Why Mourn Death Instead of Suffering?
Noticed recently that the media over here was once again making a huge story out of the death of a person who had been dying for quite some time, and this made me get back to this question. I seem to recall stumbling into a reasonable amount of coverage back when his illness was discovered, but barely a few brief notices more recently, when it could quite clearly be said that he was dying, and next to nothing in between, yet the day he died the story exploded everywhere, including both the mourning and the recognition we have come to expect.
Now that would make perfect sense if we’d be talking of a sudden, shocking death, but when the death was expected and came after a period of suffering, shouldn’t all of this have been expressed earlier? Under these circumstances, shouldn’t any respect or recognition be presented while the person is still alive, and perhaps particularly during this last portion of their life marked by such suffering, if it will bring them some small amount of comfort to notice that they are and will continue to be fondly remembered while they’re still able to actually notice that? And shouldn’t the sadness be caused by the suffering itself, or if specific moments are needed then by the failure of a treatment or at the very least by the moment when the condition clearly takes what is expected to be a final turn for the worse?
If anything, since such a death marks the end of suffering, it should be at least a reason for relief, if not even some subdued celebration, yet what we have are funerals and later commemorations, both of which are usually sad affairs, plus all of this coverage focused on the death when the person was more or less famous or had otherwise attracted the attention of the media. All of these rituals, be they religious or secular, seem so deeply entrenched that they’re not only not questioned, but actually cause those who’d shun them to be seen as strange at best. On the other hand, despite being far more likely to have a positive impact even if only thanks to the placebo effect, an elaborate healing ritual would frequently be seen as superstition, foolish or primitive, while a sending off one done before the person’s death and with their direct involvement would likely be a great shock and possibly generate particularly negative reactions.
Of course, the fact that people frequently tend to do things simply because “that’s how it’s always been done” or, if they analyze the options at all, they do so very irrationally and pick the one that makes the least sense is nothing new, and when it comes to death this discussion could easily be expanded to burial as well, not to mention to the right to die at the time and in the manner of one’s own choosing, but those are topics for another time. This was only meant to be a brief rant triggered by something I happened to notice once again recently, so I’ll leave it at that for now.
