Excerpt from Funeral Etiquette

By David L. Tamarin

©Girls and Corpses Magazine

As a benefit to Girls and Corpses readers, we surveyed many experts in order to find out how one should behave during a funeral. For this Girls and Corpses exclusive, I interviewed many funeral homes, morticians, necrophiles, pallbearers, hearse drivers, etiquette experts, a drunk homeless man, a convicted murderer and James Thompson, author of a book about proper funeral etiquette. After this exhaustive survey I have come up with several Funeral No-Nos.

1. Shouting “Encore” after the eulogy. This expression is usually reserved for plays and cock-fighting tournaments. Usually the speaker is not a professional and does not have extra material for the audience.

2. Heckling speakers. In a majority of cases funerals are not the same as stand up comedy acts where heckling is part of the show. Often times the speakers are nervous and/or upset, and yelling, “My dead grandmother could write a less boring eulogy” is out of place. A is “Swing, Batta, Batta, Swing.” Audience participation is discouraged. At one service attended by Mr. Thompson, a heckler caused a commotion by throwing rocks at the widow as she eulogized her former husband. He repeatedly yelled “You suck” and “Bring out the whores!” Chanting “Boring, Boring, Boring” is also considered rude.

3. Ordering pizza and telling them to drop it off at the casket, as the pizza delivery boy tries to open the casket to deliver the pizza. At one disastrous funeral where this happened the pizza boy couldn’t get the coffin lid off so he walked around asking, “Who wants a pizza? Fresh and hot”. This turned into quite the predicament as the pizza boy ended up in a dumpster with his throat slit.

To read more Funeral No-Nos order Issue #2 of Girls and Corpses Magazine