The bizare cult of death

The cult of death . . . what the??? Strangers hugging; much wailing and gnashing of teeth; thousands of stupid teddy bears piled up and sixteen billion flowers wilting in the sunshine. What the?? Yes, I’m talking about this cult of death which rears its head every time some one famous kicks the bucket.

I suppose by now one can’t get within a hundred yards of Michael Jackson’s star on the walk of fame what with the mountains of flowers and teddy bears surrounding it and overflowing into the street. And who can get near the Neverland gates for the mounds of death gifts strewn or stacked around them?

Can anybody be that grieved when someone dies? I think not. I think what we are seeing is nothing more than ‘look at me suffering’ narcissistic bone heads who don’t have an original thought produced from within their grey cells.

Is there any chance that this could be genuine grief?? You gotta be kidding. Genuine grief from millions who have nothing better to do than read the gossip columns and watch soaps every day? Not a chance. These people just want nothing else but to be noticed. They want something to make them sound or look important when in the welfare office line up, puffing their ciggies and waiting for their next hand out.

Hey, don’t get me wrong. I’m not knocking poor Mike. I think the young man was a genius. A little bizarre but a genius just the same. In fact he was a lot bizarre. I just question the motive of the hundreds of thousands of keeners who put on such a public display of grief when 99.99999999999999999999% of them had never seen the man. I feel bad at the man’s passing but I have yet to ring National Florists for a delivery to the Neverland Ranch. Michael meant nothing to me.

Damn, maybe I’m missing something. I’m still probably the only human being on this island earth who didn’t lose sleep over the untimely death of Princess Diana. Sorry Di, you really meant nothing to me either, even with your photo ops when you were standing in a cleared mine field. Sure, you did wonderful things for children and charities (as did Michael) but why not; you had the tax payer’s money to do it with and nothing else to do anyway. At least Michael gave a gift of his music to the world. You gave a pissed off Mohamed Al-Fayed.

And what about these piles of teddies, flowers and love notes that appear at the place where some one unfortunately lost their life in an accident or a gang shooting? Most of the people dropping off these useless gifts don’t have a clue who the deceased was. Nope, somebody died, better get my death weeds on and dash down to the site with a teddy bear. To make it worse, these wanna be grievers will – if they have one – drag their child along to show how they too can become a professional griever. Maybe even get their photo in the paper. Have people nothing better to do?

I’m not saying death isn’t a terrible thing. Sure it is to those who knew the deceased whether family or friend. (Not a good thing for the deceased either.) But to gather in moaning mobs at the instant of some celebrity’s death or to keen and pound one’s chest at the death of someone you don’t know, borders on the macabre. Sick too.

Certainly I feel very sad when I read of the death of a child either by accident, disease or foul play but to weep and wail and bare my soul in public is not normal. Okay, okay, so I put a bottle of Jack Daniels on Jim Morrison’s grave over in Paris. But what the hell, it was for Jimmy!