You’re On the Wrong Side of the Zombie Apocalypse

Life is easier as a zombie in the undead armageddon

Feb 17, 2025

Hey Wilding Out peeps!

I’m still on vacay in Mexico, being balls-to-the-wall busy trying to make up for being first the sick week. If that first week didn’t kill me, making up for it quickly might.

I think I’m going to need a vacation just to decompress from my vacation.

I’ve got some great stuff percolating in my brain bucket, but I feel like a bit zombie-brained at the moment. In honor of my zombie brain, I’m going to breathe some life back into this piece on zombies—which was my very first post on Substack.

Back then I didn’t have many readers, so only 21 people saw it…and I’m pretty sure 15 of those were my friends. It always bugged me that this argument for joining team zombie didn’t get more play time. So, here it is again since 3,127 of you haven’t seen it before.

After my vacay, I’m definitely going team zombie—I’m exhausted!

And if you haven’t become a paid member of the Wilding Out Army yet, consider giving a paid subscribe at the end, where options start at just $1/month or $10/year :)

Now, onto my zombie-argument…

Images by brgfx and wirestock on Freepik (edited by brain-eating author)

If Hollywood has taught me anything, it’s that surviving a zombie apocalypse looks hard. In a zombiepocalypse, we’re innately supposed to support Team Human. Not me though — I’m going Team Zombie.

Think about it, being human is hard on the best of days. But it’s even harder during a boogeyman cataclysm.

And by my calculations, we’re overdue for a zombipocalypse.

Humans have been talking about them since ancient times, but have yet to see a zombiedemic. The Ancient Greeks were the first to fear zombies, which they called “Vrykolakas”. They were so fearful that they posthumously pinned down bodies they buried, to keep them from reanimating.

Their de-animation rocks must’ve worked, although possibly using the same specious reasoning that Lisa Simpsons' anti-tiger rock kept tigers away.

In more modern times, places that practice voodoo — including Haiti and the Caribbean, Brazil, and the American South — also believe zombies can rise from the dead. A voodoo practitioner called a bokor can use ‘zombie powders’ (made from shells, herbs, animal parts and fish) to create the undead.

A famous Haitian man, Clairvius Narcisse, claims to have been zombified. Experts believe it was the effects of voodoo powders made from tetrodotoxin (a deadly neurotoxin that naturally occurs in pufferfish) that caused his infamous reanimation in 1962.

Between our obsession with the undead and our newfound technologies — zombies are bound to come to life one of these days in a lab somewhere. Or if you believe Narcisse, already have.

Damnit scientists — can we just leave some things alone?

A Zombiepocalypse Sounds Exhausting

Anyhoo, when the zombie debacle happens, humans will be in constant ‘go mode’. You’re constantly on the lookout, watching your back, with your head on a swivel. Then there’s the seemingly never-ending foraging for supplies, like Spam and Twinkies.

You spend every moment trying to survive.

You also have to find weapons to stave off the hordes of Walking Dead. According to Hollywood, you need an arsenal of longswords, guns, rocket launchers, maces, and flails. I don’t know how to use any of these. I learned blow darting in Malaysia, but I doubt Zombies would succumb to a poisoned dart.

Also, I’m in Canada — where would I even find weapons for my local apocalypse? I’m pretty sure thugs and gun runners would be charging exorbitant prices.

There are other lifestyle-decreasing inevitabilities to consider too. If movies prognosticate effectively, zombies are attracted to light and fire — so you’d spend your life cold and in the dark.

You also have to form alliances. I doubt I’d get Hugh Jackman, Ryan Reynolds and Chris Hemsworth to respond to my makeshift bat signal. Alliances would need to be formed with those around you. So, your neighbor Steve who you’re in a feud with over the property lines, your siblings and their endless rivalries, and your already backstabby coworkers.

We can’t even get along with Sherry from HR in the best of times, you think you can handle an undead armageddon with that bitch?

Awful alliances, forever foraging, lifestyle losses, and weapons quests. I’m pre-exhausted just thinking about it.

Meanwhile, the zombies are out there just living their best afterlife.

Why Team Zombie Is Better

Instead of spending your life in fear and constantly in defensive mode, allow me to persuade you over to Team Zombie. Here is some brainfood for thought — but choose your side of the human chasm wisely. As my first selling point, you don’t have to be on the lamb with HR Sherry. Also, you get to bite her.

Being a zombie is a cakewalk in comparison to zombie-evading human.

Why be scared of becoming undead? You’re going to die anyway. If not from zombies, from starvation, disease, Sherry’s betrayal of you, time, or salmonella.

Not every aspect of the zombie life is perfect. Eating brains doesn’t sound ideal, but some cultures do it already. Granted, it's not human brain. But — zombies are undead, which means they survive without eating and drinking. So you don’t have to eat Steve’s brain if you don’t want to.

Although, if they don’t have to eat to survive, that means they hunt people for fun. Hmm. Well, I have been looking for a new hobby that I can really sink my teeth into.

Perhaps you’re averse to the undead aesthetic. But if Bill Murray can pull off the zombie look, I’m confident I can. If you’re thinking zombies are ugly, first off — that’s undead-based discrimination, and shame on you. Have you seen what we can accomplish with makeup now? We can just lumber and shuffle over to a Sephora. I have no doubt they’d have a zombie lineup of products out within a week of the Walking Dead doomsday.

Images by brgfx and mario_luengo on Freepik (edited by dead-adjacent author)

I suppose I could try working with what I have — lawd knows my current makeup has turned me from zombie to human numerous times already. But I have a feeling I’d need a rosier-colored foundation, and I picture a lot of smokey eyes, and damnit — I’m terrible at those.

Humanizing zombie makeup will have a learning curve, but I’m willing to learn. I’m confident that Gen Z will have zombie ‘get ready with me’ makeup tutorials posted on TikTok by the end of the first day of the shuffling-stiffs snafu.

As an added bonus, I can throw out my vast array of anti-aging creams. Think of the savings.

Back to the highlights of joining the undead. Think of all the free time you’ll have. You’ve never seen a zombie in line at the DMV. That’s a bonus right there. Also, I’m pretty sure zombies don’t pay taxes.

Have you ever seen a zombie in a hurry? No, they shuffle along slowly. They meander, taking their time to smell the roses. Ok, maybe they’re not smelling the roses but they’re chillaxing to the max.

It would be peaceful. Zombies aren’t big on watercooler chitchat, so we’d get a much-needed break from the stress of the latest ‘hot goss’. Personally, I’m not a talker anyway. I enjoy the quiet. Many days this month alone I would have preferred to communicate only in grunting.

For those concerned about being labeled a zombie, never fear. You know some bleeding-heart Gen Z’er is going to start a campaign for the ethical treatment of zombies. They’ll probably decide that zombie is a slur and campaign for us to be called ‘Zeds’, ‘former humans’, or ‘human adjacent’.

That won’t stop Steve from coming up with all sorts of names for the human adjacent though. We’ll probably be called everything in the undead book, like Infected, Biters, Shamblers, Shufflers, Lurkers, Groaners, Rotters and Stiffs. The joke’s on them though in the end. They’re the ones running.

But we’ll also have our fans because humans are a weird bunch; zombie fans are called Zombophiles.

Life on Team Zombie is the winning side of the undead dystopia. So, swap the ‘hustling life’ for the ‘shuffling life’.

Life is hard, being a zombie looks easy. Somebody, please — bite me.