When someone dies, we often say they ‘passed’ or ‘passed away’. And it isn’t just people trying to soften a conversation for the bereaved. The bereaved is likely to say, ‘When my father passed away a couple of years ago…’ What’s wrong with ‘died’? My dad died. My mom died. They’re dead! :eek:
We don’t say ‘graveyard’, though that’s what it is. We say ‘cemetery’. OK, I don’t have a problem with that. ‘Memorial park’, though… Nope. Can’t say it. ‘Funeral director’? I prefer ‘undertaker’. (Well, unless ‘funeral director’ is abbreviated ‘fun. director’.)
How about bodily functions? I urinate and defecate. And I don’t ask where the bathroom is. I ask where the toilet is.
Euphemisms are an attempt by the weak-willed to let squeamishness triumph over reality.
This isn’t just about euphemisms, though. We eat chicken and salmon, but not cow or pig. Ever wonder why? For the same reasons you ‘urinate’ and ‘defecate’ instead of engaging in activities rhyming with ‘missing’ and ‘hitting’ (I have precious little squeamishness myself, but forum rules are forum rules)- the words used by the invading Norman nobles came to be seen as loftier and better than those used by the defeated Saxons.
I eat deadcow and deadpig. Also deadfish. And filtration units. (And yes, I eat the shrimp heads when I go to the Vietnamese restaurant and get the skewered shrimp.)
I’m with ya no this one, Johnny! My dad died. There was no passing. One minute he was taking a shower, the next minute, he had fallen to the floor, dead from a heart attack. Using a different word wouldn’t have made it any less real or painful.
My ex-wife was a palliative care specialist and taught grief counseling for many years. She was insistent that people avoid using euphemisms. She says that the grieving won’t be shocked to hear that their loved one is dead and you avoid the possibility of offending them with some mawkish gem designed to make you feel better.
I agree that “passed” is silly (“Life is a test. My grandma passed!”), but to me, “passed away” is simply a synonym for “died.” How do you distinguish between euphemisms and synonyms?
Good for you! But I usually pee and poop; urination and defecation take too long.
As is pointed out in that thread, the word “toilet” (imported from French) is itself a euphemism, originally meaning a place for dressing oneself, or the act of dressing oneself.
I don’t actually think there is a common word for the place in question that isn’t a euphemism, or started out as one. Unless “shitter” counts.
(By the way, I assume any parrot jokes in this thread are redundant?)
I was just ranting at the office the other day about layoffs. Management talks about the people who were “impacted.” Guess what - We were all impacted, because the way we go about doing our job changed. And our friends aren’t at the office any more.
The people who were shown the door? They were fired…let go…laid off…etc. But impacted? C’mon. Don’t try to sugar coat the fact that they don’t have jobs anymore. It’s insulting.
“Smartsized.”
“Decruited.”
“Streamlined.”
“Given time to pursue other opportunities.”
“Last observed in the parking lot, carrying their belongings in a cardboard box.”
Passed is a reference to leaving this world for the next one. It’s a reminder to people of faith that the end is really a beginning. It’s much easier to think of Uncle Fred with 7 virgins at his side than simply decomposing in his “burial vault.”
The way I understand it, graveyards are typically attached to churches, while cemeteries are purpose-built places to bury the dead. That distinction makes sense.
I think (don’t know for sure) that an undertaker was more of a one-man show, while a funeral director is just the client-facing part of a larger funeral business that may have separate funeral directors, embalmers and grave diggers.
Seriously though, I tend to agree with the OP and almost always use “died” myself. But if it’s someone’s loved one and I think the bereaved might be a little sensitive about it, I’ll go with the euphemism.
