To be upset at how many people turned up to my dad's funeral in casual clothes?

[Wheelchairbarbie]

My dad died last month and the funeral was yesterday. It was an unexpected death and very very painful for us all to lose him.
I don't know if I'm wrong and I shouldn't be focusing on it but I can't stop thinking about how many people came to the funeral yesterday just dressed as though it was a random day in Tesco.
Women in strappy tops and tight, short dresses, men in jeans or jogging bottoms, some not even clean, trainers and flip flops everywhere, hair in messy buns, it was all there.
I felt so upset that they didn't seem to think him or we were worth the effort.
I've never seen funeral guests dressed like this. I've always put on a black dress, spent time over my make up, worn nice jewellery and heels, maybe even a pashmina and a hairpiece. I'm only 35?

AIBU to have found it so upsetting?

Yes quite… and I did say this in my post “I’m not saying this is what you did during Covid but a lot of people during Covid settled into a routine of wearing t shits/ jeans/ joggers”

”I have no intention of turning up at any events where I'm expected to wear formal clothing.”

So why comment on a thread then by saying you have nothing suitable to wear for a funeral?

how are other people informed of this do you think? Is there a rule book? No.

Well actually there is, but to be fair most people don't check it regularly. However, you really do have to live under a rock not to have any idea how to dress for a funeral (and don't ask me how anyone missed the "don't wear white at a wedding" rule, I truly don't know, and I've been accused of personally making it up because I want to ruin weddings for people, which gives you some idea of how resistant people are to finding out they've been doing something wrong).

But let's say you truly didn't know and you honestly thought it was totally done to wear ripped denim, dirty joggers and flip flops to see someone put in the ground or oven. You didn't, obviously, but let's pretend you did. Ok, now you know. So now you know better, and you can see there are a lot of people who'd be very upset to see you rock up to their loved one's interment like it was a beach party... why wouldn't you just dress differently from now on? What purpose could you possibly have in arguing and complaining about it instead?

No, I've said up thread I'm not going to any more funerals.

It's only in the last two or three years since I started on MN that I heard about the white at weddings thing, and no, I haven't been living under a rock!

Completely agree. If in doubt there is such a thing as google too… which people didn’t have generations ago and STILL knew what to wear. I’m not buying this shit that people just don’t know 😂

I don't dress like a slob for any important occasion but I also don't attend funerals at all because I think they're an outdated money-making scheme that cause unnecessary distress. So if you think it's a societal expectation that I do go, that's further evidence for you that people either don't know or don't agree with you.

Times change. Being in your 40s as I am and you are and getting het up as you are about people doing things differently to you is just a recipe for causing you stress unecessarily.

Okay lol

Because they're an outdated money-making exercise that is completely unnecessary and cause unnecessary distress.

“I don't dress like a slob for any important occasion but I also don't attend funerals at all because I think they're an outdated money-making scheme that cause unnecessary distress.”

Says it all really 😂
Another one who doesn’t attend funerals commenting on a thread about people who do attend them.

Well, unless there are circumstances around this that you haven't disclosed, I think that's plain selfish.

It certainly is, and also really quite childish. But if a person really is unwilling to wear anything appropriate for an occasion, it's better to send their apologies than rock up looking totally inappropriate and disrespectful and then try to put everyone else in the wrong.

Also, refusing to attend funerals on an anti capitalist principle is a new one on me, but again, if someone's going to make out that I'm doing something morally wrong by holding a funeral, I'd rather they fucked off too.

I think it'd cause me far more distress to think someone wasn't going to even bother to turn up to my funeral or that of a loved one on so-called ideological grounds. If that's even the real reason - ime when people trot out the 'it's just a money-making exercise' spiel it's a handy excuse not to do something they can't be arsed doing.

And it's not for you to speak for everyone else on what is or isn't 'necessary'. How arrogant.

I'm a vintage Goth by style, so finding something black and suitable for all weathers isn't an issue for me. What flummoxes me is when no black or bright colours is a stipulation. Had to dig out a bright red shiny skirt for my ex FILs funeral. But that's how it works in my opinion. No stipulation - formal and sombre. This "but how do people know" hand wringing is very peculiar. How many celebrity funerals have been plastered all over the place for example? I don't recall the Queens funeral being populated by Juicy Couture.

Same. My SIL wore a white dress with a little bit of black flower pattern on it to my wedding only 15 years ago when I was 32 and she was 34. It is only in the last couple of years since I've seen threads on here that I've discovered I was meant to be offended by that and she would stand out as trying to male a point. She wasn't, she didn't stand out and nobody thought it was in the least inappropriate.

I'm not arrogant thanks.

the last funeral I went to was the funeral of my best friend who died at 42 of cancer and I saw her 5 year old daughter bewildered in the dress she was supposed to wear to her Mums wedding which couldn't happen because she died too soon.

And heard her parents sobbing as they said how much they loved her. And all the music that was played that I now can't hear without breaking down.

I thought WTAF are we all doing here? why are we doing it? is anyone actually comforted by this or is everyone just having the worst day of their lives and will carry the traumatic memories of this that will be triggered for decades when that song comes on the radio, or they see Lillies or whatever?.

How on earth was that 'paying your respects'? just being there being the worst day you could possibly imagine. Looking at the coffin and imagining my best friends cold, dead body in there. Was that me paying my respects?

I paid my respects to her when she was alive. I loved her, deeply for most of my life. I said goodbye to her when she was dying.

If other people want to go to funerals that's up to them but I won't and thats up to me. I couldn't care less what people think.

Just look at this thread and all the other threads of distress caused BY FUNERALS. Someone didn't wear what the judging person thought they should wear, someone thinks this piece of music should have played and not another, someone thinks so and so should have attended, someone thinks so and so shouldn't have attended, someone thinks so and so shouldn't have spoken, someone thinks so and so shouldn't have sat in the first row. Who should get to go in the funeral cars? Complaints about so and so who hasn't seen the deceased in years turning up for a sandwich and a piss-up.

On and on.

There are frequent threads about people and their expectations of what should and shouldn't happen.

How is any of that respecting the dead?

Cut it all out. I won't ever go to another funeral. I'll have a pure cremation, my parents have already said they want the same too and they're the only people i'll be expected to bury.

The white at a wedding thing is clearly about not wearing anything that might clash with or upstage the bride, if it's a white wedding. Again, not rocket science. White with a pattern on is not traditionally bridal.

Except you'll be told time and time again on here that the "rule" extends to anything with a white/cream/pale yellow/pale pink/pale blue background even with a floral or any pattern. Which just goes to show these things are not agreed upon or have a general understanding.

I give up. Perhaps it's time for everyone to have a state issued uniform.

I am also retired and mostly wear joggers etc, but I do have a couple of pairs of black trousers (they are stretchy and comfortable, but they don't look like joggers) and a couple of dark coloured long-length blouses as well as a jacket and a dark coloured proper coat. I have worn them for many funerals - not dresses or veils or hats, but relatively smart.

My son wears joggers etc for work as he works in a warehouse. He can't afford a suit, but a few years ago he got a black blazer type jacket, a white shirt and some black trousers from a supermarket. He too has worn this to several funerals. His main problem is shoes, but he got away with plain black trainers the last time and they looked OK.

You don't have to be fashionable, just neat and smart and not too casual and these clothes last for years because they aren't worn so much (we hope).

Yup.

And all the people who think a bride should only wear white if a church wedding/first wedding/is a virgin or hasn't lived with the groom before marriage.

So as you say, no shared understanding or agreement on what these 'social expectations' actually are.

I saw someone complaining the other day on SM that the Father of the bride 'giving his daughter away' should only apply if she was living at home with her Dad before marriage and otherwise, it was just performative for social media.

@grumpygrape

unfortunately you will have funnels to attend in the upcoming years, no doubt about it

@OneElatedOpalDuck

you’re so cool and subversive 😎

The social expectations are on the guests to turn up in an appropriate outfit for that event. So what if the bride doesn’t wear white to a church wedding. It’s the bride’s wedding and her choice. But to somehow claim that it’s ok for all her guests to turn up looking like a bag of shit because they can’t be arsed to make the effort is beyond me! The thread is not about what the organiser of the event looks like as they will have come dressed appropriately for their “theme” it’s what the others who attend those events wear.. and if they look like complete slobs then that’s an issue with them, not what colour a bride is wearing.

Read the post I just made about my best friends funeral before you make unnecessary shitty comments.

Oh just don't do that in the first place. Seems like you're the one that hopes to be cool with your use of emojis.

@OneElatedOpalDuck

funerals help some people psychologically. So you cannot say they are a money making exercise that’s pointless