Even in ancient Sparta, apparently, people had to be advised to resist the urge to speak ill of the dead. According to Diogenes Laertius, among the precepts held dear by Chilon of Sparta was that “of the dead, nothing but good†should be spoken.
Like some of Chilon's other rules for how not to live - “Do not laugh at another's misfortune,†“Let not your tongue outrun your thought†and even, “Gesticulation in speaking should be avoided as a mark of insanity†- the taboo on gloating over the death of one's enemies seems to be losing hold in the era of social networks, where millions of half-formed impressions and knee-jerk reactions circulate around the globe within minutes of any major news event.
So, as The Independent reported from London this week, it was little surprise that about one-third of the first 25,000 comments posted online after the death of Margaret Thatcher - the former British prime minister who inspired an intensity of feeling, in both her supporters and her opponents, rarely seen outside authoritarian states - were negative, according to the media monitoring firm Synthesio.
Among those stepping forward to bury Mrs. Thatcher, not to praise her, were political opponents like George Galloway and Glenda Jackson; the filmmaker Ken Loach; the Irish Republican Gerry Adams and other residents of Ulster; the editors of Glasgow's Evening Times; the singers Billy Bragg and Morrissey; Antonio Lulic, the musician and Elvis Costello fan behind the Web site Isthatcherdeadyet.co.uk; the 233,000 fans of that site on Facebook; and even Australia's foreign minister, Bob Carr.
Then, on Wednesday, came news of the apparent success of a Facebook campaign to send the song “Ding Dong, the Witch Is Dead†to the top of the British singles chart this week to celebrate the death of the country's first female prime minister.
Belfast Telegraph Irish nationalists celebrated the death of Margaret Thatcher on Monday in Ulster with flags and graffiti.The song, from the soundtrack to “The Wizard of Oz,†entered the weekly chart at No. 10 barely a day after Mrs. Thatcher's death was reported, just a few thousand sales short of the third spot. If the song is still in the top 40 by Sunday, the BBC will be forced to decide whether to play it during the weekly broadcast of “The Official Chart Show†on its main radio channel. The corporation, which has been deeply respectful of Mrs. Thatcher since her death, said in a statement on Wednesday that the chart show “is a historical and factual account of what the British public has been buying, and we will make a decision about playing it when the final chart positions are clear.â€
This was all in keeping with what one observer of social media predicted in a comic chart produced three months ago, as Mrs. Thatcher neared death.
As BBC News reported, a scan of social networks also revealed “lots of people who got angry at the people who were happy at the news.â€
“Show some respect,†tweeted one. “Celebrating someone's death is a bit sick,†said another. “Today someone's mum died,†was a third.
Not all of Mrs. Thatcher's political enemies expressed hatred after she died. Several members of Parliament, like David Lammy of the opposition Labour Party, tried to strike a more respectful tone in their comments.
Among those who reacted negatively to the outpouring of hate online and on the streets was Martin McGuinness, a former commander in the Irish Republican Army, who recoiled in horror after hundreds gathered in Belfast and Derry, honking horns and waving flags as if Ireland had won the World Cup.
Writing on Twitter, Mr. McGuinness, a former leader of the militant group that came close to assassinating Mrs. Thatcher and her whole cabinet in 1984 but later made peace, urged his followers to refrain from celebration.
Late Wednesday, Mr. McGuinness's perspective was echoed by his colleague Gerry Adams in an interview with Rodney Edwards of The Impartial Reporter, a Northern Irish weekly published in County Fermanagh. In 1981, Irish nationalist voters in Fermanagh elected the I.R.A. prisoner Bobby Sands to represent them in the British Parliament, just before his death from a hunger strike.
Speaking to Mr. Edwards, who made an advance copy of the interview available to The Lede, Mr. Adams said he stood by his initial criticism of Mrs. Thatcher for letting I.R.A. prisoners die from hunger strikes that year rather than granting them the status of political prisoners, but called it “demeaning to celebrate anyone's death.â€
“It isn't up to me to forgive her for what she did to the prisoners; that's up to them and their families,†he said. “I can forgive her, because I think we have to be about forgiveness. I can forgive her for anything that was done to me under her rule, and I don't have any problem with that - I actually believe in forgiveness. I just know as an individual, hatred or failure to forgive is most corrosive to the person involved as opposed to the perpetrator, who mightn't even be conscious of what you are thinking about him or her.â€
He added: “We Irish are very forgiving people. We don't speak ill of the dead.â€
Robert Mackey also remixes the news on Twitter @robertmackey.
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