That ribbons & balloons along public streets for a funeral is litter rather than a tribute?

Noticed a rotting bunch of flowers by the river today. Thought hoorah no plastic wrap. Then noticed it had a ribbon tied around them. Where the person who left them thought the plastic ribbon with a perfect loop for animals legs and necks to get caught it was going to end up when it got swept away from the rocks when the river levels rose. 🤔 🌊

If they are genuine then they would keep up the appearance and not just let stuff rot away.

I do litter picking every week around my village. Have you ever, in your life, stopped to pick up the crap that people leave for someone else to clear? Doubt it. But carry o leaving cans of beer and sodden Teddy bears as a lovely memorial.

@Talltreesbythelake of course not 🙄

What a daft thing to say.

I don’t really get these answers about it being scruffy performative etc. do you not believe these people are genuine? Obviously toy are aware that people grieve differently and that it’s not for you to decide what is appropriate grieving but these posts are coming across as others just not taking it seriously as grief.

And when you see popped balloons, string, cellophane wrapping all blown over the verges and hanging from the bushes you think what a lovely tribute?

There is a shrine on the Woodhead Pass which has been there for 20 years. It has had people looking after it but is starting to look tatty and overgrown. I’m hoping that his family has found a peaceful place to remember him.

I didn’t know the young lad but I’m pretty sure he wouldn’t want his family and friends remembering him at the place he was killed.

Yes to the benches. I enjoy pausing for a moment to look at the little brass plaque to see which dear loved one is being remembered, with their name and a few carefully-chosen poignant words about what they meant to those leaving the tribute.

The thing is, though, that the primary purpose of a bench in a public place - and the reason for the council granting permission for it - is so that people can sit down for a rest on it.

If it's frequently covered in... well, anything apart from people's bottoms, it defeats the whole object of it being there. What was a beautiful, subtle, practical tribute - a way of keeping alive the memory of a special person whilst also providing ongoing comfort and rest to those who live on in the area - is completely destroyed.

I can understand tributes being laid in the immediate aftermath when shock is reverberating (particularly when its an event that has shaken a community), but they should be removed in a timely fashion as decay sets in.

In recent years it seems to have become a thing to "decorate" memorial benches and leave their use impaired by flowers and other tied on and inevitably left to decay. The bench and its plaque are already there as a memorial.

I've never been to the site where my close family member died abruptly and prematurely. I lay flowers at his grave at specific occasions (wrappings disposed of appropriately), and remember him as and when anyway.

I wonder if the development of these tribute trends are connected to the decreased formality of funeral rites, increased time for funerals to take place (often 4-6 weeks) and people not paying the significant cost for graves or plots for ashes to be interred so that leaves a place of death as a focal point for memorial rather than a traditional type of dedicated site.

They do in our cemetery. My late mum agreed to be buried (we had a conversation about what to do when she was terminally ill when I was 23 as all her family are cremated) because I felt I needed somewhere to go. Her one condition was that there was no "tat" or fake flowers put on the grave, which I happily agreed to. Since then my brother used a space in the grave for a child his girlfriend had had an elective termination for at a late stage for serious medical reasons, and so my nephew is buried with my mum, and my dad's in there too. My brother's girlfriend's mum visits a couple of times a year with fake flowers, teddy bears, cards in polythene, ornaments etc. I don't want to be mean as her grandchild is buried in there, but it's awful, it's bad for the environment, and my mother would have been so upset about how it's turned out. She doesn't remove anything - so there are dirty teddies, toys, faded fake flowers there, that I have to move, and feel really mean doing so.

If its done as a tribute.... then dont let it end up looking like a junkyard.

Christ - you're a hard- hearted lot. When I see that I think how very sad. I don't think of it as litter.

Totally agree
Maybe the local Council should step in with new. Bye laws and fines about leaving rubbish and. fly tipping.

Do people also leave this type of trashy tribute rubbish in cemeteries and.around crematoriums?

Think the days of saying ones respects in a quiet way with a bunch of flowers have long gone..

Just another occasion that has become a day out to the Circus.Then get legless at the pub afterwards as the final tribute.

Happy Days Folks
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⚰️🥁🎈🎊🎉🥃🍷👎

V annoying - see also helium balloons. Environmental disaster. See also flowers on graves wrapped in plastic! Where do people think this plastic is going to end up? So rude.

I'm with you - I cannot stand yarn bombing. There's one near me that does a theme during their annual town festival and it looks utterly shite.

Yes they are usually thinking about their loved one who has died rather than the plastic, bastards.

I'd volunteer to tidy away the Newky Browns. 😉

Also, flowers will before long rot into the ground and complete their nature cycle unobtrusively; whereas a bottle of Newky Brown that's left there in tribute to your old drinking buddy is a forgone dangerous hazard in the making.

The 'love' padlocks on bridges really irritate me too. I kind of get the very first one, hidden unobtrusivvely right down there in the corner; but when you're having to shove thousands of them along the support wires of the creaking bridge to make room for you to add yet another one, what does it actually achieve?

Just like flinging yet another bunch of (not even unwrapped) flowers high atop the existing mound of them.

I hate anything like this, left in a public space. My worse experience is people who think the countryside would be improved with a few knitted items.

I don't have an issue with it personally, but I agree that a family friend should be nominated to go around and discretely remove it within a couple of days.

Minks are going to mink.
As pp have said oh look how much more heartbroken I am compared to others.
And it's usually he was lovable rogue that translates to a pita within a community.

Performative Grief seems to have become a thing since Diana died.

Someone has an accident, and the people who witnessed it, heard it, live nearby, attended to the injured, have to be reminded of it by way of balloons, candles, ribbons, banners etc.

Maybe those people don’t want all of that outside their property. There was a near riot when a property owner tried to take down a banner etc that were attached to their property.. the police had to be involved.

The person most likely didn’t die at the scene anyway, died in an ambulance, or in the hospital .. so what are people actually marking ? Why the scene of a horrendous accident.

As for “vigils” that (round here) always seem to end up in chaos & fights - what happened to quietly remembering someone with a bit of Dignity? How did standing on the street, drinking, whilst releasing a balloon into the air, become a thing ?

“I’m sadder than you” “look how popular this person was” “I’m more filled with grief” .. tacky

But at least on a grave it is limited to one small space and will almost certainly be kept tidy either by the family or whoever takes care of the place. I don't think anyone has such a problem with that. But when it's in public spaces, tied to lamp posts or benches it's just litter.

It's right up there with my hatred of people who build crappy cairns everywhere to 'mark' they've been there. One person does it and then the next 3000 do it and it just becomes a huge eyesore. You're not special and nobody wants to see your stupid piled up stones on a 2000 year old tomb.