Tune Req: Crematorium Debacle

Subject: Creamatorium Debacle
From: saulgoldie
Date: 18 Feb 02 - 04:01 PM

Dear Fellow Catters, I would do this if I could write a song to save my own life. But I can't. But if someone would write a (reasonably playable) song about the "misplacement" of some many dozen bodies and substitution of wood ashes by the creamatorium in Georgia, I sherwood love to play it! My limited sense of song protocol suggests that it should be a sharp satire. Anyone? Thanks!

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: beadie
Date: 18 Feb 02 - 04:54 PM

Sounds like something straight out of the old Mitchell Trio classic, "It was a hell of a funeral (or; A Dying Business)"

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: beadie
Date: 18 Feb 02 - 04:55 PM

This situation is not, however, as Chad Mitchell might have put it, "a creme de la creme crematorium."

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: SharonA
Date: 18 Feb 02 - 05:04 PM

Ooh! Let me put my mind to this. Good challenge, Saul.

You may also be interested in taking a look at the songs written for an old Song Challenge on a related subject: SONG CHALLENGE! Part 33 – Who Left Uncle Harry in the Bushes?

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: SharonA
Date: 18 Feb 02 - 05:15 PM

Just read an ABC News article that says that on Sunday, Georgia governor Roy Barnes visited the town where the crematorium is located. ABC missed the opportunity to headline that story as: "BARNES IN NOBLE".

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: M.Ted
Date: 18 Feb 02 - 05:24 PM

Why should it be a sharp satire? That seems like a standard response to everything, and as a result, they've pretty much worn out their welcome--how about a serious song, or an old fashioned love song?

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: SharonA
Date: 18 Feb 02 - 06:30 PM

Aw, geez, M Ted, and I was just about to post a satirical parody!

Oh, what the heck... you can write the serious song while I post this:


AUNTIE'S CREMATION
(Tune: "Anticipation" by Carly Simon) (butchered lyrics by SharonA)

We may never know where these remains came from
But the stink about them aired today
And I wonder if Aunt Lil is with them now
And was wastin' there in the pines, since May

Auntie's cremation, Auntie's cremation
They're bakin' her late
And she is still waitin'

And I'd tell you how pleased we don't feel 'cause she's there too
And how light her arms feel without meat
But I, I regurgitated what I ate last night
When I was thinkin' of rats that bite her white right teat

Auntie's cremation, Auntie's cremation
They're bakin' her late
And she is still waitin'

And tomorrow we'll light what we can gather
And we'll stuff it in an urn or in a vase
So we'll try to seek and find her eyes right now
And her right ear
Then we'll start a good old blaze
We'll start a good old blaze
Here's her right ear
Now we'll start a good old blaze
We'll start a good old blaze
We'll start a good old blaze
We'll start a good old blaze
We'll star - arrrrrrrrt a good old blaze!

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: SharonA
Date: 18 Feb 02 - 06:41 PM

P.S. – But in all seriousness, this really is a devastating situation for a lot of people who are now mourning all over again for their loved ones, and I hope that the perpetrator of this atrocity goes to jail for a long, long time.

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: Gareth
Date: 18 Feb 02 - 06:50 PM

Convinces Me

"Stop Engines"

Splash !

"Ahead All"

Gareth

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: SharonA
Date: 18 Feb 02 - 07:00 PM

Also see this thread on the same topic: BS: I think there's a song challenge here!!!

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: SINSULL
Date: 18 Feb 02 - 07:02 PM

Hate to spoil the party but I am with Sharon on this one. It is hard to imagine the grief a family will have to endure once they discover that the remains of Mom or Dad or the baby have been treated with such total disrespect by the very people who were paid to provide a dignified cremation.

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: M.Ted
Date: 18 Feb 02 - 07:38 PM

Hey, Sinsull, Sharon's the one who posted the lyrics, not me--"less than sensitive" is a phrase that comes to mind, Sharon--

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: Mickey191
Date: 18 Feb 02 - 07:54 PM

Sharon A-After You crapped all over everyone with your insensative posts, you have the gaul to apologize.

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: Herga Kitty
Date: 18 Feb 02 - 07:59 PM

I nearly posted to the other thread and then refrained out of consideration for people who are grieving. But then I remembered that the late Keith Marsden song, "Then all his other wives came in" was prompted by him overhearing someone who was afraid she'd be late for a funeral. Which was why the song asks to keep him on a low light because she might be late.... It's true that whatever and how bad the situation is there will always be at least two sides to it. And being deceived about your loved ones feels really bad however it happens.

Kitty

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: DougR
Date: 18 Feb 02 - 08:16 PM

Somebody already did: "I ain't got no body ..." (Sorry. Bad taste I know, but couldn't resist.)

DougR

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: Ebbie
Date: 18 Feb 02 - 08:59 PM

This kind of incident is not unknown, maybe not even uncommon. In the early 80s in the small coastal town of Lincoln City, Oregon (Art Thieme will remember it as being close to Depoe Bay. Lincoln City was incorporated from 5 tiny towns: Devils Lake, Oceanside, Nelscott, Taft and Cutler City some years back.) a mortician did the same thing. I forget how many wrapped bodies were stacked in his garage and other nooks, 21 comes to mind. In the cemetery, they also discovered multiple one body-on-top-of-another-and-another graves.

Had I had a suspicious enough mind, I could have been the one to turn him in, strangely enough. One sunny day I had walked on the beach from Cutler City to Oceanside and on the way back on the highway I stopped and admired some molded fiberglass and concrete lawn and gallery creations an outdoors shop had on display. There was one in particular that I liked- but I told the man I had to leave, that the odor coming off the hill was nauseating me. I don't remember that he even responded to my comment, though it seems like he must have been aware of the odor. Eventually it was a neighbor of the mortuary who called in the police.

It was the same story the man in the current newspaper story gave: he got behind, he said, and then didn't have the money to catch up. The closest crematorian was some miles away, and he said he couldn't afford their prices, anyway, and he was planning to bury all the bodies instead of cremating them. Even though he had continued to accept people's orders and payments for cremation.

As you can imagine, in a small town like Lincoln City (fewer than 10,000 people) it rocked everybody. The grief was palpable. His wife, bless her heart, was a registered nurse who was very popular in the community- I have no idea if she knew how ill her husband was. I never talked with her again before, as it happened,I moved back to the Valley.

Ebbie

Subject: Creamatorium & Sensitivity
From: saulgoldie
Date: 19 Feb 02 - 07:53 AM

I would like to apologize for starting this thread. First reason is that I shooda called it a song challenge, and along with that, I shooda seen Spaw's similar thread that I cannot seem to find anymore. Second is that I do think I was insensitive to the feelings of the surviving victims. To be sure, there are many folk songs about various tragedies of various scales. However, there most lilely was at least some appropriate period of time before the quills started scratching out the lyrics. As a charter member of the "sensitive newage guys" club, I care deeply about the feelings of my fellow Catters. And I do not want to cause any pain for any of this family.

OTOH, some of you do not feel that I was at all inappropriate. So, thanks for that, and my apologies to anyone who felt hurt by my suggestion.

Sincerely, Saul

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: SharonA
Date: 19 Feb 02 - 11:28 AM

To all: I'm sorry. It was not my intention to "crap all over everyone", or anyone. Yes, it was insensitive of me to post the parody song above, and I do apologize for any pain I might have caused or exacerbated by posting it.

Sharon

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: GUEST,Chip A.
Date: 19 Feb 02 - 04:42 PM

Hi Sharon,

Remember Lupus? My friends grandson used to live in one of those bodies. His 17 year old widow and baby buried a box of cement dust. Now she has to live it out all over again. Pretty sad. Real people they are!

We even? ;)

Your friend,

Chip

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: Spartacus
Date: 19 Feb 02 - 04:54 PM

One day when i was walking, just me and my pitbull he ran into forest and came back with a human skull

I snuck in to the forrest and much to my suprise, 200 bodies from the swamp began to rise

I got out of the forrest as fast as i could run I ran into a building labeled "creamatorium"

I went to the front door and grabbed a breath of air, but painted sign across the door read "closed for repair"

Ok...it's a start

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 19 Feb 02 - 05:03 PM

You may bury me in the East,
You may bury me in the West,
But I'll hear the trumpet sound
In that morning.

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: SharonA
Date: 20 Feb 02 - 10:36 AM

Chip A: Remember? How could I forget?! I'm sorry to hear that a friend of yours is one of those who've been deceived by this horrible man Ray Marsh. Indeed they are real people, really hurting.

Yep, we're even! :^) But please do see my comments in the "BS: I think there's a song challenge here!!!" thread (I've made several comments!), particularly this one: post from SharonA 20-Feb-02 - 09:49 AM

Your friend,
Sharon

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: guinnesschik
Date: 20 Feb 02 - 01:00 PM

A similar thing has happened many times at a cemetary not too far from our home. The owner has been on the news several times in the past ten years, due to lost bodies, stacked bodies, moved headstones....What surprises me most is that people continue to choose to have their loved ones buried here!

What a tragedy.

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: Mrrzy
Date: 20 Feb 02 - 03:49 PM

SharonA & saulgoldie, you did nothing wrong or inappropriate and have nothing to apologize for in general. I still think that a song would not be inappropriate, although I guess that parodies/comic songs will be a while in coming. But as I said in the other thread - this does need a song, it just should be a tragic ballad. In 20 years people can sing it like "I turned 21 in prison doing life without parole" but meantime the tune should be a dirge.

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: SINSULL
Date: 20 Feb 02 - 04:59 PM

No apology required to me. I stated my opinion and respect yours. I do remember a similar story with a pet cemetary. People paid a fortune for burial and grave maintenance only to have their pets turn up in a rotting heap in the woods. I wonder how some people sleep at night.

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: GUEST,John Gray - at work
Date: 20 Feb 02 - 09:23 PM

Maybe they should have checked that gas hadn't been piped to that area before they built the crematorium.

JG/FME

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: SharonA
Date: 21 Feb 02 - 07:13 PM

Thanks, Mrrzy and SINSULL. I've been turning this issue around and around in my head over the last several days until I don't know what's right or wrong or appropriate or inappropriate anymore.

On the one hand, this thread started with a request for songs with the suggestion that they be written in a sharply satirical style, so one would expect to find satire here, not anything sensitive or tasteful (and the suggestion, found in many places on Mudcat, to ignore a thread one doesn't want to read would apply).

On the other hand, some people here and on the "BS: I think there's a song challenge here!!!" thread seem to think that a period of time should elapse before any parodies or satirical songs on this subject are posted, out of consideration for the survivors of the deceased involved in this situation... but no one is saying how long that period should be. Today's news reports say that officials estimate they'll be searching for bodies for at least eight months – do we wait until all the bodies are found? Do we wait until they identify all the ones that they can? Or do we take the view that dark humor or "shock humor" can be cathartic and can be a healthy way to help people deal with the gruesome aspects of the situation now, when the shock has immediacy and should be dealt with somehow?

For my own part, do I leave my parody song on this thread, or ask Pene Azul to remove it for me (if he will)? As I said on that other thread, I was trying to express outrage about what the Marshes had done through outrageous satire, but it seems that the parody itself has generated outrage toward me for the satire's tastelessness and insensitivity (and for mine in posting it so soon.... or at all). Either that, or people are simply frustrated because they can't get at Ray Marsh, so they're taking it out on my parody! So what do you think, guys: should it stay or should it go now?

Sharon

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 21 Feb 02 - 08:12 PM

You can't un-write a song you've written and posted publicly.

And I don't think there can be any time limit for a serious song about anything. And a satire is serious, however funny it might be on one level.If it's not fundamentally serious, it's not satire.

Fun songs are maybe something else, - but I don't really think time solves that one either. I personally get queasy at the way people sing The Titanic as a fun song. I was somewhere where that was happening the other day and I was thinking "I wonder how long it'll be before people will feel able to sing about September 11th in the same way?"

It's not just about respecting the feelings of relatives, it's about accepting our shared humanity with the victims, however long ago. "Little children wept and cried as the waves crept over the side..." That could have happened yesterday, or tomorrow, so what that it happened in 1912? The song would still be about what happened yesterday and tomorrow.

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: catspaw49
Date: 21 Feb 02 - 08:16 PM

Two threads.......Both with a lot of emotion and controversy.......And TODAY I heard on the radio I heard a parody telling this tale to the tune of "Monster Mash." So, there ya' go..........

Spaw

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From:
Date: 21 Feb 02 - 10:14 PM

I think joking about some things can never be in good taste. Is there a reason to tell jokes about the potato famine? The Cambodian experience? The train burning up in Egypt? Why would people want to? Never mind, I don't really want to know the answer....I honestly don't get this but to each his or her own..mg

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: Mrrzy
Date: 22 Feb 02 - 08:59 AM

I'd like the words to the Monster Mash parody, wonder if they are anywhere. If they bother people, as they say, don't read them. Sinsull - KEEP.

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: SharonA
Date: 22 Feb 02 - 10:37 AM

Mrrzy: Was "KEEP" addressed to Sinsull, or to me with the wrong name (someone else mis-called me "Carol" recently, too)? I'm confused! I think I'm having an identity crisis *G*

Kevin (McGrath): It's true that I can't un-write a song once it's written and posted publicly, but I could ask for it to be removed from the thread and, if Mudcat administration agrees to do so, I could then post a statement instructing anyone who wants the lyrics to send me a Private Message.

I agree with your feelings about the song "The Titanic". There's a kids' version of that song, and local radio station WXPN-FM plays it occasionally on its "Kids' Corner" show. In this version, there are all sorts of noises such as bells and whistles, intended to amuse, while the voices sing "It was sad..." happily and lustily – all in fun. What makes me uncomfortable when listening to that broadcast is that it's being directed at children, and I can't help wondering if they're learning from this to have a casual disregard for the loss of life.

Speaking of casual disregard, this thought about the Noble crematorium occurred to me: Ray Brent Marsh is 28. News reports say that some of the bodies at the crematorium site have been there for as long as 15-20 years. This would mean that they were dumped there when Marsh was anywhere from 8 to 13 years of age. It sounds to me as if Marsh was raised in a morally bereft environment where the practice of stashing bodies was acceptable, where he was never taught to be respectful of the feelings of the relatives of the deceased, where he was never taught about the sanitation problems that rotting corpses pose. I wouldn't be at all surprised to hear that Marsh has severe emotional problems as a result of this kind of upbringing. But I am surprised that no charges have yet been filed against his parents. Talk about corrupting the morals of a minor!

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: GUEST,Chip A.
Date: 22 Feb 02 - 04:29 PM

Hi Sharon A.

Been gone for a couple of days and just now read your post of 2/20 @ 10:36 A.M. I did read the posts you directed me to. Actually I'd guess that you're one of the more sensitive and caring folks on mudcat. So, thanks for being that kind of person.

Now, let's go home, clean up and head for the Fri. night jam!

Chip

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: SharonA
Date: 22 Feb 02 - 04:37 PM

Thanks, Chip; I'm trying (in fact, some people say I'm very trying!). There's a jam, you say? Lead the way! :^)

Sharon

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: Mrrzy
Date: 22 Feb 02 - 04:47 PM

Sinsull, SharonA - it was SOMEBODY I admire! Identiy crisis? No, just frazzled old Mrr!

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: GUEST,Guest Anon.
Date: 22 Feb 02 - 09:14 PM

Sharon A, You simply must get your parker pen or #2 lead or whatever you use when you compose songs about decomposing bodies. You cannot let Danny Pearl's death go unheralded. Use some of the lines from your Auntie song.Aunties cremated, the stink about her aired today,how light her arms feel without her flesh. You simply must get a line in there-how light his body feels without his head. Oh do! Chip called you sensative-Jesus help us.

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: Mrrzy
Date: 25 Feb 02 - 10:52 AM

Puh-leeze, everybody. SharonA, I posted mine on the other thread...

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: SharonA
Date: 25 Feb 02 - 11:35 AM

Guest Anon: I said this on the other thread about the crematorium ("BS: I think there's a song challenge here!!!") when this situation was compared to the 9/11 terrorist attacks, and I'll say it again here: Trying to draw a comparison between this situation and any terrorist activity is like comparing apples and oranges.

No, I'm not going to make light of journalist Daniel Pearl's kidnapping, torture and murder by terrorists. But the people whose bodies are in question here were not terrorized, kidnapped, tortured or murdered by Ray Brent Marsh. He is a corrupt businessman, not a murderer or a terrorist (as far as we know!). He and apparently his parents, too, have been swindling customers for years. Part of the definition of satire is "a work holding up human vices to ridicule or scorn; trenchant sarcasm used to discredit vice" (Webster's Dictionary), and that was my intention in writing a parody about the Marshes' theft by deception, by reflecting the anger and disgust felt by the bereaved toward Marsh as they are forced to deal with the decomposing remains of their loved ones and arrange – again – for cremation of those remains once they're found.

Oddly, the Marshes' plot was uncovered because a passerby noticed a skull on the property, not because any – ANY, in 15 to 20 years! – of the survivors of the deceased noticed that the urns they were given contained concrete dust or wood ashes or potting soil. It's hard for me to believe that the funeral directors, at the very least, didn't check the contents of the bags sent to them by Marsh before passing on the urns to the bereaved. How could anyone mistake potting soil for ashes... if they had but looked?!?

Now the local news stations are advising people to shop carefully for a crematorium and ask questions before going ahead with a cremation, as there appears to be little legal regulation over them. It's the old story: let the buyer beware.

As for my insensitivity in posting the above satirical parody (please note that I forewarned people that they were about to read a satirical parody!), I've already apologized for any pain I might have caused or exacerbated thereby. I've already explained the reasons I wrote what I wrote. I've already explained the way I feel about the crematorium situation in Georgia. I've already asked whether people think I ought to try to have the song removed from the thread, and no one has answered in the affirmative. I've done all I can do about it. If people still feel the need to read something they've been told is satirical and then take offense at it, so be it. That's the chance one takes when one writes satire.

Sharon

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: GUEST,Luke52
Date: 25 Feb 02 - 03:23 PM

The local authorities still have not caught on!

The SOLE PERSON that was arrested is 28 years old and some of the bodies were reported to have been there 15 years.

He started YOUNG, only 13 years old!

C'MON NOW! GET REAL!

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: Wolfgang
Date: 26 Feb 02 - 04:49 AM

Those who compare what is done or happens to humans with what is done to bodies should try to get their priorities in order. Look at the respective sentences for (mass) murder and what this man has done to see that society in general also sees a big difference in guilt. I have not the slightest difficulties to see why someone who wouldn't even dream to write a satire about torture or a mass murder feels alright with writing a satire about the crematorium theme.

Wolfgang

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: Fossil
Date: 26 Feb 02 - 08:22 AM

IMHO there's no disrespect shown either to the dead or their friends and relations in writing a song satirising the way in which the remains were disposed of. So SharonA, stop worrying. I get the distinct impression that some of the negative comments above are coming from individuals with one eye situated in the middle of their foreheads. The dead certainly won't care and the others would do well to direct their anger against the system that allowed it to happen, not commentators on the event itself.

Another thought that occurs to me is that the practice of writing both humorous and tragic songs about human disasters has a long and honourable history. Just off the top of my head, "Wreck of the Old '97", "The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll" and "The Reuben James" all deal with human tragedies of one sort or another. Not to mention Tom Paxton's recent take on 9/11. I went definitiely wobbly around the top lip when I first heard that one - should Paxton have considered the possible effect on my feelings (or those of the firefighter's families) when he sat down to write it? No way...

And let's not get too vituperative about the poor (literally) person at the heart of this event. Dealing day in and day out with dead bodies and human grief must give you a heavy weight to carry. Most crematorium and undertaker's staff become at least a little desensitised over time: it's the same defence mechanism that drives the medics' and nurses' black humour. A coping strategy, not inherently evil. This guy has taken disrespect for the dead further than most people would consider acceptable, but it is in the same line. And if, as posts above have suggested, he would have to have been brought up from an early age to think that way, is he really so bad?

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Creamatorium Debacle
From: Mrrzy
Date: 26 Feb 02 - 09:12 AM

Yes he is, but again, the only crime committed here was fraud - he said he'd do A with your money and he did B instead and pocketed the change. I think this is called capitalism? Comes with Caveat Emptor?