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149 C. Meyer (et al.), “The Massacre Mass Grave of Schöneck-Kilianstädten Reveals New Insights into Collective Violence in Early Neolithic Central Europe,” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, vol. 112, 2015, pp. 11217-11222.
150 Steven Pinker, The Better Angels of our Nature: The Decline of Violence in History and its 68
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commerce and cosmopolitan morality and culture—in short, modern civilization—has dulled to a significant degree the edge of the normal y sharp sword of human violence. He accepts that humans, like chimpanzees have a genetic trait for violence (i.e. are hardwired for violence), but modern civilization has constrained violence and kept it on a tight leash. Given the extent of violence in the past, Pinker, I believe, has made a strong case for his thesis. Nevertheless, if this is so, consider the logical consequence of Pinker’s position: if modern civilization col apses then the restraints holding back the pit bull of human aggressiveness and violence will be removed, and Hobbesian humans in a war of all against all (or tribe against tribe) will stalk the earth once more. Given the principle “the bigger they are (or higher they fly), the harder they fal ,” the col apse could very well lead to levels of violence not yet experienced as “col apse shock”
leads to many losing their “heads.”151
In Post Apocalyptica, people real y will be de facto zombies, and if all of the nuclear power plants on earth meltdown before, during or after the col apse, spreading ionizing radiation across the planet, stricken with radiation poisoning, they will be for all effective purposes, “zombies,” complete with radioactive rotting flesh, as seen in Fear the Walking Dead season 5 (2019).
But Won’t We Be Able to Rebuild?
Annalee Newitz in Scatter, Adapt, and Remember,152 accepts that humanity is heading towards disaster: “whether the disaster is caused by humans or by nature, it is inevitable.”153 Humanity has experienced population crashes in the past, but bounced back over thousands of years. The fundamental survival strategies are to scatter/bug Causes (Penguin, New York, 2011).
151 See Nicholas Monsarrat, The Tribe that Lost its Head (House of Stratus, Looe, 2000).
152 Annalee Newitz, Scatter, Adapt, and Remember: How Humans Will Survive a Mass Extinction (Anchor Books, New York, 2014).
153 As above, p. 1.
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out, adapt to the new environment, and seek to preserve as much accumulated knowledge as possible.
Lewis Dartnell in The Knowledge: How to Rebuild our World from Scratch,154 goes further and shows how, using the basic scientific method—empirical observation, experimentation and testing, instrument construction and theorization—civilization can allegedly be rebuilt after The Great Col apse.
Dartnell argues that preservation of the scientific method would enable many basic technologies to be rediscovered if lost from an apocalyptic disaster. The core scientific beliefs include the fundamental ideas of physics and chemistry, such as the atomic hypothesis (i.e. matter is composed of particles such as atoms), and the postulate of methodological materialism (explaining the physical world using physical rather than spiritual entities). On this basis, for example, the germ theory of disease would be preferred over say, the evil spirit theory. Sound principles of public health would be adopted, such as don’t empty your bowels within 100 meters of your water source, and cover your poo-poo with dirt to prevent flies spreading your dung around when they feed on it and then land on your ham and cheese sandwich, and so on.
Dartnell also accepts another fundamental assumption of this book: that modern humans are weak, especial y those in the developed societies. In former times “everyone was a survivalist, with a far more intimate connection to the land and the methods of production,” but today people in the developed world “are astoundingly ignorant of even the basics of the production of food, shelter, clothes, medicine, materials or vital substances. Our survival skil s have atrophied to the point that much of humanity would be incapable of sustaining itself if the life-support system of modern civilization failed, if food no longer magical y appeared on the shop shelves, or clothes on hangers.” Core skil s need to be relearnt if post-apocalyptic survivors are to continue living.
154 Lewis Dartnell, The Knowledge: How to Rebuild Our World from Scratch (Bodley Head, London, 2014).
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Even a humble pencil, because of the sourcing of raw materials and dispersion of production methods, could not be made from scratch. Dartnel ’s proposal for rebuilding civilization is based on the proposition that there would be vast quantities of resources left for survivors after certain global disasters, thus giving a safety margin for the reboot of civilization.
Most knowledge, especial y that on the internet would be lost, and many textbooks would only be accessible to specialists. Most books contain no relevant practical knowledge at al . Dartnell also accepts another core proposition of this book, that after The Col apse, violence and looting will be a way of life and even once law-abiding citizens will now do what is necessary to survive. This will require having a gun (or many), as well as gangs/tribes of people uniting into a protective force to protect perimeters.
Darnel ’s proposal is based on a “sudden and extreme depopulation that leaves the material infrastructure of our technological civilization untouched.”155 The “best” way for the world to end, on this scenario, would be a nuclear holocaust or massive coronal mass ejection, although Dartnell strangely does not consider the health impacts of ionizing radiation produced from the meltdown of nuclear power plants. He says that if there is a col apse without immediate depopulation: “[t]his wastes the grace period, and society promptly descends into Mad Max- style barbarism and subsequent mass depopulation, with little hope of rapidly bouncing back.”156 As Fred Hoyle put it:
It has been often said that, if human species fails to make a go of it here on Earth, some other species will take over the running. In the sense of developing intelligence this is not correct. We have, or soon will have, exhausted the necessary physical prerequisites so far as this planet is concerned. With coal gone, oil gone, high-grade metallic ore gone, no species however competent can make the long climb from primitive conditions to high-level 155 As above, p. 22.
156 Dartnel , as above, p. 24.
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technology. This is a one-shot affair. If we fail, this planetary system fails so far as intelligence is concerned. The same will be true of other planetary systems. On each of them there will be one chance, and one chance only.157
Apart from this problem, Dartnell says in an internet post that survivors will face a problem of learning practical skil s, such as metalwork from guide books, as to obtain such skill takes years of an apprenticeship under a master.158 There is also the problem of maintaining basic intellectual skil s such as reading and mathematical knowledge and passing it on to the next generation. I believe that it should be possible to pass on basic reading and writing skil s, even in a small group of survivors. Elementary mathematics—arithmetic, geometry, trigonometry and basic algebra at a high school level—
should also be possible in survival group having a mathematical y educated person. However, there may not be the time and resources to preserve much of higher mathematics (symbolic logic, metamathematics, transfinite set theory, projective and differential geometry etc.). The joy of solving complex mathematical problems, such as nonlinear partial differential equations—perhaps a higher pleasure than an orgasm—will be sadly lost to humankind. Wel , this is the apocalypse and sacrifices will have be made.
Conclusion: Kiss Liberalism (and Almost
Everything Else) Goodbye
This chapter has discussed in more detail the meaning of the zombie apocalypse in contemporary culture, especial y film. The position taken in this book is that the zombie apocalypse is a metaphor for the death of civilization. It is the aspect of col apse t
hat is of central importance in almost all zombie apocalypse fiction. Organized 157 Fred Hoyle, Of Men and Galaxies (University of Washington Press, Seattle, 1964), p. 64.
158 Lewis Dartnel , “Tacit Knowledge and Loss of Reading,” at http://the-knowledge.org/
en-gb/tacit-knowledge-loss-reading/.
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society with functioning technology could easily deal with bunches of mean biting “humans,” effortlessly mincing them with any number of instruments of death. But when organized society no longer exists, and the biters are seeking your flesh – then it gets interesting. The col apse of civilization can lead to people acting in a zombie-like fashion (as depicted in the movie The Road (2009)) and as we have seen, there are plenty of real-world examples of humans behaving in frightening violent ways. The forces of civilization breakdown, such as climate change,159 will generate a hyper-violent world once The Col apse occurs. Further, it has been argued, humans are unlikely to be able to claw their way back to a civilized state once “The Fal ” has occurred.
The coming “zombie apocalypse” may be of interest to those who are opposed to liberal globalist society and its ideologies..
There is, of course, a lively conventional academic attack upon liberalism,160 but there is also a critique coming from the Dissent Right161 and “Dark Enlightenment” rejecting universalism, egalitarianism, the “Cathedral” (the power elites and new class) and embracing ethnocentric religion and ancestral folkways.162 The Dark Enlightenment is a diverse array of positions including paleo-conservatism, tribalism and nihilism, opposed to the existing globalist/cosmopolitan/progressive regime and its constitutive ideologies of democracy, egalitarianism, socialism, modernity (but also “post-modernity”), and instead emphasizing the importance of organic community, the value of tradition and culture.
For example, conservatives may be interested in the remarks by Ashley Barkman, in her paper “Women in a Zombie Apocalypse.”163
159 J. Barnett and W. Neil Adger, “Climate Change, Human Security and Violent Conflict,”
Political Geography, vol. 26, no.6, 2007, pp. 639-655.
160 Alasdair MacIntyre, After Virtue: A Study in Moral Philosophy (Duckworth, London, 1981).
161 R. Houch, Liberalism Unmasked (Arktos, London, 2018).
162 Alfred W. Clark, “What are the Characteristics of the Dark Enlightenment?” April 27, 2013, at https://occamsrazormag.wordpress.com/2013/04/27/what-are-characteristics-ofthe-dark-enlightenment.
163 Ashley Barkman, “Women in a Zombie Apocalypse,” in Wayne Yuen (ed . ), The Walking 73
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She said: “[i]n a zombie apocalypse feminism is pretty much dead in the water” and Barkman rejects the trendy feminist idea that sex and gender are social constructions: “men and women are not just biological y different (male and female), but also spiritual y different: differences between masculine and feminine exist at conception.”
This proposition is known to be true “natural y,” as a matter of empirical observation. Men are, in general, natural y stronger and more aggressive than women due to higher testosterone levels, and women of a childbearing age (if fertile) are vulnerable to pregnancy.
Here is the kicker: “masculinity has qualities that lend itself to leadership, whereas femininity leads itself to being led.” Hence, in a zombie apocalypse, feminism “which argues that gender is a social construct and thus woman should be given the same roles and duties as men is not only unrealistic, but also ineffective and inefficient.”
They can quietly argue about that one after class in the Womyn’s Room, or the “safe space.”
The scenario depicted in Mad Max: Fury Road (2015), which has a feminist warrior, Imperator Furiosa (played by Chalize Theron), who can out-shoot and out-fight a hardened warrior like Max, is possible, but improbable. It remains a fantasy, much like Kill Bill (volume 1, 2003; volume 2, 2004). The situation is more likely to be as Barkman has depicted. This observation follows from a lifetime of street awareness, being in and witnessing fights, as well as from the theoretical considerations that Barkman references.
Another, more likely scenario for women has been given by Megan Hurwitt, an intelligent, attractive, young lady featured in an episode of season one of Doomsday Preppers (2012). When the crash comes she sees people killing each other for food. Moreover, for women who do not prep she said: “you don’t want to have to resort to whoring yourself out; that’s what a lot of women would face.”
Tragical y, a large number of men are likely to become, as seen in war zones across history, sexual predators, making rape both a sport and political weapon. It is already happening.
Dead and Philosophy: Zombie Apocalypse Now (Open Court, Chicago and La Salle, 2012), pp. 97-106.
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A contemporary example of this return to savagery is supplied by the capture of Yazidi women by Islamic State fighters beginning in 2014. The Yazidi is, or was, a Kurdish community with many woman having blond hair and blue or green eyes. Isis stated that it wanted to “smash this “blond bloodline” by impregnating thousands of kidnapped Yazidi women, and has done so, while the West did little specifical y about this.
The Islamic State issued a document by its research and fatwa department, which “justified” using captured woman as sabaya (sex slaves) and permitted the raping of pre-pubescent girls who are “fit.”
According to the October 2014 edition of the Islamic state’s digital Magazine Dabiq, the revival of slavery is part of their belief that the end of the world was coming.164 The “rape manual” states that woman can also be beaten. Thousands of captured Yazidis woman have been sold as sex slaves in slave markets, with blue-and green-eyed young girls bringing “top price.” Some Yazidi were dragged into sexual slavery by their hair.165 Price tags were apparently placed on the women.166 Teenage girls abducted by Islamic State fighters were sold in slave markets for as little as the price of a packet of cigarettes.
Girl’s that did not convert to Islam were tortured, raped and murdered. Many raped Yazidi girls committed suicide, and in June 2016, isis burnt 19 Yazidi girls to death in iron cages after refusing to have sex with jihadists.167 In “brothels” run by British female jihadis,168
women were raped at a rate of up to 30 times in just a few hours; as 164 Nour Malas, “Ancient Prophecies Motive Islamic State Militants: Battlefield Strategies Driven by 1,400-Year-Old Apocalyptic Ideas” The Wall Street Journal, November 18, 2014, at http://www.wsj.com/articles/ancient-prophecies-motivate-islamic-state-militants-1416357441.
165 A. Lloyd, “Yazidi Girls Dragged into Sex Slavery by Their Hair,” The Australian, December 23, 2014, pp. 1, 4.
166 Ivan Watson, “‘Treated Like Cattle’: Yazidi Women Sold, Raped, Enslaved by ISIS,”
November 7, 2014, at http://edition.cnn.com/2014/10/30/world/meast/isis-female-slaves/.
167 J. Newton, “ISIS Burn 19 Yazidi girls to Death in Iron Cages After they Refused to have Sex with Jihadists,” June 6, 2016, at http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3627063/ISIS-burn-19-Yazidi-girls-death-iron-cages-refused-sex-jihadists.html.
168 “British Female Jihadis Running ISIS “Brothels” Allowing Killers to Rape Kidnapped Yazidi Women,” http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/british-female-jihadis-running-isis-4198165.
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one headline put it: “I’ve been raped 30 times and it’s not even lunch time.”169
While the rape and genocide of the Yazidis was proceeding, on December 16 2014 the Al-Qaeda affiliated terrorist group Tekreek-e-Taliban Pakistan, conducted a school slaughter of unmitigated depravity. Seven jihadists, who wore suicide bomb vests, attacked the Army Public School in the Pakistani city of Peshawar (“City of Flowers”). The massacre of 132 teenage children and nine teachers (121 children and three staff were wounded), involved shooting them at point blank range, throat slitting, head severing and burning them
alive. The jihadists, cornered by Pakistan’s Special Service Group, detonated their suicide bomb vests, all seven dying.
In general, these attacks have been seen as a product of Islamic extremism, shaped by their medieval outlook and philosophy. While this is undoubtably true, these acts of brutality arise from those who have put themselves beyond the pale of civilization and who see the end as nigh, and we would expect similar, if not more extreme acts of savagery during the col apse of civilization, the zombie apocalypse and in Post Apocalyptica. So, the phenomenon is not just a product of radical Islam. All of this and more will be coming to your street, if you survive and remain in the cities.
The coming zombie apocalypse will differ from The Walking Dead, which maintained, at least in the first few seasons, a conventional moral universe, with Rick decked out in police uniform, with the now-discontinued, anachronistic, Colt Python .357 Magnum at his side, a John Wayne-symbol of order, and right vs wrong. Rather, the world will be more like Dead Set (2008), a zombie apocalypse five-part series created by Charlie Brooker, set in the UK Big Brother House. As in the reality TV show, people essential y destroy each other, self-destruct, and no one is “saved.”
169 John Hal , “‘I’ve Been Raped 30 Times and It’s Not Even Lunch Time’: Desperate Plight of Yazidi Women who Begged West to Bomb her Brothel after ISIS Militants Sold her into Sex Slavery,” Daily Mail Australia, October 21, 2014, at http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/
article-2801353/i-ve-raped-30-times-s-not-lunchtime-desperate-plight-yazidi-woman-begged-west-bomb-brothel-isis-militants-sold-sex-slavery.html.
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The considerations so far in this book suggest an answer to the question posed by physicist Enrico Fermi (1901-1954) (the Fermi paradox), “where is everybody?” This is the prima facie contradiction between the alleged high probability of intelligent life in the universe (even our galaxy) and the lack of human contact. Who, with even half a brain, let alone two heads, would want to visit a planet containing killer animals, a miserable bunch of fuckers, such as the human race? To a higher intelligence, would not the entire human race, and that includes all races etc., appear to be little more than a bunch of brainless … zombies?