<p>cptofthehouse
If a more affluent family loses a teen, there will be a huge service with hundreds of people. The line to get in can go around the block. Weeks worth of home cooked meals are delivered to the family home. The flowers sent go up to the sky. A foundation is often created in the deceased’s name. Fundraising dinners are held yearly where tens of thousands of dollars are raised for charity. </p>
<p>Now the other side…</p>
<p>I have a friend who sits on the board of a certain college. He told me recently of a fight he waged to get a story published about a student who was missing for some time and then found dead in some type of drug den (having overdosed). The student was from a poor family and on scholarship. Apparently, she also had the disease of addiction. The original game plan was to say nothing - let the story die. Now if this had been an affluent lacrosse player who died of cancer in an expensive hospital bed, there would have been a campus-sponsored service with a thousand in attendance. Sad how socioeconomic disparity follows us to the grave.</p>