Shop til you drop
Viewed by Prospero
This is not a sophisticated essay, although the themes are prevalent enough to gain the fleeting attention of most awakened human beings and illustrate some Setian principles.
Throughout such classics as Night of the Living Dead (1969), Dawn of the Dead (1979) and Day of the Dead (1982) are a number of themes that mirror certain Initiatory perceptions and processes at an early stage.
At a sociological level the films echo Romero's fears of a consumerist society driven by the most instinctive and unthinking levels of the mass force of the human condition. These fears are glyphed as the living dead zombie. For Romero the zombie is a potent symbol of the manufacture and manipulation of a compliant and unsated slave mentality that finds sufficient resonance beyond the brains and gore for the films to be remade and parodied. The British Shaun of the Dead (2004) is a particular favourite.
Within the Romero genre of films the zombie is at the mercy of instinct and other human functions such as mind and emotion are turned off. Hence in these films the dead appear to communicate non-verbally - acting as one hungry unconscious mass of moving meat. They react to situations like a herd, and do not perceive as individual intelligences. The music, movements and displays of a supermarket Mall hypnotise them. They are manipulated by their own subconscious forces, which in turn are pre-programmed into a minimal-focus relay circuit. As Dr. Miland Rouch in Dawn of the Dead surmises: "these creatures are pure motorised instinct".
P.D.Ouspensky in The Psychology of Man's Possible Evolution has a more advanced categorisation system that conveys something of the cosmic and comic situation of the human being and a possibility of cure.
Man is asleep and must wake up. He is asleep to himself and the reality of the world. He spends most time dwelling within lower functions of the human being rather than operating the machinery from higher centres. Man then is a robot running on autopilot as steered by genetics, environment and peers. Very rarely does he awaken, and yet the sleeper must awaken. Such a perception is a prerequisite for Initiation.
The key to awakening to various degrees of consciousness is Self-Remembering which is at first an observer-like state characterised by non-identification with instincts, thoughts and feelings. Such self-consciousness is a prerequisite and process for Initiation resulting in greater degrees of freedom in the universe.
Isolation is also a key sociological theme in the films; the survivors are always the more advanced and perceptive characters who see things as they are and have been. They are willing to make a break with the past and all they have known - not just as an escape but to survive as an individual and continue the human race. For some the unknown is exciting, for others an alternative to the known. Once the zombie threat is reduced or eliminated the Living are free to live individual and virtually unprogrammed lives in a new environment. The key to this is a blend of realism and opportunism concerning the long term fate of the human race, beginning with themselves.
A word of warning. The zombie is also cannibalistic: they try to consume and destroy the Life which they do not have. Now zombies can be Awakened from their sleep-walking, such as the pet subject 'Bob' in Day of the Dead learns to remember himself. But to wake the dead is risky business - they may try and bite you in their unhappy state.
Think of this next time you visit St. Tescos or eat in King Burger, and contemplate the differences between yourself and them, what they could do to you and what you could do for them, and more importantly what you can do for yourself. Look out for survivors in stores near you.