Pop culture follows our rhythms when it comes to fear (no surprise, as pop culture is sort of a barometer of the mood of a society). We display our fear, our feelings of dis-empowerment (which causes fear and anger, which is caused by fear-try to follow THAT) in our movies, TV and other entertainments. Zombies have perhaps never been as popular as they are now, and according to Clemson University Professor, Sarah Lauro, we become obsessed with zombies during times of economic upheaval (scary to all of us). Personally, I can see that. I am fascinated by zombie movies (if they aren't too gory), but they also scare the stuffing out of me and can give me the heebie jeebies all night, which is why I try to watch such things (remote at the ready to fast forward if it is too scary) before it gets too late. I think they scare me more than the run-of-the-mill monsters like vampires and giant, Tokyo-eating reptiles because they are, essentially, us; but with all the good stuff gone (we are a dangerous enough creature even when the good stuff is present). I loathe horror movies of the "slasher" variety. I hate gory violence perpetrated by and against humans; it actually fusses with my physiology.But films such as Saw, Friday the 13th, and Scream meet some sort of need or there wouldn't be so many sequels, prequels and knock-offs. It is an interesting phenomenon, but I don't get it. The only reason I think I can stand to watch zombies is that in my relatively logical mind, I am mostly convinced that they are not possible. Fear.
Note: I was going to put a photo of a zombie here, but I couldn't find one that didn't freak me out.
When asked about the newest zombie craze, the Zombiefather himself, George Romero, said that today's zombies play by different rules and that he doesn't understand the obsession. I thus submit he has solid investments and is not worried about paying his mortgage, losing his job, paying for college, etc. Subtext and deeper meanings aside; I don't care what a zombie flick is aiming for in terms of lofty meaning, the one common thing is that humans turning into mindless, instinct-driven creatures without feeling, pain or fear, SCARE THE HELL OUT OF US, and we seem to love it. Who would have thought one of the most popular shows on TV would be about surviving and trying to navigate through a post-zombie apocalyptic world. Admit it-you know exactly who I mean when I say: Rick, Carl, Shane, and Andrea. The Walking Dead, an episodic TV show, is just ending its third season (there will, no doubt, be a fourth). Three seasons about a plucky, familiarly dysfunctional and changing group of survivors who want nothing more than to find a place to settle and raise a family without the fear of some "walker" ruining it all by trying to eat their faces off (reasonable, yes?).
Speaking of walkers, it is Good Friday as I write this and thousands of pilgrims are making the walk of the faithful to El Santuario de Chimayo in northern New Mexico. This morning on the radio, the hosts were discussing how, because of the TV show, the pilgrims will no longer (for a while at least) be referred to as "walkers" because of the zombie connotation from the show. True? Probably not, but interesting what came to mind with the utterance of a simple word.
Where was I? Oh yes, FEAR. I have noticed, as I get older (also a source of great fear to many), that my fears have evolved along with me. When younger, aren't our fears simpler (again, if we are lucky)? Fearful that we won't go to prom, that we won't pass our driving test, that we won't get into the college of our choice (yes, the fears of a lucky kid in the developed world). We don't typically fear falling, car accidents, or illness because we are all ten feet tall and bullet-proof (and in my blessed and cushy world I never feared gang violence, mortar shells or famine)! I noticed when I had my daughter (at the ripe old age of 41-and no, that is not a typo) that I suddenly found myself experiencing the most unfamiliar fears; some mostly insignificant, like slight pangs, while others were baseless but bothersome. Suddenly I consistently drove within 5 mph of the posted speed limit, always wore my seatbelt, dressed appropriately (and made others do so) for the weather, paid attention to my spending and my choices of entertainment (hmm, Perfect Circle or Raffi?). It was a strange road...it still gives me the shivers. Now, I am not quite as fearful as I was of somehow denting my daughter's psyche before she reaches adulthood (acceptance that it is somewhat inevitable?). Instead, I have other fears. I fear both not having a job and staying in the one I have now. That is fear; an incongruous little beastie that either sneaks up on us or hits us square in the jaw; and often we can't predict which it will be.
Fear is always with us; whether in plain sight or just out of view. It is always ready, though, to catch us at a vulnerable moment and try to get the best of us. Fear is part and parcel of our experience; it is how we deal with our fears that shapes who we are to ourselves and others. Individual fear, while alarming, doesn't rattle my nerves half as much as group fear. When a large group is afraid, the most devastating consequences can occur. Ahh, you think I am being dramatic, don't you?
Think about fear and how it messes with not only the individual but the collective consciousness. The so-called Red Scare of the 1950s, the Cold War, AIDS, Bird Flu, and now the Global Economic Crisis, just to name a very few. All of these moments in history were built upon and controlled by the fear of a large group of probably otherwise rational people:
"A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky
dangerous animals and you know it."
- Agent K, Men in Black
When people are afraid they tend to say and do things that they may well regret later, especially if egged on by someone they perceive as somehow more in control and on top of the situation. I am sure that to many people, Senator Joe McCarthy seemed perfectly reasonable in persecuting actors and artists and accusing them of being disloyal to their country. After all, he was an elected official, he had inside information (and ambition to spare). I am sure that the people who sold out their friends and neighbors as being communists weren't doing it out of primal fear for their own lives and livelihoods; but rather as dutiful American citizens...uh huh, you betcha.
Fear made people afraid to sit on public toilets during the 1980s. Now, I have a similar fear but it isn't because I fear getting AIDS (have you seen some of those places?!). I remember the hysteria; people freaking out over mosquito bites, kissing and using the same damn towel as someone who might be infected with the "homosexual's disease." I imagine some people look back at those times and experience a bit of shame...
The big fears du jour seem to be gun control and gay marriage, and both are eliciting some mighty strange and irrational behaviors. I get that people use factoids that make their argument and conveniently forget those that might go against, but I am positively amazed at how people have used the Bible to make their arguments to justify hate and bigotry when on the very next page there are likely laws they wouldn't dream of following. There is nothing like selective law-abiding, but don't worry, we all do it to some degree; I used to speed, remember? Fear. But of what? Fear that the gay couple next door might be viewed as legitimate as you and your opposite sex spouse? Or is it a fear of the unknown? I have always harbored the thought that the more homophobic a person is, the more they fear that they too, might be one of them-GASP! Newsflash, wondering what it is like to kiss or have sex with someone of the same gender doesn't mean you are a homosexual (although you might be)-it means you are curious. Fear.
Gun control is a slightly different but still familiar issue with regard to fear. People become afraid when their values are threatened (see above, gay marriage). Try to follow me down THIS rabbit hole...Values are those things, beliefs, ideas on which we spend resources (time, money, energy, etc.) to protect. When our values are perceived to be threatened, we get mighty fearful and that kind of fear begets anger and irrational digressions (read: paranoia) into new environs. I am summarizing here so don't go all hater on me: The big gun issue over the last few years has been over assault weapons (who needs them ,who can/should have them, etc.). Then some psycho with a gun (or ten) murders people (igniting fear!) and raising the argument on guns to a different level. Unfortunately, this elevation then leads to assumptions about the government's motives in trying to disarm its people and brings up all sorts of comparisons to the rise of Hitler and the impending disintegration of our society.
On FaceBook I have been watching, with equal parts bemused detachment and fearful awe, the continuing argument between posts about our "dictator" President and his hypocrisy in wanting to disarm all the regular people while he keeps his armed security force. Or, the posts that quote Hitler (completely out of context) with the inevitable statement that the U.S is next! The problem with this rhetoric, aside from the fact that it just instills more fear, is that when driving back to the facts, these fears are baseless. Unfortunately, fear-mongers never let little things like facts get in the way of their agenda. Additionally, and more frightening to me, is that these things also veil the issues that, in my not-so-humble opinion, we should actually be fearing. I am frankly more afraid of big corporations genetically modifying our food supply into oblivion while we act like sheep and do nothing about it. I am afraid that we are destroying our natural world faster than we can identify the damage, must less try to fix it. I am afraid that if we don't figure out that we have infinitely more in common with the rest of the world than we have differences, we are going to destroy ourselves in some vain and pointless effort to demonstrate some sort of pseudo-superiority. Fear.
I know, I am taking all of this too seriously.
Here's my bottom line, I guess. We will never get rid of fear (we shouldn't, it is a biological imperative that helps us survive). Franklin D. Roosevelt was right, however, when he said that, "The only thing we have to fear, is fear itself." If we know we are afraid, and that it shapes our behaviors, we can, in theory, also realize when we are acting dangerously towards each other or the common good. For example, I have learned that throwing a shoe at some poor arachnid is going to neither alleviate my fear of them, nor will it be beneficial to the spider. The same is true about more "significant" fears (Note: I am not trivializing arachnophobia. When I was a kid I spent a week leaping at least two feet to and from my bed at night and every morning after seeing a house spider crawl underneath. I was terrified to get my feet too close to where I couldn't see if there was a spee-ider waiting to eat my toes off in one big, fangy bite.). IF people would stop looking outward to find (and destroy) the source of their fears; instead looking inward to try and understand exactly what and why they are afraid, much less social damage and conflict would occur.
Yes, a lofty dream. But it gives me something to think upon while I build up enough nerve to maybe, perhaps, possibly watch, in the daylight, on a small screen, with company, the upcoming Brad Pitt zombie flick, World War Z (Zombies who run fast?! Oh good night, Mabel!).
One last note on fear...I pondered this for days before I finally decided to add it to the above. There is a fear (only slightly alluded to in the previous narrative) that we all feel at one point or another in our lives. I won't say it is the fear of death because I am not so afraid of dying as I am of dying too soon (which is probably like much of the population). When illness, injury or (gods forbid) war, famine or natural catastrophe occur, fear takes on a different shape. When my mother was diagnosed with terminal cancer her initial fear was palpable (as was mine). That fear can be a driving force to battle a disease with everything at your disposal; it can motivate people to help each other in times of crisis; or it can bring out our lesser selves that slink away thinking only of our own fate. More often though, that sort of life-threatening fear brings out the best of us. The most courageous people I have ever met are those who face their own mortality with grace and humor and acceptance. I hope I would be so courageous in similar circumstances. Now, being thus the paragon of grace, etc. when faced with possible, probably or certain death is not to say that these same people won't fight with every fiber of their being in order to "not go gently into that good night." Rather, it is those people (and the people who support and care for them) who show courage either way; for it takes a huge amount of courage to fight in the face of some of these things., especially knowing the fight may be for naught. I say all of this having only been a spectator to such things...but my day will come and I hope for wildcat fury and fight AND grace and acceptance WHEN IT IS TIME (and here's hoping we all get a say in that).
On FaceBook I have been watching, with equal parts bemused detachment and fearful awe, the continuing argument between posts about our "dictator" President and his hypocrisy in wanting to disarm all the regular people while he keeps his armed security force. Or, the posts that quote Hitler (completely out of context) with the inevitable statement that the U.S is next! The problem with this rhetoric, aside from the fact that it just instills more fear, is that when driving back to the facts, these fears are baseless. Unfortunately, fear-mongers never let little things like facts get in the way of their agenda. Additionally, and more frightening to me, is that these things also veil the issues that, in my not-so-humble opinion, we should actually be fearing. I am frankly more afraid of big corporations genetically modifying our food supply into oblivion while we act like sheep and do nothing about it. I am afraid that we are destroying our natural world faster than we can identify the damage, must less try to fix it. I am afraid that if we don't figure out that we have infinitely more in common with the rest of the world than we have differences, we are going to destroy ourselves in some vain and pointless effort to demonstrate some sort of pseudo-superiority. Fear.
I know, I am taking all of this too seriously.
Here's my bottom line, I guess. We will never get rid of fear (we shouldn't, it is a biological imperative that helps us survive). Franklin D. Roosevelt was right, however, when he said that, "The only thing we have to fear, is fear itself." If we know we are afraid, and that it shapes our behaviors, we can, in theory, also realize when we are acting dangerously towards each other or the common good. For example, I have learned that throwing a shoe at some poor arachnid is going to neither alleviate my fear of them, nor will it be beneficial to the spider. The same is true about more "significant" fears (Note: I am not trivializing arachnophobia. When I was a kid I spent a week leaping at least two feet to and from my bed at night and every morning after seeing a house spider crawl underneath. I was terrified to get my feet too close to where I couldn't see if there was a spee-ider waiting to eat my toes off in one big, fangy bite.). IF people would stop looking outward to find (and destroy) the source of their fears; instead looking inward to try and understand exactly what and why they are afraid, much less social damage and conflict would occur.
Yes, a lofty dream. But it gives me something to think upon while I build up enough nerve to maybe, perhaps, possibly watch, in the daylight, on a small screen, with company, the upcoming Brad Pitt zombie flick, World War Z (Zombies who run fast?! Oh good night, Mabel!).
One last note on fear...I pondered this for days before I finally decided to add it to the above. There is a fear (only slightly alluded to in the previous narrative) that we all feel at one point or another in our lives. I won't say it is the fear of death because I am not so afraid of dying as I am of dying too soon (which is probably like much of the population). When illness, injury or (gods forbid) war, famine or natural catastrophe occur, fear takes on a different shape. When my mother was diagnosed with terminal cancer her initial fear was palpable (as was mine). That fear can be a driving force to battle a disease with everything at your disposal; it can motivate people to help each other in times of crisis; or it can bring out our lesser selves that slink away thinking only of our own fate. More often though, that sort of life-threatening fear brings out the best of us. The most courageous people I have ever met are those who face their own mortality with grace and humor and acceptance. I hope I would be so courageous in similar circumstances. Now, being thus the paragon of grace, etc. when faced with possible, probably or certain death is not to say that these same people won't fight with every fiber of their being in order to "not go gently into that good night." Rather, it is those people (and the people who support and care for them) who show courage either way; for it takes a huge amount of courage to fight in the face of some of these things., especially knowing the fight may be for naught. I say all of this having only been a spectator to such things...but my day will come and I hope for wildcat fury and fight AND grace and acceptance WHEN IT IS TIME (and here's hoping we all get a say in that).
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