The Walking Dead, a Horticultural Lament

Beefs with Walking Dead

I’ve been pretty impressed by the responses I have received for my blog re: the whole Duck Dynasty / Phil Robertson blow up.  So, I figured I would throw another one out there which focuses on a popular TV show, from my own, very personal perspective. 

One of my favorite shows of the past few years is The Walking Dead.  Yes, it is a tired premise.  The zombie motif hasn’t been the same since Zombieland.  Those guys just nailed it.  The dystopian genre, among my favorites, should not be limited to the undead, as there are many, very well done shows about the apocalypse (check out the BBC’s Survivors). 

Regardless, The Walking Dead has garnered a huge following.  Bottom line is it is a pretty good show.  I like the premise and the cast’s relationships which have developed thus far.  Now in its 5^th season for those with cable, I’m a little behind the times with seeing the 4^th season, free and streaming, on pollystreaming.com. 

With the first few episodes, several personal peeves surfaced, peeves which had percolated throughout the previous seasons.  However, I can put those peeves aside and suspend disbelief enough to deeply enjoy the show.  However, again, these peeves cannot go unaddressed.  Secretly, I wish for a job as a continuity editor on such a show, so this could serve as a brief C.V.

Season 4 finds our heroes and heroines holed up in a prison.  As with the preceding episodes, it takes place in the south, apparently in Georgia.  My elation that a big budget show would take on filming in the South is hard to contain.  The native vegetation seen on screen enhances the authenticity of this.  I am so glad to see a show that isn’t obviously filmed in the west.

Many episodes show the characters out in the woods.  Daryl is a product of this back woods, bred in the wild characters.  Hershel, with his agrarian background, small town vet persona, is perfect and does not betray his authenticity through his accent.  Rick, the key figure, is convincingly died in the wool good ole boy.

Herein lie my grievances.  Some of these gripes originate long before Season 4, but, as I am currently working to beef up my blog, and could not take it anymore, I am speaking out.  There is no excuse for these flubs.

First, let us examine Hershel’s collection of Elderberry with the intent of treating those infected with a strange leap from bite infections to some other vector.  Elderberry has been known for centuries as having antioxidant, antiviral, and anti-inflammatory properties.    His premise is that this is a natural, readily available herb which could hold off the rampant contagion turning healthy folk into zombies, without the previously isolated case of bites.

All of this makes perfect sense to me.  During a working summer in an English garden, my cottage was visited by some Travelers wishing to harvest the prolific berries of the 20’ tall Elderberry in my backyard.  Sure, why not.  The Travelers were a demographic I could relate to, having spent several years deeply enamored with the Grateful Dead.  These folks were basically a travelling parking lot event, living the dream.

The huge drupes of fruit were there for the taking.  The Travelers offered to cook me supper and libation in return for the favor.  Their goal was to collect the fruit with which to make medicinal concoctions and juice.  The flowers were also prized earlier in the season.  Quickly, they set up orchard ladders and harvested a ridiculous amount of fruit; snip, snip, dropping fruiting heads 8” across into their bags.

So, Hershel goes into the obviously Oak / Hickory forest and begins harvesting plants, making it known his intent.  The problem is two fold: 1)  The plants he was harvesting were undeniably recently planted.  Their crowns were above ground and they were arranged in a most unnatural way, and incredibly uniform.  2)  The harvested plants were far from being Elderberry.  Elderberry has a palmate leaf (I think that is the term) whereas this plant had a simple ovate leaf.  Busted.

Next faux pa was with some cover applied to the set.  Often, to give the atmosphere of overgrown, loads of viney plants are placed around the set.  In one segment, Tyreese, Daryl, and Michonne  go to town, hoping to harvest some pharmaceuticals  and whatever else worthwhile can be salvaged with the hope of saving their ailing friends.  In the process, they hack their way through loads of vegetation to access a vehicle.

Here’s the rub:  the vines they are hacking, which are a very prominent part of our southern proliferation, are very visibly without life support.  By this, I mean that it is obvious the vines, stretching from ground level into the trees tens of yards above, are blatantly beyond life.   The leaves are withered or scorched, perfect testaments to having been cut, placed, and subjected to too much heat and lack of water. 

Then, here comes a biggie, one which always annoys me across the board of post-apocalyptic shows, is the height of the grass. In every example I have seen, the grass has been cut within the last month.  With The Walking Dead, let us assume society collapsed at least 2 years before Season 4 debuted. 

This past year, I injured my hip in February, had surgery in May, and have been lame since the beginning.  Only through the good will of friends did I get my grass cut this season.  The first cut was chest high with a brush mower, which struggled with the volume of grass.  After that, two cuts with a heavy duty riding mower were required before one could even saunter out to the back garden.  There is no way in hell grass could be kept at the height shown without regular maintenance. 

Then there is Carol and Rick’s venture into a subdivision to reconnoiter supplies.  Along their way, they discover some other survivors who have made do with the natural bounty available.  Carol and Rick go out foraging and stumble upon a great harvest of tomatoes. Summertime in Georgia, what could be more natural than ripe tomatoes?

Let’s look at the tomato.  First, it is an annual.  This means one must plant it every year to yield a plant and fruit.  Of course, tomatoes are notorious for self-seeding, planting themselves wherever ripe fruit set seed.  I have grown self-sown toms, loved the random results, and not  paid much attention.  What bugged me about these plants is they were perfectly staked, with an assumed period of neglect.

Tomatoes require constant attention in their growing life.  They will quickly shoot up to 6’or 9’.  To produce good fruit, one must monitor and manage this.  Such was not the case in this episode.  Wondering through an urban wasteland, our compatriots discover multiple, perfect tomato plants and harvest bags full.

Last, but by no means least, there is the choice of material for reinforcing the perimeter fence securing the prison from the beasties.  As the hordes of undead pressed against this defense, the fence began to give way.  Huge walls of chain link fence, bolstered by steel poles set in the ground, and topped with razor wire, began to fall.  Here, we have a very existential threat.

Of course, this was not a total surprise.  Everyone could see it coming, including the characters.  They took proactive action by placing poles to reinforce the actual fence.  Unfortunately, they once again made a strategic mistake.  They used pine poles.

Pine is good wood, if you want a bazillion 2x4s or other dimensional lumber.  If you are fighting zombies, I would highly recommend going with something with less flex and a longer life span when exposed to the elements.  It’s Georgia.  Cedars are not a scarce commodity.  They last forever.

Dear Reader, thank you for sticking with me through this rant.

Duck Dynasty Delimma and Why It Matters to Me

December 19, 2013

Sooo….Duck Dynasty’s patriarch, Phil Robertson made some remarks in a GQ magazine interview where he expressed his fundamental / evangelical Christian views regarding homosexuals, as per his interpretation of the Bible.  In response, A&E (a subset of Hearst and Disney corporations) put him on an indefinite probation from the show.  The issue has overwhelmed the internet.  Fully half of my Facebook feed is full of such, with some posts surprising me in their rigidity and origin.

Before going any further, my biases need explanation, especially as these biases have me confounded on what to think about the hooha.  This is not to say I think the whole blow up really deserves the attention it is getting.  Why I think that will be explained below.

Above all, I think celebrity worship is just plain silly.  Granted, sometimes when celebrity becomes a lightning rod for real issues, speaking out, or seriously considering one’s stance, it is important.  This is one of those instances.

In regards to my feelings on homosexuality, I really don’t feel one way the other about it, especially in regards to right or wrong.  Judge not, the shortest chapter in the Bible, is one foundation of my personal religious views.  I have known several people who either knew they were gay for a long time, and others who later discovered, realized, or came out about their sexuality, never feeling threatened or imposed upon by their orientation.  

In the former category, I could point to one gentleman who I worked with previously.  He is a wonderful man, probably 10 years my senior, who I would like to count as a good friend from that epoch of my life.  His sexuality was never an issue, an obstacle, or uncomfortable in regards to our friendship.  Beyond that, he was very OK with educating this naïve small town boy about issues regarding homosexuality.  For context, this was 1990 + Atlanta where a large homosexual population existed during the peak horror of the AIDS plague. 

In the latter category, several women I know realized their sexuality after we had active relations.  During college days, I was head over heels in love with several women who later came out.  In one case in particular, I made substantial life decisions to enhance the potential for a relationship.  With others, as early as high school, I enjoyed an active boyfriend / girlfriend relationship, a random make out session, or a pining hard core crush, only to learn later in life that they had come to their personal truth and I was no longer in the pool of candidates for their affection.  Despite this bummer, they still have my respect and friendship, if not longing thoughts about romance.

My 10 year old son and I are huge fans of Duck Dynasty.  We watch a lot of videos when we are together, especially since I had a hip injury followed by surgery and have been pretty much lame since last February.  I have pretty rigorous criteria for what we watch, be it movies, YouTube videos, or TV shows. 

First, there is entertainment value for both of us.   There needs to be some greater redeeming value.  Examples of this are valuable video experiences which I impose (Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid most recently), talking cat videos, or shows which have something to teach respectively.  The last category is best exemplified by Mythbusters which discretely inserts proper scientific inquiry into good fun.  This category shows him experiences he might otherwise miss, expose him to possible career ideas (Making the Cut comes to mind as he has thought about Secret Service / Spy / Special Ops jobs, as most little boys do).  Good fun, good clean fun, is the overriding, basic qualification. 

Duck Dynasty largely satisfies these criteria.  We both enjoy the largely innocuous show.  The Robertson clan is very funny, often witty, and offers insight into another lifestyle’s detail.  We have shared laughs which had us doubled up while watching. 

My son has fallen in love with shooting and guns over the past few years, often badgering me for an opportunity to go hunting for squirrel and even deer.  Recently, Phil was shown gutting a catfish with his very queasy young granddaughters.  I believe this was my son’s first exposure to the necessary gore inherent in processing game.  Having hunted quite a bit in the past, the ethos of eat what you kill is a core belief.  This obviously entails having the fortitude to clean your kill.  I asked my son if he could gut an animal.  He shivered and said absolutely not.  Good life lesson, good argument for the next time he wants to go hunt.  There is no catch and release when you shoot something as opposed to hook something. 

I have known many Robertson-esque people in my life, some of whom are much loved, very large influences on both my son and me.  I relish their interactions with both of us.  When in high school, in rural Kentucky, kids were given a free pass to skip class twice a year:  during tobacco harvest, when the family income depended on their help, and the opening of deer season, when the family larder depended on their help.

Going deeper into personal beliefs, I have long believed the “of the earth” folks are more valuable now than ever before and have more to teach our modernized, tech dependent society in invaluable ways.  I tried to gear my life in that direction for several decades, only to learn the uncomfortable challenges which that way of life dictates, what it means to live that close to the bone or depend on the bounty of nature to support one.

I believe all of us in modern America could learn some very valuable lessons from the Robertsons.  Beyond the above, such would include entrepreneurship, dealing with hard times, life in a family business (another dashed hope of mine), and what the deep south or rural America is about.

The Robertsons, for better or worse, do not pull any punches.  You see what they are genuinely about with every show.  From beheading ducks in front of an elementary school class to Phil’s frequent appearances on the pulpit.  In other words, you get what you pay for.  I don’t feel they are pushing anything beyond the importance of being a redneck over being a yuppie, the importance of educating the younger generations about the same, and the requirement that one should be able to pee off the front porch without consequences.  It is what it is.

I have known, do know, and value knowing many who are fairly rigid in their religious belief, be it Christian, Buddhist, Jewish or Muslim.  I don’t feel the need to challenge them in their beliefs, nor do I feel the need to accept their views as the gospel.   Under no circumstances do I appreciate having one’s views forced upon me, regardless of those views’ political, religious, cosmological or whatever connotations.  I have found that I can see beyond the motivation to convert and accept and love those doing the converting.

As an aside, several times in my life I have opened my door and welcomed into my home proselytizers, mainly of the Church of the Latter Day Saints missionary bent.  Once, this was a devious, you asked for it way.  Two young Mormons showed up at my door mid-morning, about 10 am.  The visit was during the annual three day run for the Grateful Dead in Atlanta, circa 1991.   As the front yard would attest, full of bumper sticker covered microbuses and ratty cars, the house was full of sleeping dead heads, about 40 of them, scattered on couches and the floor.

When the fresh faced chaps knocked on the door, and I was the only person fully conscious at the time, I thought it would be a mutually educational experience to invite them in.  As is my experience with missionaries, they weren’t forcing anything on me, but giving me an opportunity to be educated.  From my hospitality, they got the same.  Beer cans and other detritus from a party which only ended a couple hours before, bleary eyed roommates and guests beginning to stir, surely made an impression.  I got a free Book of Mormon, and a couple others joined us on the couches in the living room for parts of the visit.  After they left, hoots and hollers resounded through the house, those of us experiencing it howling at the perceived impact on the fresh young fellows, those just rousing wondering what the hell just happened.

Bottom line – I respect these guys who wonder all over the planet to espouse their beliefs, regardless of how annoying I selfishly felt their intrusion.  In the multiple encounters I have had with missionaries, they have, to a man, not said you will burn for eternity if you don’t follow our dogma.  They are there to share and educate, fulfill their religious dictates, from my experience.  They operate on the presumption that what they are doing is a “low kill” proposition, few converts will emerge, but their job is to keep on keeping on in step with their beliefs. 

So, to the crux of the issue, Phil Robertson vs A&E.  This bit will most likely be less verbose than the preliminary groundwork.  On the one hand, there is Phil, a self-confessed Bible thumper, espousing his thoughts on homosexuality.  On the other hand, there is A&E distancing themselves from these divisive comments.  Each is standing by what they believe to be the right thing.

This dilemma has several tangents.  Personal / corporate belief, constitutional rights (free speech, religious freedom), and commercial viability come to mind.  I will address these in no particular order.

The First Amendment:  “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.” (Wikipedia).  Ergo, Phil and GQ had every latitude in delving into the subject.

Capitalism dictates placating those who pay the bills.  In regard to the network, they must cover their asses as to where those ever important advertising dollars come from.  This nugget of functionality requires action.

Here, I will opine.  Both parties had the right to act as they did, with the caveat of “at your own peril”.  For Phil, repercussions were obvious.  He is a celebrity.  Anything that comes out of his mouth is going viral.  For A&E, they must, first and foremost, as big business, ensure income and thus fear the implications.  I will withhold opinion on the legitimacy of the LBGT community’s complaints, they are free to fight as hard as they can afford to.

As things go, I think A&E will get the short stick.  The advertisers may fall lock step behind the network’s actions.  The big however is A&E sure as hell knew what they were getting into.  The Robertson’s faith, and other philosophies, is front and center.  If the network airs bits of Phil’s sermons as a part of the show, extrapolating his personal beliefs isn’t rocket science.  Therefore, the network should have seen it coming. 

What is the potential outcome?  My gut says a great deal, if not the majority; of the Duck Dynasty fans appreciate the Robertson’s lifestyle and beliefs.  That is why they watch.  The most popular reality TV show ever is largely buttressed by these lifestyle and belief issues.  Bottom line – A&E is going to see an enormous backlash from viewers and will have to reconcile this with advertisers’ input.  This doesn’t even consider the reaction from the rest of the Robertson clan and the viability of the show.

In sum, I really don’t think either party is in the wrong, entirely.  I do think Phil was frank and sincere, and forthcoming in his acceptance and lack of judgment of others, despite his personal convictions.  A&E is covering their corporate ass, with no concern for the greater philosophically significant aspects of the situation.  14 million viewers, and huge swaths of America, cannot be ignored or suppressed, regardless of a divergence in opinion.

My bet is A&E will lose the Robertsons or, at least, this battle.  The Duck Dynasty will continue whether or not on the network.  I vote for personal conviction over corporate paranoia, despite my support and empathy for the LGBT community or my questioning of the Bible as the true word of God.

see also:
http://www.npr.org/blogs/monkeysee/2013/12/19/255430555/duck-and-cover-what-exactly-is-the-point
 http://benswann.com/michael-lotfi-duck-commander-phil-robertsons-first-amendment-rights-violated/

update:  duck commander (the robertson family) responds - http://duckcommander.com/news/robertson-family-offical-statement#.UrOnrAIUZ5Q.facebook