Sorry to hear this my friend. Being a Father myself I just couldn't imagine.

Degree depends on who died
how close you were

a tragedy is a tragedy to whomever is suffering that tragedy. tragedy's cannot be measured because every tragedy is ultimately a tragedy in its own right.

if I had a lisp my computer would be soaked lol

I don't even know if "tragedy" is the appropriate term for a terrorist attack. It's almost offensive when the news media talk like that.

A "tragedy" is usually something more like an accident, or unforseen event. When apologists for the likes of the IRA called their terrorist attacks tragedies they weren't condemning those attacks and just saying that they were regretable.

A couple losing a child is tragic. It seems unfair but it's nobody's fault, or it was an accident. I guess people talk about things like the murder of JFK as national tragedies but there's an element of "not understanding why" in that case and possibly in the case of terrorist attacks and high school shootings. So to that extent there's an element of tragedy about them.

Dramatic irony consists in the actors being unaware of the forces conspiring against them. Likewise, you can consider the death of Princess Diana a tragedy if you portray her as the innocent lamb that went to the slaughter and entertain conspiracy theories about it and we (the audience) know what she didn't. It's after the fact but, "If only she hadn't got into that car" is something we can say with hindsight and the degree of the tragedy is measured by the consequences.

In reality it's measured by how many people are effected. A lot of people were effected by the death of Diana and a lot of people lose children. When other people have been effected by the same thing it's not just a personal tragedy.

Arguably the firework on the head incident was more stupid than tragic. It's a matter of opinion. One person might say that a young person dying from a drug overdose was a senseless and tragic event and someone else might say that they made their own choices and were just stupid and knew where it would all lead.

a tragedy is a tragedy is a tragedy...

i think, the degree of one is not in the event itself but in how a person or all the people involved are affected by it, whether directly or indirectly.

a terror attack no matter how minimal, is not just a tragedy...it's a profanity.

True. It's really difficult to 'measure' the degree of tragedy. Pansy's 'impeccable' view stands corroborated by the following quotes of various 'philosophers' who have 'observed' tragedy in their own way..(As I read each one of 'those quotes', I failed to 'gauge' the 'degree of tragedy' in each case...)




The tragedy of life is often not in our failure, but rather in our complacency; not in our doing too much, but rather in our doing too little; not in our living above our ability, but rather in our living below our capacities.


Benjamin E. Mays




The real tragedy of the poor is the poverty of their aspirations.


Adam Smith



In human intercourse the tragedy begins, not when there is misunderstanding about words, but when silence is not understood.


Henry David Thoreau





To believe in love, to be ready to give up anything for it, to be willing to risk your life for it, is the ultimate tragedy.


Leonardo DiCaprio




Tragedy in life normally comes with betrayal and compromise, and trading on your integrity and not having dignity in life. That's really where failure comes.


Tom Cochrane




The tragedy of life is in what dies inside a man while he lives - the death of genuine feeling, the death of inspired response, the awareness that makes it possible to feel the pain or the glory of other men in yourself.


Norman Cousins






The tragedy of modern man is not that he knows less and less about the meaning of his own life, but that it bothers him less and less.


Vaclav Havel





Everybody knows about Pearl Harbor. The thing that really fascinated me is that through this tragedy there was this amazing American heroism.


Michael Bay






It must be borne in mind that the tragedy of life doesn't lie in not reaching your goal. The tragedy lies in having no goals to reach.


Benjamin E. Mays




The greatest tragedy in mankind's entire history may be the hijacking of morality by religion.


Arthur C. Clarke





The mark of your ignorance is the depth of your belief in injustice and tragedy. What the caterpillar calls the end of the world, the Master calls the butterfly.


Richard Bach





If you believe, as the Greeks did, that man is at the mercy of the gods, then you write tragedy. The end is inevitable from the beginning. But if you believe that man can solve his own problems and is at nobody's mercy, then you will probably write melodrama.


Lillian Hellman

pain and suffering are part of our human condition trying to control or ignore does not help but working through seems a great strategy...

Tragedy is tragedy...

GranGran passing away, in her sleep, at 109 years old... Is certainly a tragedy to that family.

A 22 year old drunk moron, decides to launch fireworks from the top of his head... well, that loss, might be a tragedy to his family.

I think the most important element of this question is in WHY someone asks it. And the specific reason why I strongly support the OP posting this for discussion, is that all of us are subjected (whether we realize it or not) to the fact that people in positions of power DO try to establish degrees and levels of tragedy, for more than one reason.

Insurance companies want to establish formal Degrees of Tragedy (though they wont call them that) so as to maximize their profits.

Corporations want to establish Degrees of Tragedy, in order to limit their legal responsibilities and liabilities.

Governments want to establish Degrees of Tragedy, in order to use the perceived differences to do everything from justify wars, to hiding persecutions of citizens.

From an emotional standpoint, I agree with others here, that telling someone else how they ought to feel is ludicrous and insulting. But I have to admit that there are practical considerations which we MUST face up to.

Two weeks ago, I woke up choking on my own vomit, but I wouldn't count THAT as a tragedy. It was just coincidence. And I hope it never happens to me again. I'll spare you the details.

if you had of died that would have been a tragedy.

I hope that doesn't happen again and you have got medical advice.