Facebook is not the place to find out your child is dead

John Coonen says:

04:51pm | 09/10/09

Get used to it. It’s going to become commonplace.

Eric says:

05:17pm | 09/10/09

No, there doesn’t need to be “some sort of regulation”—any more than there needs to be a law against telling people bad news via telephone or newspaper.

Get a grip.

Lanai Vasek says:

05:20pm | 09/10/09

OK - so @Eric how would you feel if you found out on Facebook someone you loved had died.

My bet is you probably wouldn’t feel very good.

WKBent says:

05:24pm | 09/10/09

Dear “The Punch”,
Not withstanding the sentiment of this article, my sympathy to the parents and I would certainly not want to hear of the death of a loved one in this way, but this a bummer of a way to close your site off for the working week.
WK

Matt says:

05:34pm | 09/10/09

“arguably one of the most insensitive ways around.”

How is Facebook any more insensitive than a phone call from a random police officer? I agree with Eric 100%.

It’s 2009, technology is advancing and I think you need to aswell.

Alex says:

05:49pm | 09/10/09

Eric is spot on.

I work for a large social networking site.  There is absolutely positively no way any kind of rule or regulation against posting insensitive or offensive news could work - not in any technical, administrative, legal or practical sense.  For exactly the same reason there’s no regulation against telling someone bad news by telephone, mail or shouting over the back fence.

It’s heartbreaking, really it is.  But that doesn’t mean it’s simply a matter of writing some magic rule to make it go away.  Seriously, what would the regulation say?  How would it work?  What’s to stop people simply breaking the rules?  Is there to be a punishment for telling someone bad news before they’ve heard it from someone else?  If that’s the case, how are people to know whether or not it’s safe to talk about something?

Eric says:

05:52pm | 09/10/09

The point is, I wouldn’t feel very good regardless of where I found out. Facebook is just another means of communication, like the phone or the radio.

You might as well try to ban phone calls or news reports about people dying. Someone is always going to find out unpleasant things in an unpleasant way.

I don’t see how any such regulation could possibly work in practice.

Vanessa says:

06:17pm | 09/10/09

So are we also going to ban the use of telephone calls to let people know someone in another place has died, or is it only the big scary internet that you have a problem with?  Technology is being used; how is it ‘a great tool for reporting on breaking news events’ but not if someone has died in them?  That’s completely illogical & ridculous!

It’s never good finding out someone has died, the medium of transferring that knowledge however makes not a scrap of difference.

Margaret says:

06:46pm | 09/10/09

To me, the difference is that, as with any other news (good or bad) I think it’s just common courtesy that the closest family members are told first, as sensitively as possible - be that by phone, email, letter or doorknock. A personal message to notify the parents (even via the personal message function in facebook) would be preferable to a public post on somebody’s profile, as the first announcement of such a thing.

Likewise, I wouldn’t post somebody else’s pregnancy announcement or “he proposed!!!” etc. until that person had had an opportunity to tell those they are closest to first.

I don’t think it’s a “technology is bad” thing, just a courtesy thing.

Leigh says:

07:00pm | 09/10/09

There is no easy way to deliver such tragic news.  But we only become sensitive to the means of delivery when we have experienced that pain ourselves.  Word of mouth, telephone, email, facebook - its about the sensitivity of the bearer of the news.  Who in their right mind would broadcast a death through social networking before the family is aware - only someone who has a lot to experience and learn.

Empathetic says:

07:09pm | 09/10/09

I guess it is the same as seeing it on the news before the police have made it to your house to advise you, as in our case. And I guess the poor friend who posted it Facebook would have assumed that the police or someone would have notified the family and they wouldn’t at that moment be reading Facebook. I guess it was all just bad timing and you can never prevent that. My condolences to the family, it is always a gut-wrenching time and I pray that they will be comforted.

Steve says:

07:11pm | 09/10/09

For all the “how would you like it” commenters…

This did happen to me this week: logged on to Facebook to find one friend leaving a message about the death of another. There is no doubt it felt strange compared to hearing it spoken by someone, but the news itself was sadder than the way it was delivered.

Many years ago (before mobile phones and the internet), I was living overseas when I heard about the death of my aunt—via a letter from my brother which described her funeral. The vagaries of international post had meant his letter arrived before the one from my father with the actual news of her death. *That* was a shock. And I felt so far away, isolated in time as well as space.

Today, I find Facebook and Twitter keep me connected to friends and family spread around the globe in a way that is far more immediate and personal than anything previously. In the past I may have gone months or years without hearing from or about an old friend; now I hear about babies and relationships and all sort of news as it happens. And I like that.

Hearing about deaths is not really that different from hearing about births. In fact, if “bad” news was regulated and I could only get somebody’s idea of “good” news via social networks, that would actually be more isolating, less human. It would make social networks a false world. Pleasantville. Eden before the apple—a world of unknowing.

In the end, I just saw what happened to me this week as a marker. The first time, but not the last, that I will find out such news this way. But life is like that, full of good and bad.

Lanai Vasek says:

08:14pm | 09/10/09

@Leigh Agree with you wholeheartedly.

@Steve I’m so sorry you had to hear of bad news on Facebook first. I personally think that would be a horrible thing. Thankfully, it has never happened to me.

You make some interesting points though about the good vs. bad news on social networks and their “humanising” of them.

I disagree, of course. But not because the opinion is not valid - simply because, and I know this will annoy many people, I think social networks aren’t a “real world” interaction. It’s all a bit of a false world to begin with.

Bronson says:

09:11pm | 09/10/09

Are you kidding? Facebook isnt some grand publishing site. Its a personal network. So in the same way as you would tell people face to face or sms them or individually call them of bad news..you can do that on facebook. Facebook has good and bad sides. But one thing I think is good is in bad times. I have had friends die pre facebook or even internet that I wasnt able to be tracked down for weeks after the funeral…horrible. I take great comfort in that if anything ever happened to me I dont have to worry that only the people known to my family will be notified. If anything happened to me someone would post it on my wall and all my friends would know right away.

iansand says:

09:12pm | 09/10/09

Would you rather hear from someone who can respond and sympathise, whether by phone or in person, or from a machine where there is no prospect of any response?  Pretty simple.  The former what we all would want.  Get a grip and its equivalents is a pretty brainless response.

stephen says:

09:47pm | 09/10/09

Two sorts of information I suppose : Facebook and Shakespeare. Just don’t stop reading Shakespeare.

Eric says:

10:00pm | 09/10/09

Lanai, I’m sorry if I came across as a bit harsh in my first comment. That was just my initial reaction to what I saw as an attempt to impose a regime of censorship.

Your intent is good, but I don’t think your proposal could work. It’s just a fact of life that sometimes we will get bad news, in ways that we don’t like.

I try to look at the positive side of social media. I have many friends all over the world, most of whom I only know through the Internet. If I died, I would like them to know, and I don’t see any other way this could happen.

There is a downside to Facebook and the rest, but in this mas society of strangers, I think it fills a gap where it’s needed.

Adam says:

10:18pm | 09/10/09

Lanai, I understand your sentiment but I don’t agree.  If I found out my kids died in an accident - how I found out would quickly be the furthest thing from my mind and the least of my worries.  In this case it may have taken police hours to follow procedures and contact the family, it may help with their grieving that they were able to arrive at the scene so soon.

DC says:

11:05pm | 09/10/09

The world has been transformed for better and worse by the Internet. This can be part of the worse and there is nothing you can do about it.

Like the death of TV journalism.

Bev says:

11:19pm | 09/10/09

IT SHOULD BE UP TO THE POLICE TO INFORM THE FAMILY THAT THERE LOVED ONE DIED.

OK THE PRESS SAY THAT THERE WAS A CAR ACCIDENT AND A FEMALE DIED BUT DO NOT SAT THE NAME OR FACE BOOK.

Michael says:

01:17am | 10/10/09

Lanai Vasek, you’re sentiments are indeed correct - it would be a devastating way to find out such a tragedy from innocently logging into Facebook. It must have been truly devastating for those people last week to open their newspaper and find out about the tragic events in the Pacific where their family and/or friends are or were - trying to relate to those feelings brings a cold sweat.

Personally, I would never post something up like that on my public profile as I would feel this would be insensitive to the families and close friends so soon after the event - it’s called social awareness. You acknowledge that you don’t know how these instances can be regulated, and the answer is that it can’t. You initial suggestion about self-regulation is the closest we can come, and it depends on people having a sound social awareness or sense of appropriateness. I do not criticise the sentiments of your article: indeed I empathise. But there is no artificial alternative to forethought - I just hope the family can eventually come to grips with everything that has happened and receive all the support they can get from those who really care.

Daniel says:

08:25am | 10/10/09

What is going on in Australia? This really is an absolute joke.

Lanai Vasek says:

09:18am | 10/10/09

@Michael You make a very good comment.

I imagine it is tragic under any circumstances finding out a loved one is dead, and indeed it would have been horrible for the families of the victims of last week’s Pacific disasters.

I was contacted last week by an extremely distraught woman who was worried sick about her sister in Padang. The sister turned out to be alright but I can only imagine what her horror would have been if she had logged into Facebook or Twitter and saw posts or pictures entailing her death.

I 100 per cent agree users need a social awareness or a sense of appropriateness in order to self-regulate these kinds of posts.

There needs to be a clear list of do and donts on social media, that people actually follow.

Sadly though, I think there will still be those who feel the need to “be the first” to tell others the horrible news of someone passing away.

mel says:

12:08pm | 10/10/09

my father was a police officer and had to inform people that a loved one had died many times. all police will tell you that this is one of the hardest things to do, you never know how someone will react.  having a person there to tell you the sadest news of all can be a great comfort. to have someone hold you and get someone to be with you.
are the people who post these type of things on facebook doing it for the right reasons or just trying to be the first.

Julie Coker-Godson says:

12:40pm | 10/10/09

It has always been the way (prior to the internet of course) to notify the relatives of the deceased before publishing the names of deceased persons in accidents etc.  It should remain that way.  The administrator of Facebook could have intervened and stopped that post I’m sure.  It is a matter of showing courtesy and respect to the family of the deceased.  I’ve just closed my Facebook and Myspace entries, not out of protest, but out of concern that someone could do the same regarding myself and I would not want that at all for my family and friends.

Bald Eagle says:

01:22pm | 10/10/09

I guess you all know now that the parents didn’t find out about it from facebook.  They found out when someone sent them and SMS.  An equally bad way.  Don’t people realize that txt’ing parents their child is dead is wrong. A phone is for talking on, not sending out death notices.

Jolanda says:

08:16pm | 10/10/09

This is life the way that it is and that it will continue.  The people who posted about the news of the death may not have known that the parents had not yet been advised.  Often these young people are distraught with the death of one of their peers and they reach out to their friends and loved ones via the internet.  It isn’t easy dealing with grief.  Also, alot of young people do not allow the parent on their face book so it could also be that the young people were not to know that the parent had access.  There are so many variables.  I feel for the family and friends, I can only imagine their grief.  It is very young to die at 16.

Education - Keeping them Honest
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Our children deserve better

Jenny says:

09:55pm | 10/10/09

I was appalled by this story.  It made me feel ill and I cannot even begin to imagine the anguish this family suffered at finding out their precious child was dead via Facebook.  Police are trained to deliver such sad news with compassion and empathy and to offer comfort to the shocked and grieving loved ones.  This is such a tragic event compounded by the way in which the news was received.  My deepest condolences to this precious child’s family and friends.

Montana says:

05:18pm | 11/10/09

Get used to it, its becoming commonplace, what kind of insensitve souls do we have out there, I have teenage daughters and I am not a fan of facebook in the way that it making our society have a lack of respect for others around them, just because you see something or are told something it is not a right to spread this all over a public network where others lives are ultimately going to suffer, anyone that has had anyone die, its private and a sensitive issue , FACEBOOK is not the PLACE. .  Lets have a fee for the users and make FACEBOOK what is was designed for

lee says:

05:28pm | 11/10/09

While I agree that this incident was terrible, it’s not really appropriate to call for legislative regulation of the area. The call should be for people to have some sensitivity and fore thought when using social networking.
Firstly, I simply don’t think its appropriate to legally regulate social interaction. The law and the government cannot solve all your problems, nor should they try to.
Secondly from a legal standpoint there would major be jurisdictional issues. It would also be very difficult to practically enforce.
And finally, what your talking about is essentially censorship, and that is a slippery road you’re heading down.

Lanai Vasek says:

06:02pm | 11/10/09

@Julie Coker-Godson - Wow that’s a brave move closing your accounts.

As I say, I think social media is brilliant and it certainly has its place, but I draw the line at people being notified of their loved ones deaths on these platforms.

Something needs to be done. We cannot and should not simply sit around and “get used to it” because one day sadly it may happen to us, and I know how distraught I would be if Facebook was my only consoling voice at the time.

Alice says:

09:39pm | 11/10/09

I don’t think anyone would intentionally facebook the news of someone’s death, realising that the family members and those closest to the individual involved didn’t know already.

how are you meant to regulate something like that? facebook management can’t possibly monitor every single wall post or message that is sent to someone and research the meaning behind everything that is said. also, how can you accuse someone of committing a crime if they did happen to break such horrible news to someone by accident, when they were just trying to offer their condolences for instance?

obviously, that is a terrible way of finding about your daughter’s death but with our ever-advancing communications systems, that’s just the way this world rolls.

James says:

04:45pm | 24/10/09

@ Julie Coker-Godson Seriously? You think the admin team on a website that hosts millions of profiles is going to be trawling through every post to see if it’s insensitive? Get a grip.

@ Lanai Vasek You have good intentions, I’m sure, but what you’re proposing is not only illogical but impractical. You’re correct, of course, that it would be a horrible way to find out you had lost loved ones, but as has been pointed out, finding out news like this isn’t going to be pleasant in any manner of delivery. Do you disagree with people at the scene of terrorist incidents or natural disasters informing the world via Twitter? Because I sure think that while it’s creating a world in which new information stays new for about three seconds, and sometimes the bad news is caught up in that, I’d rather be informed as quickly as possible. If it was my kid killed in an accident I sure as hell wouldn’t want to be going about my day in blissful ignorance until the police phoned.