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Author: Edith Jennifer Hill, Associate Lecturer, Learning & Teaching Innovation, Flinders University
Original article: https://theconversation.com/grave-cleaning-videos-are-going-viral-on-tiktok-are-they-honouring-the-dead-or-exploiting-them-240553
Cleaning the graves of strangers is the latest content trend taking over TikTok. But as millions tune in to watch the videos, it’s becoming clear not all of them are created equal. Two grave-cleaning creators in particular seem to reside at opposite ends of the trend.
One of the first accounts to gain popularity for grave cleaning was @ladytaphos. This account is run by Alicia Williams, a Virginia resident who treats the graves with great dignity. Williams will often share the story of the person residing within, and acts with grace and kindness as she restores beauty to the graves.
On the other end of the spectrum is Kaeli Mae McEwen, or @the_clean_girl, who leans into more clickbait-y tactics. McEwen is known for throwing a pink spiky ball through a graveyard and cleaning the grave it lands on. She also uses her videos to promote her own pink foamy cleaner (which at one point could be purchased via a link in her bio).
Cleaning and death
While Williams’ and McEwen’s videos may seem novel to some, death and cleaning have a long and varied relationship that spans time and cultures.
Washing a loved one’s body before burial or cremation isn’t just practical – it’s a significant ritual that provides meaning during a period of grief. In certain cultures and religions it’s also a process of purification, or preparation for the afterlife.
Much has been written about cleaning and clearing out the homes of deceased people. Family members often won’t agree on how to approach such a task. In his essay on death and objects, author Tony Birch writes about his mother clearing out his grandmother’s house.
“My mother decided that our first task after her death was to empty out her Housing Commission flat and scrub it clean,” Birch writes.
He first laments the move, but later recognises the value of cleaning together before sorting – and treasuring – the items his grandmother left behind.
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Margaretta Magnuson’s 2017 book, The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning, is a humorous and thoughtful introduction to the Swedish movement of döstädning. The book (and subsequent reality TV series) has sparked various conversations on death and cleaning, and especially on cleaning before you yourself pass away so you don’t leave a mess for your loved ones.
Grave cleaning can be seen as another continuation of caring for the deceased. People who decide to clean the graves of strangers may do so out of respect, or in an attempt to give them “their name back” (as names on graves become visible following the removal of debris).
Two very different approaches
Williams and McEwen are received quite differently by viewers. Anecdotally, viewers respond more positively to the calmer and more respectful cleaning videos by Williams, who takes time to explain the process while ensuring the correct products are used.
Meanwhile, many find McEwen’s videos problematic and criticise her for not adhering to proper graveyard decorum. McEwen makes a spectacle of sites of mourning, such as by pretending to vacuum graves, replacing flowers placed by others and making jokes. Viewers also speculate the products she uses may cause damage to the graves.
Perceived intent plays a role in how each creator’s content is received. While Williams focuses on respectfully restoring graves to their former glory, McEwen positions herself as the focus and merely uses the graves for content.
A complex emotional object
Similar to other funerary objects such as coffins and urns, graves are associated with both the person who died and the fact of their death. As such, they are emotionally complex objects that bring both strength and sadness to those left behind.
But graves are unique also in that they are private objects of grief exposed in a public context. Anyone visiting the graveyard can view and interact with them. Does that make them “fair game” for content creators?
Graves don’t just represent deceased loves ones. They can also act as stand-ins in their absence, becoming stone bodies of sorts. As sociologist Margaret Gibson describes in her book Objects of the Dead: Mourning and Memory in Everyday Life, “death reconstructs our experience of objects”.
“There is the strangeness of realising that things have outlived persons, and, in this regard, the materiality of things is shown to be more permanent than the materiality of the body,” she says.
Caring for and cleaning graves can therefore be interpreted as caring for the deceased, by extending their existence through the materiality of their resting place.
Psychological researcher Svend Brinkmann asserts artefacts such as graves are “culturally sanctioned”, gaining “significance from a collective system of meaning”.
In other words, we as a community create and uphold reverence for such items. This is partly why the desecration of graves is viewed as abhorrent. It is societally understood to be a desecration of the person themselves. It’s also why content creators must tread lightly.
A reason for haunting?
There are ways to interact with gravestones (and even create content) which acknowledge their complexity and connection to their owners.
TikTok creator Rosie Grant (@ghostlyarchive) bakes recipes found on headstones and records the process. She has even met with the families of the deceased to make the recipes together and learn more about the people behind the engraving-worthy food.
However, randomly cleaning the graves of strangers is fraught territory – and rife with potential privacy issues. It isn’t clear whether McEwen seeks permission from loved ones before cleaning graves, but contextually this seems unlikely.
Recent discussions have also uncovered questionable editing in her videos. Some graves in her before-and-after videos have been edited to appear cleaner and to have their structure altered. McEwen’s pink foaming cleaner also appears to be a blue cleaner edited to appear pink, raising even more questions about intent and responsibility.
While McEwen claims to be “honouring” lives by cleaning “final resting places”, the consensus from viewers is her actions are dishonourable. As one host commented on a in podcast discussing McEwen cleaning a baby’s grave while speaking in a kiddish voice: “Fuck you, you’re going to get haunted.”