When Robin Williams died, lots of people here were like “I was numb the whole day”, “I didn’t get out of bed”, “I couldn’t stop crying”, and so on.
I really cannot understand it. I can’t imagine feeling more than slightly miffed by the death of my favorite actor, Peter Dinklage. It wouldn’t last more than 20 seconds and then, selfishly, might thoughts would go on to “who’s gonna play Tyrion”.
Or when a musician dies. I can’t understand the whole “his music was the soundtrack of my life.”
How do you live in the normal world if the death of a complete stranger who doesn’t even know or care you personally exist affect you?
When pope John Paul II died, I shed a couple of tears and felt sad for about 10 minutes, but he’s the leader of my religion, God’s representative (I doesn’t matter if you believe it or not, I do.)
If you’re old enough, you’ll remember how the hole world (it seemed) went into mourning when Princess Diana died. Personally, I don’t get it. Same with celebrities as the OP suggests. I’m not *happy *these people died, but I honestly don’t feel what would be called “sadness.” I was shocked with Lennon was shot. If I had been older, JFK assassination would have floored me, I’m sure. But upon hearing about the death of Prince, Michael Jackson, Robin Williams, etc, all I’ve got is “that’s too bad.”
I think it has to do with giving a shit. I’m Catholic too but the most John Paul’s death got out of me was a “huh, now what”. On the other hand Robin Williams has made me happy multiple times and I was bummed that he wouldn’t come out with any new material so I was much more emotionally impacted by Williams. Same thing with Fisher I see her face more often then my extended family spending at least 6 hours with her each year I was actually bummed for a couple of seconds when I heard she died since I won’t be getting any new material from her but I won’t even care that much when my aunts die.
I think the more positive memories you have tied up with someone the more their death impacts you now with celebrities you can go back and enjoy the times you had with them on film so it’s lessened then it would be with an uncle who was a favorite as a child and there is no way to relive the memories.
For Carrie Fisher she was a childhood hero. She was the princess who although she had a loyal team to help, was a full fledged kick butt hero on her own. She morphed as an adult into a woman with a wicked sense of humour and a vocal opponent of women being judged solely by their appearance. She was also a strong proponent for the destigmatization of mental health issues.
She helped mold my view of the world and particularly since she had come back to a greater public profile in the last couple of years and we were looking forward to even more from her the loss is a little sharper than it would have been had she remained a shadowy childhood hero.
That said I didn’t even take to my bed for a day when we lost my niece, but everyone reacts differently to loss and none of them are wrong.
We don’t all have to be the same. I don’t need to feel the same way as everyone else to respect their right to feel that way.
I’ve always found that grief, like humor, affects different people differently. The bond may be to the artists work or to the artist personally because of their work… or it could just be for some totally unrelated reason.
Maybe they fell in love to the person next to them when that movie played? maybe they got over a break up listening to that artist’s songs? Its very hard to say because people are so very different.
Can it seem inappropriate? Sure, it can.
Is it? I think that’s harder to say.
As an analogy, when I was 14 I was at the wake of a relative. I loved & respected that person… I missed them & I felt cheated that they had died.
I was in the corner of the room when an older relative came up to me and started to tell me the most horribly inappropriate jokes. I didn’t want to laugh… I shouldn’t have found it funny and I knew laughing was wrong.
Still, I had to leave the room. In the next room, tears poured out and I found myself laughing and crying and shaking all at the same time.
It was a totally inappropriate emotional release… and for the life of me I couldn’t justify why it was happening or why I needed it so badly.
Nobody else was doing this… why was I doing this…?
The only explanation I have was… is… that everybody experiences and expresses their grief differently.
I think it’s less that a singular person died (Like, say Prince) and moreso that the idea of what that person meant to the individual (Prince’s music brought them through some moment in their lives).
This reminds me of a conversation I have with Ms. Cups about fandoms and such. They’re not real (and to a point neither are celebrities) but if they came into your life at the right time, and helped you through something or had a meaningful effect on you, it’s not that they died, it’s that the idea died with them.
Of course this. Prince represented a bunch of things to me about expanding my perspective in music and in life when I was much younger. As a musician, he stunned me with his multi-layered brilliance.
I really, really respect Peter Dinklage, but his roles haven’t touched me even close to that level of depth. I don’t know that I feel that way about actors. But musicians that have touched me? Yes, their deaths hit me.
I think it’s the loss of their talent. They did so much to bring us entertainment, but now they won’t do anymore.
The one that hit me the hardest this year was Alan Rickman. He was so good in so many things, and now I won’t get to see him perform or act in new things.
I’ve never actually cried, or felt the need to stay in bed all day, or even really talk about how a death has affected me, but for me, sometimes a celeb death reminds me of their work and where I was or what I was doing at that time in my life. It sort of becomes a nostalgic pull-- thinking back to how young they were, how young I was, what their work made me feel, etc.
I wasn’t alive when the Beatles were big, but they were a huge part of my life in college. When George died, I was sad.
When the actor who played Morty Seinfeld died (Barney Martin) I felt a little sad as my dad and I shared a bond over that show when I was away at college.
I’ve loved Star Wars since I was a kid-- watched them with my parents, saw ROTJ with my cousins and grandparents. When I heard Carrie Fisher died, I felt sad.
Not really a sadness over the person (although I’m not a psychopath, I do care when people die), but rather a reminder that time moves forward, I’m not as young as I used to be, yadda yadda yadda.
I’m the same way. The less you know about a person, the less you care about them…at least that has been my experience. I wasn’t close to any celebrity, so most of their deaths just get–at most–an “oh. well, that’s sad” and then a sort of shrug and going back to what I was doing.
But if it’s close friend or family members or pets, it’s been much different. I can’t even begin to describe how I felt when I learned the girl I had a crush on in high school–who I had also lived with for a short amount of time–had died in a car accident (years after I had last seen her). It seemed so unreal.
*No man is an island entire of itself; every man
is a piece of the continent, a part of the main;
if a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe
is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as
well as any manner of thy friends or of thine
own were; any man’s death diminishes me,
because I am involved in mankind.
And therefore never send to know for whom
the bell tolls; it tolls for thee. *
– John Donne
When a beloved celebrity of one’s youth dies, it is as the tolling of the bell.
Secondly, I think it has less to do with someone’s death and more to do with the realization of one’s own mortality. The older we get, the less of our childhood heroes exist in this world. And thus, the more alone we become.
I remember once, in my twenties, an older friend of mine once told me: “Spend as much time as you can with your parents. Because once they’re both gone, your whole world changes.”
I found that slightly chilling. And it’s something that has stuck with me over many years.
Sometimes a celebrity has a successful career; it reaches a peak in midlife, then turns dormant in old age. When the celeb dies, everyone is reminded of what once was and fond memories come back, but at the same time there is sadness that there will be no more.
I remember I was upset when John Belushi died. But the sentiment was basically “That idiot, he had such talent and he deprived us of decades of great movies”…
Other than that - never really got upset over anyone well-known dying that I didn’t know personally. So I guess I join the OP in his befuddlement.
Yep. Also Sam Kenison. He’d been through some rough times, and he was finally getting his life back together. Then he was croaked by a drunken teenaged driver.
For the most part I agree with the OP. Oddly, however, Robin Williams was the exception for me. For a week or two, I would start to tear up when I thought of it. I think for me it was mostly the contrast of someone that brought so much joy to people had such a difficult struggle with depression. And I was selfishly thinking “God, if he couldn’t deal with it, what chance do I have”. Its making me sad just thinking about it now, I wish he could have found the right kind of help at the right time.
But like I said, Williams is the exception for me personally. Often, it seems to me that when a celebrity dies, the tributes on social media have more to do with liking the art that person made than with sorrow for the family’s loss or that person’s struggles if the death was untimely. I usually chalk it up to typical internet exaggeration (no one likes bacon THAT much, do they?)