By Devyn Lewis
Illustration by Ariel Mitchell
Are we really that different from zombies?
Picture this: you’re walking down a well-lit sidewalk, and you see someone approaching you, mumbling incoherently to himself. The drool dribbling from his mouth and the distant look in his eyes must surely be signs of someone hungry for brains. However, right when the seemingly half-alive person reaches you, he continues to shuffle on by as if he never saw you in the first place.
It’s not that your brains aren’t delicious. I’m sure they are: an hour of yoga a day and a scrumptious diet full of organic fruits and vegetables are sure to produce some appetizing brains. Perhaps it wasn’t the inedibility of your grey matter that thwarted this zombie-like creature to pass you, but the fact that he wasn’t as half-dead as he seemed.
Though you could have sworn you heard the zombie-like creature mumble “brains” as he approached, it’s possible he was actually having a conversation — and not just with himself. For, as you glance back at the slowly shuffling passerby, you notice a strange electronic device attached to his ear. This device, you realize, is one that he is actually talking into; because it was attached to his head, it looked like he was madly talking to himself. The careless swinging of the arms is perhaps not because of loose tendons, but because he is merrily resting his limbs from not having to hold a cellphone to his head all day. And perhaps that glazed look in his eyes is exhaustion, now setting in after all the excitement of finally acquiring his new Bluetooth. To celebrate his dutiful consumerism, he bought himself a warm Krispy Kreme donut, the filling of which has oozed down his chin.
Anybody who ceases to think for themselves is a zombie. To enable this zombification, consumer culture has a pre-approved status quo of values just for you. Bite-sized pieces of information are coming at us from every corner, expediently and without discretion, ready to be chewed up and spat out as fast as our consumer-driven appetites will let us.
How does one avoid becoming an unthinking, unconscious being? First and foremost, we need to take conscious control of our lives. There are many easy steps to prevent yourself, and perhaps society as a whole, from becoming zombified.
STEP 1: Turn off your TV and read books instead.
Seriously, turn off all its subliminal messages and flashy ads screaming at you how to think, how to feel, and how to be human. As the late comedian Bill Hicks put it: “Watching television is like taking black spray paint to your third eye.”
There have been numerous studies done on television and its subsequent effects on brain wave activity. In 1967, Herbert Krugman found various abnormalities activiated in the brain during television watching. There is disproportionate activity in the right side of the brain, causing the release of pleasure-inducing endorphins. The brains of people watching television have also been measured to produce low alpha waves, similar to a hypnotic or meditative state. This state renders the watcher with little or no conscious activity as the brain is in a mode of suggestibility, causing some researchers to liken watching television to staring at a blank wall.
Reading books is an obvious alternative to watching TV: it activates neuron pathways in your brain, while television reduces brain wave activity.
STEP 2: Avoid or reduce exposure to WIFI, cell phone and other forms of EMR.
The user guide to your cellphone warns consumers to keep the device one inch away from the body when in use. This is because the electromagnetic radiation (EMR) that cell phones and other electronic devices create is potentially harmful. Concentrated exposure at high frequencies of EMR heats up organic matter and has been measured to alter brain wave activity up to one hour after use. Bluetooths are even worse: you are exposing your brain to a constant low-level of EMR. Cell phone manufacturers have to meet Health Canada’s code requirements for the Specific Absorption Rate (SAR) of EMR to the head; that said, numerous studies have still measured alterations in brain wave activity even below the deemed level of “safety.”
STEP 3: Avoid putting unnatural substances in your body.
This includes anything from psychotropic prescription drugs, to artificial chemicals and food additives. For example, there is growing controversy over psychiatrics such as SSRIs (anti-depressants), and the subsequent personality changes and “brain fog.” And before you take another sip of that “diet” pop, take a second to think about aspartame and other artificial sweeteners: aspartame, that zero-calorie, phenylalanine based sweetener, produces excitotoxins in the brain, which has been linked to a whole host of medical conditions, including behavioral disorders, migraines, and even brain tumours. And who can forget that face-eating “zombie” on the amphetamine-based street drug known as bath salts?
STEP 4: Keep an open mind.
Socrates once said: “True knowledge exists in knowing that you know nothing at all.” The best way to keep from becoming zombified is simply by keeping an open mind. Don’t believe everything you hear point-blank; what we know today can easily be changed to another “fact” tomorrow. With a closed mind, we may miss many of the potentially mind-expanding ideas around us.
Now we can all take a deep breath, knowing that we are one step closer to saving ourselves from a potential zombie apocalypse. Now that you’ve read all this, I’m sure the world will get a little quieter as the infinitesimal buzzing of the TV set slowly starts to fade away.
