Just the other day, I made an egregious faux pas at a friend’s house by jokingly referring to the violent demise of his spouse. In my defense, we had just finished watching the movie seven whose entire theme is about this psychopath who goes around killing people gruesomely and my comment was made while discussing the movie afterwards. The room fell silent and even I could make out that I had committed a blunder. I sure got a earful from Anupa while going home. I also apologized to my friend the next day if I had said something to hurt his feelings.
This incident got me thinking – why are we so touchy about the subject of death in general? Anupa assures me that the hesitancy is pretty widespread and that I’m the anomaly for not minding. Perhaps it has something to do with both my parents being doctors. We discuss death all the time at home. Just the other day, my mother and I were discussing the best way to commit suicide without pain and expense in case my parents get so old and pain ridden than life is just not worth living anymore. In fact, whenever my mother used to go on a trip somewhere, she would pull us aside before leaving and tell us where the important keys and documents were kept just in case she never came back. I have a file in my Google docs which has all these important details so that we don’t have to go into a flap in case someone in the family dies.
So as a person who’s quite comfortable talking about death, I find the tendency to avoid the topic in Indian society pretty puzzling. I mean sure, no one wants a loved one to die. But talking about it won’t cause it to happen. Keeping quiet about it won’t prevent it either. Unless of course it’s a superstition, in which case I understand. We’re all superstitious about something or the other I guess. But if it’s not superstitious, what is it?
Strangely, I find that it’s Indians who dislike talk of death more than people here in the US for example. It’s strange because Hinduism is arguably a very chill religion when it comes to the final end. Other religions postulate that there’s a final judgement which is pretty scary if you ask me. Hinduism on the other hand simply treats death as shedding your clothes. The soul finds a new body and things go on as usual. Krishna told Arjun not to grieve for loved ones because they’re not really dead.
If anything, it should be the Atheists who hate discussing death because everything literally ends for them. No rebirth, no heaven…nothing. But I’ve met quite a few Atheists who don’t mind discussing their death or the death of others in public. But I don’t know whether it’s a religious thing, or a cultural thing here. Perhaps the problem is philosophical and people feel that since death is a horrible and bad thing, then talking about it is in poor taste.
It’s like the elephant in the room. Every knows it’s there but no one wants to acknowledge it. We all know we’re going to die and everyone we love is going to die and yet we don’t talk about it. This despite that fact that talking about death can be very interesting since it presents concepts such as the soul, mortality, God, the value of life etc. One of the most important distinctions between humans and animals is that we seem to be the only creature who is aware of our own mortality.
Could someone who is more clued into this help me understand this recalcitrance?
I wish we did talk about death openly and simply as a fact, not as something horrible to fear… It would help if one sensed they might be dying and when there is no time/opportunity for others to comfort or reassure them (and how much can one do that, it’s better if one has grown up hearing about death as a fact, not as something scary…). I have come to love the Hindu concept of life after death – although I find it difficult to believe, but if one could believe that, there would (should) be far less fear of death.
I have seen and had without ever questioning it, accepted this superstition about not talking about the death of a dear one, and I feel we would all have benefitted from discussing how one would like things to be done, even children should be allowed to express that, because it would matter a lot to the parents… (to be able to do things that the child wanted). Buddhism discusses death more openly.
In reply to indianhomemaker
One of my greatest wishes is to not die in my sleep. I want to have a last goodbye to the world at large and to the people who’re around me at that time…
Hinduism, Buddhism, Zen…these Asian religions seem to take a pretty lenient view of death. It’s less scary than say Christianity or Islam. Which makes me even more surprised that we in India have problems discussing death openly.
In reply to bhagwad
well, most people don’t get to say goodbye to anyone.
I don’t have any problem talking about death but I can understand why your friend may have been hurt by your comments…If I had lost my husband to violence, I wouldn’t appreciate someone making nonchalant statements about it especially if my feelings are still raw…You don’t know what your friend went through or what his mental state is…It’s personal for him and may still be bothering him…
Similarly, a woman who has been raped wouldn’t like her friends making fun of rape victims in front of her…
Bhagwad, whether we like it or not, we are a part of society and being a part of society means filtering things according to the situation…
In reply to Sraboney
Quite, I agree entirely. In my particular case though, my friend had no such personal experience. He said as much. Which is why I wasn’t sure why he had felt hurt…hence the post :)
We are generally not that adept at handling change, and with death such a major change in life( with the end of said life, or start of another one) we are not eager to accept it, in spite of the fact that we cannot do shit about it eventually working out. Maybe when we are able to find a way to download our brains,psyche, thoughts and how we function on to a machine or maybe jump from one body to that of a dormant clone we can find a loophole.
I joke about it all the time. In fact I once said that I love the world too much and would generally hang back as a ghost and play pranks on my sons after my time is done. I said this to a room full of people – and it did not go down well. :(
It is the inevitable – if we talked about it and joked about it, we would be more prepared for it
In reply to Phoenixritu
You got frowns even for that? I would think maybe that was kind of a nice thing to say!
“… Could someone who is more clued into this help me understand this recalcitrance? …”
If that’s not a rhetorical question and you arent just seeking for confirmation bias you may get some interesting replies from some of the right-wingy sites :-)
One I have heard about from my childhood is “Gulikan”. I am hazy on the details but this is AFAIK a belief that at most times generally but evenings in particular, spoken thoughts can or may be rendered reality through the agency of this gulikan. I’m guessing this is a kind of supernatural entity that is either mildly malevolent (it will not actively harm you) or a naive “good spirit” that assumes you are seriously expressing your sincere desire.
This only works for negative events; wishing away for a lottery win every day at 6pm doesnt help :-) But come to think of it this might also explain why we traditionally light the prayer lamps and spend sandhya time in prayer.
I’m also guessing Gulikan will skip non-Hindus and atheists.
thanks
Jai
In reply to Jai_C
My question wasn’t rhetoric at all, and your explanation really is very interesting…and somewhat creepy :)
I thought perhaps the fear wasn’t due to as concrete an apprehension as you lay out but a more general feeling of unease. But who am I to talk?
In reply to bhagwad
I’m no expert and the apprehensions can only be as concrete as it is possible for anything to be that is based on spirits! But I do think most cultures and belief systems will have something similar in different forms. Its just that modern societies in those countries have moved away from those traditional beliefs while by and large we havent.
In passing a few notes:
1. a throwaway comment in a travel article on Bali says that the Balinese Hindus are quite different: no morbid fears, they pray at the temple for the departed soul and then arrange a feast.
2. western societies do seem to avoid the D word too, they say “pass on” or even just “pass” which was quite confusing for me initially. I attended memorial services where the point was to talk about the life of the deceased; everybody skirted around the actual event that brought them together that day.
thanks
Jai
Some time back I wrote a story dealing with death of a loved one and one lady seriously told me not to post it. “Shubh shubh” bolo is something that is taken too seriously in our country.
As an army officers wife, we had to talk to the other rank ladies about insurance and such so that they would be aware of such things and would not be cheated of their share of benefits in the case of death of the spouse. We were asked by the Commander’s wife to present the matter very very diplomatically and carefully, never ever using the word ‘death’. I must admit it was a real test for the lady who had to make the presentation that day.
Another instance is the time my husband had to go on a mission (his first after our marriage). He wouldn’t tell me directly that the situation was grim and anything might happen, but I picked up the signals alright, but wished he’d come right out and tell me! :) It is tough when your partner has to go off knowing that coming back is something of a question but is unwilling to talk of it. But to be fair to him, once he knew me better, all details that I had to know where clearly told me whenever he had to leave.
I agree with what IHM says.
In reply to shail
I can imagine that talking about life insurance without talking about death can be difficult :) . In fact, shouldn’t we call in death insurance?
Perhaps we should understand that death and life are two sides of the same coin. Life gets its meaning and is defined only through its opposite. If we feel don’t mind discussing birth in a matter of fact way, then we shouldn’t mind discussing its complement either.
Bhagwad, I misunderstood…I apologize…If you were talking hypothetically, then I don’t know what the problem with your friend was…I often joke about death…I remember after reading about the Terry Schaivo case, I told my husband that if I were in a similar situation, please let me die…His answer was “Please tell your parents that…I don’t want them coming after me…”
But us Bengalis love to discuss morbid things, diseases and how xyz died. :D but have to notice if we are comfortable discussing our own deaths.
In reply to Reema
Or the deaths of relatives in front of them!
In reply to Reema
Bengalis esp. love discussing their stomach ailments…
In my opinion, most people in rural India talk about death all the time. Sometimes they talk about it all week and never let up.
Only in the bigger towns the people stay away from death talk.
does anybody else get a captcha to access this site? not to post comments, just to read stuff. it says the system or some other on the n/w has a bot virus…. but my AV is fairly up to date and i dont see this on other sites.
and… the captcha is pretty tough! can take a minute to figure out.
i will probably check in less frequently now :-)
thx
Jai
In reply to Jai_C
Hi Jai,
Sorry about that. I’ve shifted to a service which hosts my content as a CDN and this is probably the reason. I’ll add you to a whitelist so you don’t fact this issue again.
When you fill out a captcha, there’s an option to send me a message isn’t there? Just give me a buzz so I’ll know which visit is yours and you won’t face the problem again.
Sorry about the inconvenience. I don’t want you check back less!
In reply to Jai_C
Just got your IP address and saw that it had been challenged. I’ve added it to the trust list – you shouldn’t be seeing the captcha anymore…I hope!