How we think about death

Locutus

Adorable Deplorable
Jun 18, 2007
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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
 

SLM

The Velvet Hammer
Mar 5, 2011
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London, Ontario
Man, that is a heavy duty topic for a Saturday a.m.! 8O Are there no cartoons on Saturday mornings anymore?

Looks interesting so I'll bookmark it for later though.
 

JLM

Hall of Fame Member
Nov 27, 2008
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Man, that is a heavy duty topic for a Saturday a.m.! 8O Are there no cartoons on Saturday mornings anymore?

Looks interesting so I'll bookmark it for later though.

Morbid friggin' subject, ain't it. I've been thinking about being put on ice. -:)
 

WLDB

Senate Member
Jun 24, 2011
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Ottawa
Man, that is a heavy duty topic for a Saturday a.m.! 8O Are there no cartoons on Saturday mornings anymore?

Need cable for that. Ive never had it. No landline either. ha.

As for death, I think about it daily. I find it and everything related to it to be fascinating. Morbid? Perhaps. It isnt having any negative effects on me though. I made my arrangements as soon as I was old enough to. Revised them last year. Unfortunately death doesnt give a damn about age. You're never too young to go. Still I'd like to live for as long as possible in a healthy state. If they somehow figured out how to extend life Id sign up. I never really understood the "but then life will be boring" or "meaningless." Perhaps for them, not for me. If you get bored you can always check out.
 

SLM

The Velvet Hammer
Mar 5, 2011
29,151
3
36
London, Ontario
I never really understood the "but then life will be boring" or "meaningless." Perhaps for them, not for me. If you get bored you can always check out.

That is a bit like the "having to struggle to gain weight is hard too" crowd. Not that they're very big.
 

darkbeaver

the universe is electric
Jan 26, 2006
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RR1 Distopia 666 Discordia
I don't know who you are. If you are young you are gifted with insight beyond your years. If you are old you understand that the day will come for each of us when we will welcome death like an old friend.

I am not young and I was never gifted excepting those things got from others, my superiors. In line with my borrowed philosophy there is a school of thought which teaches that we are embarked into the material death from the moment of material conception. We are not our bodies. It takes all of our lives to die. A good death and a good life are siblings.
That's what they say anyway.
 

WLDB

Senate Member
Jun 24, 2011
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I don't know who you are. If you are young you are gifted with insight beyond your years. If you are old you understand that the day will come for each of us when we will welcome death like an old friend.

Or rage against the dying of the light.
 

BaalsTears

Senate Member
Jan 25, 2011
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Santa Cruz, California
... A good death and a good life are siblings.
...

Duality is written into the fabric of the universe. It's too bad it takes a lifetime to understand this.

Or rage against the dying of the light.

What happens to a young Welsh poet when he comes to New York? The experience kills him. But at least Dylan Thomas honored his father with a memorable poem.
 

Cliffy

Standing Member
Nov 19, 2008
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Nakusp, BC
Nope.................three.........................A$$holes!
Without one you would die of constipation.

Most people are afraid of death because their ego is afraid of non existence. I don't think the body cares. It is just a machine.
 

WLDB

Senate Member
Jun 24, 2011
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Ottawa
Most people are afraid of death because their ego is afraid of non existence. I don't think the body cares. It is just a machine.

Is not the brain a part of the body?

In a way we are all going to die a lot sooner than we think. Cells die and are replaced daily. The body completely replaces itself a number of times over the course of a normal 'lifetime.' We keep slightly worse copies of ourselves until we get to one that just doesnt work and dies.
 

damngrumpy

Executive Branch Member
Mar 16, 2005
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kelowna bc
Death is one of those once in a lifetime events for each of us.
I don't want to go, the reason is selfishness. I want to live to
at least 325 years old. That way I would be the last person
on government pension and the buggers would have to bring
my money to me in an armoured car. My father once told me
he wanted to die in bed, at the age of a hundred and ten shot
by a jealous husband
 

JLM

Hall of Fame Member
Nov 27, 2008
75,301
547
113
Vernon, B.C.
Without one you would die of constipation.

For sure, I wasn't thinking of that particular A$$hole! -:)

Death is one of those once in a lifetime events for each of us.
I don't want to go, the reason is selfishness. I want to live to
at least 325 years old. That way I would be the last person
on government pension and the buggers would have to bring
my money to me in an armoured car. My father once told me
he wanted to die in bed, at the age of a hundred and ten shot
by a jealous husband

Did it pan out for him? -:)