Afraid of the Inevitable

Americans are afraid of death. We don't even use the word "died" when someone close to us dies. We insist on using phrases that get the point across without really saying anything, like "passed away" or even "kick the bucket". We, people, created these phrases to try and protect us from the harsh reality that we will all die at one point. Talking about death openly is usually not considered to be a good conversation starter or topic, as people don't like talking about it. Death is even used to put fear into people, for example, the picture of the skull and crossbones on packs of cigarettes that has the caption "smoking kills you". We are frightening our population with death, and not just on cigarette packs. This fear of death could be linked to our materialism, as perhaps we try to fill our lives with as many things as possible because we never know what day will be our last. But that, is a topic for another blog post.