Mourning is a Private Affair

Here's the hard cold fact. Death is a part of life. We will all go somehow at some time.  Loss and grief are also part of life. Try as we might, we can't avoid them either.

Robin Williams died on August 11, 2014, twenty days ago. Since most who did not personally know him have moved on, I thought it would be appropriate now to write about some impressions I had at the time.  I wasn't the only one who considered this.  Amy Webb wrote a piece for Slate.com about it and she got me thinking about my own response to grief and social media.

When the announcement came about Williams' passing, I was immediately struck by how Twitter and Facebook went crazy with postings.Why? What were we sharing? Grief? Or a desire to be involved in a big news event? 

When we post about the loss of a loved one, what do we expect?  Is it fair to assume that everyone will grieve the same way we do? Do we really think that people we have never met care about our loss? Do we have a right to criticize how other people grieve?

Sometimes events should be private. The loss of someone we loved should be one of those times. I never want to rate the appropriateness of my grief by the number of likes on a Facebook posting. There is no possible way that a Facebook friend, who is often a writer or fan I don't know well if at all, can understand how I feel.  They are unique personalities unto themselves with different experiences and cultures. The way they handle loss will be different from the way I do.

A few years ago, my family suffered a great loss at the holiday season. Close friends rallied around. They telephoned, they took me to dinner, and they supported me as I struggled through the emotional jungle. There is no possible way a click or 140 characters can replace the level of caring I found in a crowded restaurant, a miniature Christmas tree, or someone going through bags of clothing with me.

Death is a deeply personal experience. When it enters your life, you will want to, but you won't be able to, whisk your feelings away with a click or a tweet. And if you try to do that, you will be left devoid of comfort. Social media is great for some things. It may make you feel a part of something important. But it's no substitute for holding onto your teddy bear, or your best friend, or your mate and sobbing the pain away.

Iran, Michael Jackson, and the Internet

News events that two years ago would have had absolutely nothing in common were tied together last week by communication capabilities – the Iranian election protests and the death of Michael Jackson. Several articles have been written in recent days about the impact Twitter had on both stories. The information could not be contained and, although it was not always completely accurate, people had it instantly.

As news spread, through Twitter and other outlets, people hopped onto the Internet to learn more. There were so many Google searches conducted that, according to BBC News, Google thought it was under cyber-attack. In her June 26, 2009 article on www.bbcnews.com, Maggie Sheils said, “Google’s trends page showed that searches for Michael Jackson had reached such a volume that in the so-called “hotness” gauge the topic was rated “volcanic.”

One newsman commented that journalists once confirmed stories like these with two reliable sources before releasing them. There would have been a potential delay of several hours as information was gathered and verified. Now, a member of the paparazzi on stakeout at the Jackson home alerts the media and the news is in Japan in seconds. A cell phone in Iran records a demonstration and people thousands of miles away watch it on Facebook moments later.

Technology is reshaping our world. The communication “cat” is out of the bag and nothing can stuff it back in. Governments and celebrity families must accept that no matter how hard they try to suppress it, news about them will be around the world before they can blink. Concealing information is almost impossible now. Whether the news is about a suppressive government, a crooked state politician or a troubled rock star, we will know about it in an instant. While this may be a terrible burden for the Jackson family and the Iranian government, it is a ray of hope for the rest of us.