A mere three hours ago or so I was reading a story in the San Francisco Chronicle about the debate raging over the Associated Press' pre-written obit for Britney Spears. Now, a lot of newspapers pre-write obits; this is no secret. But most write them for old people of renown in the region or nation, whatever the coverage area is. You get the idea. VERY FEW -- and I would say almost none -- write obits for really young people. But apparently the AP feels there is a need to be prepared as it was NOT when Anna Nicole Smith died.
Generally, I think it's a good call to be prepared no matter who you're obitting (is that a word?), but I also have concerns about how you would go about choosing "disturbed celebrities" who might die. By pre-writing their obits, is the paper pegging the person as a danger to oneself or others? Would that lead to a self-fulfilling prophecy?
This is the story about the raging debate:
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin
In any case, what's creepy is that three hours after I read that story about the big debate about the Britney obit, I read that Heath Ledger had died at age 28.
This is the obit: http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/la-na-ledger23jan23,0,2214665.story?coll=la-home-center
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