Vile Bodies?

[swl]

Incidentally, if anyone was ever interested in shrinking heads (as one does), I wrote this handy guide -

www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/brunel/A25172282

;D

[trubble]

Jan 23, 2009 14:13:59 GMT rjpageuk said:

Jan 23, 2009 14:08:16 GMT trubble said:

I've decided.

If I get the opportunity to visit Dr Hagens' exhibition I will consider doing so.

This one cannot prove it is ethical and is not the only one or even the first of its kind.

This article sums up the difference, ie consent.

I didnt realise there were two competing shows, and can understand moral objection based on lack of consent.

Me neither!

But I may have to change my mind on this. Mini-T has arrived home from school enthralled with the idea of visiting the exhibition after dissecting a pig's heart in Biology class and loving it.

[trubble]

Jan 23, 2009 16:19:51 GMT rjpageuk said:

Jan 23, 2009 15:39:42 GMT @riotgrrl said:

So it must be time.

So how long does someone have to be dead for before it's ok for us to look at their bodies?

I dont think it is anything to do with time, it is about consent.

There is no way any mechanism can be put in place to allow either the person mummified or the immediate family to offer their consent whereas now there is.

If someone does not wish for their body to be used in this way (or short of them specifying, their family doesnt want it to be) then it doesnt matter how much time passes it shouldnt be as long as this knowledge is passed along with it somehow.

But we can guestimate that given the intense fuss surrounding Egyptian corpses and the deep russian-doll cases and tombs they were found in, that the body was not something to be displayed. We can guestimate a position of non-consent.

[everso]

Jan 23, 2009 11:26:45 GMT trubble said:

Lots of good points to consider. Hmm.


I was tempted to watch that programme but then decided I couldn't handle the heavy vibe so I'm very grateful to hear its content here. Feel free to add more details!

Anyway . . what struck me most was that the poor dead, blackened baby being hoisted about above the man's head was not being afforded any dignity in death. I didn't find it repulsive or sickening, but I don't believe that I need to see dead babies to be able to understand that babies are dead in quite horrific ways.

I am not a religious person, and to me a corpse is just a corpse. As I've said before, in my will I have left my body to medical science as I have no interest in it post-mortem.

But nonetheless, I still feel that using the dead, manipulating and passing round their bodies for political gain, is profoundly wrong.

Having not seen it, perhaps I can't comment but..

The baby was not afforded any dignity in death by being killed in the first place, the showing of the stark reality might be undignified but the filming of it is offering the only dignity possible - that such an horrific death of a baby should not go unrecorded.

? Maybe.. ?





I don't think anyone needs to be religious to feel the need for respect for the dead, I think it's a fairly primal urge. Elephants pay respect to their dead. They don't just leave the body alone after death, they stay with it to 'protect' it for a decent time before they move on. Of course, I am presuming elephants aren't religious and have nothing to base that presumption on.

using the dead, manipulating and passing round their bodies for political gain, is profoundly wrong.

If it's not just reality of war, if it's political manipulation then Yes. It really is. I can't think of any mitigating circumstances.


So to do it for mere financial profit has to be worse.

Yet, profitable or not, it would still be educational to view these bodies in the exhibition and I can't fathom how any group could finance this without using the market. Perhaps making it profitable is the only way to stage it.

I am putting myself off the idea of going as I type. I can't imagine the educational value would be more than the profitable value and the lack of consent is perhaps the most disgusting part of the exhibition.

It's not like the RSC using a real human skull to play Yorick. That guy not only consented but willed them to use it. The RSC had to stop using it because it was attracting the wrong type of audience, gapers who went just see a real skull used; what with that and the Dr Who fans, any Hamlet fan in the audience would be a rare thing, not to mention disheartened.

I suppose if this were an exhibition of models of humans I wouldn't even have thought of going. I don't want to walk around this bodies exhibition with a crowd of Barnum and Bailey fans.

Of course, I am presuming elephants aren't religious and have nothing to base that presumption on.

I'm tempted to mention Jumbo and his devotion to his god.

Sorry that was a bit light-hearted and this is a serious subject. I thought Riot's post was very good. Like her, I'm not religious (No? Really?) but I feel a body should be treated decently after death. Holding a dead baby in the air for all the world to gawk at, with all the histrionics that Arabs revel in, is IMO horrible.

BTW my son saw this exhibition in, I think, Germany. He loved it, weirdo that he is.

[trubble]

Jan 24, 2009 15:31:43 GMT everso said:

Of course, I am presuming elephants aren't religious and have nothing to base that presumption on.

I'm tempted to mention Jumbo and his devotion to his god.

I stand corrected!


Did your son see the Dr Von Hagens one though? Or the Chinese one? There seems to ethical concerns about one but not the other. You see I think I'd like to go really and I didn't realise there were 2 different ones but now that i do, I doubt both will attempt the Irish market.

I have been to circuses that had animals performing and I'm against that idea IF the animals might be unhappy. This Italian one I went to had several elephants that stood on balls and their hind legs, all stuff straight out of Dumbo. It was fab to be honest but I felt really really really guilty about enjoying it.

[everso]

Jan 24, 2009 16:14:55 GMT trubble said:

Jan 24, 2009 15:31:43 GMT everso said:

Of course, I am presuming elephants aren't religious and have nothing to base that presumption on.

I'm tempted to mention Jumbo and his devotion to his god.

I stand corrected!


Did your son see the Dr Von Hagens one though? Or the Chinese one? There seems to ethical concerns about one but not the other. You see I think I'd like to go really and I didn't realise there were 2 different ones but now that i do, I doubt both will attempt the Irish market.

I have been to circuses that had animals performing and I'm against that idea IF the animals might be unhappy. This Italian one I went to had several elephants that stood on balls and their hind legs, all stuff straight out of Dumbo. It was fab to be honest but I felt really really really guilty about enjoying it.

Ah, now you come to mention it, I believe it was the Von Hagens one. In any case it was a few years ago. My son is the sort of person that likes the unusual and it was right up his street.

I'm not keen on zoos, let alone circuses.

[rjpageuk]

Jan 23, 2009 18:34:16 GMT trubble said:

But we can guestimate that given the intense fuss surrounding Egyptian corpses and the deep russian-doll cases and tombs they were found in, that the body was not something to be displayed. We can guestimate a position of non-consent.

I guess so, but there is no one around for it to affect so I suppose that makes it feel ok.

[everso]

For all that I've said above, I just thought: Mr. E. and I went to have a look at the mummies in the British Museum a while back. Fascinating, but thinking about it, it's not much different really. We were still gawking at poor dead people who never gave their permission to be disinterred, carried across the sea and put on display in a museum.

Naughty eversos.