Further to this post on the alleged political subtexts of zombie films, it seems the debate refuses to die.

In The American Prospect, Paul Waldman argues:

[A]t heart, the genre is a progressive one. It’s true that fighting off the zombie horde requires plentiful firearms, no doubt pleasing Second Amendment advocates. And in a zombie movie, government tends to be either ineffectual or completely absent. On the other hand, when the zombie apocalypse comes, capitalism breaks down, too – people aren’t going to be exchanging money for goods and services; they’re just going to break into the hardware store and grab what they need…

But most important, what ensures survival in a zombie story are the progressive ideals of common cause and collective action. A small group of people from varying backgrounds are thrust together and find that they can transcend their differences of age, race, and gender (the typical band of survivors is a veritable United Nations of cultural diversity). They come to understand that if they’re going to get out of this with their brains kept securely housed in their skulls and not travelling down some zombie’s gullet, they’ve got to act as though they’re all in it together. Surviving the tide of zombies requires community and mutual responsibility. What could be more progressive than that?

Over at Ace, Mætenloch takes a different view:

Despite that local spot of bother, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad still finds time to share his thoughts on more elevated matters. Press TV, the state-sponsored purveyor of “24/7 truth,” quotes approvingly:

In the democracy of the West, the exalted values and the people are ignored, [whereas] the aspiration and origins of the Islamic Revolution are different from those of other revolutions. Because, in the Islamic Republic that rose from the revolution, the object is the realization of Divine aspirations and the commands of the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH), and, consequently, the perfection of humanity.

Those with the stomach for it can witness the ongoing perfecting of humanity here, here and here. Apparently, the process is more stick than carrot. 

Caution: rationalisation in progress.

My politics comes from Marxism and feminism; it’s republican, it’s gay and it’s green… The survival of an honours system clothed in royalism and imperialism is a reproach to New Labour’s craven sentiment about pomp and power… That creates a contradiction in moments like this… You ask yourself the question: how can I accept anything from this horrible imperial regime?

Why, it’s former Communist Party member and all-purpose agitated person, Beatrix Campbell. Sorry, Beatrix Campbell, OBE.

Michael Totten has links, clips and coverage. See also Breitbart and Azarmehr.

For newcomers, three more items from the archives:

Spooky Action.

Jim Schnabel’s charmingly bizarre film about Cold War research into extrasensory perception as a tool of espionage. By turns intriguing and hilarious.

Rebellion, Revisited. 

Classroom impropriety and the grooming of young minds.

Even if we set aside the not insignificant issue of whether professors of, say, literary criticism have any business trying to “win over” their students and mould their political outlook, reasonably or otherwise, there is another problem. Is the student-professor relationship sufficiently equal and reciprocal to ensure evidence and reason prevail? Is there no pressure on students to defer, to please? Can we simply assume that improper leverage will never be brought to bear – for instance, in terms of grading or more subtle signs of displeasure? And isn’t there an unavoidable air of… predation?

Infestation.

A Guardian writer asks, Am I Fit to Breed? Other, less hesitant souls long for human extinction.

Explore the greatest hits.