A so-called influencer pretended to be dead and arrived at his own “funeral” in a helicopter. He wanted to teach his family a lesson in the importance of staying in touch.

Wife and children join the game

45-year-old David Baerten from Belgium had conspired with his wife and children who played along on social media about the macabre prank:

Rest in peace dad. I will never stop thinking about you. Why is life so unfair? Why just you who was going to be a grandfather, you still had your life ahead of you. I love you! We love you! We will never forget you.

Cheers everyone!

The next phase was the funeral, where many of the “deceased’s” family turned up – and so did the deceased himself. He arrived by helicopter with a film crew and was greeted by stunned mourners as he jumped out:

@el.tiktokeur2 Tu nous as eu on t aime mon ami on est content que tu es parmis nous ❤️❤️#pourtoii #fyp #fypシ @Ragnar_le_fou ♬ son original – Thomas faut

Cheers everyone, welcome to my funeral.

Some also shed tears of joy and hugged him thoroughly.

The Tiktoker justified the stunt by saying that he wanted to reconnect with his other and well-tattooed family – with whom he had lost contact.

What I experience in the family often hurts me. We never invite each other, we no longer meet each other, we have grown apart. I wanted to give them a life lesson and show that we don’t have to meet only at funerals.

They call themselves “influencers”

Baerten, who has around 165,000 followers on TikTok, has not yet released his video of the session, but footage of his arrival in a helicopter and tears of joy has been published.

Whether the stunt would have been carried out if social media did not exist, no one can know. The battle for followers and likes is fierce among these people who live off contentless content. They call themselves “influencers”.

Cry wolf

Those of us who intend to live for a while will see how many show up in version two of the “influencers” funeral when it comes. Maybe they will then put on their fine clothes?

@el.tiktokeur2 Tu nous a eu je te le jure j etais en pleure moi et apres j ai eu le choc poto on t aime beaucoup ❤️@Ragnar_le_fou @Leclercq Philippe #fyp #pourtoii #fypシ ♬ son original – Thomas faut

The shroud can wait

On Friday, a 76-year-old woman from Ecuador “rose from the dead” after the hospital had declared her dead. During the memorial service, the mourners heard knocking sounds from the coffin. The “deceased” had decided to save the shroud for a later occasion and was promptly dispatched back to the hospital:

Declared dead – woke up during the memorial service and knocked on the coffin