Whether you are an average joe struck down with Cancer, or run over by a bus, a 'hero' soldier shot down in conflict, or a drug addict jazz singer who takes one too many drugs and doesn't make it - a life is a life. It is not clever or witty to compare someone who has died at the hands of a soldier's gun, or at the mercy of a dreadful disease.
No matter how your life is taken, it has been taken.
The family you leave behind will be mortified by your death, however it has occurred. Sayings such as 'they had a good innings' does not begin to heal the wound of a life now gone.
Addiction is a disease, it is easy to look down your nose at someone afflicted with addiction and make the assumption they have chosen their path - but I can guarantee that people who are addicted to anything, be it drink, drugs or tobacco, would wish everything they have not to be afflicted with that addiction.
As Russell Brand has said before me, it is something we all need to live with. The fear of addiction, and well done to every person who has not become addicted to something, well done on having that strength, not everyone has that, and those of us who are addicted to something need help not your scorn.
To compare people's lives and deaths is not big and its not clever, every life is worth living, rich or poor, famous or alone. No one person deserves any more accolade than anyone else. At the same time, the fact that addiction related deaths in celebrity circles makes big news can only be a good thing - it might just save someone else life, one of the little people who are just as likely to become addicted to a street drug, or alcohol as the next person, nobody is free of that.
Hear hear! Well said!
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