Tuesday, August 02, 2016

Is this what's done, now?



So there's this blog that I check in on once in a blue moon.  I don't check in more often because it's very much a "mommy" blog, one of those where seemingly every action of every member of the family is documented obsessively with photoshopped pics, so meh.  But  I checked in recently for the first time in a few months to find that the woman's husband had passed away from an aggressive form of cancer, leaving her to raise their five young children.

So terribly sad.

And the woman had had a couple of friends of hers take photos of the funeral.

Lots of photos.

All skillfully taken, artfully lit, and filtered.  Including photos of the children grieving, and the woman sorrowfully bending over her husband's casket.

And the woman put the photos up on her blog.

And I just ... is this a thing, now?  Taking photos at funerals?  and then photoshopping the photos to get the best shot?  I mean, I know they photographed caskets, etc. in the early 1900s, when "post-mortem" photography was a creepy thing (confession time) (they sometimes posed the corpses to make them look alive, oh YUCK)  but now?  Today?  And then posting them to the internet, where any schmo, myself included, can look at them?  why?

Please tell me this is not a thing, now.  Please.  Because looking at the grief-filled pics of a stranger's funeral seems an awful lot like rubbernecking at a traffic accident, i.e., not something to be encouraged.  And now I feel petty just for commenting about it.  Ick.



5 comments:

Connie - Tails from the Foster Kittens said...

we all grieve in different ways. While it is not my choice.. I'd like to forgo the funeral all togeter.. I figure to each their own.

Domestic Kate said...

I can't blame people I guess. Unfortunately, families often don't get together unless someone dies, so it's a rare opportunity to get everyone together, dressed up, etc. I'm uncomfortable with it too, though.

~~Silk said...

As I'd mentioned, nobody ever tells me someone has died until they've been long buried. Long after Gramma died, I happened to see a photo my mother had taken of Gramma in her coffin. That's the first time I really believed she was gone. I never saw a photo from my father's funeral, so it was many years before I stopped being afraid of him suddenly attacking. I've often thought that the purpose of a funeral is on the surface to honor the dead, but deep down is actually to confirm that they're indeed really truly dead.

You've never heard of the Victorian practice? http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-36389581

~~Silk said...

Oops, just reread the post, and yeah, you do know about the Victorian thing. Ne'mind.

rockygrace said...

haha, Silk, I can think of SEVERAL people whose funerals I'll prolly attend just to reassure myself that they're dead.