This article chronicles how current “…American pop culture sees dead people.” Jeesh, I had no idea there were so many books and TV shows on this. Just a week ago, I picked up the current issue of Skeptic magazine, after reading Deconstructing The Dead: Cross Over One Last Time To Expose Medium John Edward by Michael Shermer, as well as perusing the James Randi Educational Foundation’s site. Randi slices and dices medium James Van Praagh, the subject of the CBS miniseries “Living With the Dead” that starts this coming Sunday.
I plan to do more reading before I expound on all this afterlife stuff, but what struck me about the Newsday article was the notion that the explosion of books and movies about communicating with the dead could be related to the aging of the baby boomers.
“Today’s trend seems to be not only a reaction against making death the antiseptic province of funeral homes, but also a reflection of baby boomers’ grappling with the loss of their parents and, increasingly, their peers….The baby boomers are poised to remake the experience of dealing with death, grief and loss… “
Now that makes sense, at first blush. We’re not content with the traditional notion of heaven and hell but we’re not keen on the notion that we’re no different than a raccoon or a dandelion — once we’re dead, dat’s it, dat’s all, der ain’t no more. But regardless, the bigger question for me is how does our involvement with all this afterlife stuff contribute to us living a better life — one of satisfaction as well as a contribution to the world?