Speak Ill of The Dead

With the recent death of conservative US politician Lindsey Graham, there has been a sudden uptick in discussion over political decorum, echoing the sentiment “don’t speak ill of the dead.” A noble virtue, one which rings hollow considering the life preceding the death. Mr. Graham was a (closeted) homophobe, an avid supporter of the Palestinian Genocide, and a rapt defender of President Trump dismantling the US government, including the supposed decorum expected by his fellow harbingers of the American Reich of those who have had to suffer the consequences of his erroneous career.

Whether it is Graham, Margaret Thatcher, Ronald Reagan, or Charlie Kirk, there is this strange idea that death should be the absolution of deeply antagonistic and aggressively austere people. The defence that their death should be respected and celebrated simply because they were “divisive” undermines the validity of those they harmed, writing them off as overzealous differences of opinion.

It is not an option that Thatcher sold off the UK for pennies, privatising its resources and services, used police and military forces to assault, intimidate, and even kill union workers and civil rights campaigners, and waged a pointless war against Argentina to maintain colonial control of land smaller than Tasmania or Belgium.

It is not an opinion that Reagan sold weapons to Iran to help fund cocaine traffickers, he gutted social welfare and tax intake to the point of impoverishing his own nation, he and his wife turned away gay friends begging for help during the AIDS epidemic, and that, like his British mistress, he sold his country to private corporations, including normalising turning children’s entertainment into lightly veiled advertisements.

It is not an opinion that Charlie Kirk, the Internet personality who thought he was a rhetoric genius as he debated, in some cases, children, used his dying words, a racist dog whistle, as a poor attempt at saving face after being called out to prove his baseless accusation that America’s notorious gun culture, the same one he defended, saying some deaths were “worth it”, was caused by trans people.

These are facts, not differences of opinion. You are asking us to respect in death those who didn’t respect us in life.

On some level, the call for respecting the dead comes from a place of sober realisation; other people choose how we are remembered. While you can trust loved ones to humanise you in their minds, the same can’t be said about those you’ve hurt. Perhaps it was distasteful people sang “Ding Dong, The Witch is Dead” when Thatcher died, or when Kirk’s death became the subject of memes, but these weren’t (solely) the work of Internet edgelords. What kind of life must you have lived when people must be asked, even demanded, to respect you in death? Does that sound like the life of a person who did you no harm?

The general interpretation of the expression is to leave the dead alone, to excuse their mistakes, and accept that we are all equal in death. This quickly doesn’t make sense when you remember the person is dead; what do they care? For some, the final word is enough to reevaluate their life and give back to the world. Famously, Alfred Nobel, the inventor of dynamite and other explosives, fearing the legacy he’d leave behind, set up the Nobel Prize, to celebrate achievements in literature, science, and world peace. Numerous libraries, museums, theatres, charities, and institutions have been set up by morally compromised tycoons, politicians, and historical figures; it doesn’t absolve them of their sins, but at least they understood legacy is the good you do, not the harm you ignore. I think it’s no coincidence that in a time of such wealth disparity, and further concentration and corruption of power, we are seeing less altruism, and more performative platitudes, taking the kindness and meekness of others for granted.

I believe a more fitting interpretation is to not speak ill not out of reverence or sanctity, but for your own peace of mind. Whether you loved or hated them, grief is your loss to process. Death, for some, is anticlimactic. There will be no karmic satisfaction. No comeuppance. No validation. The bastards got away with it. And now they expect you to mourn them?

So, speak ill if you must. Speak so ill your words spread like a hungry cancer. Speak until you can’t any further. Then let it go. For your own sake. Live your long life knowing the truth about them. Let them rot without another word, no matter how satisfying it may be. Outlive their memory and surpass them. Live a life so well you never have to ask anyone to respect you in death.

#HI