“Everybody seems more concerned with what was thrown off the bridge than they are with the thoughtlessness of people expressed in the song”
It isn’t thoughtlessness. People who have lived with death and dying accept it happens, that we don’t always know why and that, at least in human eyes, there often IS no reason why.
That is also true with suicide. People who commit suicide often do it for reasons known only to them. Where other may see success, they see failure. I feel bad if I hear someone kills themself, but I feel worse when someone who has a lot to live for and wants to live, dies!
But either way, “Pass the biscuits, please!” Our lives go on. And sometimes, not for much longer: “Papa caught it, and he died last spring.”
I feel more for “Mama” than for Billy Joe.
Brother married Becky Thompson. He was a pig(movie).