Zombies

Everyone loves zombies; well, I know I do. Anyway, why is it that zombies capture the imagination? I think there are a number of things going on in our minds at the subconscious level that makes zombies fascinating. For one thing, they are "the walking dead", and that taps into a bizarre twist on the story of Jesus. Jesus was also a man who arose from the dead and walked among the living. Of course, the Jesus story is a message of hope and gives a sense of purity. Zombies share in common with Jesus the power of life after death, minus, of course, the white robe... oh, and Jesus never wanted to eat people's brains (the sole objective of zombies). But when we make this disrespectful comparison, we notice something interesting - zombies don't really cut it as the inverted image of Christ. Zombies are not really devil-like; they are not really demonic; they are not even just plain evil. Zombies lack something crucial that would make them truly evil; that would make them blameworthy beings; that would make them deserving of our enmity. What is it that they lack? They lack consciousness; they lack freely chosen intentions. While zombies are certainly not brainless (indeed, the only way to kill a zombie is by destroying its brain), they are definitely mindless. They have no "inner life"; no sense of themselves acting in the world; they never really make any choices about what do to. Deep down, I feel sorry for zombies. I hope this little piece contributes, if only in some tiny way, to a better understanding of and empathy for zombies and eventually to a rapprochement between zombie and human-kind.