Have You Noticed That...

[poliphilo]

...No-one simply dies these days. They always "sadly die" or "sadly pass away" or whatever featherbedding euphemism for kicking the bucket the writer feels comfortable with. Anyway, it's always "sad"- unless of course, it's "tragic".

Anyone would think death was a bad thing.

This morning, for instance, I came across a little piece about the cast of Dads Army- all of whom (apart from "stupid boy" Ian Lavender) were born over a hundred years ago. Apparently they've all "sadly passed over." Well, what a surprise!

If John Laurie hadn't "sadly passed over", he'd now be 123. Think of everything he's missed out on, all the roles he could have played!

Please, it's not "sad", it's natural.

Most of these people have been dead so long they're probably on their next incarnation by now...

Comments

[qatsi]

Yes, your point is a wider one, I think. I suppose it's a safe formula. Who, would it be reported, has joyfully died? Hitler, I suppose. In my lifetime I can only think of Bin Laden who fits that description, but even then laced with a foreboding of what comes next. Milosevic and Ceaucescu, probably; and I wouldn't say I mourned Thatcher either. But as you say, it's natural and it's just a fact, it devalues the language to over-apply it.

[poliphilo]

I think it's a pity Hitler and Bin Laden died the way they did. They robbed the world of a reckoning.

Had Bin Laden lived he might have said things from the dock that would have seriously embarrassed all sorts of people. There was a reason why he was killed and not arrested.