The autonomous insulting is a bug. It was supposed to be fixed in a patch last week but they had to pull the fix and wait another week or two. It's a high priority issue at least. 1,540 people have clicked Me Too on this one, and there are over 1000 comments on the bug thread :o
�https://answers.ea.com/t5/Bug-Reports/OPEN-Autonomous-Insulting-Patch-1-92-145/td-p/11932091
As for your dead, yes, they still exist in ghost form! Ghosts can be socialized with, although you can't necessarily call them up and ask them to go somewhere with you, you have to wait for them to contact you. If you spend time on the lot with their tombstone at night, you're more likely to see them then. Ghosts can even be added to your household (if you put their tombstone on your lot) and then you can play them.
Unplayed ghosts will be culled from the game eventually. If you want the ghost completely gone from your game sooner than that, you can visit the tombstone and choose "release to netherworld".
