Jordan Karlesson
It should be shocking that many people truly believe a real zombie apocalypse is happening in China right now. But in the times we’re living in, it would be more shocking if people didn’t believe such an absurd notion.
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According to Newsweek, the fears stemmed from — you guessed it — a “news” story filled with lies. The falsehoods spread across social media like a virus before they were eventually debunked. Pity the reporters who had to spend their work hours disproving nonsense instead of reporting on real issues.
The toxic article was titled “This Is How a Zombie Apocalypse Is Most Likely to Start in China.” It contained conspiracy theories about Communist countries secretly exchanging information about global threats. In an effort to prove that point, apparently, the article pointed to the Soviet Union’s denial of Chernobyl in 1986.
Newsweek said the article baselessly claimed China would hide news about a global catastrophe like Russia did with Chernobyl. That’s supposedly because both countries engage in “lies and propaganda.”
To support the unfounded, outrageous, and even dangerous claim, the preposterous article said: “By refusing to admit the truth of the zombie outbreak to the world, the Communist Chinese government aided its spread due to misinformation about what was actually happening.”
As Newsweek noted, that line came from the horror novel World War Z by Max Brooks. That’s right, a novel — or, in other words, a work of fiction.
Zombie Lovers Feast On Bogus News
Theories from Nostradamus worked their way into the mix as well. Specifically, people thought several events would end humanity in 2021. Some of the predictions included a famine of Biblical proportions, a comet hitting Earth, solar storms, and a zombie apocalypse.
Once social media got hold of the ridiculous theory, well, you can probably guess what happened next. Suddenly, the uninformed and misinformed started asking questions, became frightened, and believed theories further and further off the deep end. As if a zombie apocalypse itself wasn’t farfetched enough in the first place. Then Internet trolls piled on with more manipulations and falsehoods, and — viola! — the mainstream media started running stories about the topic due to increased public interest.
Once the zombie apocalypse became part of the public discourse, the Centers for Disease Control and Preparedness (CDC) responded.
The CDC actually wrote, “As it turns out, what first began as a tongue-in-cheek campaign to engage new audiences with preparedness messages has proven to be a very effective platform. We continue to reach and engage a wide variety of audiences on all hazards preparedness via zombie preparedness.”
In 2019, The New York Times ran an article titled “A New Red Scare Is Reshaping Washington.” The piece rang the alarm amid fears of China’s growing military might. We’ll take that any day over China exporting “A New Dead Scare.”
