Posted By John Sears on April 5, 2011

A story where peoples’ hearts are in the right place, I suppose, but a bit of education could be in order:

Scores of the rotting undead shambled out from the newly blossoming trees of Columbia Park in Kennewick sometime after 3:30 p.m., spattered with blood and hungering for human flesh. They moaned a chilling cry for “braaaiiiiinnnnssss” as they marched through the park in a loose column.

Still-human survivors ran for their lives. Some climbed trees, where zombies clawed at their dangling feet.

It was the stuff of nightmares.

It also was a unique way for a local couple to gather their friends, dress up in horrific costumes and raise nonperishable food donations for people in need.

The ZRC approves of Zombie related charity. Very much so, in fact.

We also approve of Living people taking a chance to walk a mile in the shoes of a Zombie, so to speak, by dressing up as one in, say, a Zombie Walk.. so long as it’s tasteful and respectful of the feelings of actual Zombies.

It doesn’t sound like this event really meets that latter criteria, unfortunately. On the other hand, they did arrange a Zombie-themed event as part of a charitable drive, so we can’t be entirely hard on them here at the ZRC; like I said above, their hearts were probably in the right place, they just weren’t cognizant enough of the plight of the Differently Animated.

Next time, might I suggest printing off some of our fine informational pamphlets and making it not just a fun get-together, but a learning experience too?

Category: Zombie Media | No Comments »
Tags: Greenface, Social Justice

Posted By John Sears on April 5, 2011

Depressingly, the variety of Anti-Zombie videogames just seems to keep increasing at a steady clip. Perhaps tiring of the Zombie Apocalypse theme, Anti-Zom developers are branching out:

There’s no denying it. Zombie games make money. No one has anything against a good zombie game really, it’s just that there’s a lot of them. So we needed to try something different. We didn’t want to kill zombies in the usual way. We didn’t want to survive a deadly undead army in the ruins of some scary-ass town. We wanted to travel through time and shoot zombie dinosaurs and mummies and junk. So, we created Age of Zombies!

To conduct field research, the development team actually journeyed back in time to experience what it meant to really blast zombie faces with guns while standing around the Pyramids and Japanese villages and such.

Somehow I doubt that these guys actually have a time machine, but the point is clear: move over Zombie Apocalypse, we’re putting Zombie massacres into quasi-historical settings for the bloodlust of the slack-jawed, twitchy-thumbed Anti-Zombie gamers of the world.

Distressing. ‘Age of Zombies’, with its anachronistic regression into violence against the Differently Animated, is out for all sorts of platforms. iPhone and iPad, PSP and PS3, etc.

I’m going to go watch the election returns and celebrate as Madison re-elects (b/c both candidates have been mayor) our Zombie Tolerant Mayor and remember that the whole world isn’t dominated by fear and loathing of the Differently Animated.

Category: Zombie Media, ZRC News | No Comments »
Tags: Madison Protests, Social Justice, Videogames

Posted By John Sears on April 5, 2011

The Zombie Walk Against Governor Walker (which the ZRC of course attended) has been getting lots of press, and surprisingly, a few stereotypical ‘Zombie’ jokes aside, it’s mostly positive!

From AMERICAblog:

It seems more zombies turned out in Madison, Wisconsin this weekend than Teabaggers turned out in DC last week. Yeah, that’s right — zombies in Madison. Hundreds of them. Protesting a lack of brains (their favorite food, of course) under the Badger rotunda.

It’s true that there were a sizeable number of Zombies who needed some brains to eat at the Walk, but to be fair, none of the restaurants on State Street serve brains, which surprises me regularly.

DailyKos unfortunately stooped pretty low to make some Anti-Zombie cracks:

I’m sorry I had to miss this one. Maybe if they’d scheduled it for after dark, like proper zombie organizers should, I could have joined in. But I guess they figured that no one else would be there to see them at night.

I’m pleased to say, that like all previous outpourings of citizens at the Capitol, this was an entirely peaceful and non-violent rally. (Easy for us regular folks, but you have to figure it was quite a challenge for this group.)

Zombies are people too, DK diarist. They don’t resort to violence just because they’re Undead; that’s a harmful stereotype pushed by the Anti-Zombie media.

The DK diary does embed one of the ZRC’s photos though, so thanks for the flickr traffic, I guess.

An Examiner article does a much better job for the most part:

Saturday Wisconsin Zombies rallied in Madison to protest Governor Scott Walker and the state GOP attempt to strip union members of long cherished collective bargaining rights. The good natured march was organized via the social networking website Facebook.

Just so. It was a great day and fun for all concerned.

The ZRC Banner can be seen in the Examiner’s video, in fact:

We’re at about the 35 second mark; my hair has rapidly started to lose all of its blue, just in time to end up on the national media! Oh, I look like I have a mohawk, it’s so sad.

But enough vanity. More coverage? Yes, there is more!

From Current.com:

Creatively they marched in protest gaining momentum as they were met with approval by onlookers while carrying signs and moaning in search of brains.
“What do we want?” “Brains!” they chanted.
These committed protesters made a pact that this would be a peaceful march, in opposition to Governor Walker’s attempt to eradicate Collective Bargaining rights.

As mentioned above, it’s true that, literally speaking, there is a dearth of Zombie-centered cuisine on State Street, however I think most of the ‘Brains’ chanting was meant either ironically or allegorically; if one talked to the Zombies it was clear they really wanted a better class of politician, not to eat said politician’s brain.

Which is what you’d expect from an engaged Undead citizenry.

Even Faux News was there to see the Differently Animated protest for positive change:

I think this rally has not just elevated Zombie issues to local attention, but it’s helped to promote a more positive image of Zombies *nationally*, and that’s amazing.

Category: Zombie Media | No Comments »
Tags: Madison Protests, Public Appearance, Social Justice

Posted By John Sears on April 5, 2011

You have two Zombie Tolerant (or better!) candidates for mayor, plus other elections including a Supreme Court race that has become a referendum on Governor Walker (who is Anti-Zombie).

I highly suggest voting tomorrow. Wisconsin has same-day registration, so there’s no real barrier. Find your polling place (use this site) and go there.

Polls are open, I believe, from 7:00 am to 8:00 pm.

Now go!

Category: ZRC News | No Comments »
Tags: Madison Protests, Social Justice

Posted By John Sears on April 5, 2011

This kind of speaks for itself, but what the hey:

The Walking Dead Girls is a behind-the-scenes look into zombie culture in the United States and the obsession into “”Sexy Female Zombies””. What is it about Zombie Bimbos or “”Zimbies”” that are starting to gain the worlds interest? Why are zombies now in mainstream culture and seen in advertising from JCPenny and Sears? With interviews with zombie master maker George Romero and cult movie star Bruce Campbell from ZomBcon 2010 and so much more. Also with a rare look into the making of a Zombie Pinup Calendar, behind the scenes of “”Stripperland”” and “”Clublife”” Daniel Baldwin’s hip hop Zombie music video debut. “”The Walking Dead Girls”” is a sexy look into the zombie phenomenon created by George Romero that is 40 years in the making.

Yes, you can examine ‘zombie culture’ by studying the exploitative and violent Anti-Zombie media, and using it to construct remarkably twisted ideas of what constitutes a female Zombie. Or as they refer to them, ‘Zombie Bimbos or “Zimbies”‘

This is remarkably misogynist as well as remarkably Anti-Zombie. First, you stereotype Zombies. Then you further stereotype and degrade female Zombies. THEN you claim that these doubly stereotyped caricatures of Zombie Womanhood are somehow representative of a larger ‘culture’ of Zombies in America.

Alternately, you could do a deep and reasoned study of Chinese-American culture by studying Fu Manchu and other movies about the ‘Yellow Peril’.

*rolls eyes*

Sometimes, I swear, the things the ZRC has to deal with. Compare these stereotypes, by the way, with the active, informed and politically motivated female Zombies we saw at the rally last Saturday.

I have a feeling, based on our personal experiences, that there’s a lot more to the culture of Zombie Women than Zombie pinups and Romero movies.

Category: Zombie Media | No Comments »
Tags: Academia, Books, Journamalism, Madison Protests, Mainstream Media, Social Justice

Posted By John Sears on April 4, 2011

I sent the following email to Mayor Dave’s campaign staff yesterday regarding the Soglin attendance at Saturday’s Zombie Walk and the pledge Soglin made toward better integration of the Differently Animated in the City of Madison:

To the Campaign of Mayor Dave Cieslewicz:

As you are no doubt aware, yesterday a heavily publicized ‘Zombie Walk Against Governor Walker’ was held in downtown Madison, and the Zombie Community came out in force to support collective bargaining rights and in opposition to the divisive agenda of Governor Walker. (For more information on the Walk, you can see our writeup at http://zombierightscampaign.org/blog/?p=2016)

Your rival candidate in the upcoming mayoral election, Paul Soglin, attended the Zombie Walk and spent considerable time conversing with his Zombie fellow citizens and addressing their concerns. Spontaneously he also announced his support for adding the Undead in general and Zombies in particular to the city’s Equal Opportunities ordinance, calling for a long-overdue revision of existing policy. You can see our coverage of these remarks as well as video of Soglin’s commitment on the record at: http://zombierightscampaign.org/blog/?p=2019

Our question, as representatives of the Undead Community, is two-fold.

One: Would Mayor Dave support this same or similar measures to aid the Zombie population of Madison and protect their civil rights?

Two: What policies or positions does Mayor Dave bring to the table that might convince a Madisonian Zombie to cast their ballot for Mayor Dave over former Mayor Soglin?

We eagerly anticipate your response to this weighty topic.

Sincerely,

John J Sears
President of The Zombie Rights Campaign

About us: The Zombie Rights Campaign is the world’s premiere advocacy organization focused on the concerns of the ‘Differently Animated’, more commonly known as Zombies, Mummies, Liches, the Reanimated Dead, etc. Based out of Madison, Wisconsin, we work tirelessly on behalf of our Differently Animated clients to advance toward a day when people are judged on the content of their character and not the presence of a heartbeat or aerobic respiration

Well, today we got a response from the campaign!

Granted, it’s not a concrete set of policy proposals, but the campaign staff for Mayor Dave did send us photographic proof that he was, in fact, at the Zombie Walk:

It’s understandable that we missed him. It was a huge event and lots of people were around at all times. We apologize for not knowing that he was in attendance; to be fair, however, the Isthmus also failed to note that Mayor Dave was at the rally.

Might I suggest next time both major candidates in an election such as this give short stump speeches on the issue of Zombie Rights? Even just fielding a question or two would be very useful. And the ZRC is always willing to sit down and present a few questions, or even arrange a quick photo opportunity, for any politician willing to dialogue about Zombie Rights.

We will continue to press both candidates in the limited time remaining for further details of their plans to work toward the benefit of with peaceable Differently Animated of Madison. Remember, however, that the election is tomorrow, and no matter who you prefer, Mayor Soglin or Mayor Dave, that both candidates were willing, at a minimum, to publicly appear at a Zombie event here in Madison and spend quality time with their Undead constituents.

In other words, we’ve got two Zombie Tolerant, hopefully even Zombie Friendly people running for office. The only way to lose is not to cast a ballot at all.

Category: Zombie Media, ZRC News | No Comments »
Tags: Madison Protests

Posted By John Sears on April 3, 2011

Just so you know the origin of the above phrase when I start using it reflexively, watch this Youtube April Fool’s prank/video:

The relevant portion starts at about 1:39, if you’re in a hurry.

Category: ZRC News | No Comments »
Tags: Youtube Mischief

Posted By John Sears on April 3, 2011

Here at the ZRC we think that the best way for Living people to come to accept Zombies is to see Zombies and their supporters helping out, doing good, or in yesterday’s case, peacefully assembling in public.

Apparently the Anti-Zombie filmmakers, however, have something of the same idea about themselves:

Gawid Entertainment has teamed up with Scares That Care! to help sick children.

Gawid Entertainment is donating a sizable portion of all sales from Zombie Doomsday: A live action Zombie movie, Another Zombie Flick: The making of a low budget Zombie movie and Diary Of An Ex Child Star.

“Scares That Care!” is a not-for-profit organization that provides money, toys and other items to help sick children.

Just what is ‘Zombie Doomsday’? Well, as you might guess, it doesn’t look to be Zombie Friendly:

Another Zombie Apocalypse story, although at least this one has a well-cut trailer. I’m not sure if the ‘reality show’ angle is cliche by this point or not; as someone who stopped watching TV years ago (except on DVD), I’m continually appalled just to find out how many reality shows there still are. They seem to be spreading all the time, like a bad skin infection. So I think we can give the concept at the very least a nod toward plausibility; pity the ‘Zombies rising up to kill’ part had to come in to muddy things up.

Still, if you have to support an Anti-Zombie film, at least here you’d also be helping out some sick kids. We’ve declared amnesties before, with Tom Savini no less, so I guess we can do it again; on the other hand, we’re not actually going to *endorse* going out and seeing this movie. If, however, you must watch an Anti-Zombie film, then we’re going to suggest ‘Zombie Doomsday’, because at least they’re trying to make up for the harm their movie does to society in some small fashion.

If on the other hand you want some fine ZRC merchandise with all proceeds to benefit the Red Cross, go to our ongoing sale (new items soon!) at this address.

Both fine causes, showing that, even though we can’t agree on the treatment of the Differently Animated on film, we can agree on some things. It’s a start.

Category: Zombie Media, ZRC News | No Comments »
Tags: Horde for Humanitarian Aid!, Social Justice

Posted By John Sears on April 3, 2011

I really didn’t want to have to write this post.

In the wake of our original reporting on the Zombie Walk Against Governor Walker, a ‘Citizen Journalism’ site covering the Madison protests decided to copy large portions of our text without attribution as part of a slightly longer piece on the Zombie Walk. In fact, not only did they take our content without informing their readers it wasn’t their own work, but Politiscoop put it under someone else’s byline. Even more shockingly, their alterations and additions to the text clumsily attempt to transform it from a statement of support for Zombie Rights into a trite, defamatory piece of ‘conventional wisdom’ about the Differently Animated.

Here, for comparison, is how their blog post reads:

Sunday, 03 April 2011 10:34 Citizen Journalist

Madison Wisconsin -The Zombies were out in force to show solidarity with the Living hordes, aka ‘Unions’, who are faced with having their fundamental rights to gather and work collectively to better their lives stripped away by a college dropout who somehow stumbled his way into the Governor’s mansion (and promptly cut corporate taxes by over 100 million dollars, in a recession).

Saturdays walk was almost a look into Wisconsin’s Working class future as many appeared to be lifeless souls wandering the streets aimlessly in hopes of finding some GOP brains to feast upon though apparently in Madison Wisconsin there is a severe drought of Republican intelligence so the zombies walked with famine in mind.

Zombies know what it’s like to be told that they can’t gather together, can’t work together, aren’t allowed to form hordes to protest for a better Unlife, so they came out today to stand with their Living colleagues and lurch toward a brighter future. And this time, I think they got some serious results. Thanks to Cori a Scoop Reporter here at PolitiScoop for the fun photos!

Now here’s the relevant portion of our original post, written by me over 12 hours earlier:

The Zombies were out in force to show solidarity with the Living hordes, aka ‘Unions’, who are faced with having their fundamental rights to gather and work collectively to better their lives stripped away by a college dropout who somehow stumbled his way into the Governor’s mansion (and promptly cut corporate taxes by over 100 million dollars, in a recession).

Zombies know what it’s like to be told that they can’t gather together, can’t work together, aren’t allowed to form hordes to protest for a better Unlife, so they came out today to stand with their Living colleagues and lurch toward a brighter future. And this time, I think they got some serious results.

Here once again is ‘their’ post with the stolen content in bold:

Sunday, 03 April 2011 10:34 Citizen Journalist

Madison Wisconsin -The Zombies were out in force to show solidarity with the Living hordes, aka ‘Unions’, who are faced with having their fundamental rights to gather and work collectively to better their lives stripped away by a college dropout who somehow stumbled his way into the Governor’s mansion (and promptly cut corporate taxes by over 100 million dollars, in a recession).

Saturdays walk was almost a look into Wisconsin’s Working class future as many appeared to be lifeless souls wandering the streets aimlessly in hopes of finding some GOP brains to feast upon though apparently in Madison Wisconsin there is a severe drought of Republican intelligence so the zombies walked with famine in mind.

Zombies know what it’s like to be told that they can’t gather together, can’t work together, aren’t allowed to form hordes to protest for a better Unlife, so they came out today to stand with their Living colleagues and lurch toward a brighter future. And this time, I think they got some serious results. Thanks to Cori a Scoop Reporter here at PolitiScoop for the fun photos!

This has honestly never happened to me before. At the ZRC we release all our original content under a Creative Commons License. You are free to take some or all of our work, remix it, make derivatives, publish and republish it to your heart’s content – so long as you acknowledge us and don’t try to use our work for commercial gain.

I’m a very laid-back guy on these matters. If your site is commercial, but you wanted to to use a fairly big swath of our prose in a fair use context, I’m not going to make a fuss. Our flickr photos are published under a CC license, so I fully expect they get embedded in sites that are commercial from time to time. We’re not unreasonable here at the ZRC.

This Politiscoop thing is another matter entirely however. Not only did ‘Citizen Journalist’ steal my work by taking a fairly large piece with no acknowledgement that it was not his or her own intellectual property, they then distorted it with gratuitous slams against the Differently Animated, then shoved the resulting incoherent mishmash out there on the web, where it could further degrade and pollute our discourse.

Topping it all off? There’s a Paypal link at the top of the page hosting our stolen content so readers of the plagiarizing site can reward this ‘Citizen Journalist’ financially.

Shocking and unacceptable behavior all around. Potentially actionable too; I’m looking into that. In the meantime, I just wanted to set the record straight, on behalf of The Zombie Rights Campaign, that this material is altered, not representative of the positions of The Zombie Rights Movement, and Living Supremacist as well.

What an ugly development to come out of a fantastic event like the Zombie Walk.

Category: Zombie Media, ZRC News | 1 Comment »
Tags: Journamalism, Mainstream Media, Social Justice

Posted By John Sears on April 3, 2011

Yesterday was a great day for Zombie Rights, what with the quite large and entirely peaceful and law-abiding Zombie Walk Against Governor Walker here in Madison.

Even the Mainstream Media’s reporting on the event was largely positive:

On Saturday afternoon, the protest movement against Gov. Scott Walker finally died, so to speak. A shuffling, groaning army of zombies lurched up State Street, carrying anti-Walker signs and lamenting the lack of brains — their favorite food — at the Republican-dominated Wisconsin Capitol.

Organized on Facebook, the Zombie Walk Against Gov. Walker brought out hundreds of undead with bloody faces, stringy hair, and a commitment to collective bargaining rights. They didn’t scare many people as they staggered up State Street, obeying traffic lights and occasionally breaking character to smile at the cheering onlookers.

…

One of the people smiling was Capt. Carl Gloede of the Capitol Police, who seemed to greatly enjoy the gory spectacle. “It’s another unique Saturday afternoon,” he said.

Capt. Gloede affirmed that the zombies had a permit to march and were being very cooperative. But don’t be fooled — this undead legion truly is out for blood, at least in the upcoming election. As one sign put it:

“Come Alive April 5!”

I’m not sure where the ‘out for blood’ stuff comes from. It’s a phrase suggesting determination and violence, but if they were trying to conjure up Undead imagery they missed ‘Zombie’ and hit ‘Vampire’.

Still, reporting was largely positive, the event went off without a hitch, and the Zombie Community of Madison even got some serious political attention from former Mayor Paul Soglin, who showed up to the event and spent some time fielding questions from the Zombie attendees.

In fact, Paul Soglin called for adding the Undead in general, and Zombies in specific, to the city’s anti-discrimination laws:

This is an outstanding development and we will be contacting his rival, Mayor Dave Cieslewicz, for an official response on his level of support for Zombie Rights.

Update: The Mayor Dave campaign has responded, with photographic proof that he attended the Walk, in fact.

The ZRC respects both candidates for their commitment to outreach.

Category: Zombie Media, ZRC News | 3 Comments »
Tags: Madison Protests, Social Justice