#ask a mortician

[thedapinna]

I like history, memes and American girl dolls. Here's the union of all these.

#ss eastland #donner party #dancing plague #appalachian trail #molasses #boston #margaritaville #heavens gate #cleopatra #theda bara #american girl #american girl dolls #history #meme #wendigoon #ask a mortician #kaz rowe #niche memes #is this too niche

[lunar-vvitch]

Today, Caitlin Doughty of the Ask a Mortician YouTube channel posted a video discussing the fact that her recent video, a long form documentary style video on the 1915 disaster of the SS Eastland in Chicago, the story of which has largely been forgotten, was given a community guidelines violation. It did not violate the guidelines YouTube has claimed it did, or any guidelines. But the video was essentially shadow banned. Caitlin is, of course, a mortician, and also a death-postive advocate and educator. Her entire channel is about education and honest discussion of death. The SS Eastland video was the product of months of work by her and her team in collaboration with historians and relatives of victims of the Eastland. An educational documentary that had the sole purpose bringing light to a forgotten tragedy and remembering the victims has been hidden away from all but those who know right where to look for it. The video is below, please watch it and share so this story isn't forgotten.

"A massive ship, an unthinkable tragedy, a chance to make sure the victims of the SS Eastland aren't lost to time."

Edit: the embedded video won't play because it's been age restricted :| of course. here's the link: https://youtu.be/UCHt2MOVCbg

#caitlin doughty #ask a mortician #ss eastland #censorship #youtube

[t0rschlusspan1k]

Landis Blair, illustration from From Here to Eternity by Caitlin Doughty

#art #Landis Blair #From Here to Eternity #Caitlin Doughty #Ask a Mortician #Order of the Good Death #cw: death #cw: scopophobia #illustration #favs

[whilomm]

to help spread the word a lil, ask a mortician just put out a new video, this one specifically about proposed FTC regulation changes for U.S. funeral homes, and theres a comment period that closes October 10th, 2023 to ya kno. comment on em. tell em to help make funerals a lil cheaper.

I would really reccomend watching the video as she explains it a lot better, but the TLDR is that the FTC is thinking of adding some rules to the regs on how funeral homes disclose a couple of things, like prices (making them list prices online, so you dont need to drive to 7 diff funeral homes to price shop the day your son died, and cause hidden prices=more expensive), and make it clearer WHEN embalming is required (that is, that its NOT required by law, but might be required by the funeral home themselves)

like i said, watch the vid for a better explaination, but both of those things contribute to funerals being Mega Fucking Expensive, so. if you feel like it, go to the FTC and tell em to implement the changes!

comment period ends october 10th, 2023!

#ask a mortician #caitlyn doughty #funerals #ftc #federal trade commission #uspol #funeral industry #buzzy #Youtube

[chaoticintellectual]

i think that the more weird and vaguely spooky a mortician is, the more trustworthy that makes them. Like, if your mortician dresses goth or like an old-timey doctor, then you know they’re passionate about their jobs. If your mortician is just an old man with a boring suit, then he’s probably just in it for the money.

#ask a mortician #im just saying

[a-typical]

At almost any location in any major city on Earth, you are likely standing on thousands of bodies. These bodies represent a history that exists, often unknown, beneath our feet. While a new Crossrail station was being dug in London in 2015, 3,500 bodies were excavated from a sixteenth- and seventeenth-century cemetery under Liverpool Street, including a burial pit from the Great Plague of 1665. To cremate bodies we burn fossil fuel, thus named because it is made of decomposed dead organisms. Plants grow from the decayed matter of former plants. The pages of this book are made from the pulp of raw wood from a tree felled in its prime. All that surrounds us comes from death, every part of every city, and every part of every person.

Death avoidance is not an individual failing; it’s a cultural one. Facing death is not for the faint-hearted. It is far too challenging to expect that each citizen will do so on his or her own. Death acceptance is the responsibility of all death professionals—funeral directors, cemetery managers, hospital workers. It is the responsibility of those who have been tasked with creating physical and emotional environments where safe, open interaction with death and dead bodies is possible.

— From Here to Eternity: Traveling the World to Find the Good Death, Caitlin Doughty

#dead man's bones #death avoidance #death acceptance #Caitlin Doughty #Ask a Mortician #From Here to Eternity: Traveling the World to Find the Good Death #From Here to Eternity #books #bookblr #death positive #death positive movement #nonfiction #science #history #travel #anthropology #memoir #sociology #atypicalreads #deathcare #cw death

[sailor-hufflepuff]

YouTube has decided that the latest Ask a Mortician video isn’t “educational” enough, and has buried it, despite it being chock full of researchers, historians, and family members telling the story of a tragedy that the world has mostly forgotten.

So I’m sharing it here, with what few followers I have.

#ask a mortician #deathlings #video content #youtube #know your history #history #chicago

[kindsoulbuddy]

Caitlin Doughty (Ask a Mortician) does such important work with her youtube channel and her nonprofit Order of the Good Death, as well as the books she’s written (I’ve read them all).

She is also bringing awareness to how cruelly animals are treated in this video she just posted. Animals continue to perform for people to this day.

Please keep in mind it’s heartbreaking and hard to watch but I think it important.

Also, youtube is treating her and her channel like a pariah and she depends on her patrons.

YouTube has taken her videos down before.

Even if you don’t watch this particular video I think she’s doing such vital work and changing the way we confront death. So check her channel out!

And check out:

#ask a mortician #caitlin doughty #youtube #tyke the elephant #elephant #🐘 #stop animal cruelty #trigger warning animal abuse

[lilbabysy]

Embalming tools and chemicals from my class ⚗️

#ask a mortician #cemetary #mortuary science #embalming #embalmer x reader #mummification #decomposition #reek of putrefaction

[roundbrackets]

The SS Eastland and Community Guidelines

I just watched Ask a Mortician talk about the tremendous work she and her team put into The Forgotten Disaster of the SS Eastland. I watched that video, I love that kind of stuff, and this one was truly well made. But the video I was watching was called Did We Really Violate Community Guidelines so that's where it ended - she and her team had worked their asses off to produce a documentary of a little known disaster and now it doesn't show up in your recommendations or in search Because YouTube found it had no educational intent. You can find it only by browsing the channel itself.

Months of work she said, buried in the slag heap of videos you'll never see. YouTube is a stone wall. There is no way to reach a person - not by email or by phone - you can't plead your case to the automated messages -

Where does that do but leave you questioning where you're going and whether it's worth it?

A per YouTube the real problem was the death, violence and gore - I have to assume it was the describing of the many dead, and the loved ones left who had to verify they had received the right body to bury, because there were just so many and clerical errors happened.

And I guess maybe it was also the story of the boy who never spoke of the day he swam and swam to recover the dead but once. It was a memory of a dead woman, deep in the hull of the ship, with her infant still wrapped in hers arms.

The sorrow resulting from the SS Eastland gutted me. That's violence of a sort, I suppose.

#ao3 #archive of our own #youtube #ask a mortician #community guidelines #creator

[chaotic-archaeologist]

What is the difference between a coffin and a casket?

Caitlin Doughty has said it better than I ever could.

-Reid

#he speaks #coffin vs casket: know the difference people #ask a mortician #order of the good death

[lottieurl]

i fucking hate caitlin doughty

since when is the funeral industry on anon in MY INBOX?

jokes aside tho i was gonna delete this and then realized it's a great excuse to recommend to everyone this interesting video about caitlin, her work and the funeral industry titled "does the funeral industry really hate caitlin doughty". especially recommended to my follow deathlings from outside usa because there is an interesting mention of people who aren't american getting some false ideas about funeral industries in their own countries which is a fair criticism! although i think caitlin tends to make it clear what is exclusively (or largely) an issue only in the american funeral industry and i think it's moreso just another case of american cultural hegemony around the world if anything. you can't really blame caitlin herself for focusing on the country she lives in and the realities she's most familiar with. but anyways. give this video a watch

#caitlin doughty #ask a mortician #and for those who follow me and dont know abt her i cant recommend checking out her work enough #she has a youtube channel (ask a mortician) a podcast (death in the afternoon) and she published a few books #and she always tries to be as respectful as possible when discussing various topics or different cultures despite also being hilarious #this is so insanely random tho why do i get so many anons Like This lately bfbsbsj #none of you can imagine some of the shit i deleted lately #but yeah okay let me use your dumb ask to chat abt caitlin some more on here

[miel-1411]

I accidentally found this guy on the Internet and couldn't pass by...

#kuroshitsuji #ask a mortician

[hotvampireadjacent]

A Conversation with Caitlin Doughty . I know a lot of people like her. I saw a link to a zoom webinar on my local libary website on the 16th, 7pm cst if any of you are interested while there's avability. free of charge.

#ask a mortician

[bloonfroot]

HEY

Do you like Youtube documentaries?

Are you prone to morbidity?

Do you believe in removing the stigma surrounding death and funerals and creating a culture where it can be discussed openly and death plans become commonplace, so that the loss of the loved one isn't inherently coupled with the massive familial battle over how to handle the deceased's body, possessions, and funeral costs?

Well, you should check out Ask A Mortician! Particularly you should watch the above video, which is a documentary about a shipwreck in the Chicago river that has somehow gone undiscussed despite being on par, loss of life wise, with many other historical disasters that we DO commonly learn about.

The reason I am posting this is because Youtube, on its never ending mission to kill every creative who uses the platform, has flagged the video for "violating community guidelines" and as such is no longer being shared by the algorithm, and still might lead to its deletion.

I find the whole thing frustrating. A major component in the story of the SS Eastland is, in the host's own words, that big corporations aren't looking out for us. And here's a big corporation bottlenecking the story of hundreds of poor, immigrant factory workers dying five feet from shore because of the neglect of big corporations.

Even if you aren't personally interested, please consider reblogging.

Direct sharing is the only way this video can be spread now, and quite frankly, I think it's important to prevent Youtube from sweeping this story under the rug.

#ask a mortician #ss eastland #youtube documentary #also caitlin doughty and her team do a lot of great work and are very respectful and they dont deserve this #Youtube

[a-typical]

In Toraja, during the period of time between death and the funeral, the body is kept in the home. That might not sound particularly shocking, until I tell you that period can last from several months to several years. During that time, the family cares for and mummifies the body, bringing the corpse food, changing its clothes, and speaking to the body.

The first time Paul ever visited Toraja, he asked Agus if it was unusual for a family to keep a dead relative in the home. Agus laughed at the question. “When I was a child, we had my grandfather in the home for seven years. My brother and I, we slept with him in the same bed. In the morning we put his clothes on and stood him against the wall. At night he came back to bed.”

Paul describes death in Toraja, as he’s witnessed it, not as a “hard border,” an impenetrable wall between the living and the dead, but a border that can be transgressed. According to their animistic belief system, there is also no barrier between the human and nonhuman aspects of the natural world: animals, mountains, and even the dead. Speaking to your grandfather’s corpse is a way to build a connection to the person’s spirit.

— From Here to Eternity: Traveling the World to Find the Good Death, Caitlin Doughty

#indonesia #Toraja #mummification #death acceptance #animistic #Caitlin Doughty #Ask a Mortician #From Here to Eternity: Traveling the World to Find the Good Death #From Here to Eternity #books #bookblr #death positive #death positive movement #nonfiction #science #history #travel #anthropology #memoir #sociology #atypicalreads #deathcare #cw death