Dead people always described as being full of life and lighting up the room

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

I seem to be noticing this lately. People–usually folks taken out prematurely and uexpectedly–described as cheerful, fun-loving, welcoming extroverts. Always full of life…the type of person who lights up a room the moment they enter it. (And will always give you the shirt off their back, too.)

Is this just confirmation bias? Maybe other personality types are also praised, but I’m not registering these cases for some reason.

Or maybe people who aren’t full of life don’t have a lot of friends to sing their praises? They die and no one is there to tell the TV reporter how great a person they were. Could this be the (sad) case?

How do you think people would eulogize you in one sentence? If someone described you as a person who lit up the room, would you agree with this? Have you ever heard someone that you knew described like this, and you felt that it was not accurate?

2

No one’s going to say this about me. My personality has two settings when people are around: Taciturn and Obnoxious.

3

She was reallly smart and funny, but she could be kind of a bitch.

4

It is because of the phosphorescent fungi that grow in corpses.

5

My father in law said of his wife, “ooooh, she was always SO MAD.”

6

He really lit up a room.

If only there had been a fire extinguisher we wouldn’t have had to use the shovels.

7

I think most of the time, we tend to think of the people we’re close to and love as “lighting up the room” when they’re around even if other people wouldn’t think of it that way. I could picture my fiance saying that about me, because I can be funny and bubbly when he’s around even though I am pretty quiet and introverted in general society.

8

monstro, ime most people are not described this way, it’s probably about 20%. And those 20% the description can be applied to fairly (for various values of fairly) reasonably.

It’s just that with dead people you accentuate the positive… for a fantastic example of this… hell I was gonna link to it but I will create a new therad about it, back in a jiffy

9

I remember after the Columbine shooting seeing a memorial segment for the victims on some news program. The announcer read the names and a brief description of each of them, often including their accomplishments or positive personality traits. Then one of the boys was described as someone who “liked driving his truck.” That was it. Maybe this guy was really into his truck, but I felt bad thinking that this poor kid was murdered and that was the best they could come up with to describe him.

10

Another thing that just crossed my mind.

Many young lads who, erm, would be unlikely to have been a lawyer in ten years time, athough probably already had plenty of court room experience, if you know what I mean that die in the UK due to “misadventure” (almost always either theirs or that of lads similar to them*) are described in the paper after they lapse as a “promising footballer”.

Apparently this started out as a bit of an in joke and is getting quite well known now.

If you don’t believe this, have a look at this google search.

I hope this helps in future with any attempts to translate UK media. It may also provide you with a glimpse into the British mindset.

*Occured to me that especially with the US emphasis on race my cunning allusions might be sounding as if I’m talking about some kind of race. I definitely ain’t, this applies to all races in the UK, which while not a post-racist society has a very different kind of racial issues to the US.

11

That’s what we call damning with faint praise, right there, folks! Poor kid :frowning:

12

“Who?”
and
“Kinda Creepy but seemed harmless enough”.

13

It’s the same phenomenon that promotes mediocre pop stars to genius status once they die prematurely (i.e. Jim Croce, Kurt Cobain, John Lennon etc.).

14

There are fashions in obituaries, much like there are fashions in everything else. Just think of the fashion in names, or cliches in dating personals ! Think of all the “god fearing” and ““being a good wife/husband”” that people were described as long ago.
And some people will even think in fashionable terms, while others will be totally clueless when it comes to any fashion.

Maybe for the Columbine shootings, the reporter quoted some online “leave your message here” guest book, and the parents of this kid were lower educated and when they visited that site, they just blurted out the first thing that came to their mind. And because the kid had gotten a truck last month (he was in high school and maybe just got his car at 16, right?) and for the last month or so, that truck had indeed been everything to the kid.

Me, I know a few people that will lit up a room for me. I don’t know if they will lit up that room to any other person present, though. :slight_smile:

15

She meant well.

16

Yeah, its rare for anyone to say that the deceased had all the charisma of a turtle.

Same thing sorta happens when they interview the neighbors or coworkers of a guy who just shot up some joint killing people. “He was quiet but pleasant enough.” Rarely "we just knew he could shoot up an Arbys.

17

“And now, a moment of silence in memory of Freddy the Pig.”

18

“Whenever Wheelz entered a room, people would usually eventually notice he was there.”

19

This phenomenon seems directly related to the fact that no one I want to be dead ever seems to die. It’s god laughing at me.

20

I opened this thinking that it would be about reactions at open casket viewings or funerals…“Oh, he looks so alive!” or “She looks so good!”