Zombie Apocalypse: Or I’m one lucky bitch.

So I finally got around to reading World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War and I’ll tell you something, unless it’s the Second Coming of Jesus Christ Himself, if the dead start walking, I’m fucking killing myself.

World War Z is a series of interviews with survivors of the WWZ, civilian, military etc. It’s organized to tell the stories about the beginning, the middle, end, and rebuilding afterwards. So on the one hand, you know that everyone you’re reading about survives. On the other hand, it’s fucking scary to think about what happens in the Zombie Apocalypse. It’s terrifying to think about what the hell would happen if civilization fell apart.

See, I live in the western world of the 21^st century. I’m in a PhD program, I’ve got a Master’s from an Ivy League school – so, I might not be personally rolling in the dough, but in many ways I am the elite of elite in the damn world. I can rest assured that my water is potable, and if it ain’t, I can get a filter system. I can get aspirin and emergency medical service (although I might not be able to afford the latter, I can definitely get it). Most days I don’t think of myself as that lucky. I’ve got enough debt to own a house in some places and all I got was an education, I don’t have a dishwasher. Wah wah fucking wah.

My point is: I whine about not having a dishwasher. I can’t begin to fathom the social fallout of the Zombie Apocalypse. My 11 year old goddaughter is totally into zombies and is patiently awaiting WWZ so that she can test her zombie survival skills. I am not so amused. See, the Zombie Apocalypse isn’t going to be all fun and games. It’s going to be blood and brains and piss everywhere. It’s going to be the collapse of civilization as we know it, and people will die because civilization as we know it has divided labor so well that most of us in the western world wouldn’t know how to hunt, kill & butcher an animal, determine which plants & mushrooms are edible, nevermind knowing how to build a secure shelter, repair a car, or shoot a gun and hit a zombie in the brain.

I’m really fucking scared of Zombie Apocalypse. I don’t think it’s especially likely that the dead will start walking and want to eat us all, spreading infection and doom exponentially. No. I’m scared of whatever fucked up shit would happen if America ever really faced a war within the borders, thermonuclear apocalypse, famine, drought and/or environmental devastation leading to Mad Max insanity. I’m soft. Oh SURE. I’m a Girl Scout. I know how to set up a tent and CPR and shit, but I’ve never fired a gun, I’ve never really been in a physical fight, I can’t even run a 10 minute mile and nevermind climbing anything.

So I’ve picked up my gym pace. I’m committed. And you know what, when I hit the treadmill, I envision a) Zombie Apocalypse or b) The Rise of the Machines. Sometimes I envision zombies and the T-1000 teaming up to get me.

In conclusion:

World War Z is a scary book, and it gave me some really messed up dreams. I’m afraid of this war/apocalypse/end of civilization thing. This motivates me. “Run fat ass, RUN.” I also wonder if I should learn some more practical skills, like shooting guns, fighting, building, sewing, hunting etc.

And if the Zombie Apocalypse happens, I’m gonna bend over and kiss my sweet ass goodbye, then off myself. In the meantime, I’ll try to remember how seriously lucky I am that my biggest problems are student loans, picking wine for my wedding, and lack of dishwasher.

My White Privilege is showing.

In my drive to take myself more seriously and present a more professional image so that I will be taken seriously, I came across numerous references to an incident at a law firm. Glamour Magazine editors giving a presentation on “Professional Image” at Cleary Gottleib proclaimed that afros and dreadlocks are not appropriate for the workplace because they are “too political.” In other words, people of African descent are expected to use chemicals on their hair and scalp and spend time & money forcing their hair to look straighter, smoother and, let’s face it, more white, in order to present a professional image in the workplace.

Now, there are very few times when my white privilege is apparent to me. I can’t help it. I’m white, so it never occurred to me that black hair still carried that kind of baggage in the work place and it never occurred to me to think about the ways hair might carry such different meaning for black women than it does for me. A few recent blogs piqued my interest and sparked reflection on my own professional image & hair dilemma.

In some ways I felt like cutting my hair was giving in to a patriarchal, established ideal about how women are supposed to be and look. Pretty women aren’t supposed to be intelligent and capable and they certainly can’t count on being taken seriously in the academic world. I felt like keeping my hair a stance against such sexist bullshit, but you know what? I often wore it up when teaching or presenting a paper – because it wasn’t professional. So I was giving in already. And really, I do want to be taken seriously and a hair cut wasn’t that big a deal for me. It didn’t occur to me that women of different race, cultures or religions might have a different relationship with their hair.

But I’m lucky enough to benefit from white privilege. The black women whose blogs I linked to above don’t have that privilege. Adriel Arocha wasn’t so lucky – and he’s a male kindergartener! My friend Kosher Academic is a modern Orthodox Jew and a Ph.D. student and she’s written a number of posts about her feelings & experience with hair covering, and although I read them, I never really thought about the difference between her experience with her hair and mine or how her religion or religious ideas about her hair might run up against a standard idea of professional image. I mean, it’s not in my daily experience to think about the affects of being an Orthodox Jew on anyone’s academic or professional image. Maybe she’ll find time (between school, marriage and kids – heh) to write a little bit about her experiences in academia as a woman and a Jew. (Hint = request for something I’d like to read on your blog or talk about at Big Professional Conference).

At any rate I don’t know how to express my outrage about the varieties of prejudice against black women (or men, for that matter) wearing their hair in a natural style in a way that isn’t condescending or that doesn’t presume to understand an experience I can simply never have, but I want to try to be more attentive to these kinds of issues in the academic and professional world. People should not be expected to change the natural states of their hair or body and they should be allowed to wear culturally and religiously significant clothes, head coverings and hair without being told it’s unprofessional. I guess the best thing I can do is call attention to the issue and call people on it when they express prejudicial attitudes.