Topic Author's Original Post - Feb 8, 2013 - 06:32pm PT
This humor has never worked for me. I figure the people who write it have never had a friend who died while climbing. I think about the guys I knew who lost it with their boots on and I'd trade any of the "YGD" people in a second for my old friends.
Risk sports can be dangerous shti. People who throw dying as a joke, have no clue-or they never felt the emptiness that comes from that type of whorehouse- where someone steps out and you can pull on the rope as hard as you want and they are never coming back.
Show some respect or just learn to tell a joke that's funny
You can't tell someone "that's not funny" - it doesn't work like that. You could tell them "that's not appropriate." Or else you can try to understand the humor behind the joke. We react in different ways to shared experience. Comedians try to make us laugh about it.
I hear you Hobo Dan. This is a tough one to respond to. I hear what you are saying, but I also understand what people like locker mean when they say that phrase.
I think it's about how each person is built heart and mind wise. We are all different and we all express ourselves differently.
This is the great dichotomy of humankind. Some think like you; some like Locker. You both honor your friends that have gone before you. But you express things differently.
Wars are begun and fought for this very reason....different logic, varying ideas and miscommunication.
My best friend jesus says always believe the best about others. He knows we are all so different and that we can be like sandpaper to one another. The good thing is that sandpaper smooths rough edges. The sandpaper people in our lives, ones that are tough to deal with, help us become smoother, better people. imho of course
Well then, I guess I think too much, others would say....what the f#@#k screw those ygd peeps.
Gezzzz donini, that's quite a question ? How do you answer it?
I don't know if this address's your question, but my response is I would rather die doing something I love than "saving" myself for old age by living on the couch and never doing anything new, exciting or challenging.
Used to be a life wimp, now I'm a life liver.....well I mean I live....my livers fine....I think. :D liver lynne :D
As IZ would say, OOPS! I think I've spent to much time at the desk today and need some outdoor O2....getting silly.
Jim: lets rephrrase that "how we've lived". And how do we judge that? By experience? By success? Failure? Dodging bullets? Beats the hell out of me. You got your good days, You got your bad days.
Not sure if this applies: I had this student who got hit with a bad disease--she went from being a nice little kid to hanging on in a wheel chair and weighing about 45 pounds--The thing is she's a great person and she's making the most of what she was given. Her pleasures come from reading and study and she's making a go of it. She can't climb--fact is she can't even walk anymore.
Her future prognosis does not lend it itself to a long life but what are you gonna do? "Yer gonna Live- that's what--She knows she's on borrowed time and she is using every second! Watching the dignity that she carries with her is hard for me to explain- It is like an honor to have been able to witness it. Sounds corny but that's the best I got.
Dan, death is ugly. No matter how we look at it. Maybe that is why so many go the religious route. I think about it every night when I climb into bed and close my eyes. Some nights I just smile and feel gratitude for the days I have been given. Other nights I get angry.
Keep fighting the good fight. Your opinion matters.
It's hard to live unless you realize yer goan die. I've lost a lot of friends, but never my sense of humor. When I go, you can mourn if you must, but keep on laughing.
Heck;
Even climbing equipt comes with the warning,
"The use of this equipt could result in injury or Death.
Use at your own risk"
I usually use the quote when someone asks a question
on the forum that should really be asked to an instructor or a mentor,
in person and demonstrated.
I wonder if Actors get upset when they are told to "Break a Leg"
before going onstage?
You say "break a leg" before a performance because you can't say "good luck." Saying "good luck" in that context is incredibly bad luck. However after I broke my leg, that expression no longer rolled off my lips as it once did, to go hand in hand with hobo-dan's premise. But I still say it. I interpret "yer gonna die" similarly - as "good luck."
One last thought - Freud wrote a really good book on this subject - Jokes and Their Relation to the Unconscious. It's one of his best works & there are some decent jokes in it. I'll paraphrase my favorite:
These two dirtbags are hanging out in front of the employee housing showerhouse.
One asks the other, "Did you take a shower?"
"No," the second dirtbag replies, nervously. "Why? Is one missing?"
Sorry that you have lost friends climbing. Certainly many of us here have as well.
I think you need to look at the context in which we say these things. We're not saying it in a mean-spirited way - it's all in good fun. I think the "break a leg" analogy is a good one - I have shared that many times when stepping on stage for a gig.
And yup, we're all gonna die. And if you died tomorrow, where would you spend eternity?
And by the way ....
Yer gonna die!!!!!!!!!!!!!1111111
Come to the bridge this spring, and tell me who you are. I'll give you a free beer, along with a certain salutation ....
People who throw dying as a joke, have no clue-or they never felt the emptiness that comes from that type of whorehouse- where someone steps out and you can pull on the rope as hard as you want and they are never coming back.
Show some respect or just learn to tell a joke that's funny
It's cool, bro. Obama made a joke about drone strikes on potential suitors for his girls, and we all have heard a few holocaust jokes - Anne Frankly, I think that kind of behavior is just deplorable.
Learn to laugh. I bet a lot of your friends you lost would want you to. We got a short time on this planet, lets ride it till the end with big f*#k off grins.
Greg
(someone who has lost friends in the mountains)
It's true, you are going to die. I could be wrong but this is one article of faith that has absoluteness and statistics on it's side.
Because YER GONNA DIE ! you should always enjoy life. (even when life sucks)
PS: As to the pain expressed in the OP, yes, death is sometimes unfair.
That doesn't mean friends that died in a certain way, that caused us left, to shrug, feel sad but say: "what did you expect" kind of ruefully, is wrong.
WW1 4 million US persons involved.
WW2 16 million US persons involved.
Appr. 1 in 40 lost their lives in both wars.
2005 appr. 300,000 enlisted in the US Navy and 40% are pilots.
From a new millenium C++ book by Stroustrup noting he quotes a admirals
saying being "damn the torpedos, full steam ahead". I think many college
people maybe right that we can't afford those build ups.
I have been a fireman for almost 25 years, I have lost five co-workers to on the job deaths and several others, probably 20-30 that I have worked with that died to job related cancer either after retirement or while still active duty. We see death almost everyday in one form or another. We don't take death lightly, we certainly don't sit around wringing our hand waiting for the axe to drop. Humor, gallows humor, is one way to deal with it and from someone on the outside looking in it can seem sick and twisted but it serves a very real purpose. In climbing that same type of humor can be helpful and keep you from focusing in on the wrong things that could otherwise be distracting and ruin a perfectly good time. For crying out loud, it's not disrespectful in the least. Maybe take up whiffle ball as a hobby.
I remember topping out "Long John Wall" in in Eldo' with the hopes of continuing up the Yellow Spur. What we saw was a train up every route in that area, locals can imagine. We called off our bid and just enjoyed our position.
Then I stood up cupped my hands and screamed "Yer all gonna die!!!!"
All the "on belay" Joe. "Off belay" John. "Take!!!". "Up rope!", "What??!!!", "I said...!!!" Suddenly stopped. It was dead silent...
Then two people on different routes just went "Woooooo Hoooooooo!!!!"
And that wall seemed a little more relaxed. They got it.
Dan I'm sorry for your loss(es) I have lost several as well. It sucks. But as many have pointed out, we are all gonna die. And I hope my friends and family do not mourn for me but go on laughing as well.
Isaac Hayes' new album Shaft was put on and the needle dropped.
A dead man who was my father came home on a Friday night from work and was the instigator of delivering super soul sounds on vinyl to a bunch of ebullient kids. We were happy for the music and glad to enjoy the good company of the provider who was equally taken away by the sound.
Isaac is gone as well but there's no way out, so get funky ! ! !
Celebrate the life of those people you knew. It's what goes on and not a bad thing !
Everyone now alive has a death sentence. Some of us in a dozen decades and some of us tomorrow. You don't know which one you are going to be, but you do know....
YOU'RE GONNA DIE!
And by the way
In our society and culture, death is something dark, mysterious, and fearful. Ancient cultures did not regard death as an enemy, but dared to make it an ally. It is ultimately about daring to live fearlessly from the centre of one's truth, to challenge and defeat the tendency to inertia, fear of life and premature old age. To quote one of the great teachers, the Peruvian shaman Don Eduardo Calderon: "a shaman is someone who is already dead [or who knows he is inescapably dying] and thus has no fear of death or life". Sometimes a life threatening crisis is what calls a person to the way of the shaman.
In traditional wisdom and knowledge, life is a continuum that does not end at the moment of death. One of the most important traditional tasks of the seer, shaman, medicine man or woman is to assist people who are either dying or the spirits of those who have died to make the transition into great domain of consciousness. This body of practices is known as Psychopomp, from the Greek word psychopompos which literally means "conductor of souls". In Greek mythology, the god Hermes served as the escort for the dead into the afterlife. This concept of a guide or intermediary between the living and the dead is a collective theme found in most religions and mythologies.
The Way of the Samurai is found in death. Meditation on inevitable death should be performed daily. Every day when one's body and mind are at peace, one should meditate upon being ripped apart by arrows, rifles, spears and swords, being carried away by surging waves, being thrown into the midst of a great fire, being struck by lightning, being shaken to death by a great earthquake, falling from thousand-foot cliffs, dying of disease or committing seppuku at the death of one's master. And every day without fail one should consider himself as dead. This is the substance of the way of the samurai.
You're going to die. You are going to die. You will die. I will die. We will die. Don't ever forget it.
Ultimately the zero and the one are different and by being different distinguish each other from each other. Death defines what it is to be alive. If nothing ever died we wouldn't understand that we are alive. Also there would probably be a lot of trilobites and dinosaurs and stuff here instead of us.
Why since I am myself subject to birth, ageing, disease, death, sorrows and defilement, do I seek after what is also subject to these things? Suppose, being myself subject these things, seeking danger in them, I were to seek the unborn, unageing, und.
Yes, I get that no one here is wishing for someone to perish. the point I was trying to make is that, as a joke it does not work- IMO. It just comes across as crude bordering on pointless.
For example: Someone brings up a plan or a climb or a goal they have and then the reply is YGD--why would you say that? It's not clever, it adds nothing to the discussion, it seems like small potatoes. It's a show stopper. We can do better.
YOSAR or rescue crews are not my point- They work in and with tragedy and need to be able to release. I get that. But that is not what we're talking about here.
Pete I'll take you up on the beer.
It is pointless, hobo dan. It is levity. It is one of our markers around this campfire, a stone you refuse to kick along but I find it satisfying in a Sisyphusian sense of senselessness.
I have lost so many friends to climbing over the years and mourn their passings to this day. My phone is choked with the phone numbers of the dead. Can't seem to bring myself to delete them.
I do not take their deaths lightly but I can still laugh at death. Have you ever had a near death experience or witnessed someone who has? Did you ever notice the propensity of the survivor to laugh almost hysterically? Just dodging a bullet is as serious as it gets but often leaves the survivor chortling. It is not disrespect of the dead but appreciation of the living and It is a human coping mechanism.
I would suggest that if the flippant comments some climbers make offend you then you should probably stay clear of the BASE jumping crowd. Now those cats have some dark humor. In fact here is a joke about a BASE death that I made up after the event.
The lead up to the Halloween after Dwain Westin split himself in half by hitting the Royal Gorge Bridge at 120 mph in a wing suit ten feet away from me I was driving my daughter to school.
She was throwing a terrible hissy fit about only being able to come up with half a costume. I looked at her in the rear view mirror and said "You could go as Dwain Westin".
Badumpbump-rimshot. True story.
The BASE jumpers loved that one. And it was no disrespect to Dwain.
I think it is a feeling that if you can't laugh about death you will cry about life.
One of the ways I coped was to turn the experience into a painting that I call "Event Horizon".
Event Horizon.
Credit: philo
Macabre? Perhaps.
RIP Dwain Westin. You lived your life head on, on your own terms, went out with a bang and didn't leave too much of a mess behind.
I always yell "yer gonna die" when I see climbers up on a wall as I float and bloat down the river. I always wondered if they thought it was funny or not. I know I would.
I think It's sad that some company has come up with something this silly and probably very ineffective as away to seperate people from a few hundred bucks. That's it nothing else. did I question your sobriety in some way? I haven't been stoned in thirty years for wtf it's worth.
I went to many air crash sites in my time. Many body and body parts recoveries. And Yes,, you do go the direction of humor to alleviate what otherwise is pure tragic circumstance. there is no belittling, but rather a self defense mechanism- where you either laugh, or cry. Its a JOB your there to do- and doing it with the best of abilities is required. That includes your self well being. Ive always thought of the "yer gonna die" as just that. Now in some instances here on ST, that has actually been a near prediction! ( See rapping el cap thread) .. So obviously this phrase can be turned an actual..It has relevance here.!
say, as to the story of the gal with the illness, i sure do understand what you are feeling and mean, as well...
also, after reading certain post from various climbers here,
i can see why and how, the various guys/gals share their
expression of that phrase...
however, as to me... i am more inclined toward //your
vein//, mined from the rocks of our human structure's way of life on this
ol' earth--fragile as it is, due to this,
though, in my case:
i'd say a bit more:
i always felt that knowing we do die, we should do our best at living every day--so i just use the invented 'motto' of my own,
as my 'battle cry' so to speak, or 'call to arms' while here on earth:
how do i live this out? "we best get to life now!"
or, in the case of my babies that i had:
"how do i get them to live, and, to their best in it?"
so my feelings are more of a HOW not to WASTE the moment,
so i was always more immersed in that thought, so the climber 'die' expression is not what i'd lean towards saying, it's 'saved for that one day that only god knows of', or said when we 'feel it coming' and
NEED that 'spring board' to go...
i think the MAIN reason, i always felt that was this:
i used to babysit, and i feared to do my best for them (the babies, or kids)...
then, the hardest thing i ever HAD, as my own, in my life was:
having my very own babies!!!! their FULL all time care, was in MY
hands, and judgements were for THEIR life!...
at once, i fully knew that they could die, babies do die in their sleep, and you learn that lesson fast... even when you THINK 'this is it, i have a baby', and you've birthed it safe-and-sound, you know it is not to be, for some. :( :O
thus, each day was: how to live... lets DO IT...
OUR time will come--and when it does, we face that day,
with the knowledge, then, of 'how to do it our best' as well...
thanks for sharing this, hobo_dan...
*or if it is a loved one, dying, 'how do we help them'
or if we can't, and they have died too fast: 'how to we help their family get through it?"
and now,perhaps for you:
how do you help your student/friend, get through HER process...
god bless to you, as you are working on this....
Who you calling boring?
Grade A Asshole?
Yeah- probably right on both accounts. But a "Republican" that's the first time that one has been pulled out. I actually have a McGovern 1972 for presidentposter in my classroom- top that!
Thinking things over it's probably the lack of wit that I find most annoying in the YGD comment.
Base jumping sounds tough.
I'd like to make it to the Sushi fest but the schedule just hasn't let it happen. But if it did, I'd definitely DINE.
I've come to realize that death is a process. It's something we all have to do but (except in cases of instant death) it doesn't just "happen" to us rather it's our final act of LIFE. We are alive through that process. I held my grandma as she slowed her breathing over a three hour period with a grin on her face, til she took her last breath. She went through the process with grace; didn't try to fight it.
I also like "it's a good day to die" and the meaning of that is not so obvious. Took me a long time to see another side of that one, having read many quotes from native americans tales of going into battle. I used to think it was sick and suicidal but they didn't really want to die.
Don't take every thing to your heart. These 'yer gonna die' people are just fooling around. This forum would turn into a boring ass place if every little thing that offends someone is taken out.
And some of my friends did die climbing. But the truth is...
yer gonna die!
and maggots are waitin!
Maggots are waitin. Photo by Adam Burch
Credit: Vitaliy M.
so get out and do all the sh#t you want to do in your life as soon as possible, cuz life is not forever!
Sunset after finishing raps down from South Howser
Credit: Vitaliy M.
Fk YEA!
Credit: Vitaliy M.
Alaska
Credit: Vitaliy M.
Whitney and Russell from Cleaver peak
Credit: Vitaliy M.
Climbing Doodad
Credit: Vitaliy M.
Even rappells are scenic!
Credit: Vitaliy M.
Cute goats around Enchantment Lakes
Credit: Vitaliy M.
Hamik leading out on pitch 8
Credit: Vitaliy M.
Getting down from Snowpatch
Credit: Vitaliy M.
Beautiful view of Minarets. Route goes up the face of the highest pointy peak
call the waaambulance. Everyone dies, I just hope I die from something other than slow illness. Dying from climbing is fine by me, but being eaten by a shark while surfing sounds even better.
we don't even know what dying means, so why fear something that might be awesome? Or it might be nothing, or it might be awful. We don't have a clue.
Until we each realize that our individual death is our illusion we will have talks like this and think we are victims of our friend's death and express some pain/hurt or anger. Well, I can say Cosmic.
I am reminded of a song by Queen but the words don't persist. For one death --one thought, move on.
I think that dealing with death using a sense of humor (as much as is possible, at any particular time) is more healthy than dealing with it using a head-in-the-sand religion.
I hope that after I pass away, with time the people that knew me and cared about me will smile when they remember me, and find something about that memory to laugh about.
That's the plan. I sure as heck won't survive my own life!
I have lost folks, including a few in the scuba diving world. I don't take that phrase in a dark way. It's a warning about what you are doing, heck, I can die slipping in my shower. It is also a statement about the inevitable, that it will happen. When, how, why... You can control only so much. I'll do my best on keeping myself and those around me safe and the rest... Well, it is what it is.
Used to be a life wimp, now I'm a life liver.....well I mean I live....my livers fine....I think. :D liver lynne :D
So deliver us from evils, weevils, all the phake Elvises and devil-may-care turdes who like claiming a certainty in an ironic manner, turning death on it's head. And this sort of deliverance is useful for lots of things, humor being one. Black humor, as practiced by Vonnegut, who thought saw a way out alive, but changed his mind later when he passed away, is what this phrase is about, making light of a dark subject.
This thread is gonna die--just like "He Died Doing What He Loved" died. We wore the topic out. And here it is, in another guise.
The Biography of Sinuousityby O'Slide tells us that if one is cowardly in his approach to life, in other words, a "life wimp," then he is a sheep and is eligible for shearing, just on principle, by the wolves of the land...
Let us know!