Q: How many zombies does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A: BRAINS!!!
Q: Why did the zombie cross the road?
A: BRAINS!!!
Q: Knock knock.
A: Who’s there?
Q: Zombie.
A: Zombie who?
Q: BRAINS!!!
Examples of racist “jokes” from a children’s book, The Monster Mash Joke Book, edited by Frank Ulstrom, Funny Bone Books 1972.
Popular culture has done a great disservice to the Tzombi race, particularly over the past 60 years, as evidenced by a number of films and graphic novels and so-called “survival guides” that have surfaced into mainstream “entertainment" (I shall not bother to mention these titles by name).
In reality, it would not be an egregious claim to state that the history of the Tzombi race is the history of civilization itself. A largely nomadic people, tzombi have been present at the sites of many of the greatest achievements in human civilization. Temples, cathedrals, entire systems of logic and philosophy have been built (in some cases literally -- see the “Legend of the Knocking Virgin,” Alternative History Monthly, January 1997) on their backs. And yet, of the popular conceptions the public-at-large holds, one is a corruption, and the other is nothing short of racism.
I shall address this last first, as it is easiest to dismiss.
The popular conception of the Tzombi as mindless, brain-eating miscreants is utterly unfounded. While it is true they have a limited capacity for reading due to poor eyesight, their intellectual capacity varies as widely as that of the pre-deceased (for a more specific study on categorization of the Tzombi population, I will refer you to an internal document PAGE NOT FOUND produced by the Center for the Study of the Living Deceased [CSLD]).
According to my extensive research, history shows us there have been Tzombi philosophers, Tzombi mathematicians, and Tzombi emperors. There have also been Tzombi serfs, Tzombi criminals, and Tzombi manual laborers. There have no doubt been a few cannibal Tzombi; as there have been cannibals among the pre-deceased. But the misconception that Tzombi eat brains is, frankly, ludicrous. The human brain is completely encased in a thick layer of bone—the skull—which makes it the most difficult portion of the body to get at. When such a plentitude of meat is readily available, why would anyone take the trouble to get to the brains? I have been told that in certain movies the “zombies” crunch through the skull with their teeth, but in reality Tzombi have been known to suffer from necrotizing periodontitis. In general, Tzombi are anxious to preserve their teeth for as long as possible and would no more engage in such an activity than an intelligent man would open a beer bottle with his teeth.
As far as I can ascertain, the misconception about Tzombi eating brains stems from two sources:
1) An ancient Sumerian text in which Sargon the Great commands his Tzombi hordes to establish dominion over the living by decapitating several of them and removing their brains with sharp sticks before throwing them into the fire
2) A series of articles from the Boston Sunday Globe in December of 1888 “exposing” cannibalism in Haiti.
Couple this with the fear of the minority (or The Other, as dictated by theories of continental philosophy) and it’s easy to understand why most Americans have come to believe that “zombies” are out to steal our brains, much in the way that in the past it was feared that African Americans would steal our women, Jews would steal our gold, and Catholics would steal our babies.
In any case, the 1888 expose of cannibalism in “Hayti” betrayed the Tzombi race in two ways: one, it is patently untrue; two, the Haitian zombie is not a true zombie, but rather a ritual, or performative, one (the Haitian zombie has its origins in the Kongo, but a history of the true Tzombi goes back as far as ancient Sumer). In the 20th century, a series of books by Wade Davis explored the concept of these Haitian zombies, most notably THE SERPENT AND THE RAINBOW, a marginally convincing (in my opinion) treatise that was subsequently turned into an utterly unconvincing film starring Bill Murray.
7 comments:
THE SERPENT AND THE RAINBOW was a GREAT film starring Bill Pullman. Check your facts, a**hole.
Don’t bury me…I’m dead!
I like to eat brains.
I myself have a hard time telling the difference between Bill Murray and Bill Pullman.
What was the exact date of that article on cannibalism? I’m doing a paper on Indigenous Religions and might be able to use it.
Unfortunately, the article in question has been destroyed by the mice which invade my office on a nightly basis. I’ve complained to the building management company several times, but they have failed to respond. To my credit, you’ll notice that I didn’t attempt to reconstruct the article (though I was tempted, as I have a perfectly photographic memory). Best of luck on your paper!
I LOVE this blog. Have you ever considered writing a book?
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