that shows what would happen if the living dead were to really overrun us. Bottom line: humans wouldn't stand a chance.
The zombie scenario comes in many forms. In some movies and books, a virus turns us into living dead. In others, a chemical mishap wakes up the deceased. In still others, it remain unclear what causes all the trouble.And maybe that's all the better. Becase no matter how you look at it, corpses that walk and kill are of course somewhat... unrealistic.
Zombies defy all logic. How can someone who has been injured so badly that they can no longer live still, ehm... live? How can a rotting cadaver still stumble about and kill you? Why would it go after living humans in the first place. Wouldn't it be easier if it just hunted pets, or cooked itself a meal? Or go to a McDonald's: with a bad breath like that, they'll surely let it go first.
Zombies: the facts.
Fortunately, there is no known condition that turns dead people into cannibalistic killer corpses. Usually, dead is dead.
Indeed, some people have made it back to the land of the living, for example after reanimation in the hospital. But usually, they don't wake up with a particular apetite for raw human flesh -- even though they'd have good reson for that, considering the food they serve in hospitals.
Yes, there are a fewe rare conditions that transform people into dangerous, raging psychopaths - the Indonesian disorder called "amok" is the most well-known. But diseases like that have nothing to do with death nor cannibalism - and they aren't contagious at all.
Still, movies, books, comics and computer games have told and retold the zombie scenario again and again. One of the earliest examples is Edgar Allan Poe's short story "The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar" (1844), in which a terminally ill guy slowly turns into a living but rotting corpse after he is being kept from dying by hypnosis. Among the most recent examples are the blockbusters "Dawn of the Dead" (2004) and "28 Day/Weeks After" (2002/2007) - the storyline we started this post with is more or less based on a scene from Dawn of the Dead.
At the moment, there are at least 90 zombie movies we know of. But the theme has many varietions aouside those movies, from the Body Snatchers-movies to the Borg from Star Trek to even The Matrix, in which humans are turned into living dead batteries.
So: why is it so pupolar? Why do zombies sacre the hell out of us? Obviously, much of it has to do with our instinctive fear of death and our in-built disgust of dead bodies. Corpses and cannibalism - these are two of our deepest taboos, and breaking them scares the shit out of us.
On a deeper level, some of it has to do with mass psychology and sociology. In western society, "freedom", individuality and being able to make up your own mind are considered the highest goods. Zombies are quite the opposite, the nightmare ti the dream. They are the ultimate de-humanized beings.
Ans then there's the link with voodoo. Originally, "zombie" is the Afrincan word for a conjured slave. Several West-Afrincan religions share the belief that a sorcerer can transform someone into a slave by stealing his momery, his awareness and his will. No rotting corpses involved - just an average guy, turned into a will-less slave.
In American slave times, this idea mixed with ancient European superstitions. For example, in New Orleans around 1800, white and black folks alike feared a "zombie" that was said to haunt the streets. But the zombie involved had nothing to do with rotting corpses. It was the ghost apparition of a French officer holding his head under his arm! Maybe just a French drunktard stumbling about.
On the isle of Haiti, the word "zombie" took another twist. In 1801, the Haitian slaves revolted the whites off of their island (though they ended up buying their independence) - interestingly, their leader was a conjurer-priest, Toussant L'Overture, who promised his followers they wouldn't die during the uprising.
After that, the former slaves founded the voodoo fath, a religio that is part catholic and part African. Just like in Africa, Haitian voodoo-followers believe you can turn someone into a zombie, as a means of punishment. In Haiti, voodoo priests used and use puffer fish poison (tetrodotoxin) to accomplish this. The poison, administered as a powder, produces a deep, dead-like coma first, and then a lethargic, vegetative state of non-being.
It was only in the 1960s when Hollywood came up with the idea of the modern day zombie: the one that bites and growls. The watershed movie that gave the zombies their new image was the legendary horror classic "Night of the Living Dead" (1968).
In the meantime, quite a few real "zombies" live in mental hospitals around the world. But they don't bite nor eat brains. They're normal, living people, turned into plats by vicious poison, bocause of some ill-willed sorcerer, os some incompetent exotic sea-food restaurant. So in fact, we should feel sorry for the zombies. Those poor, poor living dead!
Now, the end this, and as a means of compensating for our delay, we give you this fun quiz, which will let you know what chances you have of survinving the "Zombie Holocaust". Have fun.
Here are our own results:
The Oris:
What'dcha expect? He'ss a wuss
Keilvethe:
Well, it's something...
- by: Keilvethe, The Oris
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