fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #2992 ]

⌈ Secret Post #2992 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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[Grand Theft Auto 5]

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[Zipang]

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[Ricky Gervais]

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[Tokyo Babylon/X1999]

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[Dexter]

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[The Mentalist]

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[The Truth - Terry Pratchett]

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[It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia]

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[Douglas Adams]

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[Black Books]

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[Lucky Star]

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[Edward Petherbridge as Lord Peter Wimsey]

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[Ga-In, Brown Eyed Girls]

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[Oz the Great and Powerful]

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[Colin Baker]

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[9 Hours, 9 Persons, 9 Doors]

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[Yatterman Night]

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[Johnny the Homicidal Maniac]

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[Blake's 7]

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[Game Grumps]

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[Alexis Denisof]

Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 07 pages, 170 secrets from Secret Submission Post #428.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

I've been reading archaeology books lately and it's beginning to bother me that I can't really figure out where one would (or should) draw the line that separates grave-robbing/tomb desecration from valuable and important scientific/historical study. Porque no los dos and all that and there's definitely plenty of times when you only have the former but is there ever really a case where it's all the latter? Tough to contemplate, especially since there are SO. MANY. cases where it's almost the only (or just simply the only) means we have of learning anything about the people who lived in X time and place.

I find the concept of grave-robbing/tomb desecration silly to be honest. Unless they have living relatives or someone with a claim to to the legacy, who CARES?

They're DEAD. It's not like the person who is dead is gonna care.

They were still a person, carefully buried by people who cared about them in a way that fit with their beliefs and culture. Most archaeologists also seem to struggle with this from time to time, it's not like it's completely out there to worry about disrespecting what they intended. I mean, there are plenty of people found dead in the modern day who don't have any family or anything, would that make it ok to just throw their bodies in a landfill and not care?

Speaking for myself -- I don't give a shit. And anyone who is dead is clearly incapable of caring. The reason to care, as far as I'm concerned, is not to cause emotional distress to loved ones or descendants.

And you should never be intentionally disrespectful/desecrate in a hateful manner.

But, say, you're running out of room to bury the dead and there's a bunch of unmarked graves that no one cares about? Go ahead and dig them up and put them in a much smaller communal grave. I don't think that's an issue at all.

I totally agree with this, all of it.

But I don't blame anyone who doesn't. Stuff like this makes us human!:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I07xDdFMdgw

Edited 2015-03-14 22:29 (UTC)

In Bio/Forensic Anthropology and Archaeology, we're (supposed to be) taught to handle human remains with care because they were once real, living humans and we are in the field of humans.

Well sure, there's no reason to be INTENTIONALLY disrespectful. But if you accidentally break some of the bones, there's no reason to get all up in arms about it. They're DEAD. If you didn't mean to do it, took all feasible precautions, and something still went wrong, then no biggie as far as I'm concerned.

...some religions believe bodies must be buried whole (i.e. no cremation/autopsies/etc) and it's very important the bones not be disturbed.

Plus, the terrible things that always happened to Indiana Jones.

Yeah, but once those family members are dead, who cares?

The person who is dead won't care. (They're dead). And if all of the loved ones are gone then no one's feelings will be hurt. No one will be left to be upset. So if there's no one left who will care, it's a non-issue.

So go to town.

0/10 you blew it by responding to every reply. You on Flat View or smth?

What's Flat View? And why wouldn't I respond to every reply?

I legitimately don't think that digging up the graves of people with no loved ones/descendants is an issue. Unless it's to be intentionally disrespectful -- such as if it was done on the basis of ethnic/racial hatred. Because then the members of that ethnic/racial group would be upset.

But digging up the graves of people long gone, with no living loved ones, and with no descendants or community to get upset by it is a completely moral non-issue to me.

NGL this is kind of a silly troll accusation. That's like someone who refused to debate with me because I had 10 years on my Steam account and that meant I was a better troll than him. It's like, what?

ayrt

Eh, something about it just pinged my trolldar. Think it was the repetitive insistence on standing their ground, in the replies. I could be wrong. *shrug*

idk some people just firmly believe in stuff and the opinion in question isn't THAT out-there IMO. Unlike, say, that person who kept bringing up how much they hated waitresses.

DA

Is it so hard to believe someone could hold that viewpoint, and not be trolling? I mean, personally I agree with them. Once someone is dead, that's it, and even if you decide to dig them up and put them in a museum, they're not going to suffer from it.

You are saying their beliefs don't matter whatsoever. Which is, as a number of those religions and cultural strictures are still practiced to this day, essentially saying that the beliefs of the thousands of still-living people who practice them don't matter. That's a lot of feelings to hurt, and a lot of people who will care. Anything with cultural or religious implications has a much, much wider impact than just the people immediately affected by it.

As my archaeology professor explained it, from how he was trained but not all of archaeology acts this way, is that when archaeologists dig, they have to have an expressed research question in mind and do extensive research before they dig, and they only dig so much, in case future science can anaylze the site with better technology and less disturbance. He told us that they tend to recover the site with the dirt that's been displaced. Also, unless the sites are tombs/grave sites/temples/contain human remains/other sacred places, most of what archaeologists find are the trash people left behind at a sudden, or in a hurry, and a lot can still be learned.

But, he did say that back in the day, archaeology was about more about "collecting cool shit", and THAT I would equate to grave robbing. He also told a story about how he wanted to dig out on a reservation here in California, and went before the tribe council to reassure them that he wasn't studying grave mounds, he knew exactly what they looked like and would stay away from them.

So, basically, I'd like to say that archaeology has come a long way with ethics, but there's still something to be unsure of.

I don't think there's ever case where it's entirely valuable and important scientific/historical study. I think, for archaeological study, you're always going to have an element that conflicts with the ideal of respect for the original culture. It's difficult to have a clinical dispassionate academic discipline that's trying to analyze a specific culture, and merge that with a total respect for discrete cultures (and I would point out that IMO this is also a problem that for instance anthropology deals with).

But the question is how you balance that against the need for knowledge and I would argue that in general the importance of knowledge wins out.

[ SECRET POST #2992 ]

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