Nathan

I should not have said those things to you.

I apologise.

What I should have said:

. We have never heard of Graham Downing
. We don't know if such a person ever existed

Therefore:

. We don't know if this unknown person ever went to Vietnam
. We can't know if an unknown person was a “man of stature”
. If he did exist he died recently in Australia, and he didn't give his life “for others”
. And we can't possibly conclude that “many knew and looked up to (him) in terms of life and discovery” if we don't know if he even existed
. We haven't heard of the anonymous person who put up the post for reasons known only to that anonymous person.

But, above all, those of us who responded to the post probably need our heads read for not just ignoring it as we ignore the occasional advertisements and rubbish that slip through the system.

The world is full of nutters and seriously ill people who do all sorts of irrational things.

As for judgements, we all make them every day, and so we must if we want to survive.

Mean spiritedness with petty and ungracious actions towards
others should have no place in our society. But sadly there
are those who make it their purpose in life to be like
this. Extending an apology is a commendable act - but in this
case it should apply to more than just one person.

ttbn,

We don't even know if David Singer is real. I mean he churns out the same stuff nearly every week, like some sort of robot or artificial device.

I have a lot of respect for our Vietnam veterans in terms of their work and the fact they did something I just couldn't do. I'm not up to it - serving in the military.

In terms of the writer, no it's not really an opinion, but I do hope it starts a debate about something. They have expressed their emotions about the loss of their dad, depression and anxiety and we know from figures that men are more likely to commit suicide than women.

9 each day in Australia will take their life, 7 of them men and around 1.5m people here in Australia live with depression.

http://www.beyondblue.org.au/mental-health/statistics

Often their situations are trivialised in a men vs women battle of the sexes and for Vietnam veterans we know they are part of those men in terms of statistics who will take their lives.

To finish, who cares if Graham Downing isn't real? For me I'd rather be on the safe side and recognise he is a sign of those who gave their lives in earlier times for people today.

Graham Downing tribute.

http://tributes.newcastleherald.com.au/obituaries/504504/graham-stewart-downing?r=https://tributes.newcastleherald.com.au/obituaries/newcastleherald-au/

Sorry to those who this upset. I was just acknowledging my dad.

Dear Basso70,

The grieving process is different for everybody.
I don't see anything wrong with someone wanting
to tell others that they just lost a loved one.
It can be a healthy way to cope.

People should be able to grieve without judgement.
None of us should get to dictate how others grieve.

Everyone grieves differently.

Thank you for sharing your grief with us.