How long would it take?

by **Babidoll85** » Fri Mar 30, 2012 6:10 am

How long do you think it would take the government to inform us of a zombie invasion? Would I find out by looking out my window? Would it come across my tv? Will it be too late? Well, it wouldn't be too late for me since I've decided to be bad ass, but ya know, the average person.

by **Tater Raider** » Fri Mar 30, 2012 6:32 am

Free press here in the US would get the word out quickly, but there would be a ton of confusion as to what's going on and I don't think "the government" would ever come clean with all the info. In the past I'd go with cover-up but social media has changed that forever.

Someday someone will have a broadcast channel that is nothing more than broadcasting what people see on their implants - the ultimate in reality TV. At that point all bets are off.

by **Dabster** » Fri Mar 30, 2012 6:43 am

If we're talkin' a genuine zombie apocalypse (as opposed to a hurricane or tornado) the literature shows us two approaches.

#1. They say nothing helpful until it is way too late, when a sad goverment official embarassedly explains that you have to destroy the brain. Of course this is hours or days after you had to use a shovel, baseball or rugby bat to stop your usually friendly nieghbor from eating you.

#2. It starts slowly 'over there'. Someplace considered inferior to us, like (No offense intended! I am merely citing the literature) Africa or North Korea. Where it slowly builds. In this case the goverment gives lots of advice but it is mostly useless and counter productive.

However, if you're talking about something like hurticanes, real-life stuff, I would say they do a decent job of advising the population. For example they have a multibillion dollar satelite system to watch for storms and all the commercials advising people to be prepared.

Kinda weird, huh?

by **Kutter_0311** » Fri Mar 30, 2012 6:57 am

I don't think it's weird. Known threats are planned for. Emerging threats are... not...

by **Tater Raider** » Fri Mar 30, 2012 6:59 am

Kutter_0311 wrote:I don't think it's weird. Known threats are planned for. Emerging threats are... not...

Not strictly speaking true in this case. There have been studies done, some by the government. Short version of the zombie study: we're screwed unless info gets put out early. Personal take on the short version: we're screwed, so look after yourself.

by **Dabster** » Fri Mar 30, 2012 7:11 am

Kutter_0311 wrote:I don't think it's weird. Known threats are planned for. Emerging threats are... not...

I am by no means putting all of my faith in the goverment saving us, I am merely stating that they usually aren't as incompetent as many would like to think.

Sure the US goofed handling Katrina and the Japanese bungled their tsunami but by and large society muddles through.

Oh! Here's a good example: Mount St. Helens erupting in 1980... They alerted the locals, repeatedly tried to get the crazies off the mountain, did a decent job of flood and debris management and had masks to everyone in 24 hours. Not bad for our first, lower 48 volcano!

by **prtp3warrior** » Fri Mar 30, 2012 7:40 am

Babidoll85 wrote:How long do you think it would take the government to inform us of a zombie invasion? Would I find out by looking out my window? Would it come across my tv? Will it be too late? Well, it wouldn't be too late for me since I've decided to be bad ass, but ya know, the average person.

Don't lnow how long it would take but it seems to me that sometimes....maybe even often...If they are telling you it is not a real big deal on the news and in the political press...it probably is. If they are telling you it is a really big deal...it probably is not.

I just am not a very trusting person when it comes to these things. I understand that many will disagree.

by **Kissing-Tom** » Fri Mar 30, 2012 7:46 am

The government says everything too late. Why it will be different under a zombie-attack?

by **NamelessStain** » Fri Mar 30, 2012 9:38 am

IMO once something covers more than a 50 mile radius, the media would be all over it. So hope you aren't within that 50 miles

here · by **oldsoldier** » Fri Mar 30, 2012 1:46 pm

If it doesnt happen on facebook or twitter, no one will ever know. And, the majority of folks on those may be zombies now....

by **Logans Run** » Fri Mar 30, 2012 2:01 pm

The media likes epidemics ... and even more they love pandemics ... I think news will get out.

by **SeerSavant** » Fri Mar 30, 2012 11:33 pm

If it breaks out in the 1st world nations, it will start out on YouTube. Someone's shaking cell phone video...

It will be loudly denied or debated while nothing really gets done.

Any mention of zombie will be ridiculed and browbeaten to science.

After it's spread too far too much for anything to be done about it, it will become "breaking news" and everyone will come up with the same answer that they do for any terrorist style or chemical/biological attack, and will involve staying at home, making sure you have plenty of water, and duct tape...

So to answer the original question... Your more likely to have seen one in real life, before the existence is confirmed by the powers that be....

by **Kutter_0311** » Sat Mar 31, 2012 1:16 am

SeerSavant wrote:Your more likely to have seen one in real life, before the existence is confirmed by the powers that be....

Which is to say, Put your weapons and clothes where you can find them in the dark :wink:

I think, in general, ZS advocates not waiting till someone else tells you there is an emergency.

Be prepared to be a first responder, or at least the first survivor capable of passing word to emergency services.

by **dan-bri** » Sat Mar 31, 2012 7:33 am

Dabster wrote:If we're talkin' a genuine zombie apocalypse (as opposed to a hurricane or tornado) the literature shows us two approaches.

#1. They say nothing helpful until it is way too late, when a sad goverment official embarassedly explains that you have to destroy the brain. Of course this is hours or days after you had to use a shovel, baseball or rugby bat to stop your usually friendly nieghbor from eating you.

#2. It starts slowly 'over there'. Someplace considered inferior to us, like (No offense intended! I am merely citing the literature) Africa or North Korea. Where it slowly builds. In this case the goverment gives lots of advice but it is mostly useless and counter productive.

However, if you're talking about something like hurticanes, real-life stuff, I would say they do a decent job of advising the population. For example they have a multibillion dollar satelite system to watch for storms and all the commercials advising people to be prepared.

Kinda weird, huh?

Dafuq is a Rugby bat? :p
Also I reckon if it were to happen facebook and you tube would be your first and most confused source of information.

by **Bonecrusher Doc** » Sat Mar 31, 2012 11:44 am

I think Fukushima is a good example.

Some folks on the internet were saying almost the whole world's food supply was dangerously contaminated.

The Japanese government belatedly released public announcements regarding radiation safety, with guidelines that seemed to get more and more lax depending on how capable the government was of dealing with the situations.

The truth lay somewhere in between.

I'm glad to have my NOAA Alert radio, but by the time the government releases a public statement, you're too late. You'll be stuck in a traffic jam with everyone else leaving town.

by **Bob Bobberino** » Sat Mar 31, 2012 9:38 pm

It's already begun. Don't say nobody warned you.
The government and media don't want you to know that they have been quietly moving zombies into your neighborhood for years.

by **Alpha-17** » Sat Mar 31, 2012 9:52 pm

Dabster wrote:If we're talkin' a genuine zombie apocalypse (as opposed to a hurricane or tornado) the literature shows us two approaches.

#2. It starts slowly 'over there'. Someplace considered inferior to us, like (No offense intended! I am merely citing the literature) Africa or North Korea. Where it slowly builds. In this case the goverment gives lots of advice but it is mostly useless and counter productive.

^----This.

SeerSavant wrote:If it breaks out in the 1st world nations, it will start out on YouTube. Someone's shaking cell phone video...
It will be loudly denied or debated while nothing really gets done.
Any mention of zombie will be ridiculed and browbeaten to science.
After it's spread too far too much for anything to be done about it, it will become "breaking news" and everyone will come up with the same answer that they do for any terrorist style or chemical/biological attack, and will involve staying at home, making sure you have plenty of water, and duct tape...

^--- And this.

The government only responds to threats after the fact, it's terrible about responding to future threats. The bureaucracy needed to focus the vast resources of an entire country also make changing that focus very difficult, almost impossible without a rude awakening (Pearl Harbor, 9/11, etc). If zombies were to show up, I'd say you'd see them in the States, at least in small numbers, before the Gov't would make any substantial move.

by **Dabster** » Sun Apr 01, 2012 12:03 am

dan-bri wrote:Dafuq is a Rugby bat? :p
.

You knew what I meant!

by **Bonecrusher Doc** » Sun Apr 01, 2012 1:45 am

At least we can depend on the California Highway Patrol: http://www.sacbee.com/2012/03/30/437753 ... mbies.html

by **DarkAxel** » Sun Apr 01, 2012 3:34 am

Here's how I see it happening:

A patient is carried into a hospital with some unknown illness, wakes up from a death-like, state, and begins chomping on a nurse, orderly, doctor, or other hospital denizen. Within an hour or so, someone posts the happening to Twitter, Facebook, or a horribly shot cell-phone video to Youtube (a la the Saddam Hussein execution). A few more social media posts later (and the news going viral), and half the internet is wondering if some guerrilla marketing firm is promoting a new violent action flick. By the time the comment hipsters start decrying the lameness and "So Yesterday"-ness of zombies in popular culture, interest wanes and most of the Internet goes back to normal.

Then, someone in the mainstream news media notices that something on the Internet went viral, and decides to share the Tweets/status updates/video during their tech segment. Some enterprising reporter for a news affiliate runs down to the hospital in question to be greeted by a crowd of first responders and rubberneckers. By this time, the Internet has moved on to the next viral nonsense, new meme, or brilliantly captioned lolcat pic.

That (un)lucky affiliate reporter gets eyewitness video of zeds chomping on the police cordon, and the major networks pick up the feed. It runs with the Five O'clock news. CNN posts a short blurb on it's website, and the comments section for that article devolves into posters laughing because they know all of this is just viral marketing and CNN fell for it, or that CNN is behind the curve on tech stories.

Sometime around 8 at night, the networks interrupt programming with a report on a riot in Patient Zero's hometown. More video is posted on Youtube, and social media is buzzing with the news that this shit might just be real. By the time the 11 o'clock news comes on, zombie hunters are loading up and heading out to the infection zones only to be arrested or turned back by police and NG units.

Three weeks later, the .gov might say something about zombies.

by **bcvojak** » Mon Apr 02, 2012 4:51 pm

Babidoll85 wrote:How long do you think it would take the government to inform us of a zombie invasion? Would I find out by looking out my window? Would it come across my tv? Will it be too late? Well, it wouldn't be too late for me since I've decided to be bad ass, but ya know, the average person.

Watch the movie "Dead Air" (aka Pontypool) . . . Though I guess it is technically an "infection" movie as the dead don't come back to life.

I love the scene where the chick reporter is standing in the middle of the raging zombies thinking that she will be safe because she's a reporter. . . .

She was wrong . . .

by **Niblick** » Mon Apr 02, 2012 6:27 pm

Pontypool was awesome. Honestly, I'm not too worried about a wide spread zombie pandemic because of all of the firearms here in the US. I feel like we would find out later rather than sooner, but with how popular zombies are in today's society, maybe the first eye witness would get it right.

by **duodecima** » Mon Apr 02, 2012 6:39 pm

Niblick wrote:Pontypool was awesome. Honestly, I'm not too worried about a wide spread zombie pandemic because of all of the firearms here in the US. I feel like we would find out later rather than sooner, but with how popular zombies are in today's society, maybe the first eye witness would get it right.

Only if they actually look like what they're "supposed to" in the movies.

by **tedbeau** » Tue Apr 03, 2012 11:18 am

duodecima wrote:
Niblick wrote:Pontypool was awesome. Honestly, I'm not too worried about a wide spread zombie pandemic because of all of the firearms here in the US. I feel like we would find out later rather than sooner, but with how popular zombies are in today's society, maybe the first eye witness would get it right.

Only if they actually look like what they're "supposed to" in the movies.

WOW! This opens up a whole new thread! What if Zombies don't have grey skin and blood dripping from their mouths? How would you go about identifying Zombies if they looked and walked like normal people until they grabbed you and bit you?