Ask Lemmy

27049 readers

1742 users here now

A Fediverse community for open-ended, thought provoking questions

Please don't post about US Politics. If you need to do this, try [email protected]

Rules: (interactive)

1) Be nice and; have fun

Doxxing, trolling, sealioning, racism, and toxicity are not welcomed in AskLemmy. Remember what your mother said: if you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all. In addition, the site-wide Lemmy.world terms of service also apply here. Please familiarize yourself with them

2) All posts must end with a '?'

This is sort of like Jeopardy. Please phrase all post titles in the form of a proper question ending with ?

3) No spam

Please do not flood the community with nonsense. Actual suspected spammers will be banned on site. No astroturfing.

4) NSFW is okay, within reason

Just remember to tag posts with either a content warning or a [NSFW] tag. Overtly sexual posts are not allowed, please direct them to either [email protected] or [email protected]. NSFW comments should be restricted to posts tagged [NSFW].

5) This is not a support community.

It is not a place for 'how do I?', type questions. If you have any questions regarding the site itself or would like to report a community, please direct them to Lemmy.world Support or email [email protected]. For other questions check our partnered communities list, or use the search function.

Reminder: The terms of service apply here too.

Partnered Communities:

Logo design credit goes to: tubbadu

founded 1 year ago

MODERATORS

282

This company sells real human skulls. It claims all of its skulls are ethically sourced. How do you ethically source a human skull for sale to a random buyer? (www.skullsunlimited.com)

submitted 2 months ago by FlyingSquid to c/asklemmy

167 comments fedilink hide all child comments

No, I don't want to buy one. This came out of a discussion about my brother, who is so much weirder than me if you can believe it, who owns a real human skull.

I don't know how he got it. I don't know where he got it from, maybe this company, more importantly, I don't know why he would want such a thing. He is not a scientist, he works in IT. He did get an MFA in theater, wanted to be a professional theater director and loves Shakespeare, I can't believe the reason was because he wanted Hamlet to be super authentic.

We're not all that close, so it really hasn't come up in conversation. I only know about it because he posted elsewhere a while back that he was on a Zoom meeting at work and he showed it off and couldn't understand why everyone stopped laughing and got silent. So obviously he thinks it's cool to own it.

It used to be a person. I'm an atheist and I don't believe in an afterlife, but that's just basic disrespect.

Anyway... how can you ethically source a skull and then sell it on the open market?

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[–] voracitude 1 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (1 children)

I think selling such skulls would be highly unethical.

Would you? Why? FWIW I agree that as long as there's a living person who cares about the fate of the bones then selling them would be unethical, I'm just curious as to your specific reasons - like, what is the hypothetical you're imagining, behind this statement? Are you contending it would be unethical even if nobody living cares, just due to the provenance? I can see why you would object if the former user of the anatomy believed in the sanctity of remains, for example.

I'm not sure I'd agree, but I'm not sure I'd disagree either. I'd need to think on it more. Right now, I'm leaning towards respecting the wishes of the dead as far as their remains go, because the universe is big and cruel and the only kindnesses are those we make for each other, so why shouldn't that extend as far as we do?

[–] FlyingSquid 1 points 2 months ago

Because I think there are living people who care about the fate of the bones. You don't think there are lots of people who would object to such things? There are.

This isn't theoretical. People are criticizing museums for having the bones of slaves.

https://www.pbssocal.org/shows/democracy-now/clip/bone-rooms-how-elite-schools-and-museums-amassed-black-and-native-human-remains-without-consent