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I've known only one other person besides me who admits to disliking ceremony of any kind, be it a wedding or graduation ceremony or ...?

Ceremony embarrasses me.

I find it hokey to the max.

Badly done amateur acting makes me want to either laugh out loud or scream, 'stop it', you're making an bubblegum of yourself or selves.

Why ceremony is insisted upon makes me wonder...why?

What's the motivation?

No doubt, I'm in a very small minority of folks who think this perspective or are there others who think this way regarding ceremony, but simply don't speak up for fear of being thought odd?

You?
 
Easy. Just stay away and don't fret about it.

For others that agree with the protocol, or are less intimidated by it, that's okay too.

I have been at many "ceremonies" thru the years, where certain people were glaringly missing, professing the same reasons for their boycott. For some, I think it's a bit selfish, and for some, it gets them the attention they wanted.
 
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Being in a ceremony??? Most people don't like being in the spotlight. I've been an actor/singer/speaker/etc since middle school so I'm good with it. Being in the military one gets used to ceremony. One of the highest moments in my pitiful life was when I was awarded a plaque during the graduation ceremony for USCG Aviation Electronics School for achieving the highest grade point avg they had ever had in the entire history of the school.

At my wedding, I was not embarrassed, but my wife was horrified to find all those eyes on her. She is that way. I'm not.

I have it in my will that there will not be a funeral nor memorial when I pass. However, I have requested a Veteran's military graveside sendoff. The local American Legion provides.

Watching ceremony is boring IMO. TV awards shows, yuck, and now they are so political... no way!!!
 
I find the opposite, most people I know HATE ceremony. Besides being in hot gyms or parade fields, its annoying to me because I'm a cynical SOB. Maybe 10% of the people there will actually follow through with their goals. Most marriages fail, so the smiles and tears and uncomfortable clothes go wasted.

I went to a high school graduation this year and listened to this kid drone on and one about stuff that sounds great until you start paying taxes or find out how apathetic humans really are and how they won't jump to join your cause. If I could do a graduation speech, it would go like this:

25% of you have tried synthetic narcotics, many more will try them in college, if many actually go. 20% of you will go to prison.

At least 10 of you already have children, and another 30% will have them before you're 20. Try not to pawn them off on your parents, after all they thought today was going to be the liggt at the end of the tunnel.

5 or 6 of you will have children before you're 20 and will go to prison for touching them indecently (raise eyebrow and look at a few people directly), isn't that right?

I'd end with this: "Don't let today be the high point of your life. With laws and modern medicine, you're likely to have another 70 years of mediocrity ahead of you".
 
I have it in my will that there will not be a funeral nor memorial when I pass. However, I have requested a Veteran's military graveside sendoff. The local American Legion provides.

I've thought about this too. I'm very involved in Veterans funerals. And I see a myriad of excuses of why folks just can't make it to the funeral. I don't want folks needing an excuse to not make it to mine.
 
I've managed to avoid nearly all but those of actual personal significance for well over a half century.
Even fewer today than recent years have passed cut off requirements. The few remaining that pop up now & then have enhanced meaning.
 
I've thought about this too. I'm very involved in Veterans funerals. And I see a myriad of excuses of why folks just can't make it to the funeral. I don't want folks needing an excuse to not make it to mine.

People don't like funerals. I don't like funerals. I feel much better about memorials, but they are never comfortable. It's not a comfortable occasion. But I go. I owe it to certain people to show up and pay my respects. One of the hardest things I've ever done was speak for my best shooting buddy at his memorial. But his wife wanted it, so I manned up.

I went to Argonaut's memorial. He was deserving of the effort.

If there are six people willing to show up and carry my casket, that will be fine.
 
"Ceremony" is part of human societies, probably as far back as there have been anyone resembling homo sapiens.. Rites, rituals, liturgies, and ceremonies are part of what binds us as races, tribes, societies, and nations, and ultimately, as humans... Doesnt matter what the racial, national, religious, or social stock is, we all have rituals that resonate deeply in the human psyche. Sure they can be used and abused as tools of control.. Doesnt make them any less important socially.
 
graduation speech

At my son's graduation the 'fan favorite' teacher they invited to speak gave two pieces of important advice: "Don't ask, always take the last piece of pizza, and don't accidentally use Preparation H for toothpaste, it's a mistake you'll never recover from."
 
I hate people who feel they have to sing in front of me for no reason other than they think they are special for some reason. Talk about annoying. Well, except for maybe Elvis. He would sing about a jelly roll or Queenie Wahini or something and that's cool. But he's dead now (or so they say...) so that Era is over.
 
Don't like them. Don't like liturgies/etc. either. I think they are stupid, and a waste of time - at least for me. I get that some people seem to need them, but not me. I thought it was just me.

I don't even like business meetings for the most part - especially the dog and pony shows. Waste of time mostly. I sit thru twice as many meetings now that I work on two projects. If it is a quick huddle/review/etc. where we are actually discussing something, then it may be a necessary evil. I let other people do the presentations of my work.

Weddings are one of the worst. Funerals - well those are for the survivors - I don't want one. I will be cremated and I have asked that there be a party instead of a funeral, where everybody is asked to wear a Hawaiian shirt, and there be food and it be totally informal. Had a niece who died in a car accident a couple of years ago and there was a picnic with photos laid out. That would be nice. A BBQ picnic out in the woods, with friends - I like those. I like people to have a good time, not sit around in uncomfortable clothing and be sad while someone stands up and delivers an awkward eulogy - or worse, a preacher delivers a sermon.

I skipped my HS graduation, and both college ceremonies, and if I could have I would have for the 'A' school in the military (made worse by the fact that I had to give a speech since I was the 'honor-man' of the class - it was a short stupid speech).

I will sometimes attend ceremonies for the sake of the person who it is for, or for family. But I am thankful for being able to send my regrets for many of them because they are out of town/etc. - I just dislike suffering thru them.
 
"Ceremony" is part of human societies, probably as far back as there have been anyone resembling homo sapiens.. Rites, rituals, liturgies, and ceremonies are part of what binds us as races, tribes, societies, and nations, and ultimately, as humans... Doesnt matter what the racial, national, religious, or social stock is, we all have rituals that resonate deeply in the human psyche. Sure they can be used and abused as tools of control.. Doesnt make them any less important socially.

That's the thing. I am not anti-social, but I am not a social person, and I find most social aspects of humans and society in general annoying - often harmful to people who want to live their lives as they see fit without others interfering.
 
I think my formative years of having a hard scrabble shaped me into one who finds ceremony an exercise in counterfeit and elaborate emotion. Ceremony is also something I didn't participate in because it wasn't a part of my growing up world, thus when adulthood came about and my circumstances changed it was something I was introduced to and found weird and foreign to me.

I found ceremony in the Army especially unappealing. As a soldier, I was trained to shoot and break things, not march in parades or suffer stiff and awkward ceremony. Had I known in advance about such bs I probably wouldn't have enlisted...maybe.

I don't think there's a right or wrong in ceremony. If it's for you...great and I'm glad you like it as often it can't be avoided if you can't say no.

Yes, I know it's history as a tribe reinforcement/social glue, etc. But, I guess it had to have been something you grew up with to be germane to you as a person.

This is also/probably/partly why I can't find any pleasure in attaching my emotions to any sports team. I see all such as businesses who I owe no allegiance to. Why should I? 'We won' 'We lost' ah, no, you weren't on the team knuckle head...so there's no we, unless you're dreaming.

It's not 'my team' unless I'm an actual team member, but I digress...

I'm thinking about this subject as I'm being importuned to attend an upcoming ceremony that I'm absolutely not going to. I won't be guilt tripped into it either.

Did I wake up on the wrong side of the bed this morning?

Yep...

Any more of 'my tribe' (chuckle) of ceremony detester's out there?
 
"Ceremony" is part of human societies, probably as far back as there have been anyone resembling homo sapiens.. Rites, rituals, liturgies, and ceremonies are part of what binds us as races, tribes, societies, and nations, and ultimately, as humans... Doesnt matter what the racial, national, religious, or social stock is, we all have rituals that resonate deeply in the human psyche. Sure they can be used and abused as tools of control.. Doesnt make them any less important socially.
I for one am glad rituals involving human sacrifice has lost its favor. Now if we could persuade the politicians to give it up too, I'd call that progress.
 
I hate people who feel they have to sing in front of me for no reason other than they think they are special for some reason. Talk about annoying.

In SPEBSQSA, now the "Barbershop Harmony Society", Barbershop singers are taught not to inflict their singing on unwilling audiences. It's an actual rule. Broken from time to time tho. Sorry!

About 10yrs ago I was coming back from break during a Grande Ronde Community Choir rehearsal and feeling my oats. Singing thru the hallway and into the choir room... I rx'd so much sch!t from two choir members that I never did it again!!! :oops::oops::oops:
 
Ceremony is garbage, imo. It wastes time and looks silly. And holidays. Decorating and spending.... More often than not I just go to work for a long shift and avoid the annoyance from either.
 

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