Rubbish euphemisms for death

If anyone finds this offensive, please let me know and I'll take it off. I work on a local paper and we get dreadfully worded death notices in on a regular basis - grammatically incorrect, rampacked full of cliches and things which make no sense. It's just not respectful and the person who died deserves simple, elegant prose.

Here are some things that irritate me.


She fell asleep – what, so she’s going to wake up after a nice long rest?
He lost his parents – highly careless, surely he can find them again if he just looks in the right place.
Mrs Norman leaves behind a husband and two children – well, I think we would all think less of her if she tried to take them with her.
Eric passed on – as in he said no, I’ll pass on the sprouts cos they make me a bit gassy.

Other pants things used in obituaries and death notices
Clichés such as – Gone but not forgotten – so why do you need to put a bleeding ad in?

I’m also not at all keen on people who ‘bravely’ suffer illness and disease – yes, it’s horrible but it’s not like you have much choice about it, really, is it? Far braver are the people facing life without them. Or firemen who die rushing in to save someone but that is a positive action, rather than just accepting something which you don’t have a choice about.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m a sympathetic person but let’s be honest, they died. You can be gentle and kind without reverting to mawkish oversentimentality. I’m not even saying call a spade a spade, I’m just saying what we journalists get taught in hack school – KISS keep it short and simple. Much more appropriate and accurate.