I Was at a Funeral of An Audiophile...

I would be happy to have Doug say a eulogy for me, of course I don't plan on going for quite some time. Tho, he'll probably throw in at the end "Hey, who's got dibs on his stereo"?! HA

Move upstream, y'all and consider why Doug saw fit to comment in the first place. Have any of you attended a funeral that you felt inclined to write about on Audiogon? Were you concerned about the audiophile credentials of the deceased? Did his surviving relatives accord him some status that rightfully applied to you instead? Were you maybe just a little bit jealous? Well I never........... did you see his system? That stuff is barely mid-fi and his speaker placement plainly indicates that he was a phony, a pretend audiophile.

Paul,

You are correct - I know who I am. Thanks for that acknowledgment. You have kindly pointed out to everyone why I don't participate in medieval superstitions. However, I feel pretty sure none of us care about my personal beliefs or your supercilious attempts to read them into my unrelated comments about the offending funeral.

No one, no matter how ignorant or arrogant, knows where we go when we die. Those who insist they do, are delusional.

I thought the post might generate some interesting discussion. I appreciate all replies, and anticipated that some would see my post as arrogant, snotty, etc. and others would see it as realistic/pragmatic, etc.

It's difficult to discuss deceased persons, making judgments about them/their life, without possibly offending. I think most of us would have felt similar in terms of assessment of the system, but I simply had the guts to say it publicly.

In terms of making judgments, or judging others' actions, you bet, I do so all the time. Further, I will judge someone's actions whether living or dead. What I hope not to do is what might be termed "judgementalism", harsh criticism of another - the old "get the log out of your own eye," mistake. We tend to want to "cushion" comments in certain social settings and on certain topics. If someone doesn't they come off as brash, harsh, insensitive, etc. So, what if this guy could only afford entry level gear, or had other financial priorities? Perhaps, but the exuberance over his being an audiophile with "state of the art" gear was what triggered my reaction.

When I began learning to ski at age 27 or so I was very proud to proclaim myself a skier, though I wasn't really much of one considering that "real" skiers spend a lot of time on the slopes, have beautiful form from years of perfecting body mechanics, often adopt the culture of skiing, have likely moved upward in terms of equipment and clothing, and may have taken special trips to ski in fantastic settings. I had done none of those initially - but I was telling everyone, "I'm a skier!"
I was actually a hack learning my first baby steps, but was overly proud of my initial progress.

I guess that doesn't happen to anyone else, huh? Especially not audiophiles.

I was intending to lead others reading the post to two concusions:
1. The man was an audiophile, despite what I concluded was a bit of unsupported pride over his rig. He loved music, played it on his rig incessantly, and enjoyed his gear. That's the basic foundation of an audiophile. The quality of his rig is not determinant, but his habitus, his lifestyle of subjecting himself to the music with regularity.

2. His family was loved. We can get too wrapped up in our audiophile world and lose sight of the things which matter most - family, friends, faith (and though faith is important to me, I'm not interested in arguing it), etc.
In the end the quality of his rig was inconsequential, as it will be for us.

Perhaps for the audiophile there are three things which cannot be avoided: death, taxes and judgments of our systems! ;)

I knew exactly where you were coming from, Doug.

That was a nice follow-up.

I hear you still can't ski worth a shit though. I judge your skiiing to be sub-par. I've written a treatise on the subject that is to be published in The New Yorker upon your death.