From Hamlet's famous "Alas, poor Yorick!" soliloquy on death and decay, to LIFE photographer Ralph Morse's still-shocking-after-all-these-years photo of a Japanese soldier's severed head atop a tank in WWII, the human skull remains perhaps the single most powerful emblem of human mortality.
Even Wiki is aware there is a societal push to push death as something to celebrate.
Throughout the centuries skulls symbolized either warnings of various threats or as reminder of the vanity of earthly pleasures in contrast with our own mortality. Nevertheless, the skull seems to be omnipresent in the first decade of the twenty-first century, appearing on jeweler, bags, clothing and in the shape of various decorative items. However, the increasing use of the skull as a visual symbol in popular culture reduces its original meaning as well as its traditional connotation.
https://web.archive.org/web/20100821074158/http://www.life.com/image/first/in-gallery/41722/skulls-everywhere
What does a skull symbolize to you if not death?
Even Wiki is aware there is a societal push to push death as something to celebrate.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_skull_symbolism