To not go to funerals

I think this is about supporting your friend.

I vividly remember two of my mum's friends showing up for my grandmother's funeral. It wasn't about their relationship with the deceased, they were there for my mum. I mentioned my gratitude to one of them recently, about 30 years after the event.

As PP said, if someone loses someone close and they invite you, it means they would like you to be there and it would be a kindness to go.

I’m 54 and have never been to a funeral. A few times I couldn’t attend for valid reasons — grandmother died during pandemic, for instance. But now I feel differently. I just don’t want to go to one. Ever. And will be specifying not having one myself.

Exactly, huge medal and a balloon for you, for using your superior thinking to not attend funerals when it would be appreciated by the bereaved.

As if the rest of us are too thick to know better.

There are lots of things in life that we don’t have to do. Help someone if they’ve dropped something, hold open a door but they are part of the social contract and some people aren’t selfish cunts and put other people’s needs before their own

Choosing not to prioritise other people's feelings 100% of the time does not make anyone a "selfish cunt".

ridiculous but ultimately irrelevant, out-dated notions like kindness and empathy?

Those notions are neither ridiculous nor outdated. Opting not to attend an optional funeral is no indication someone lacks kindness or empathy.

I’m Welsh and I’m familiar with the tradition of women not attending funerals. My paternal grandmother didn’t go to her husband’s funeral, she was in her 40’s when he died. More difficult for me to understand is that she didn’t go to her son’s funeral, he was a teenager when he died. My dad went to the funeral with his dad, his mother wasn’t there to comfort him. The funeral procession started at her house and she watched the coffin depart up the road to the chapel. When she died I found pictures of the funeral that someone else must have taken for her. The internment, the coffin arriving at the chapel.

The first real death in my family that I remember was my maternal grandad dying when I was about 18. We all went to the funeral apart from my paternal grandmother. She was at the house to watch us all leave for the funeral but didn’t come with us. But, for weeks after the funeral she was at my maternal gran’s house every morning when she got up, and every night for a few hours before she went to bed. She cooked for her and did her washing. I suppose she understood, from her own experience of grief at losing her husband many years before, what my grandmother would need beyond her presence at the funeral.

I think sometimes the tradition isn’t about not doing something, but about doing something bigger than that, supporting the grieving after the crowds have gone.

@AtlanticStar

“Something else - I remember an old friend (Welsh) telling me that back in the day women weren't allowed to go to funerals.”

well, why didn’t you say sooner!? But of course, you should never attend another funeral ever again! None of us women should!

One of the most hurtful things my mother did was not attending my DH's funeral, it was the final nail in an already damaged relationship. I needed her that day and she was nowhere to be seen, for that reason I would always try to go to the funeral of someone who was dear to me.

ridiculous but ultimately irrelevant, out-dated notions like kindness and empathy?

I think what irks me is the insistence on having one’s cake and eating it: I don’t want to go to funerals because there’s nothing in it for me and I expect to be recognised as a better / smarter / more genuine person than anyone who does attend funerals.

What is this if not narcissism?

There are lots of things in life that we don’t have to do. Help someone if they’ve dropped something, hold open a door but they are part of the social contract and some people aren’t selfish cunts and put other people’s needs before their own.

Yes @VoltaireMittyDreamsomeone upthread doesn’t attend funerals because they don’t serve any purpose for her…found that quite jaw-dropping but don’t have the energy for a big fight tonight 🤣

I mean…it’s an hour out of your life maybe a dozen or so times…to do something good for a bereaved person. I don’t get all this ‘boundaries’ shit which this feels very similar to in tone.

ok, now you're starting to sound quite unpleasant and self-obsessed, like a half rate wellness influencer.

There are lots of things in life you might not want to do, but do out of obligation. Go to work every day, eat healthily, go to the gym, a child's party, etc. It doesn't mean you're not being true to yourself if you occasionally do something to benefit others instead of only doing stuff that makes YOU happy. It's called being an adult, and a decent person.

By all means miss the funeral member of the person you don't like, but to not go to others because they don't, what, spark joy, in you (DUH, they're funerals, most people don't go for funsies) is selfish.

No-one likes funerals but it's just a thing you have to do as an adult

Disagree. There is no "have to do" about it. Being an adult gives you free will and choice, and that includes the right to opt out of optional things.

What, precisely, obliges adults to attend funerals, other than ridiculous but ultimately irrelevant, out-dated notions like judgement and shame?

But this is the whole worldview of the ’I must always be true to myself’ brigade, who can’t imagine that anyone might do something they didn’t want to except to show off.

People who prize their own authenticity above all else also tend to appoint themselves the sole arbiter of what is sensible or meaningful, and declare anyone who feels or behaves differently to be small-minded and shallow and probably stupid.

I think there are two different questions here. I wouldn't judge you for not going to the funeral of someone you actually dislike so much.
OTOH I would judge you for not going to any funeral because you don't want to. No-one likes funerals but it's just a thing you have to do as an adult.

Funerals arent fir the dead theyre for the living, that said its nuanced.

Does the immediate family need your support. Does attending cause you excess upset.

Basically if you dont like them, its a balance between your wellbeing and the needs of people your close to. I.e. if your sil died and your brother needed your support and you didnt go be there for him id judge you unless it would induce some kinda panic attack or something for you

None of us want to go to a funeral, personally i would prefer direct cremation every time but surely the reason we attend is to support grieving family and friends.
Of course there are exceptions as a pp sadly mentions understandably she can't attend them.
I was massively grateful to see loved ones there to support me and my family at my dads funeral and i will do the same in return for my loved ones .
I would rather never have to go to another one ever again but that's unrealistic so i will just get on with it and go when i have to .
I can't imagine not going to my friends funeral so i do judge and i think you are unreasonable.

Attending an event you’re invited to isn’t performative 🙄

OP do you include memorial services or are you specifically talking about funerals?

Often the funeral is for close family and a memorial service is held a few days later for the deceased wider circle. Would you attend that?

She is not that close to this mum, just knows her better than me. So you don't think it's weird if 4 women show up (only one who knows the woman) to look at her dead body and then come to the funeral? My friend goes with another mum who knows her so doesn't need any support. It was more like a social invitation and was really bizarre.