Good Question. World over there is a custom that when there is a death in a house, people visit the family and pay their condolences, tell them encouraging words to get them out of the sorrow. This not done coz the loss of the person is immaterial, but one has to carry on with his life, and we as outsiders to teh family do it, as we are not directly affected by it and have better clarity of mind that given situation. The greatest strength of all god has given us is the power of forgetting, bearing which we would never get over even the smallest sorrow in our minds. Now we can do two things, write inflammatory messages and make the death of the child sound silly, or understand and find ways to tell people to look beyond all these. Normally, in very religious Hindu families ( I am not very much aware of how and what happens in others, pardon my ignorance ), they hold a recital/explanation of the Gheeta or Ramayana etc... in order to get mental strength from the wisdom of these texts. What we are to do as good citizens is to find ways as to how this can be avoided, that is very easy,being what we want others to be. Pointing fingers will only aggravate the situation, but never provide solution.
Now to the part of what I would have done if it were my child? yes, I would be devastated, teary, my life would seem merely senseless without him/her,I might end up with bad and disastrous thoughts, thats when I need advice from others, that cosmic philosophical assurance.
