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Back during the run up to Y2K, there was a guy calling him self Salesman who frequented certain AOL chat rooms, trying to persuade people of the danger of "Y2K-induced zombification". This is a term for which a Google search returns no results, but seemed to refer to people turning into zombies for no reason other than the two zeros going up at midnight, December 31, 1999.
As it happened, it didn't turn out that way, although as recently as 2006 the Democrats were fretting about zombification technology being used by the police against their constituents. Like anybody could tell.
Our experience with zombies ended in about 1984, when we finally quit drinking. However, we understand that not everyone has the same experience, and there are people who worry about this sort of thing, including David Hambling, who writes for Danger Room (What's next in national security") at wired.com.
He suggests:

Step one, Know Your Zombies.

The idea of the zombie derives from Voodoo lore. Voodoo (or voudou or vodun) is a much maligned and misunderstood religion; the popular idea of it in the United States and Europe is about as close to the reality as Satanism is to the Catholic church. Anyone using voodoo for evil (a bokor) is the equivalent of the guys who carry out ceremonies in deserted churches with pentagrams and goat's blood.

In any case, zombies do not feature in the original West African voodoo; the idea of a person drained of their soul and forced to obey a master only appeared in the Americas. These we could class as Natural Zombies. If you believe anthropologist Wade Davis, these are created by poisoning the victim with 'zombie powder' which includes puffer fish venom (tetrodotoxin). Supposedly this causes a death-like coma and brain damage which turns the victim into a pliable slaves. These zombies are harmless; you don?t need to shoot them, but watch out for the bokor who controls them.

Then there are Supernatural Zombies, corpses possessed by spirits or demonic powers. If they are animated by angelic spirits (as in the Rime of The Ancient Mariner), then they are here to help. If they are animated by something demonic (as in The Evil Dead), then firearms may be of limited use as they are beyond the laws of nature. Consult your priest, Rabbi, guru or shaman for further advice. Unless you're one of the ultra-cool gangsters in the terrific zombie/yakuza flick Versus, that is -- in which case, gunning down zombies is all in a day's work.

A lot more lives here.
Nothing there about political, progressive, green or anti-globalism zombies or for that matter about reanimated Yippies mindlessly seeking 1968 in a futile search to recapture their lost youth, but we're sure the local polizei can cope.

Full post as published by West Neanderthal Drive on April 03, 2008 (boomark / email).