Why we don’t speak ill of the dead

For almost everyone who dies, tributes pour in. We speak of their good, and how much we will miss them. And sometimes it can feel performatory. And we can feel like we, or others are being dishonest, even if just a bit.

Perhaps the remarks aren’t very accurate of who they really were. Maybe we really remember when they were unkind and greedy but now we just have to make it up to be nice for once. Maybe we pity them because they can no longer defend themselves, and it just feels unfair to do anything but praise them.

While it can be true sometimes that we are indeed being drawn to be nice, I believe the real reason we don’t speak ill of the dead is that death, in its finality, reminds us of the fleeting nature of all things—a perspective from which our hatred melts. Suddenly, the flaws that once loomed large seem small. And now we see what was good, zoomed in, even if it felt previously hidden.

Death makes us remember that every life is a mix of light and dark — and faced with the nothingness of it all, we find no reasonable reason to stare in the dark.