The Walking Dead, Survival Rule Of The Week: People suck
By Liam O'Leary
6) People are cruel.
Right up there with ignorance, people have an amazing capacity for cruelty. Honestly, it’s staggering how cruel people can be, and, you’d think it’s limited to people like murderers or dictators, but…no, there are people who are completely ordinary, yet, can be startlingly cruel when given the opportunity.
Seriously, there are people out there right now who will revel in the misfortunes of others, laughing at other people being beaten to the point of getting brain damage or watching everything they have being destroyed by natural disasters, based on nothing more than what they think the other person thinks. Like I said, it’s staggering.
I wish I could say that people would shelve it during a zombie apocalypse, but, I know that’s wishful thinking. In fact, just like with duplicity, it will actively get worse once the apocalypse hits, for the same reason. With no one and nothing to stop them, many of those people who simply say cruel things, might just take it to the next level and do cruel things. Why? Who knows? Maybe because they’re angry that the world collapsed, maybe because they blame other people for it, maybe because someone did something to them once before, none of them are actually excuses for being cruel to people, but, they’ll convince themselves they are to justify their behavior to themselves.
Once the apocalypse hits though, you’ll have two things to worry about: 1) Making sure you don’t wind up recruiting cruel people and 2) Fighting hostiles who possess this most despicable of characteristics. For the first, I wish there were some kind of warning sign, like they glowed purple or something like that, but, sadly, they don’t. The only way you can weed out cruel people is to watch the people in your group closely, and listen carefully to what they say and how they say it. If there’s someone in your group who revels in the misfortunes of others, be they random people before the outbreak, or people who don’t pose a threat to you or your group once the apocalypse hits, to say nothing of people who are physically cruel to others, that’s about as close to glowing purple as you’re gonna get.
As for dealing with hostiles like that? Treat them the same way you would any other hostile, just be especially sure not to let yourself get captured by them, because, once someone does something like torture you…it’s not something you can undo.
People are cruel enough as it is right now when things are relatively normal, when the zombie apocalypse hits, they, and cruelty in general, will only get worse. Don’t be that way, and don’t let others be that way to you.