How each one of us relates to death is always changing. In this special issue, the Post presents stories looking at different ways we prepare for the Great Equalizer
Like life, death never stops changing. Every generation faces new facts about the end of life. Every generation thinks about it in a different way.
Fifty years ago, a Canadian who lived to 100 was a news item and the recipient of a letter from the Queen. Today Canada has about 6,000 centenarians and their number increases by roughly 1,000 a year. A century ago, the death of a child was an expected part of family life; today we are appalled and outraged when it happens. Fifty years ago, suicide was universally abhorred and treated as a crime, if not a sin. Today the right to die, which means suicide for a good reason, is legal in several countries and American states; it may soon be a part of Canadian life.
Our attitude to death might strike our grandparents as inconsistent. We may or may not be terrified by it, but in choosing our entertainment we embrace it with delight. Each night of the week a small army of actors is gunned down in our living rooms. That’s one way the present moment is unique in the history of the human race. People once defended violence in TV by citing the killings in the Bible, Shakespeare and ancient Greek drama. But earlier forms of fictional death usually carried a heavy charge of meaning and often illuminated moral issues. The casual, often motiveless slaughter we watch now on TV is different. And in quantity it dwarfs the literature and drama of previous millennia.
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Robert Fulford: Death, like life, never stops changing, nor do our attitudes toward it | National Post
Like life, death never stops changing. Every generation faces new facts about the end of life. Every generation thinks about it in a different way.
Fifty years ago, a Canadian who lived to 100 was a news item and the recipient of a letter from the Queen. Today Canada has about 6,000 centenarians and their number increases by roughly 1,000 a year. A century ago, the death of a child was an expected part of family life; today we are appalled and outraged when it happens. Fifty years ago, suicide was universally abhorred and treated as a crime, if not a sin. Today the right to die, which means suicide for a good reason, is legal in several countries and American states; it may soon be a part of Canadian life.
Our attitude to death might strike our grandparents as inconsistent. We may or may not be terrified by it, but in choosing our entertainment we embrace it with delight. Each night of the week a small army of actors is gunned down in our living rooms. That’s one way the present moment is unique in the history of the human race. People once defended violence in TV by citing the killings in the Bible, Shakespeare and ancient Greek drama. But earlier forms of fictional death usually carried a heavy charge of meaning and often illuminated moral issues. The casual, often motiveless slaughter we watch now on TV is different. And in quantity it dwarfs the literature and drama of previous millennia.
more
Robert Fulford: Death, like life, never stops changing, nor do our attitudes toward it | National Post