People making jokes about a missing Maj Gen (retired)

[Anonymous]

Renewed attention is falling on the base after the disappearance of retired Air Force Maj. Gen. William Neil McCasland, a former commander of the Air Force Research Laboratory at Wright-Patterson whose career placed him at the center of some of the Pentagon’s most advanced aerospace research. https://cnn.it/4rvWltm

...this just makes me so sad. He left his home with a gun, backpack and no devices. It seems pretty clear what happened and people are joking about UFOs.

My husband is a service member and has lost many friends, in retirement, from suicide. It's not funny, it's a huge crisis.

[Anonymous]

I am pretty sure he is not missing.

[Anonymous]

So weird, I was in a hot tub in CO two weeks ago with some aerospace guys. They were talking about a colleague who was supposed to be on the trip with them but had disappeared.

[Anonymous]

Very sad.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I am pretty sure he is not missing.

If he planned to kill himself, why not leave a note? Why not take a phone so he could eventually be found? A man with a wife seemingly wouldn’t be so selfish. (And the elderly man I know IRL who killed himself when his health issues had become too serious for him to handle left a note saying where to find his body precisely so his family could retrieve it; he did it when his wife was at a medical appointment and purposely didn’t do it inside their home).

Did he leave to be with a mistress/AP? To disappear?

Did he have military secrets and was he kidnapped? Leaving without his phone just doesn’t make sense if his goal was to kill himself. But it does make sense if he’s been taken or was trying to hide.

[Anonymous]

I agree, OP. The internet has destroyed our humanity, and I don’t think we’ve seen the worst of it yet.

[Anonymous]

So many military continually vote for the party that cuts funding for both the VA and mental health services. So while I agree this is a problem, it's one the cohort that surrounds it makes worse with their voting habits.

[Anonymous]

Op I get it but people have always done this. I’m old enough to remember the jokes about Natalie Wood after she died and Michel Jackson after he caught fire.

[Anonymous]

Times are bad, some people use dark humor to cope.

Lighten up or all of this is only going to get harder.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Times are bad, some people use dark humor to cope.

Lighten up or all of this is only going to get harder.

The problem is that none of this is actually funny.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Times are bad, some people use dark humor to cope.

Lighten up or all of this is only going to get harder.

The problem is that none of this is actually funny.

Eh, I can think of some much bigger problems. If we want a kinder world we need to vote for it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Op I get it but people have always done this. I’m old enough to remember the jokes about Natalie Wood after she died and Michel Jackson after he caught fire.

People use humor to emotionally distance themselves from something that feels too heavy or sad. It's not always expressed appropriately, but the instinct is pretty normal and can even be healthy in some circumstances.

[Anonymous]

What horrible thing did he work on during his career that haunted? You don't want that.

[Anonymous]

haunted him

[Anonymous]

His secrets died with him. Or something. There was some reason he did this. He likely viewed this action as the most empowered choice, among other options.