Tonight on The Independents: The Bright Side of Death
What the hell, the news is so bad this week we might as well jump head-first into death. Tonight's theme episode of The Independents (Fox Business Network, 9 p.m. ET, 6 p.m. PT, with re-airs three and five hours later) attempts to find the silver lining in the business of dying, or at least to imagine a future in which life-and-death (and post-death) decisions are no longer mangled by the state.
The show begins with Kenyon College Economics Professor David Harrington and Golden Gate Funeral Home Director and Ask the Undertaker star John Beckwith, who will discuss coffin regulations, tissue harvesting, the rise of cremation, and other hot funeral trends. Anti-aging visionary Aubrey De Grey then brings his beard and his wit to explain the whys and why-so-scareds of his death-defying research. Compassion & Choices President Barbara Coombs Lee talks about the lived experience with dignified-death laws (like in Oregon), and why that isn't "assisted suicide." Then it's obviously time for a game of "Famous Last Words," featuring as contestants serial ghostwriter (and Reason contributor) Michael Malice and Fox Business Making Money host Charles Payne.
So what happens when you die? We'll let viewers ask blue-eyed priest Father Jonathan Morris whether heaven really is a place where nothing ever happens. Then Malice comes back to talk about the emerging trend of super-duper fun funerals, and the show ends with the co-hosts imagining their own ideal exits from this mortal coil.
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