Shard

Parfitt (68), Michael (53), Fisher (60)...

Mortality is getting scary

scrubbedexpat091

Sad. Never know when your time is up.

Shard

Quite!

pdarwin

While it's sad that some celebrities died and at a fairly young age, statistics tell us that about 60 million other people on the planet died this year - people who were not famous and who lived very worthy lives that most of us will never know about. I can't mourn celebrities who had it all in life and often hastened their own ends with drugs and the like.

dbd33

So you have a limited supply of compassion? Regretting the passing of an amiable eccentric like George Michael depletes your ability to care about the starving in Africa?

MarkG

Not if you're a mouse:

https://www.theguardian.com/science/...ientists-claim

pdarwin

Proportional compassion.
Some years ago I worked at a children's treatment center where there were kids with such serious illnesses and severe mental and physical defects that they would live only short lives and / or painful lives. That experience taught me about who needs the most compassion and who needs less.

dbd33

seems to me to be no compassion at all.

beckiwoo

Liz Smith was 95 though

Pulaski

Richard Adams was 96.

pdarwin

I guess you didn't read my post or understand the words. I have plenty of compassion but don't have this disproportionate admiration and worship of celebrities.

dbd33

I just find the idea of measuring one's compassion, metering it out, to be oxymoronic, like rationing one's laughter or the degree of one's arousal.

pdarwin

Not purposefully rationing ones laughter or arousal, but responding in an appropriate way. We don't bust a rib laughing out loud at Last of the Summer Wine because it's gentle comedy, yet we might ROFL at Benny Hill. Same with mourning - my Facebook page has been full of messages from people who want me to care about celebrity deaths. I really don't care as much as people want me to. We seem to glorify people who were there solely to entertain us mainly as a life distraction, yet other people we just seem to have less concern about.

Danny B

Same here.

When Dr. Henry Heimlich died last week, no one really cared.

Shard

I wasn't so much mourning celebrities, as being reminded of how temporary life can be. I'm of GM's vintage, so it kind of spooked me. CF is older, but she seemed so present and vibrant with all the recent Star Wars publicity. Other than that, I entirely agree with DBD's sentiments.