(no subject)

[tinyjo]

When famous people die, particularly, it seems, members of the royal family, there is a great deal made of it in the media. All too often we are told that the whole nation is mourning. I remember it in the case of the Queen Mother, Jill Dando and Diana in particular. It's actually something I find deeply alienating. I was pretty much untouched by all three of those deaths. I didn't know them and wasn't interested in them. That feels to me like a perfectly normal reaction, but there's a constant barrage of coverage surrounding these events telling me that it ought to mean something - that there is some kind of national coming together over these deaths that everyone else is a part of. It's even more pervasive than sports - I have similar but less strong feelings about things like the world cup and the Olympics. I think the reason that they're less strong there though is that I'm aware of being part of a larger group of people who's just not interested whereas I'm not concious of a vocal community of disinterest in these cases. So, is that community there but silent? The only way to find out is a poll :)

[Poll #1048051]

TBH, if I could figure it out clearly enough, I could write a very long rambling post about my lack of sense of any national belonging of any kind (and my inability to comprend it in others) but it's still to up in the air in my mind, so you're spared :)

Comments

[zengineer.livejournal.com]

Like you I don't have particularly strong views of Diana's death. Her death was no more but no less sad than some random person dying in hospital from cancer. I think there are two issues that friends have commented on in the past.
The first is that some people think they know celebrities because they appear on television so they get upset by their deaths as you would anyone you know well. Interestingly this also applies for soap stars so they can get upset by the death of characters in a soap. I think this is misidentification but is linked to very empathic characteristics.
The second point is shared experience. People think they should feel what other people feel. For instance when someone who was quite like died at school where a friend was the head many people were very upset (including my friend) and the whole school stopped. Most people at the school didn't know the person who died but were still upset. As my friend's husband said people like us don't think that way but you need to understand that a lot of people do. Interestingly that didn't happen at my school when someone who was not particularly liked died.
I could ramble on about the socialogical advantages of shared group emotions but it would probably be rubbish.