Guest Commentary: Undead Integration
Here is another bit of guest commentary to amuse you while your queen deal with life.
Undead Integration
Zombies marching in the streets, vampires draining someone of their blood, ghouls haunting the living, these are all images from horror movies. Yet when it comes to most horror novels there is little mentioned on how the undead managed to take these long ingrained images and overcome them to live in society. At best most novels list it as a footnote in history.
All novels require some sort of invention to change how the undead need to feed. Synthetic blood is one common device for vampires to obtain acceptance in society. Yet they always continue to feed upon the living. How societies in these novels so quickly accept this when we are still struggling with the inequities unsolved by the civil right movement I will never understand. How these struggles would really be resolved is plain to see.
Legal Battles:
In the end bigotry will probably never end. At best society can be legislated to act in a civilized manner. Likely there would be numerous battles as being dead in our legal system strips you of all rights. Upon the moment of your death all contracts you have made are void, and even marriages ended. As such some sort of continuation and extension of current laws would have to be enacted.
These laws would have to extend to how one may consent to becoming undead. Is there some sort of age restriction? Would there have to be legal paperwork filled out beforehand? What arrangements would have to be made with morgues so you were not embalmed long before waking.
Civil Movements:
Some sort of outward sign of reformation would have to be shown to the public to identify those who have decided to live within the rules, at least at the beginning. In the Discworld novels by Terry Pratchett those vampires who no longer drink human blood wear black ribbons and are part of a movement that resembles Alcoholics Anonymous. This allows them to not only be recognized as not drinking blood but also be part of the public so they might eventually change the minds of the people.
As for the zombies they would likely have to be somewhat better off than those who haunt horror movies. Someone shuffling around and only being able to mumble or at best cry out for brains is likely not to do well. However someone who is dead, preserved and retains their former personality and intelligence is likely to integrate fairly well with the right application of deodorizer.
In the end there would still be quite a bit of political upheaval and social stigma to being dead. Would the dead even be allowed to vote (other than in Chicago where there is some history of this). In the end it should be something more than a footnote in history.
Happy Hunting
-Bill
Undead Integration
Zombies marching in the streets, vampires draining someone of their blood, ghouls haunting the living, these are all images from horror movies. Yet when it comes to most horror novels there is little mentioned on how the undead managed to take these long ingrained images and overcome them to live in society. At best most novels list it as a footnote in history.
All novels require some sort of invention to change how the undead need to feed. Synthetic blood is one common device for vampires to obtain acceptance in society. Yet they always continue to feed upon the living. How societies in these novels so quickly accept this when we are still struggling with the inequities unsolved by the civil right movement I will never understand. How these struggles would really be resolved is plain to see.
Legal Battles:
In the end bigotry will probably never end. At best society can be legislated to act in a civilized manner. Likely there would be numerous battles as being dead in our legal system strips you of all rights. Upon the moment of your death all contracts you have made are void, and even marriages ended. As such some sort of continuation and extension of current laws would have to be enacted.
These laws would have to extend to how one may consent to becoming undead. Is there some sort of age restriction? Would there have to be legal paperwork filled out beforehand? What arrangements would have to be made with morgues so you were not embalmed long before waking.
Civil Movements:
Some sort of outward sign of reformation would have to be shown to the public to identify those who have decided to live within the rules, at least at the beginning. In the Discworld novels by Terry Pratchett those vampires who no longer drink human blood wear black ribbons and are part of a movement that resembles Alcoholics Anonymous. This allows them to not only be recognized as not drinking blood but also be part of the public so they might eventually change the minds of the people.
As for the zombies they would likely have to be somewhat better off than those who haunt horror movies. Someone shuffling around and only being able to mumble or at best cry out for brains is likely not to do well. However someone who is dead, preserved and retains their former personality and intelligence is likely to integrate fairly well with the right application of deodorizer.
In the end there would still be quite a bit of political upheaval and social stigma to being dead. Would the dead even be allowed to vote (other than in Chicago where there is some history of this). In the end it should be something more than a footnote in history.
Happy Hunting
-Bill
posted by Laura at 2:18 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home