“To the dead, speak nothing but good.”
So goes a time-honored saying.
That is why if one wants to find out the “good” of a person, attend to his funeral and listen to the eulogies. One will hear them all. At more times though, many will end up like puking; especially those closest to the dead person's life.
Well, it is just our time-honored hypocrisy.
But why should it be? The very idea of praising a dead person before he is buried making him appear as a saint is sickening. If the praises are due and the praises are true, why publicize about them when they are already public in the first place? What is worse, more often than not, most of these are untrue.
At its worst, this practice has put many a living person at ease doing evil things as long as he lives knowing he has glib friends left who will chant his good exploits before he is buried.
The practice is maddening
Guy de Maupassant's short story, “Was it a Dream” tells us the truth of this hypocrisy.
Is it not rather time for us to put an end to this practice? One could pay a more meaningful homage to the dead by simply saying nothing at all.
The living engages continuously in politics. Could we not spare the dead out of it?
