By Max Slowik » Fri, April 20 2012

Buyers in record numbers are flooding into gun stores, retailers say. Ammo, too, is flying off the shelves. The reasons for the spike, last seen in 2009, include fears that a second Obama administration might restrict gun ownership and the popularity of TV shows devoted to doomsday preparation and killing zombies… Then there are zombies–zombie movies, zombie comics, zombie novels, zombie TV shows. Americans’ fascination with all things zombie, Parsons says, has grown to such proportions that arms manufactures now have come out with zombie-specific firearms and ammo. Products include a line of Zombie Max ammunition (slogan: “just in case”) made by Hornady Manufacturing. “We can’t keep it in stock,” says Parsons. “It comes in a cool, colorful box with a Zombie on it.” There are more than a dozen manufacturers, says Cris Parsons, 31, owner of a Texas gun store called the Houston Armory, making zombie riffles, some with a picture of a zombie on them The two position on a zombie rifle’s safety, instead of being marked “safe” and “fire,” are labeled “dead” and “undead.”

ABC touches on a couple of explanations for why gun sales are growing fast. First up, naturally, is the perceived possibility of increased gun control over the next electoral horizon. Sure, whatever. There are plenty of people buying just for that reason.

Then there are people who are buying because people are afraid of the possibility of increased gun control are buying, and they want to buy gun stuff before other people buying gun stuff drives the prices of gun stuff through the roof like it did when Barack Obama was first elected. Whew.

Then they throw out zombies. They don’t understand zombies, just point at them and shrug. Zombies!

It’s not all that hard to understand, actually. And that’s where the prepper fits in.

While it’s becoming more and more alright to admit that you like shooting, that you like guns, it’s not the same as saying you like football. This is especially true if you really like guns, and have a whole mess of ‘em. Guns are scary and some guns are even scarier. People make up terms like “modern sporting rifle” but the truth is if your stick looks like an M16 you’re a deranged nutter, a militia type, or a prepper.

But if you’re a big ol’ zombie nerd that’s a totally different deal. Suddenly you’re just a kid at heart with more money than sense, some silly toys that also happen to be guns and a “collection”–not a “stockpile”–of zombie-branded ammo. It’s all about perception.

Zombies turn preparation into a game, even the CDC knows this, and zombies generate the same results, give or take, as the prepper mindset, without all that scary SHTF noise that comes along with it. Even though, let’s face it, if you’re larded up for zombies, hurricane is just another word for rainy day.

Suddenly you’re not waiting to defend yourself in the lawlessness that follows the government going tits up, you’re just waiting for the next God damn season of “The Walking Dead” to come out on Netflix. Your enemy is the imaginary and playful undead horde, not civil tranquility and life as we know it.

Then there’s the simple, unerring truth: zombies are more fun than having your own ball pit with a full bar at the center. Plus, when you dork out on zombies you get a totally boss rifle. Tell me this doesn’t look like a spray pattern of fun:

ABC isn’t the only one who doesn’t get zombies. There’s pretty much the entire gun industry, too. But that’s a different deal entirely.

Don’t forget to print out your own official CDC Zompoc posters for work and at home!