Mourning sickness
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Mourning sickness is a collective emotional condition of "recreational grieving" by individuals at the death of murder victims or celebrities.[1]
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[edit] History
The history of mourning sickness in Great Britain can be traced to the public reaction to the Dunblane massacre that occurred in Scotland in 1996 when a lone assailant killed 16 schoolchildren and one adult at the Dunblane Primary School. The tragedy prompted a public reaction that brought a flood of flowers and sympathy cards from across Great Britain. A worldwide exhibit of mourning sickness followed the death of Diana, Princess of Wales in 1997 when the Princess was killed in a car crash in Paris. Almost immediately following word of her death, makeshift memorials to Diana began to pop up, most notably at her residence at Kensington Palace. The memorials became a gathering place for public weeping and for people to bring flowers. Similar displays of public grief occurred following the death of Linda McCartney, the murder of BBC journalist Jill Dando, the murder of eight-year-old Sarah Payne, and the murder of two Cambridgeshire schoolgirls from Soham.[1]
[edit] Anna Svidersky
The advent of the internet added a new development in public mourning sickness that was displayed following the murder of American teenager Anna Svidersky in Vancouver, Washington. Anna was murdered while working at a McDonald's restaurant, by schizophrenic sex offender David Barton Sullivan. News of her death quickly spread worldwide, initially through the website MySpace, where she had a personal page, and then through other similar sites. This created an effect of mass grief and mourning for her around the world mostly from people who had previously known nothing about her.[2]
In Britain, The Guardian newspaper compared the widespread expression of grief by strangers to that seen after the death of Princess Diana. The paper cited the 2004 Civitas think-tank, which described such grief as "mourning sickness", related to people's own emotional needs, rather than any real rapport with the deceased.[2]
[edit] Criticism
Some critics have described the public displays of mourning as "phony" and more for the benefit of the people grieving than for the victims, families or individuals that they are grieving for.[3] The media plays a pivotal role in these displays, focusing attention on the public reaction to these events. [4] Others said that "grief tourists" use the tears shed over strangers and celebrities as a form of self-indulgent catharsis, that the grief explosions are an exercise in narcissism, and that manufactured grief, complete with flowers and teddy bears, is the new opiate of the masses.[5]
[edit] References
- ^ a b S. O'Neil "Britain 'wallowing in mourning sickness' Telegraph Feb 23rd, 2004
- ^ a b Jonze, Tim. "Death on MySpace", The Guardian, May 15, 2006. Retrieved on 2006-05-23.
- ^ "Mourning sickness is a religion" Feb 23rd. 2004
- ^ F. Furedi "Mourning Sickness" The Independent August 25th, 2002
- ^ [1] Halley, Gwen, "Grief tourists lap up other people's pain." The Independent, Ireland, March 14, 2004. Retrieved August 15, 2007
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