Sanders - Fun Times at the Graveyard

[Lady Elaine]

Anybody else think the photos of these kids gleefully horsing around in the cemetery were pretty tacky? Aren't you supposed to be solemn in a place like that? I wouldn't want some kids spread out over my grave, even if it was 150 years old.

refinersfireforge.com/blog/?p=5173

[latraviata]

Anybody else think the photos of these kids gleefully horsing around in the cemetery were pretty tacky? Aren't you supposed to be solemn in a place like that? I wouldn't want some kids spread out over my grave, even if it was 150 years old.

refinersfireforge.com/blog/?p=5173

As long as the buried people are not true christians it is perfectly fine I suppose.

Well yes I find this particularly disturbing, I would never have allowed my children behaving like that in a cemetery, you are absolutely right.

[treemom]

Meh. I wouldn't let my kid do it because it disturbs other people. But really..it is dead bodies. I think we over obsess about dead bodies in the west.

[latraviata]

Meh. I wouldn't let my kid do it because it disturbs other people. But really..it is dead bodies. I think we over obsess about dead bodies in the west.

Imo it is disturbing for other people perhaps visiting their loved ones. It has everything to do with manners you know, very old fashioned and completely unnecessary, but still it makes life so much more pleasant, but who cares.

[fundiefan]

When I was a kid we played in the cemetery across the street all the time. It was also a shortcut to each other's houses rather than having to walk a mile around it.

As an adult, I've seen a lot of people do photo shoots in them for various reasons. I also have an odd interest in them when they're old and can wander for hours reading headstones. And, yeah, once in a while sitting down and taking a break.

I don't think it's a big deal. If you are a Christian, you don't believe the person is lying underneath the stone anyway; you believe the person went to heaven or hell and the body turned to dust. If you're not Christian, you can believe any number of things. But, whatever you believe, the body decomposes and pretty much does become dust.

Grave digging/robbing and such, that's a different story. Just hanging out in a cemetery? No biggie.

[Black Aliss]

If there are mourners in the cemetery, I agree, it would be in bad form to be horsing around on the graves. But it sounded to me like it was an old, no longer used cemetery, or at least an old area of a cemetery still in use.

What's proper in cemeteries seems to be a cultural thing. I've been places where the tombs were in the families' front yards and they were a place to hang out and read, or have a picnic. I've been places where people got all bent out of shape because grieving parents had decorated their deceased child's grave with helium balloons and toys instead of [the apparently more appropriate] plastic flowers. I saw a grave in a village in Holland where many of my ancestors are buried that had a Harley engine for the headstone.

Personally, if I had to be buried in the ground (over my dead body, I say!) I would want children playing tag, people picnicking, and lovers forn, er, star-gazing on my grave. Cemeteries are usually lovely spots, it's a shame to waste them on the dead.

[fundiefan]

If there are mourners in the cemetery, I agree, it would be in bad form to be horsing around on the graves. But it sounded to me like it was an old, no longer used cemetery, or at least an old area of a cemetery still in use.

What's proper in cemeteries seems to be a cultural thing. I've been places where the tombs were in the families' front yards and they were a place to hang out and read, or have a picnic. I've been places where people got all bent out of shape because grieving parents had decorated their deceased child's grave with helium balloons and toys instead of [the apparently more appropriate] plastic flowers. I saw a grave in a village in Holland where many of my ancestors are buried that had a Harley engine for the headstone.

Personally, if I had to be buried in the ground (over my dead body, I say!) I would want children playing tag, people picnicking, and lovers forn, er, star-gazing on my grave. Cemeteries are usually lovely spots, it's a shame to waste them on the dead.

I agree completely. Like any other circumstance in any other situation and any other location, use your judgment and respect the other people around you. If there is a service going on, get out of the way and shut up. If there are mourners at a grave, move along as silently as unobtrusively as possible. If there is no one in sight? Have all the fun you want as long as you do not damage.

[sugaree]

Yeah, I grew up playing in a local graveyard as well. Might be one of the things that sparked my love of history. It was old, and like fundiefan, I used to read the headstones, and wonder about the person beneath. As a young adult, I lived near a more modern cemetery, and the whole town seemed to use it as a park, jogging through it, walked their dogs, teaching their kids to ride bikes. To my sentimental mind, it seems a more fitting memorial than some solemn joyless place where no one went unless they were in a state of grief. If we're looking for some kind of symbolism, it underlines how much of our society today was created by the dead.

Like Molly Trolley, I'd much rather spend eternity somewhere where there is life and action and play. I just don't think it's a breach of manners unless there is actually a burial going on. Then, yeah, cull the horseplay.

[latraviata]

Yeah, I grew up playing in a local graveyard as well. Might be one of the things that sparked my love of history. It was old, and like fundiefan, I used to read the headstones, and wonder about the person beneath. As a young adult, I lived near a more modern cemetery, and the whole town seemed to use it as a park, jogging through it, walked their dogs, teaching their kids to ride bikes. To my sentimental mind, it seems a more fitting memorial than some solemn joyless place where no one went unless they were in a state of grief. If we're looking for some kind of symbolism, it underlines how much of our society today was created by the dead.

Like Molly Trolley, I'd much rather spend eternity somewhere where there is life and action and play. I just don't think it's a breach of manners unless there is actually a burial going on. Then, yeah, cull the horseplay.

I prefer cremation.

[JesusFightClub]

Chiming in possibly unnecessarily ;)

YES THIS to the above who said that there was nothing wrong in it. If a ceremony is going on, get lost sharpish out of respect. Don't do a harmful act like messing with a gravestone. Aside from that, it's OK to be human, they were once too.

What's there is the shell or remainders of the person, not the person themselves. They aren't sat in the grave going "Will these little bastards sftu and stop playing tag and posing for photos, I'm trying to sleep here."

[ladypuglover]

Chiming in possibly unnecessarily ;)

YES THIS to the above who said that there was nothing wrong in it. If a ceremony is going on, get lost sharpish out of respect. Don't do a harmful act like messing with a gravestone. Aside from that, it's OK to be human, they were once too.

What's there is the shell or remainders of the person, not the person themselves. They aren't sat in the grave going "Will these little bastards sftu and stop playing tag and posing for photos, I'm trying to sleep here."

Yeppers and I also agree with the other posters who saw nothing wrong with it. There is a time to enjoy a graveyard and a time to be mournfull in the graveyard. Neither is wrong if done at the right times. Should people just stop going and allowing the graves to fall in disrepaire? When we tend our family's graves, we bring a picnic and sing happy, favorite songs that the deceased loved and sometimes even dance for our deceased, but not on their graves. ;) What's wrong there is right here and vice versa. Also I would see a point if they had done anything wrong like disrupt a funeral, break up head stones or call up the dead in an evil plan to take over the car pool lane, but that doesn't seem to be the case.

[MissSeptember]

I live in a city and the church down the street from me is very old (early 1700's) and is next to a beautiful little graveyard. They have their annual church picnic and many other church events in the cemetery. This cemetery is cute. I've seen people taking their wedding pictures in it (not with the headstones, but with the ivy covered brick walls and wrought iron gates).

[clibbyjo]

I have been to very old graveyards in Paris and in Salem Mass.. Most people in both graveyards were just taking pictures, as I was. Of course some of us were looking for our OWN graves from a past life. We were all respectful. The children know I like old graveyards, they do not believe there are "people" there anymore, so they are not scared and don;t mind visiting if I wanted to.

Weirdly, I have never actually been to a graveyard for any of my relatives. I have been to only a few funerals,but never to see the actual grave. I once saw my FIL's gravesite, but he died before I met him so I had no attachment. My parents and my family will all be cremated when the time comes. I told the kids to just dump my ashes somewhere they think seems right.

[onlyorganic]

Why on Earth were they at a graveyard in the first place? I'm still figuring that one! "Hey guys let's go play in the graveyard and see if we can find an old headstone, then go to Krispy Kreme and come home and sit and play Uno with couch pillows on our laps!!!" Can we talk about the couch pillows for a second? Throw them on the floor!!! They have no problem photographing their kids lying on the floor, but the pillows must stay on our laps at ALL TIMES! It's a total Sander pet-peeve of mine...

[darkplumaged]

They aren't sat in the grave going "Will these little bastards sftu and stop playing tag and posing for photos, I'm trying to sleep here."

:lol: I'd be this kind of dead person, if it were possible.

I love cemeteries, but I've always been a little morbid. To me, they're a wonderful place for walking and contemplation. I enjoy looking at the really old stones and wondering what life would have been like for those people.

[pomology]

I kind of love the cemetery in my hometown and have spent time hanging out there.

Once a friend and I tried to translate the Latin on Jonathan Edwards' grave (Jonathan Edwards being buried in my hometown) and to read it we were sitting on it. Another time some friends and I were planning on buying toy spiders and taking pictures dangling over his grave, but then it rained. I don't think it's a big deal.

But on the other hand, I feel like it's a difference between famous people and unknown people. It might disrespectful to the living relatives of a dead person that you neither know nor know anything about to climb their gravestone or whatever. But a famous person put their life out there and had to be aware that they were bound to attract all kinds of attention. Kind of like blogs. It's okay to snark on somebody who put their life out there, but it's not really okay to stalk some innocent person who is not preaching or blogging or anything who just happens to be fundie.

[Wolfie]

Why on Earth were they at a graveyard in the first place? I'm still figuring that one! "Hey guys let's go play in the graveyard and see if we can find an old headstone, then go to Krispy Kreme and come home and sit and play Uno with couch pillows on our laps!!!" Can we talk about the couch pillows for a second? Throw them on the floor!!! They have no problem photographing their kids lying on the floor, but the pillows must stay on our laps at ALL TIMES! It's a total Sander pet-peeve of mine...

Well, it actually doesn't sound too strange to me. But like others above, I grew up near a historic cemetary. (there is a modern side, where we didn't play, and the old side.) My uncle worked there too. Just a part of life. We'd usually stop for ice cream instead of doughnuts.

And couch pillows, well, I have no opinions on those.

[gustava]

The only pix I can find that looks like a graveyard is the one at dusk with the kids dancing around what looks like a miniature Washington Monument. If that's the cemetery, it looks to me as if the kids are indulging in satan-worship.

Might someone post a link to the right pix???

[Wolfie]

The only pix I can find that looks like a graveyard is the one at dusk with the kids dancing around what looks like a miniature Washington Monument. If that's the cemetery, it looks to me as if the kids are indulging in satan-worship.

Might someone post a link to the right pix???

There are a bunch on that post- just scroll down- some they are pretending to be dead and coming out of the ground, others they are posing with headstones. It's an old cemetary.

[gustava]

Thanks Wolfie; I scrolled down. I agree it's tacky, only because the adults appear to have sanctioned it. Honestly, it's the sort of thing we did in highschool at a really old cemetery but it's absolutely, completely, totally WRONG for the kids to let the adults allow them to do it!!!!!

And I still think it looks like satan-worshiping.