live streamed funeral without my permission

[geeta2002]

my father in law died two weeks ago of terminal cancer, we held his funeral yesterday and as a family decided not to live stream his funeral, all the people that mattered to him and supported us as a family attended. His dying wish was that he didn't want his ex-wife who he hated to attend the funeral, but she phoned the crematorium up and managed to get the live stream set up without our permission. She then passed this onto 'family and friends'.
Myself, my husband and my sister-in-law are very strict with 'broadcasting' our children over social media or any form of streaming over the internet yet this was done again without our permission. My husband is ready to sue the crematorium but do we have a leg to stand on?

By law weddings and funerals have to be available to the public and entry cannot be refused. Not many people are aware of this as it’s obviously something that is not enforced.

Live streaming may be a bit of a grey area due to privacy concerns over children but as a side, you cannot legally ban anyone from attending a funeral in normal circumstances. I would take proper legal advice if you want to peruse this.

I wonder whether she said she was his wife and misrepresented her current relationship.
Stay calm and speak to the crematorium but it has been done and nothing you can do about it too much now. Presumably it was a live stream not a recording and you need a password to access so a little different to pictures /video shared all over facebook etc

Is there a GDPR issue here? It seems mad that anyone could ring up and have someone's private ceremony broadcast over the internet!

I would've thought that live-streaming is something that should only be authorized by the person organizing the funeral (your family.)

Was she still technically married to him? In which case I can see why the crematorium went along with it.

Otherwise it seems really out of line to me.

It is wrong that she managed to 'attend' when he did not want her to, I would certainly kick up a fuss.

YABU and precious about your children being "broadcast"

In the funeral I watched live streamed you could only see coffin, vicar and any speakers. The camera did not show the congregation at all if that puts you mind at rest.

I’ve recently arranged a funeral of very close family member. I paid for a live stream, and the username/password were ONLY given to me, to distribute as required to those who could not attend/were watching service from outside (due to limited numbers).
Funeral director was very clear that the link would only be given to the person who paid for and organised the funeral.

"Family" do not get to say who can attend funerals. It is a public service for celebrating the life of the deceased. If the ex wife was the mother of their children clearly they had a relationship and she may have wished to mourn the passing of her former husband.

I took the view that although I hated my exes girlfriend I smiled sweetly at her and sent my son over to them to ask them to join the family group. Take the high ground here and allow their mourning too.

I apologise profusely for my previous remark. Your situation reminded me of my exes funeral where his girlfriend behaved appallingly as she always did with everything 😣

Sue? don’t be daft.

'Public ceremony.
She could have attended in person.'

The real problem is not that she 'attended' herself virtually, but that she passed on the recording to others without permission.

I think you’re being really unreasonable, sorry. Funerals will normally allow people to show up regardless of the family’s wishes, due to Covid they have to be very strict. I can see why the funeral home wants to ensure all want to be mourners get to mourn, as close as to normal conditions.

The live streaming your children thing—sorry you’re being a bit precisou. There’s no problem with deciding you what to try to keep them off social media, etc but realistically they are being filmed every day in some capacity, you’re being very precious to blow up about this.

Also think of it this way: working in funerals must be one of the hardest, most emotionally draining jobs, you’re dealing constantly with death and tragedy, trying to ensure mourners get closure and keep various irrational, grieving people happy. They’ve been working throughout the pandemic, they’ve been dealing with people devastated at not being able to mourn in the usual ways, and then they have you coming at them on a high horse about your child social media policy and (sorry) your totally ridiculous problems. Yes if you feel strongly enough about it there’s no problem sending them a letter or having a conversation, but this whole attitude is unnecessary.

Sue if you want to, but you’ll look like dicks and I think you’ll have a very hard time in proving any damage caused. Yes things were not perfect here, but are you really amazed funeral homes don’t have cast-iron Covid policies for these very rare types of cirucmadtnces, when they have been working way above capacity for months dealing with all the pandemic deaths?!?

I'm sorry for your family's loss.

I agree with the pp that weddings/funerals are in the public domain. Individuals have no entitlement to bar others from attending.

It isn't really the crematorium's place to say who should and shouldn't have access to them via other media in the time of a pandemic - so for that reason I (as a personal opinion) think it would be unreasonable to sue them.

Was streaming the service explicitly forbidden by the funeral organisers / next of kin?

How did the ex wife get the details of the location of the funeral in order to ask?

How do you know it was streamed - where has this information come from?

Funerals are public events. Also does it really matter who else she gave the link to? They'll only have been watching if they cared about the person whose funeral is was. They're not going to be watching for fun.

I'm surprised you've even mentioned your children in all this to be honest OP.

I thought you were going to be (quite rightly) angry/upset that your late FIL didn't want his ex to attend and that the family had their decision to not live stream overruled.

That's a massive intrusion on their grief imo and I would hate to be live streamed at such a time without my knowledge.

But kids being seen in public, wouldn't be part of my anger.

I would check out the crematoriums website because you may find they live stream all services. Our cathedral live streams we know this as have been watching mass online. It was my Mil's funeral last Friday which was live streamed and was a comfort to us knowing her only surviving brother could watch the service back in Ireland. I can understand you being upset but if they do live stream all services then it's unfortunate that you either missed the info or they failed to inform you.
Sorry for your loss

His dying wish was for somebody not to attend his funeral? Wow.

Those saying funerals are a public service and anyone can attend - at the moment this is incorrect as due to covid numbers are restricted and information in those attending have to be provided in advance.
That aside, a live webcast of the funeral is something that is specifically requested (and paid for) by the next if kin, it should not be available to anyone who fancies watching it, unless the Nok choose to make the log in details available.

Funerals are generally public events, there're no invitations issued for instance.
What did your FIL's death notice say about the funeral arrangements?

In these times of Covid restrictions, with numbers strictly controlled, I can see that the Crematorium probably thought it was making the decision for the best of reasons.
Also if FIL's Ex wife still uses his name, that must have muddied the waters for the Crematorium's administration team.

I can't see that threats to sue the Crematorium would get very far, but they would certainly be a money pit if entered into!

How sad that your FIL still hated his Ex wife, don't follow in his footsteps by wasting your own emotional energy on this. Instead, celebrate FIL's life, and then leave the past behind.

I'm very sorry for your loss.

I think you need to contact the crematorium and find out the circumstances of how this arose in the first instance.

Then you need to calmly consider what you are told.

Think of what was actually transmitted. I have never seen a live-streamed funeral but presume the focus would be on a forward facing view so that you would see the coffin and whoever conducted the service and anyone who stood up to speak, rather than on a view of the attendees faces.

I also think you need to think about what you hope to achieve. If they have made a mistake what would suing them achieve? Successfully suing someone can be a lengthy process which just results in financial compensation. Money won't change the fact that your FIL's ex wife has now seen the funeral service.

I think, IF a funeral service is considered private and you are allowed to sue, I would think very hard about the benefits of doing so.

I can understand your anger and would try very hard to comply with someone's last wishes. I would also try to think that FIL and his ex wife loved each other once and that a funeral is a celebration of the whole of your life and doesn't just encompass who was in it at the end of it.

I don’t believe funerals are public.
You can restrict attendance, and make them private

Oh it appears I’m wrong. That’s odd though.

This is why we did not put a notice in the paper when my father died to avoid his ex wife attending. Not sure what you can do about this to be honest.

@sorryiasked That may be the case where you are but at our cathedral it's live streamed 24/7 and we certainly didn't have to pay for Mil's funeral to be live streamed.

I attended a virtual funeral and if it’s any help, you could barely see the congregation.