The Untold Story of a Music Royalty's Tragic End | Hacker News Reader

The Untold Story of a Music Royalty's Tragic End

jjpryor.substack.com

17 points4monthsaway13 comments

This is a common pattern.

The issue is not really the pressure, even if the pressure itself can be extremely toxic over a long duration.

The problem is the lack of satisfaction from personal growth.

We're all built with an internal feedback loop, inherited from our complex evolutionary path, this feedback loop is mostly sensitive to change.

It is impossible to live a happy life without positive feedback into this loop.

It does not matter how rich, powerful or famous you are, all of that is quickly integrated to be "normal", we need constant improvement or at least fluctuations with some positive slope.

Hell is being born with everything and slowly losing status, friends, money and hope.

The problem is when people invite drugs into their lives... It distorts perception and causes so many other issues like clinical depression, physical illness, and mental illnesses that can't properly be treated.

It's also a strange situation in which racial minorities that succumb to drug abuse are seen as criminals, while white people that have the same affliction are seen as "tragic cases of innocent societal victimization".

This world is deeply screwed up, and the music industry is even more so, but it's hard to see a story like this, as someone who wasn't "born with everything" yet still struggling after many years to create a foothold in music out of nothing, while people who have the opportunity of wealth and even ease of relation to celebrities keep failing and burning out... It's not jealousy, it's bewilderment.

The ideal that some sort of superior talent and creativity comes out of genetics, and that nefarious behavior should be forgiven based on genetics is rooted in racial superiority... It's a sham ideology we should all abandon in my opinion, especially when it keeps getting proven to be false. That being said, tragic loss of life should never be ignored and should be a lesson to us all about how to live our lives better.

This is a strangely written story. I don't get the point of hiding who the person is until the end, it's not like keeping them a secret changed how I felt about their tale.

spoiler, since that's how this article is written Do they think I'd go "oh, who cares about Elvis' grandson?" More likely people wouldn't know anything about his grandson and back out after the first line.

I never liked the old Paul Harvey "Now you know...the rest of the story" thing either. And I don't see how it's a good fit for Hacker News, either.

That's exactly why it's written this way -- to devoid the reader of any prejudice and humanize this tragic story -- because it is tragic. If it was written "normally", like "Elvis' Grandson Ben killed himself, and here's why..." some people might hand wave it away as just another "poor little rich boy story". This is also probably one of the reasons for his suicide (IMO of course). I mean, he's Elvis' kid he couldn't possibly be unhappy, right?

As to whether or not this is appropriate for HN, I'm also not so sure... but I enjoyed reading it.

The first sentence is

>The grandson of a legendary musician, Ben grew up in wealth and luxury.

If they're trying to avoid the "poor little rich boy story," they did a poor job.

I said nothing about it being unsuited for HN. I take issues with the story telling, not it being posted here.

> "poor little rich boy story,"

I think you're taking my example a little too literally there... it's an example. The point is to save the reveal (spoilers?) till the end so that you can relate to the story more.

I find it difficult to relate to a story about growing up the ultra wealthy grandson of a famous musician. Them being related to Elvis doesn't make it less relatable.

And personally, adding the "who is it" mystery made the story less relatable. Instead of reading it and empathizing, I was trying to figure out who they were talking about. Then there's the morose reveal of "Aha! It was Ben Keough that committed suicide."

I liked it actually, and also didn't know til then who it is about..

I felt like the (largely artificial and entirely author-opted) mystery detracted from the story.

I’m no particular fan of Elvis (have gone to Memphis several times and never even considered visiting Graceland), but I guessed it was Elvis’ grandson and spent 20% of my attention trying to confirm or deny that.

IMO, it’s not a particularly useful artifice.

Because it's clickbait. It's really that simple.

The lack of purpose seems a current plague on humanity, especially with rates of suicide. Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankyl got through to me. Now with kids of my own - I can only help so much, their lives will have to be from their own will to live.

Elvis was a singular talent. I feel like to consider a lineage "royalty of X", there need to be multiple members of the family who dominate the field. Not that that changes much about his sad story.

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