the real issue with death in the 21st century

I remain unconvinced that the precarious nature of life is any more or less precarious now than it has been in the past.

Coercion was surely a strong factor in the ability of man to exhort his fellow man to lay down his life for a greater cause; yet, all in all, methinks things were more than likely much more simple, "back in the day". If one were to find oneself on a war campaign "back in the day", there was no one or thing to appeal to for subsistence if you to find that you had a sudden change of heart. No. If you decided the soldiering life was not for you, then your ass was more than likley killed, or, if you were lucky, turned out to the elements. Yes, any such realization that one were, in truth, and in ones heart, a conscientious objector would be as death provoking at that time, as swallowing a handful of lethal pills would be today.

No doubt, the vast majority of soldiers in earlier ages were simply living in the moment, chasing their next meal, their next step and their next problem, issue, or pleasure, as more intelligent persons recorded the weight of booty accumulated through their efforts.

Today, the horror of death is not the violence of it all, rather, the expectation that we will have extended futures, and funds, insurance, retirement, comfort, income but, more to the point, the horror of death is essentially, the essentialist duality of not existence/non-existence and form/spirit, but the duality of semi-present/future and selfish individualism/materialism.

The horror of death is that we will no longer be able to spend, to purchase, to indulge, to see, hear, smell, taste, gratify and reflect. that is the horror of death.

We are in an age, where the contemplation of a future, is as revered as history, culture and convention had been in the past.

No one wants to die, when the virtual entirety of their conscious orb's are dedicated towards, the almost Egyptian aesthete of the pre-afterlife, which is another way of saying, the period of time between the present, and death.

I share in this horror. not because I want to, but because it is a cultural trait and obsession of our present day lives.