The Zombie Zeitgeist (Dave Sirota)

[asdjrocky]

What's with all the zombies lately?

That could be a question about one of the hippest retro fads that pop culture has going these days. Inspired by horror genres of past, zombies have lurched back to pre-eminence in books like "World War Z," video games like "Left 4 Dead" and blockbuster films like "Zombieland." Even the highbrow producers at National Public Radio recently devoted a segment to a University of Ottawa study entitled "Mathematical Modeling of An Outbreak of Zombie Infection." Indeed, the undead have become so popular, they've spurred "zombie walks" in cities and spawned Weird Al-ish parodies through Jane Austen knock-offs like "Pride and Prejudice and Zombies" and bands such as the Zombeatles (with their hit "Hard Day's Night of the Living Dead").

Frighteningly enough, though, that question about zombies could also be asked of America's political culture.

The rest-
http://www.creators.com/opinion/david-sirota/the-zombie-zeitgeist.html

[Oregone]

1. Zombie movies are interesting

Filled with social commentary (normally the people's desires, aggression & untrustworthiness cause everyone to die, instead of the Zombies). There is morally permissible violence against humanoids. Suggestive of an absolute end to a mundane life; an beginning of an extraordinary one. They got it all really. Hope, fear, love, loss, gain, action, killing, living, and a shift in the social paradigm.

[MyshkinCommaPrince]

2. There's a zombie fad now?

Huh. First thought: Are The Cramps still around? Second thought: My understanding has been that Night of the Living Dead was a coded statement about racial tension in the same sort of way that The Blob was about 1950s fear of Communism. Somehow the zombie genre always seemed to me to contain the core message of "fear your neighbor," anti-populist, divide-and-conquer propaganda. On the other hand, I sometimes tend to think too deeply and not too well - zombies probably wouldn't drool much over my brain. Hmm. Interesting.

[asdjrocky]

3. The Cramps?

I thought I was the only one. Lol.

[DBoon]

5. but Roky Erickson is still around.....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KcGb24n9hvM

[ZombieHorde]

4. Zombies rule! K&R nt