Amid the many thousands of stories written about the life and now death of gonzo journalist and novelist Hunter Thompson is an interview with his wife, now widow, Anita. Frankly, I never gave much thought to Thompson, but the circumstances surrounding his death have caused me to reflect on where we are as a society and why people like this turn into icons.
"Hunter's death was not grisly. He was in the catbird seat in the kitchen, in the mountains by his wife and family. He wanted to go out while he was still on top, not wither away," his wife said. No, it wasn't grizzly only because the bullet he shot into his head did little visible damage and produced minimal blood. But what he did do was shoot himself while his son, daughter-in-law and grandson were in the house. That is not grizzly behavior? I see a selfish end to a self-centered man, famous writer or not.
He had physical problems, mostly of the bone and joint variety, broken leg, hip trouble, certainly nothing like the health issues many cancer victims deal with. So instead of dealing with them, he chose to leave this life and made the decision to mock this life a little more by asking that his ashes be shot out of a cannon. Swell.
Which led me to thinking about the boundaries we are constantly moving back and back and back. Right and wrong no longer have boundary lines, minimal educational standards of learning are being moved back, respect for life, whether life of the unborn or the elderly is being frayed. And so when I read a paragraph in a post by Florida Cracker it rocked me back more than a little:
"I think there are new rules being formed as to who is and who is not a person. More accurately, I think these are just the old rules that are making a comeback.
The Ancient Greeks and Romans would recognize them: Expose the elderly and infirm on mountainsides, put the unwanted baby on the dungheap. The pre/post-Christian lifestyle choices."
Hunter Thompson never put together 3 sentences as prescient as Florida Cracker. Pre/post-Christian lifestyle choices...Post modernism...a steady march backward in time. Cui Bono? Who benefits?
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