The Extreme History Project

There is a highly contagious and deadly disease of mass destruction among us which has the potential to destroy all of the earth and its creatures. At least there is according to authors Jack Forbes and Paul Levy. These authors have laid out a fascinating theory, based on Jungian psychology, to explain the long history of human and cultural annihilation since the beginnings of “civilization.” In each of their books Columbus and other Cannibals: The Wetiko disease of Exploitation, Imperialism, and Terrorism (Forbes) and Dispelling Wetiko: Breaking the Curse of Evil (Levy), they name this form of collective psychosis “Wetiko,” a Cree Indian term which means “a diabolically wicked person or spirit who terrorizes others by means of evil acts” or by Levy’s more psychological term, “Malignant Egophrenia.” These names refer to a pattern of behavior which separates a person from their own sense of humanity and destroys their ability to see humanity in others. Coupled with greed for power, Wetiko creates such anti-human behavior as slavery, imperialism, exploitation and terrorism. Such behavior, Levy argues, is like the body being taken over by an alien or demon which displaces the human and, like a zombie, enables him or her to act against their own sense of humanity.

This disease is also highly contagious and has spread, like a zombie invasion, throughout most of Western Culture. It is so inherent in us, that we don’t even recognize it. It is just this disease, according to Levy, that actively destroys the environment through corporate greed and perpetuates the military industrial complex. Indeed, the entire sweep of agricultural and industrial history and its destructive wake of humanity, culture and environment has been caused by this “ME” disease and those of us not actively pursuing it, are passively allowing it because of our own diseased psyches. There is a cure, though, by returning the inflicted’s own sense of humanity and understanding of our own connectedness, we can start to heal all of us from the deadly consequences of this collective psychosis and save ourselves from the coming zombie apocalypse.