https://www.yahoo.com/lifestyle/body-dead-teen-honored-extreme-embalming-posed-video-games-sunglasses-snacks-182105773.html

Perhaps better than in a casket with people saying how "normal" he looked.

I would need a warning before I walked into that. I think I would freak out. Macabre.

Not how I'd like to be remembered.

So how do they dispose of the body after the funeral? I would think having the body in a non-standard shape would be...awkward.

I also was thrown by this remark: "Because it’s more of her, and it’s like she’s not dead." I always thought the whole point of funerals was to say, "Yes, our loved one is dead, we're saying goodbye and now we can get on with our mourning."

I wonder if this will be a new trend? I'll take cremation, please. Thank you.

I wish I hadn’t looked.

These types of funerals have been around for several years. There is a part of me that thinks it is a waste of money particularly if you can't afford a simple funeral without a GoFundMe. On the other hand, some people just have 'character' and a simple goodbye doesn't convey their life. It's a way of making people smile instead of being sad.

Just no. DH and I will be cremated. Don’t want anyone standing over an open casket saying, ‘she sure looks good, doesn’t she?’ No, I will be dead and won’t look good.

Did you read about the others too? I kinda feel sick inside, dead bodies posing as alive. I do not get all that. I like normal.

um, so that is the way to best honor and remember the deceased? not for me

Nothing is sacred anymore!!!

Very creepy. The pictures will disturb me all day.

I'm not a fan. At all.

I understood better when someone said they felt better seeing their friend that way, as though she was there with them, and not in a funeral home. Just at the table, like she always was. I get it, I guess?

In the picture of the Green lantern guy it looks like those children are terrified. I think I would be. Just why? I don't know what the heck. If I happened to walk in to one of those I would be running out.

Just too creepy for me! I'm planning on cremation....which I have yet to pay for...

I've heard of it before, even saw online a photo of an older man dancing cheek to cheek with is very rigid wife. It's not for me, I'm all for cremation and prayers.

People have lots of odd beliefs and do many stupid and creepy things. I'm not sure where to draw a line. I've stopped shaking my head at what I see and hear, it would otherwise be in constant motion.

Dawn, what a great remembrance. I decided not to look at the link. I get the idea and don’t need the visuals all day. I like the traditional way myself.

Thank you, natesg. Those guys turned what was a terribly difficult and sad day for me and my sister into a memory that makes me smile when I think about it and for that I will forever be grateful to them.

Dawn, I do not think what your brothers friends did was creepy or unusual I think what they did was kind, respectful and so memorable. The other (posing the dead) is very strange indeed.

Often in Louisiana Cajun funerals they have wakes and it is a celebration and memories of the person. Some have food and drinks some don't. I think that's very different from the posing of the body.

I too wonder how they manage to get the posed body in a casket for burial. Maybe they are cremated.

I don't go out of my way looking for funerals to go to but I can't remember one that was a strictly solemn or overly serious affair. I don't think what you're describing as a cajun tradition is unique.

Humorous eulogies and fun recollections among attendees before and after any "event" seem to be most common. My experience is that there's always something to attend the day of a gathering. Held either at a restaurant in a banquet room or at the decedent's or a relative's nearby house with catered food and drink. And sometimes the day before too, to visit the family of the decedent.

Celebration of Life events sometime later, for a larger group gathering, seem to be getting popular too.

Nothing is new. Victorian were very big on photographing deceased family members as if they were still alive. They had photographers with special apparatus to hold the deceased upright as if standing. Children were photographed with dead siblings all cuddled up with arms positioned around each other in a process that could take hours. They even had family pictures done with deceased pets. You can look this up online if you are interested. One of the ways to determine there is a dead person in the picture is the clarity of one person in a picture vs the slight fuzziness dictated by trying to sit still for long exposures. For some families it would be the only time photographs were made. Strange but true.

patriciae_gw, yes. There were many macabre practices over the years. Think of mourning jewelry.

My father in law had the William Tell overture played as his recessional. Far from solemn. But then, we're talking about a man who had a nativity set made out of dinosaurs. He was truly special. My son's named after him.

That's funny Rob.

Ilovemrmewey, I had to look up mourning jewelry. I knew they did something with the hair, but I thought they just kept it more as artwork. The most 'macabre' I think I've seen are the relics from saints. Someone gave my mom some saint relics. She was supposed to pray over them??? I know one was a tiny piece of fabric. Another was a tiny chip of bone set in a pendant with a clear cover. My teenage siblings and I disposed of them. We thought they were horrendous. I don't think mom liked them much either.

I find the after death photos interesting after knowing the story that those may have been the only photos. I've been trying to hunt one down from 1925. I didn't think to take a photo when I saw it. It's a picture of my three year old great uncle Roy. It's the only photo I have ever seen of him. Apparently, I am the family historian. I'm gathering as documentation as I can before I print my book to share with the rest of my family. I would like to include the photo as it is the only photo available. I know that little boy was loved by my great grandmother and greatly missed by the siblings who knew him.

I showed my husband this thread, and he looked at the pictures of the posing dead people. He said after he died he wanted to be posed installing outlets and some idiot turning on the electricity. (with sparks flying out of his tools and hands). Yes, this has happen more than once. By the homeowner most times or his employees. He is so crazy. I told him I was just going to dig a shallow grave and roll him into it. We both had a good laugh over the whole weirdness of it all! :) Married 50 years so we tease each other unmercifully. LOL

If the funeral is open casket, I go to great lengths NOT to view. I have no desire to have the last memory of my loved one or friend who has passed to be an image of them dead and laid out.

Dead and propped up in a chair..... that is for sure not the memory I'd want etched in my memory.

But if that's what the family wants, well it's "their" funeral.

What about these people who take pictures of their dead love ones in a casket? I despise that! My wicked stepmother took them of my dad after he died and sent them to me. There was a load of them. Did not look at them, except the first few and realized what they were. I did not know she had taken them when we were at the funeral. She mailed them to me and we lived in the same town. I was so angry, but I did not say anything to her, I just tore up the pictures and disposed them, just like I did her after my dad died.

What’s next? Selfie opportunity with the deceased?

I would not be surprised at all that selfies were taken in the cases in the article! Not surprised one bit.

My husband's mother died when he was 6 years old. There were five little children in the family, all under the age of 7. They lived in Cedar Key, Florida, which was just a little island fishing village at the time.....anyway, they had her casket in the house. He told me, he couldn't look at her. Seems like a rather traumatic thing for children....but maybe not. Not something I would want to see, if my mother had died when I was a small child.