Is This The New Funeral Etiquette

[lyall]

What is the world coming to when a funeral becomes a photo opportunity! Has anyone encountered this at a funeral, memorial service or wake they have been to? Is it just an American fad?

http://us.cnn.com/2013/10/30/living/selfies-at-funerals-tumblr/index.html

[Mamyalynne]

The very title of the type of photos 'Selfies' says it all really.

[Dee Sa]

we got permission to video my hubby's funeral this was because his mother was too old to make the journey from another country, also two brothers could not make it from there either, I am happy to say the rest made it and they did take photos on their phones of the floral tributes laid outside the chapel.

[Mamyalynne]

Dee Sa, that is wholly different and in a way I wish I had taken a few at my husband's funeral - some strikingly beautiful moments as his beloved Grandchildren blew bubbles at the graveside.


But 'Selfies'....no.

[Canary42]

Just another sign of the relentless take over of society by the Dumbs.

(Encouraged of course by the Mucky Media (e.g. Big Brother, Jeremy Kyle, X-Factor, Cheaters, etc.))

[andy-hughes]

I think its a 'generation' thing - again!

I have had a mobile phone for six years now, and I have yet to take a photo with it.

The notion of taking a photo of myself is as alien to me as talking to strangers on my computer - why would I want to take a picture of myself?

As for even touching my phone at a funeral, that is just utterly insensitive.

If you can't spend an hour or so in contemplation of a lost friend or loved one without needing to get your mobile phone out for any reason, then you don'e belong at the service.

[daffy654]

I've never been to a funeral, I sometimes wonder how at age 45 I have managed to achieve that. When my dad died his second wife banned all of us 7 children he had with my mum from attending his service and cremation, I don't even know where his ashes went afterwards.

[andy-hughes]

You are so lucky Daffy!

By the time I was twenty-five I had attended the funerals of two friends who had commited suicide, and one of my sister's twins who died a few days after birth.

I dread getting older because nature takes its course, and the number of funerals I attend will only be going up.

[B00]

"The notion of taking a photo of myself is as alien to me as talking to strangers on my computer"

Is this not what you're doing now Andy? ;-)

[Old_Geezer]

"The Selfies at Funerals page on Tumblr is a collection of, you guessed it,"
Err... no I didn't, had no idea what such an obscure word could mean.

Whilst to take such a picture because it is a fad for "selfies" is just weird, the general population does embrace weird things that no rational person can understand. But photos at a funeral is not an issue as far as I am concerned. Hardly new. That said I suspect most are taken of the flowers, but the box, well why not if that's what you want the last recorded memory to be of.

[Mamyalynne]

Triggs, sniff !


Daffy, my neighbour upstairs went to her first funeral at age 84 - her own husband. When I enquired, she explained that in her large family women always stayed at home (originated from Liverpool).

I had never ever heard of that before.

[B00]

Taking photos with your dead relatives isn't a new craze either....

https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=victorian+death+photos&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=DkdyUuPKKIKAhAeQ9oDADA&sqi=2&ved=0CCwQsAQ&biw=1366&bih=633

[jno]

well now... I'm not sure Emily Post Jr has really got this right

"You know it's not about you, it's about the deceased"... not exactly. The deceased is beyond caring. Funerals really are social occasions. People might go tto them thinking of their own impending doom, as they doubtless did in the middle ages; but I wouldn't bet that this is always the case. It never is for young people, who think they're invulnerable.

"People are usually not in the mood to have their photo taken that day"... Many funerals and wakes these days tend to be celebrations of the life of the deceased; drinks are drunk and funerals are eaten. Immediate family will surely be sad, but you can expect others to be remembering happy times in the past.

In short: would I mind people taking selfies at my own funeral? Not really.

[Mamyalynne]

B00, you are right, there is nothing new under the sun really.

[Old_Geezer]

When I think of it I tend to feel rather miffed at, as a kid, I was told I couldn't go to funerals as I'd be bored. Many of my relatives left this world without that 'official' ending as it were. No right to do that to your kids.

[jno]

you're right, B00. My OH has a family portrait from the early 1800s. Among the people depicted is a baby who'd actually died already, and looks slightly ghostly. (I'm not sure if that's deliberate, or because it was added alter and the older paint is showing through.) This wasn't uncommon. Death was sad (and it came a lot earlier in those days) but life was allowed to go on.

[naomi24]

I know someone who never went to a funeral - not her mother's, her father's, or her husband's. I was very sad when I organised her own funeral - it was one she couldn't avoid.

This service wouldn't be something I'd choose - but each to their own.

[Robinia]

Anyone taking selfies at my funeral will see the ghostly image of me peering over their shoulder.

[andy-hughes]

Boo - ""The notion of taking a photo of myself is as alien to me as talking to strangers on my computer"

Is this not what you're doing now Andy? ;-)"

I see your point, but to me it's not the same thing really.

I started on here before Facebook and Twitter, and even mobiles, were available, so exchanging views and info on here does not, to me at least, mimic the exchange of friendship on socail media sites - in which I have less than no interest, or time!