Western's Newest Taboo, who could have thought...

I was sitting here watching the Michael Jackson story, how he passed away...and i looked around me, and see everyone dumbfounded, and utterly shocked that he passed away. Many said how could it be? i never could have guessed... (yes given he only died at 50 years of age)
but people seemed utterly shocked that HE DIED...
and it clicked to me...

OUR NEWEST TABOO IN THE UNITED STATES is death...
just think about it, every other country, deals with death daily and yes it hurts...but its not the BIGGEST ISSUE...
whats the NUMBER ONE THING we dont want to discuss in America? whats probably the BIGGEST THING we dismiss, or say oh dont say that, i dont wanna talk about that...or tell your children "dont worry, lets talk about something else"

DEATH

america is too sheltered and our friends are too shallow to be of any real use in time of a crisis

OP It's the fact he just died... I mean a legacy has died today. Patrick Swayze is dying, we know, so we can accept that he is going to go. But Michael just dropped dead. No warnings. A whole history of music..... is exactly that... history. So sad.

Originally posted by RenDMC
OP It's the fact he just died... I mean a legacy has died today. Patrick Swayze is dying, we know, so we can accept that he is going to go. But Michael just dropped dead. No warnings. A whole history of music..... is exactly that... history. So sad.

what you just put, proves my point.
WE ARE ALL GOING TO DIE, and that is the fact and the reality of it.
"michael just dropped dead. No warnings."

you prove my point exactly, NO WARNINGS??
were are human, and we all are going to die, and that is the fact of life. How much warning do you want or need? a date? a time set in stone?
my POINT (which you obviously missed)
is that AMERICA is such "pussy's" for a lack of a better word. We are so sheltered, that when death faces us, we stare back at it dumbfounded and confused.
EVERYONE HAS TO DIE, im not saying i DONT feel sad about it i do, but my point is, THIS DEATH TABOO in america, needs to stop...it creates more pain and heartache than it should.

I don't care that he died, well i do but i don't show it... because he's another person just like me.

Death is Knowledge.

It makes sense...

Won't affect my life one way or another, won't alter the tracks of the planets, nor affect the financial stability of my bank account.

The guy was a freak - in that he never had a dog's chance of normality. What a fouled up family.

He never had to grow up, his perspectives were so twisted and convoluted, he could never fully trust anyone around him - much like Elvis in that respect - as he never knew who liked him for HIM, or pretended to in order that he may be able to do something for them.

All that success has a price - a very high price.

A miserable, displaced soul that can maybe now find some peace.

I'm already tired of hearing about it.

Seeing as how many people are so materialistic today they most likely never even think about death let alone talk about it to others. They are so obsessed with their own lives they can't see the broad scheme of things (reality). And they already have their minds made up about everything. Death is not in the near future for them and they just think of it (if ever they do happen to think of it) as an end or make up a delusion about what they believe will happen so they choose comfort over truth and freedom. They choose to believe in something that they really have no basis for so that they won't have to think about it anymore and that is why they can't talk about it.

yeah, i think it's because he suddenly passed and so it caught everyone off-guard.
farrah had a preconceived condition where one was conditioned to expect the outcome.

michael being "skinny" (and you know, skinny people don't die suddenly - jk) leaves me to wonder if he was on blow of anything.

at any rate: "one less pedophile"...

reply to post by RenDMC


Totally agree with you. Eveyone has become such a pu$$y, they are weak and fat. So being weak like they are well that pretty much means everyone is afraid of death, they arent used to it like we used to be. Its a big deal yes, but it isnt somthing to fear at all. Its somthing to embrace.

Originally posted by dooper
Won't affect my life one way or another, won't alter the tracks of the planets, nor affect the financial stability of my bank account.

The guy was a freak - in that he never had a dog's chance of normality. What a fouled up family.

He never had to grow up, his perspectives were so twisted and convoluted, he could never fully trust anyone around him - much like Elvis in that respect - as he never knew who liked him for HIM, or pretended to in order that he may be able to do something for them.

All that success has a price - a very high price.

A miserable, displaced soul that can maybe now find some peace.

I'm already tired of hearing about it.

honestly...no one could give a flying # about your abstract opinion about someone obviously more known than you ever in your entire life would be.
It wasn't even about michael jackson, it was the action, that made me think nothing more nothing less. AN EXAMPLE.
hopefully stupid ass individual like this will read a thread, before opening there mouth.

Originally posted by cancerian42
Seeing as how many people are so materialistic today they most likely never even think about death let alone talk about it to others. They are so obsessed with their own lives they can't see the broad scheme of things (reality). And they already have their minds made up about everything. Death is not in the near future for them and they just think of it (if ever they do happen to think of it) as an end or make up a delusion about what they believe will happen so they choose comfort over truth and freedom. They choose to believe in something that they really have no basis for so that they won't have to think about it anymore and that is why they can't talk about it.

thank you for actually READING, rather than jumping on the smallest example, and dragging it out like the lame ass guy above.

Exactly my point, we ASSUME AND THINK, people we love and ourselves are IMMUNE to death, at least in the United States or the more populated/economically stable Countries. We seem to loose our sight of death, and the meaning of it, and that it WILL COME.
My point is...dont act so shock when someone dies.
Its going to happen either way.
Imagine the ONE MAN who basically had it all or COULD HAVE had it all passed away.
And you who has not even .0039420934% of what he had thinks is immune to death
lol
basically live your life, but realize WHAT LIFE IS.

They are shocked because he was not an old man and had no public history of illness. It is because of the suddeness of the event.

Death is not taboo in our culture. We've been dealing with it daily since 2001...

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/d0c0ddc72ff3.jpg[/atsimg]

reply to post by michaelhernsin


Death isn't taboo.

Look at films from the day Elvis died, then watch clips of the hospital where he died at. They are very similar.

Micheal Jackson is the Elvis of those who were teens during the 80's and early 90's. Its not taboo, its simply shocking.

edit typos.

[edit on 25-6-2009 by jd140]

reply to post by michaelhernsin

I live my life as if I would die very soon maybe even today who really knows? And I don't think very many people would like to see it that way, but it really is a possibility and I am fine with it. I know that there are only two options (as far as I can see) for what will happen when I die and they are either life goes on in some form or it doesn't. It doesn't really matter either way. But to be happy you have to enjoy the moment and that is what I do. I feel sorry for the people who do not realize that and they are constantly in a state of fear.

death taboo? america? we must not run in the same circles.

i'm sure many people do feel/think this way without even realizing. but the entire nation? i'm sure up in beverly hills where immortality is a career goal, this holds true. but in the grimey streets of inner-city USA, there is another side to that coin.

it isn't taboo. it is an eventuality.

how does that saying go? "the only certainty in life is death..."

granted we don't have a third world view of death, but you don't have to to understand it.

people slave their lives away at work, trying to provide a future for the next generation... sounds like death is on the front burner. thats not how people that think they will live forever behave.

this country already went through the victorian era, when morbidity was all the rage.

try visiting threads right here on ATS concerning pedophiles, where many will agree that death is not a taboo subject.

we erect monuments to death in our popular culture. it is glorified. we award posthumous citiations so that in death, heroes are immortalized.

maybe the cosmetic surgery scene, and kindergarden teachers have a ban on the "D" word, but it doesn't apply universally.

reply to post by gravykraken

It's just that people never talk about death unless it's something along the lines of "I'm gonna kill you." And most people I know as far as I have any way of telling do not think of death all that much. Some people like to wear skulls and crossbones sure, but they don't think about death just because they wear the symbol. Some people even like literature and music and movies dealing with death, but they don't consciously think about the possibility of their own that much. They work all the time because they want a better life and that's all there is to it, they probably would still work all the time if they knew they would live forever too, because no one wants to live in poverty. And most the time people create some afterlife illusion to believe in so they don't have to worry about death anymore. It's all about comfort and pleasure and death is not that to most. Why else would we have suicide prevention other than to prevent other people from being uncomfortable about the situation? (I'm sorry, was I not supposed to say that?)

After a 3 yr battle with lung and brain cancer, my mother slowly died a horrific death right before my eyes. I knew something was wrong with her even before her diagnosis, and went to every appointment and was never given any false hope. However, the day she died, it was still shocking.

Of course we all know we are going to die, one day, of something, but we don't live our lives trying to pick out the day, even terminally ill people don't measure in that way. Micheals death is shocking, unexpected, and a great loss to the music industry and his fans, because he is relatively young, no health issues were being made public, quite frankly not a whole hell of a lot of 50 yr olds just drop dead.

So how is death taboo?

This thread is trash. It's not taboo, it's the final frontier.

There is nothing on earth that means more than death. There is nothing more dumbfounding than death, and there is nothing we want to understand like death.

This thread just shows us that you have no value for life, and that you think death is just another part of living. Well, if you believe life is a miracle (which I do) than how can death be seen as anything but "the great unknown"?

More intelligent people will always ponder death, while the dummies of society will write it off as a scientific half life of organic matter.

A good friend of mine , 25 - died with no reason , about 2 years ago. the doctors could not find any reason , as this guy was in perfect health . So they gave a name they could hardly spell "klajshfgasfg sindrom" not sure about the name. His death made me re-evaluate the ideea of life and death , so i spend more time doing what is right and helping the people rather than fighting to accumulate stuff and possesions. I will not take my car, ipod , house with me. I go naked as i arrived nacked on this world..