Fear The Walking Dead, Survival Rule of The Week: Grudges

This past week’s episode of Fear The Walking Dead showed just how bad things can get if you can’t bury your grudges.

I know it’s been a little while since I’ve done one of these, and, for that, I apologize. If you’re upset by this, please don’t hold a grudge, it won’t do either of us any good.

I’m kidding, obviously. But, this idea of people letting their personal issues get the better of them can turn out to be a huge problem in a zombie apocalypse.

Leave Your Grudges Behind

Now, obviously, there will be conflicts between people once the zombie apocalypse starts, it’s just human nature. Throughout our history people have had all sorts of reasons for not getting along with one another, some have been spot on, others…have been downright idiotic.

Naturally, these conflicts can get out of hand, and violence can occur. To be quite honest, if a person’s being a relative “That Guy”, I’m not averse to that person getting their face puncherized a little if their otherwise selfish behavior puts people in jeopardy.

However, when people’s personal issues devolve into attempts to kill other people within the group when they aren’t a threat, that is a problem.

Obvious though it may be, the dead won’t care about our relatively petty beefs, they will, ironically enough, just see us…as beef.

While we argue over things that we can’t change or things that might have happened before the world went to Hell, the dead will just march onward, getting a step closer to turning us into a buffet while we squabble.

Now, I must admit, some grudges people within a group may have with one another are bigger than that, they may be based on some perceived wrong done by one group member upon another, perhaps even a fairly severe one. But, unless the perpetrator actively attempted to kill the other party, is it really worth resorting to potentially lethal violence over?

For example, if a person puts down one of your loved ones that has turned into a zombie, is it really worth seeking revenge on them?

Not to go into too much detail, but, once someone’s a zombie…that’s it. They’re dead. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: You can’t cure dead!

I know people will obviously be attached to those they’ve lost, and want to hang onto them for as long as they can, but, nothing can be done for the zombified, other than putting them out of their misery!

Holding a grudge against the person who put one’s zombified loved one down isn’t going to bring them back and it isn’t going to solve anything; the zombie apocalypse will still be there, and those who’ve turned will stay dead, regardless of whether you get some pointless “revenge” on the person who did, frankly, the best thing for them.

And therein lies the overall problem: Should a person attempt to use lethal force on another member of their group, all it ends up doing is creating friction within the group, friction which could ultimately doom it when a larger threat emerges.

Unnecessary grudges like this can only lead to dissension and distrust, making it difficult for the group to trust a particular individual, or a faction within it, should one emerge.

Ultimately, holding grudges over relatively petty things does nobody within a group any good, as it only serves to distract the group from its goal of shared survival. It sows distrust when people need to come together the most. With hostiles and zombies wandering around, the last thing decent people need is a civil war.

If there’s one thing you should take away from my lesson today it’s this: When the zombie apocalypse starts, leave your shit at the door. It won’t help you. It won’t help anyone.

Next: The Walking Dead: What Would YOU Do?

And that is our lesson for today. If you like this and want to find out more rules to survive the zombie apocalypse, why not pick up a copy of my book, The Rules: A Guide To Surviving The Zombie Apocalypse! You can get it on Kindle here and on iTunes here!