John: I've been fooled before. I've talked to some dogs who I think were actually talking, and I talked to some dogs who I think were just eating peanut butter.
Dave: Yeah, does Molly just have peanut butter in her mouth?
I’ve been thinking about the various bad guys through the first book and how people act when they’re possessed/under the influence, particularly because it always bothered me that it was never explicitly stated when/how Sheriff Appleton was possessed by the flying white things. I’m pretty sure he was possessed when he found Justin White being taken over in the fake Jamaican’s house, because that’s just what makes the most sense to me, but then I was stuck wondering why he didn’t seem to behave outside the norm until his eyes blew out in the car.
I was reading the scene in the abandoned mall yesterday, where Dave is possessed by the shadow man until Krissy draws it out and kills it herself, and it got me thinking about Dave’s behavior. He starts to think about his relationships to other people, and the shadow being inside him twists everything to make it seem like everyone he knows is taking advantage of him and of the planet they live in. And the thing is, the shadow being isn’t wrong. I just think that it’s like that argument about whether or not people can feel selfless love, or if it’s all really based on returns. The idea behind that is that no one truly loves anyone else, we just appreciate what they bring into our lives - a parent loves their child because the child continues their genetic lineage, we love our romantic partners because they help take care of us/give us sex/help us pay rent, etc etc. And as far as I know, it’s a pretty solid argument. I choose not to believe that because it depresses me, so I have to believe in real selfless love.
I also think that religion is based around the idea of love, and that’s why it’s so prevalent across so many cultures. Loving one another is beneficial for our species, and it’s at the core of every spiritual guideline I can think of.
And this is where all that ties back into the book - I think the shadow people and the flying white things, all that stuff, suppress or take away the characters’ ability to feel selfless love and compassion/empathy. Appleton loses the ability to care about the people he’s sworn to protect, so his shooting Dave, burning the Jamaican’s trailer down, shooting and burning Shitload, is all born out of self-preservation and lack of concern for others well-being.
Same with Dave - when he’s possessed by the shadow person, he doesn’t care about John or Krissy, or any consequences. He wants what he wants (which I think is magnified in him more than it was for Appleton, because Dave has a serious dark side and a shakier moral compass) and he goes after it mercilessly.
Krissy wasn’t affected like that, because she (and, I think, Amy) has a strong moral compass and a deep, real love. She also has her religious views (and their associated icons) to help ground her.
I was also thinking that part of the reason that christian religous items work so well as a ward against the shadow people throughout the book is because they’re fmiliar - everyone in Undisclosed is familiar with those symbols and at least has a good idea what they represent. The cross forces the shadow man out of Dave not because it has any real power by itself, but because it serves as a reminder of love, and it reminds the deep parts of Dave what it means to care about other people as unselfishly as he can.
Apathy, and even deeper, hatred, work as powerful tools for those that are trying to tear Dave’s world apart, because it divides person against person. It’s also one of their more powerful tools because that’s what they feel towards humanity - hatred and disgust for our behaviors, our drive for species growth and preservation even at the cost of other life forms on our planet.
This is getting really long so I have to cut it off, but I have more thoughts about how that ties into the spiders of book two!
