Presiding over your own funeral. Cool or Creepy?

[peter]

Bilbo Bagins idea of giving a party and just disappearing has always held a bit of appeal to me - but it also has a 'ring' of showiness, of over inflated self-importance if you like, that I'm not comfortable with - and I don't have a community of Elves to disapear off to.

I once attended a wedding where at the start of the ceremony the brides brother stood up rather embarrassedly and thanked us all for coming - and then told us that here wouldn't actually be a wedding because the couple had gotten wed in secret some months before, but we were welcome to still have a party which we did!
I acted as pall bearer at the same chap's father's funeral, during the heat of the summer and in the days before good refrigeration in morgues (I guess). Suffice to say that from the front pew in the church it was unpleasant and embarrassing to see the nasty little swarm of flies that were circling above the thankfully closed coffin, and probably has much to do with the aversion I have to both funerals and flies to this day!

[Sorus]

Fully agree Sorus. In the UK funerals have become a way of rinsing money out of people who are at here most vulnerable.

I agree with that, but I also find the customs fascinating. (Though I would not want them for myself.)

[peter]

I also believe that ones mortal remains should immediately revert to being the property of the state upon ones demise, who should upon completion of the customary three days of being laid out, incinerate the carcass without further ado. This would end the rinsing carnival of the undertaking process, alleviate the financial burden placed upon often impoverished families and free people to pursue remembrance celebrations as they see fit without the burden of a corpse to deal with.

[Sorus]

I would be okay with that, personally, but I don't see it catching on. People are too tied up in the idea of rituals and monuments, traditions and obligations and don't even get me started on religions.

[Avatar]

Yep...cremate them all and recycle the ashes.

--A

[Ur Dead]

Yep...cremate them all and recycle the ashes.

--A

That what I am planning. No recycle.. I'll poison the ground..
A short viewing at the church.
Services. (Using the "Rent a casket" then they can sell it saying that it was used once)
After services.. feed the attendees
Take me out a make an ash out of me.
I urn to be put in my niche during the graveyard shift.(No services)

Right now I am paying for the niche.
Will get urn and other funeral expenses later.

[Avatar]

It's the viewings that freak me out. Why would you want to gaze upon the lifeless body of your friends or relatives? Just weird.

--A

[Sorus]

I agree with that, but I also find it fascinating from an anthropological perspective. And I also know that technology already has a role in such things, with people attending funerals long-distance via Skype and whatnot. The AI thing is really not far-fetched.

[peter]

It's the viewings that freak me out. Why would you want to gaze upon the lifeless body of your friends or relatives? Just weird.

--A

Completely! Worked with a girl who even took photos of her dead brother and offered to show them to me. No!!!

[Wosbald]

+JMJ+

I also believe that ones mortal remains should immediately revert to being the property of the state upon ones demise …

Wouldn't this formulation (i.e. reverting) imply that men are, originarily, the property of the State? That this proposes a sort of "Urstaat" as an anthropological first principle?

[peter]

Agreed Wos - badly put.

[Avatar]

Easily remedied by replacing "revert" with "become."

--A

[peter]

I believe ones mortal remains are the property of the State - in the UK at least. If you had some highly contagious condition, or there were questions about your death etc, I think the legislation is already in place for the state not to release (and probably even dispose of) your corpse.

[Avatar]

I'd be fine with that. I have no use for it after I'm gone...

--A

[peter]

I want mine compressed into a diamond with my name laser etched into it's surface so it will last forever......

Or made into fireworks so my friends can sip champagne as I am fired into the night sky over their celebrating heads......


Not!

[Ur Dead]

I want mine compressed into a diamond with my name laser etched into it's surface so it will last forever......

Or made into fireworks so my friends can sip champagne as I am fired into the night sky over their celebrating heads......

/sings -- Peter in the sky with diamonds.......

[Sorus]

It's the viewings that freak me out. Why would you want to gaze upon the lifeless body of your friends or relatives? Just weird.

--A

Completely! Worked with a girl who even took photos of her dead brother and offered to show them to me. No!!!

People have been doing that for as long as they've had cameras - but it made sense (sort of?) in the olden days when you might not have had any pictures of the person when they were alive. Nowadays you're bound to have any number of pictures of your friend or relative when they were alive and well, and I can't really understand the thought process behind wanting to document the funeral - much less show it off to people who weren't there and/or didn't know the person. I do still find it fascinating though. Funeral customs in general are fascinating, whatever culture or era they're from.

[Avatar]

Yeah, that Victorian death photography, with the corpses of little children and shit. Pretty gruesome by our standards.

--A

[Sorus]

And yet, people in that era had - I don't even know how to put it - a healthier? more realistic? attitude toward death in general. Now it's all about denial. In my family, it was always a taboo subject, but it was also always close to the surface, always the elephant in the room. (Granted, any vaguely controversial subject was taboo. There were so many elephants in the room sometimes it was a wonder any of us could move.)

[Avatar]

Can't really disagree with that. In fact, it's one of the last great taboos, which is pretty odd, considering it happens to all of us.

Now we're so removed from it (at least in so-called "first world" countries) that, like any other bad thing, we try desperately to pretend it doesn't exist.

--A