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“Not yet like the heroes of Pelevin’s works”: how soon will we find ourselves in a virtual cemetery
There are already quite a few similar offers on the Internet. It has gotten to the point that ritual plaques with a QR code can be ordered on the market for only 500 rubles. Made of metal, engraved and supplied with double-sided tape. To install it, simple steps are enough. Wipe the installation site with a damp cloth, remove the protective film from the double-sided tape and stick the sign on the monument. Digital paths lead to related memory pages on the Internet. This is filled in through a special form, similar to an account on a social network.
We called several funeral homes and asked if they could place QR codes on tombstones. This service is not in demand yet, the agent asked what the service would look like and was told that there were no such orders yet. However, there are no problems with providing services. If necessary, the QR code can be engraved. The price of a standard monument, ready for installation, is on average 50,000 rubles.
- I don't see a problem with that. But I don't see the point either. Who is this QR code for? Close friends and relatives already know your social media page, but strangers are not interested in it. Is this person a famous actor, writer, etc.? I think he came to visit relatives at the cemetery and passed by some boy's grave. You will see a QR code on the monument. "I have absolutely no desire to go to someone else's dead person's social media page," Elena said.
- And those who are not too lazy can use this QR code to go to the page of the deceased. But we must remember that not everyone can be kind and polite. I would be against this idea. Let your friends and relatives visit you as many times as they want, be it your grave or your pages on social networks. But I would not allow this to a stranger. "Personal opinion," another subscriber commented.
- Such amateur performance on the cross can probably be called blasphemous. However, this is a question of ethics, not a question of religion. It seems to me that society is not yet ready to accept such signs. For example, to offer to insert a QR code for a child so that he can find his parents faster. But is it convenient for your child? The inscription is also not intended for this purpose. Great photos of your dead relatives can be shown on TV, but why would you do that? Personally, I would not do that. You can do without it, because it is not so important and valuable.
— Of course, it is relevant, because in a digital society it is everywhere in life. As researchers note, we are increasingly moving our social practices into the media space. The funeral ritual of farewell, one of the most important social practices, has become an important ritual on the Internet. Another thing is what forms it can take. There are websites about famous people. You can save data about your loved ones and write books and memoirs. It is also a kind of virtual memorial that performs the function of burial, the so-called network imprint of images formed by individuals in the digital space. On the one hand, this may be our desire to perpetuate a person’s personality, but in the virtual space, what he has saved about himself is preserved. Thus, after his death, his digital traces become concentrated and organized. I think some will find this interesting, especially those who are immersed in online life.
— I think we need both. We come into this world physically and leave it physically. The coming and going of the body requires certain rituals. You cannot simply leave your physical shell and completely move into the virtual space. However, one way or another, a person is increasingly represented in the online world, where the image of a person is preserved both visually and audibly, and the desire to preserve and mark one's presence in the formation of the global virtual space is growing and growing. more. This semantic component is already present in our thoughts and perception of what is happening. The first virtual cemeteries appeared 30 years ago, but now we are trying to organize and study this phenomenon.
— The network space is becoming more and more legalized, and many actions require legal justification and specific legislative acts. If earlier it seemed that we were floating in this space, unrecognizable by our various epithets, creating a new fantastic reality, now this reality has become institutionalized and requires a command from the participants themselves. In principle, if there is an interactive part via a QR code, then legal support is also necessary. On the other hand, it seems natural to us to see portraits on tombstones. A QR code can be considered the equivalent of a portrait: you can click on a person’s image to view it. But it is more than a portrait. With the help of QR codes, we can look at various aspects of the life of the deceased. In my opinion, if this approach were to become widespread in Russia, legal justification for this phenomenon would be required.
New burial traditions, new conditions for interaction with the other world, and the fulfillment of the socially important function of ancestral memory are becoming convenient. You can go to a virtual cemetery, light a virtual candle, and create a virtual space from anywhere in the world. Performing traditional and familiar rituals of remembrance, only in a virtual space, gives us the opportunity to ease our psychological state and fulfill our obligations, as before the digital era. This is a reasonable justification for the importance of this phenomenon in modern society. But I am not sure that it will completely absorb us and cancel the generally accepted funeral traditions. We do not yet live like the heroes of Pelevin's works. "Having placed our brain in a jar," we still remain physical. And this side of our life requires the same attention as our growing virtual life.