'Selfies at Funerals'

[Dick Whitman]

Bradley, I don't think it's weird or uncouth to take photos at funerals, and I don't know that anyone else here or most people out there would think it is. We took some group shots at, for example, the luncheon following my dad's funeral. We even smiled in them. It took some negotiating, but we even permitted my dad's brothers and sister, eventually, to snap photos of him in his casket. (Ostensibly to send to his mother, but we knew beforehand that they had also openly and casually snapped photos of my aunt in repose the year before. I don't know if it's a southern thing or just a family thing.)

I know it verges on "get-off-my-lawn" territory to some, but what is bothersome here is the narcissism of taking a particular type of photo, a "selfie," at a funeral and basically live-Tweeting it with some horrendous effort to attach a profound statement to it. Look at the one, and I paraphrase: "Love my hair today. Hate why I had to have it done. #SadDay."

I imagine a lot of us just didn't realize how ubiquitous "selfies" were among young people. They apparently just snap them everywhere they go, and then post them online as kind of a running diary of their life. It's humorous, because it just would not even occur to them to make an exception in this case. It's just how they live.

 

[JackReacher]

On my mom's side of the family, taking pictures at funerals (of the person in the casket) has always happened. It's just a part of the process, I guess. But I hate it with a passion. My mom lost both her parents a couple years ago and when I'd visit, she'd have the funeral pictures just laying around willy nilly. And I learned long ago not to go flipping through any of my grandparents' photo albums unless I was prepared to see casket pictures. Horrible.

 

[Versatile]

Meh, if they're dead, their souls already are stolen.

 

[Dyno]

I never knew photos of the person in the casket was a thing until last year, when a friend's elderly mom died and my friend emailed out a slideshow of photos. The beginning of the slideshow was normal - photos over the course of her mom's life - but then there was a photo of the mom in the casket and a group photo of the children and grandchildren standing next to the casket. I found it incredibly disturbing.

The selfies are in a different category of disturbing.

 

[britwrit]

Apparently (according to this article I just read on Cracked: http://www.cracked.com/article_20577_the-6-most-terrifying-things-people-used-to-do-with-dead.html) the Victorians couldn't get enough of photographing the recently dead.

Prop them up on the couch, jam their eyes open, gather the family around for the ten minutes needed for a proper exposure. All good fun.

 

[MisterCreosote]

The Oxford Dictionaries Word of the Year for 2013!

 

[TheSportsPredictor]

Selfies = selfie-esteem:

http://www.slate.com/articles/double_x/doublex/2013/11/selfies_on_instagram_and_facebook_are_tiny_bursts_of_girl_pride.html

 

[Dick Whitman]

Selfies = selfie-esteem:

http://www.slate.com/articles/double_x/doublex/2013/11/selfies_on_instagram_and_facebook_are_tiny_bursts_of_girl_pride.html

And, from the world of Internet commentary sites, the inevitable counterpoint:

http://jezebel.com/selfies-arent-empowering-theyre-a-cry-for-help-1468965365

 

[TheSportsPredictor]

Selfies = selfie-esteem:

http://www.slate.com/articles/double_x/doublex/2013/11/selfies_on_instagram_and_facebook_are_tiny_bursts_of_girl_pride.html

And, from the world of Internet commentary sites, the inevitable counterpoint:

http://jezebel.com/selfies-arent-empowering-theyre-a-cry-for-help-1468965365

That article thinks selfies are this:

Further, self-taken digital portraits are typically posted on social media, ostensibly with the intent of getting people to respond to them — that's what social media is. In that respect, selfies aren't expressions of pride, but rather calls for affirmation. In real life, walking up to a stranger, tilting your head downward at a 45-degree angle, duckfacing, pushing your tits together, and screaming "DO YOU THINK I'M PRETTY!" would be summon the authorities. On the internet, it's just how people operate.

 

[poindexter]

SP, I don't think www.GodHatesClevelandSports.com has been updated in a while.

 

[TheSportsPredictor]

SP, I don't think www.GodHatesClevelandSports.com has been updated in a while.

Gonna put a selfie on there.

 

[Bradley Guire]

I'm getting my first smartphone this Christmas with my work money. I plan to use it primarily for taking funny pictures of my dogs.

 

[93Devil]

I mean, at least take the selfie with the corpse.

Is that Donovan McNabb? Did his mother die from too much Chunky Soup?

Cameras at funerals for African Americans in the south is not unheard of.

 

[old_tony]

I can't believe this hasn't been posted yet, but sometimes you need one to get the bereavement fare discount.

 

[spikechiquet]

Just the word "selfie" makes my skin crawl.

The only "selfie" I take is during a shower or right after waking up and I don't have to go anywhere right away.

 

[Dyno]

Oy vey.

"America’s selfie obsession reached a new low on Tuesday when a woman snapped a cellphone self-portrait that also captured a suicidal man on the Brooklyn Bridge.

With scores of onlookers watching the dramatic 10 a.m. rescue by cops, the crass camerawoman turned her back to the scene, angled her phone toward the bridge and snapped a shot."

http://nypost.com/2013/12/04/selfie-ish-woman-snaps-cellphone-shot-with-suicidal-man/

 

[Double J]

What's lower - taking a selfie while somebody in the background is trying to commit suicide, or taking a picture of somebody who's taking a selfie while somebody in the background is trying to commit suicide?

 

[93Devil]

The NY Post is lower than both.

 

[Evil ... Thy name is Orville Redenbacher!!]

What's lower - taking a selfie while somebody in the background is trying to commit suicide, or taking a picture of somebody who's taking a selfie while somebody in the background is trying to commit suicide?

They are both better than a selfie in a dirty bathroom.

 

[YankeeFan]

The NY Post is lower than both.

Yay! Another, "I'm too good to work at the New York Post" post.

Sure.