Category: Let's talk
at the weekend a young girl was murdered in reading. it's a bit complicated but basically her and her friend were taken by car to a guest house, asalted, and her body was later found in a park with her friend who had been shot but was just seriously hurt. But today her family/friends spoke out about what a popular girl she was, how she had lots of friends ... etc, and it struck me. whenever there is a high profile murder or someone young dies, it's always someone who had the most friends, always someone who was totally popular. so, is it just that people won't speak ill about the dead? or do only the good die young.
People won't speak ill of the dead, except a small minority. Take that teenage girl from Shropshire who died aged 14 and pregnant. Noone cared that she was pregnant, I heard someone connected with her saying how she would make a good mother. Surely you can't possibly be a good mother at that age, there's schooling and exams and if you devote time to that you can't to your child and if you don't, you won't earn a deesent wage to provide for that child. Obviously, she'd be a disasterous mother, and I don't think they'd say otherwise if she was still alive.
It's awkward. I think that when you're hit with the loss of someone you know, especially someone close to you, it's natural to think of all the good in them you will miss, rather than the bad. Having said that, there's also the expectation to speak only good of the dead. If you are asked to speak about someone you know at their funeral, or for the press, you are expected to say what a wonderful person they were, not point out their human flaws. Personally, I don't think it really does a person any justice to make them into a saint after their death, but that's just me.
this is a very touchy subject for me at the moment, but yeh you're right, only people say good things about them, never the bad. and i do agree, it seems that only the good die young. I lost a friend a few months ago, and like this other girl, she was popular and had a lot of riends, but she died through illness. i think it's sick how someone can just go and murder someone, they must be seriously ill in the head. although me and my friend could have arguments and she'd sometimes do things that were wrong, we always mae up at the end of the day, there was only one night we went without saying goodnight to each other as we shared a room. so yeah, that is what i think.
I couldn't agree more with all who posted here, because there's that old saying don't say something about the dead unless you can say something good, that's what I'm getting from this topic, and I can't help but think of a sertan Iron Maiden song that has these lyrics. "Only the good die young, all the evil seem to live for ever."
that's just it though isn't it. the ww put it totally when he mentioned that girl who was pregnant and murdered. yeh it was sad she was murdered, but it would have been better not to have mentioned the fact she would make a wonderful mother ... etc, if she'd been alive everyone would have said what a disgrace it was that she was pregnant at 14 ... etc. as for this recent girl, well a lot of suggestion is that the crime was somehow motivated by drugs, her attackers were apparently not unknown to her, and yet no one sees fit to mention this.
If only the good die young, then does it mean that the evil ones live to a ripe ld age? Not likely. People probably don't want to say anything bad about somebody who's just died, so they're always portrayed in only the best light.
Well, I think the saying is, the good die young, and the wicked flourish. Well, I was going to give my opinion about the way I look at it when a good person dies young, but I don't think my feelings apply here, since she was murdered, and didn't die of natural causes. As for me, I've never been able to lie about how I felt about someone, and I don't think I would say anything at all if I weren't asked, but I'm not sure I could say anything one way or the other, because there is the saying, don't speak ill of the dead, because they can't defend themselves. Thiswas just a comedy show, but it shows how a person can be put on the spot and have to say nice things about a person who has just died. I don't know if anyone on here ever watched the Jeffersons, but there was the one show where George Jefferson has this really abnoxious worker, who was always viciously attacking the customers, and generally being mean. He said something about it to the man, and the man said, they're idiots. And george said, you even insulted me, your own boss, and the man replied, you're an idiot. Well, george was in the midst of firing him, and he said you are fired, you are dead. And sure enough, the man died then and there from a stroke. The brother of the obnoxious man who had died asked George to give his brother a eulogy. He asked his wife Louise what he could say and how he could give someone like that a eulogy. She asked him what he knew about the man, and george said, he was a loud mouth. She said, well, you could just say he was outspoken. And george said, he was a know it all, so she said, he was knowledgeable. And he was a cheat, so she said, he loved everybody. How's that for a eulogy? a loudmouth know it all becomesoutspoken and knowlegeable, and a cheat becomes someone who loved everybody. Hmm, I wonder if when I die, I'll become honest, outspokenand knowledgeable? I think good things are always said about the dead, no matter who they were. Well, at the funeral, no one was grieving, they were all thinking about what he'd done to them. And hhis brother was thinking, I thought I'd never find someone to do this eulogy.
wonderwoman
If I was to be brutally murdered, I wouldn't wish my life to be judged differently simply because I was dead. I'd like people to say what they'd say if I was alive when commenting on me been dead.