Inside the Current Issue

Sequels: Sex, Zombies and Rock'n'Roll

System of a Down, Mesmerize
George A. Romero, Land of the Dead
Niles Eldredge, Why We Do It: Rethinking Sex and the Selfish Gene

Tony Monchinski

ROCK

Two concept albums dropped in the world of hard rock in 2005, Green Day's American Idiot and System of a Down's (SOAD) Mesmerize. At least I'm told American Idiot is a concept album; I'm still trying to figure out what the concept is as I groove to the first five tracks. SOAD, on the other hand, delivers an eminently rockable album that is only 36 minutes long, leaving metal fans wanting more. Don't fear: rather than release a double album, SOAD chose to put Mesmerize out in May, with the follow-up Hypnotize on its way in the fall.

The element pervading Mesmerize, the follow up album to 2001's successful Toxicity, is pessimism. Toxicity (SOAD's 3rd on a major record label), with its anti-capitalist-cum-spiritual themes took awhile to be received, issuing as it did the week of 9/11. Mesmermize's release finds the U.S. embroiled in Iraq with no end in sight, and it shows on the tracks. The CD's most successful single to date, "B.Y.O.B. (Bring Your Own Bombs)" contains the chorus: "Why don't presidents fight the war/ Why do they always send the poor?" In contrast to suicide bombers, under-armored Humvees and 120 degree heat, we get "Everybody's going to the party have a real good time/ Dancing in the desert blowing up the sunshine," a line which evokes actor James Cromwell's (Babe, Six Feet Under) comment at the Oscars that it was "obscene" that people were dying in Iraq while the glitterati and paparazzi lined the red carpet at another awards show.

The familiar SOAD themes are there. Anti-capitalism abounds. "We're the regulators that deregulate," lead vocalist Serj Tankian croons on "Cigaro," "We're the propagators of all genocide/burning through the worlds resources/ then we turn and hide." Popular culture, of which they are no doubt a part, is taken to task in "Violent Pornography," where guitarist Daron Malakian, sharing more vocals duties than on previous outings, reminds us "It's a violent pornography/ Choking chicks and sodomy/ The kinda shit you get on your TV." Call it "spirituality," the element that abounded on Toxicity is largely absent from this album, although Malakian's "Lost in Hollywood" keeps the theme alive.

Instead we get a bipolar album. At the same time that we are inundated by powerful metal riffs that make one want to get up and break something„try and sit still for the first twenty seconds of "B.Y.O.B."- we bear the lament of "Sad Statue," "You and me/ We'll all go down in history/ With a sad statue of liberty/ And a generation that didn't agree." Later in the same track Serj, in a piercing, plaintive cry, asks "What is it in us that turns a deaf ear to the cries of human suffering?" Of course there is the usual "What the heck are they talking about" lyrics that have confounded some critics (E.g., "Gonorrhea gorgonzola"-- ?).

If you've ever seen the Armenian-American rockers you know they're not your typical rock and roll band, relying on glam and good looks in place of talent. Mesmerize delivers. It's a kick ass metal album put out by progressive artists. Maybe you caught them performing on Saturday Night Live where an f-bomb got by the censors. The CD booklet is printed on recycled materials featuring artwork by Daron's dad. Past albums prove that SOAD aren't content to merely whine about the state of affairs; expect a more-upbeat album when they lay down Hyponotize.

ZOMBIES

If the theme of Mesmerize is one of pessimism, a much bleaker scene could not be imagined than that presented in the long anticipated fourth film in George A. Romero's zombie saga, Land of the Dead. Those familiar with this films predecessors (Night of the Living Dead, Dawn of the Dead, and Day of the Dead) and the host of imitators they spawned are probably already well-schooled in zombie lore. Imagine a world where cannibalistic zombies stagger around craving their next human happy meal. A world where the undead expand exponentially and humans fend as best they can behind electric fences in fortified cities. A nightmare existence that, alas, has done little to extinguish the baser aspects of human nature.

Land in a nutshell: A city of human beings survives, protected by rivers and electrified barriers. The city is a virtual fiefdom of CEO Kaufman (played by a wonderfully low key but hilarious-in-a-black-humor-sort-of-way Dennis Hopper) who resides along with the rest of the rich in the penthouses of Fiddler's Green, a sky scraper that towers over the city's indigent and indignant inhabitants. You might like to think - I sure do! - that humans would draw together in the face of the kind of post-apocalyptic horror they're forced to confront, but they don't. Greed, skullduggery, and venality are the order of the day. Kaufman and his fat cat cronies are protected by a military force and a special mercenary squad that travels out of the city in a heavily armored 18 wheeler-looking fort, the Dead Reckoning (the original title for the film, by the way), bringing back food, supplies and luxury items. Cholo (John Leguizimo, in a fine performance) plays one of the mercenaries who grows too big for his britches. When

Kaufman denies Cholo an apartment in Fiddler's Green, the slighted merc car jacks the Dead Reckoning, drives it out of the protected confines of the city, and threatens to use its multiple missile launchers to blow up the sky scraper. Kaufman has no choice but to send good guy Guy Smiley, I mean Riley (Simon Baker) and his oddball menagerie of literally straight shooting social rejects to wrestle the Dead Reckoning away from Cholo.

The dead movies have long been known for their gore and special effects. That is all apparent here, from a zombie reaching into a victim's mouth and pulling out the esophagus to spinal columns ripped out of backs. What the films have not been known for are their characterization, but in Land Romero shows he has grown as a director. Not only are the human beings here the most likeable and sympathetic of the four films, but the undead are as well. At the same time that Simon is trying to retake the Dead Reckoning, a zombie army is amassing, led by Big Daddy (Eugene Clarke), who was a gasoline-attendant in another life. This zombie shows emotion: from rage at the humans as they mow down his undead brethren to compassion as he uses an assault rifle to end the misery of a caterwauling immolated fellow zombie. Big Daddy is the Che Guevara of zombies, minus the funky beret but plus an appetite for human vittles. He leads the evolution of the zombies. The zombies learn to communicate in a rudimentary manner (text messages and emails are still beyond their grasp). Hmm, if head shots are the only thing that can take out a zombie, then that means they can't drown. And if they can't drown, well then they can just plunge right into a river and walk across the bottom to the other side where they can wreck havoc on rich and poor alike, right? You get the idea.

Romero has always sprinkled social commentary in his zombie flicks and Land is not exempt. Kaufmann, pressed by Cholo's actions, refuses to comply with the demands of "terrorists." When the denizens of Fiddler's Green find themselves between a rock and hard place (literally between an electrified fence and the undead horde), it gives new meaning to the phrase "eat the rich." The good guys in Land include a prostitute and a possibly retarded burn victim.

It's really quite fortuitous that Land got made. Romero has been yearning to do a sequel for the past couple decades, but no major studio was offering the money so he could do it right. In the last few years, with the success of zombie films like 28 Days Later, a remake of Dawn, and Shaun of the Dead, interest and profitability in the undead has been sparked anew. In short, dollars dictated the resurrection of the Romero franchise, not artistic merit or genius, although both of the later ingredients are on display here. One thing's for sure, we can expect a whole slew of zombie movies after this one.

FUCKING

Life leads to death and sex leads to life, and hopefully along the way you're not eating anyone. So you might ask, how does Niles Eldredge's Why We Do It fit into a review of "sequels"? After all, Eldredge, unlike Jared Diamond and Jenna Jameson, hasn't written a book about sex before. Chances are, however, if you're like most other human beings, you spend a good deal of time thinking about sex. Maybe you spend part of the first day in class each new semester perusing the syllabus and checking out the guys or girls in your class, figuring out who's the hottest. Perhaps you wonder what goes on in the booths of the Peep-O-Rama around the corner from the GC, or maybe you've already visited them with your handful of quarters today. Fact is, you've probably already thought about sex sometime following today's sunrise, so bringing the subject of Eldredge's book up is a sequel of sorts to what has been passing through your mind already. Blushing now, right? No need. Eldredge is here to tell you its okay, it's perfectly natural, human even, to think about sex and engage in coitus.

So what else is Eldredge doing with his book? Well, the curator at the American Museum of Natural History is reviving a war of sorts that had momentarily quieted down with the passing of his friend and colleague Stephen Jay Gould. Gould and Eldredge, best known in the natural sciences for their theory of "punctuated equilibrium," were engaged in a battle against a competing faction of evolutionary theorizing exemplified by the work of Richard Dawkins and E.O. Wilson. The two camps agree on a lot but disagree on a couple of important particulars. Gould and Eldredge held that natural selection acts on individual organisms. Dawkins and his camp see selection acting on gene lineages, with the genes "struggle" to replicate driving the history of evolution.

Gould and Eldredge criticized Dawkins as a reductionist, placing too much emphasis on "selfish genes." Gould argued that individual genes usually don't have a consistent enough effect on their bearer's fitness to back Dawkins' claim. Gould held that changes between genetic generations do not accumulate, whereas Dawkins feels it does. Gould is gone now, but not forgotten, and the torch against sociobiology, evolutionary psychology and genetic determinism has been passed to Eldredge.

And it's not like Eldredge isn't a capable opponent. He is. In Why We Do It, he points out that human sexuality includes a lot of practices that don't lead to reproduction. Masturbation, contraception, autoerotic asphyxiation, fisting, Roman showers„none of this results in offspring. So obviously genes can't be driving evolution, right? Well, not necessarily. In his landmark 1976 work, Dawkins posited that human bodies are survival machines for our genes. One of Eldredge's concerns, which he doesn't delve into much in the book besides mentioning it in the first chapter, is political. "ƒto reduce our existence in this manner," he writes, "to see ourselves as mere shells being marched around by our inner genes, is not just bad biology. It verges on a willfully stupid joke or, even worse, a malevolent political doctrine."

I share Eldredge's concern, but I don't think most who subscribe to the selfish gene theory would be willing to write off bad behavior as something our genes make us do, or to embrace Social Darwinism. Indeed, one thing Dawkins has always been very clear about is that, although our genes have programmed us to do what it takes to ensure their survival, we have free will and don't always make decisions that are in line with our gene's preferences. For example, some evolutionary psychologists argue that monogamy isn't natural for the human male, but our society prizes monogamy in marriage and relationships and many people make good faith efforts to see it through. And what about suicide?

Of course, speaking of genes "driving" and "programming" is misleading personification. "We have come to be besotted by genes," fumes Eldredge, "seeing them as the masterminds of the biological universe and as the determinants of all that is human." Yes, Niles, but genes don't think. Human brains in human beings do. And human beings are composed of genes, genes in us that have very successfully been passed down for thousands of years.

Eldredge breaks life processes down into what he calls economics and reproduction. Economics involves finding shelter and food. Reproduction is getting jiggy with it to make babies and ensure the continuation of the species. The thing is, when a couple makes love, even if they do so to create a child, they're not thinking, "Ah, here we go doing our part to continue the species." But, even if this isn't what they're thinking, it is in fact what they are instrumental in doing, and this is the heart of the selfish gene theory.

Everything humans need in order to survive is pleasurable. Starving? Doesn't that food taste good? Freezing? Doesn't it feel great to climb under those blankets? Gotta pee- what a relief to release yourself, right? Much better than having your bladder explode. So why is sex any different? It doesn't matter if it's with ourselves, a member of the same sex, or with a member of the opposite sex but not aimed at reproduction. Enough human beings are going to engage in old fashioned man-woman breeder sex to see that the human race continues.

Eldredge and his concerns are not without merit. I agree with him wholeheartedly that some evolutionary psychologists take genetic determinism to far. For example, I don't think I agree that rape exists because at one time it provided a biological advantage in that the rapist spread more of his genes, an argument some evolutionary psychologists have made. Intellectual fisticuffs like this make for interesting reading. However, given the rise of religious fundamentalism at home in America as well as the rest of the world, I think there are other things Eldredge and Dawkins could spend their time arguing about and against.

Tony Monchinski is a PhD student in the Political Science department.