Rant

[bellinghman]

There's a meme currently going round - it's one of those multiple question interview ones. Among its questions are:

If you could bring back anyone that has passed, who would it be?

I'm sorry, but if I ever encounter the author of that question, I'll have to give her a real bitch slapping. 'has passed'? For fuck's sake, are you talking about someone going past you in the street? Yes? No? No, I thought not.

You're talking about death. There's a good, short word you could have used, one that takes less typing. It's 'died'. Don't pretend it doesn't occur - it does. To all of us - no-one gets out of this alive. This sort of milquetoast euphemism is an attempt to deny one of life's most basic features.

Aarrgghh!!

Comments

[alexmc.livejournal.com]

Would you be as upset if they had said "passed away" or "passed on"?

[sbp.livejournal.com]

See also "restroom". Oddly lacking in sofas and magazines and beds.

[knell.livejournal.com]

...and lines like "She lost her husband" make it sound like carelessness (did you look behind the sofa?).

[vicarage.livejournal.com]

That phraseology is very common in the US, which is rather coy about personal, rather than violent, death.

Death, the final answer

[kelvix.livejournal.com]

I talk about death a lot. Every working day. So many times that I cannot really say.

And of course, I have to condole with the bereaved when I have never met their relative, and have no personal feeling for them - and I am a person that finds it difficult to express a feeling that I do not have. The closest I can get is sympathy, and the artificial sympathy so often expressed at this time would make my teeth grate.

Sometimes I try a sympathetic enquiry, and depending on my rough estimate of age, distress and social background of the bereaved person I might use the word "passed" usually (because I am English) with "away" afterwards. Or if discussing death in general terms might say "on his passing". There are some who find the subject too distressing to contemplate - the present horror is enough without people becoming too clinical and and businesslike. I am fairly sure that some find it macabre for a person to talk in objective terms because it can almost seem like revelling in the fact, and failing to show either enough respect for the deceased, or for the bereaved.

I get it wrong: because there is such a lot of information that needs to be collected, I sometimes fail to show adequate sympathy, and cause offence. I can be absolutely sure, however, that people's attitude towards death (when they come to see me) is usually highly emotive, and that few can discuss the matter objectively.

So, from professional experience, I would not dismiss the euphemism - when writing for a wide audience, it may cause less offence.