blog 17

Another one of my articles is called “Body Snatching & Grave Robbing: Bodies for Science”. It is an excerpt written by Megan J. Highet in the text, History & Anthropology. The main argument in this essay is whether or not nineteenth-century anthropologists were upholding ethical responsibilities when they extracted Native American corpses from their grave for dissection. It really grinds down to the exploitation of marginalized members of society. The bodies were simply extracted as resources (without permission) and then dissected and studied. This is grave-robbing in its most literal sense. Ethical responsibilities for the deceased and their families were not at all acknowledged and after the scientists were done with the bodies they would dispose of them however was most convenient, not put them back in the ground where they found them. There are two sides to this dilemma. Firstly, body snatching is wrong and cruel and not at all sensitive to those families or people. On the other hand, how many helpful and potentially life-saving discoveries have scientists discovered by dissecting/studying bodies? I am not justifying their actions at all, yet it is a valid argument that no progress in medicine and operation could ever be made without exploration of the human body. Today, people are much more likely to donate their bodies to science once they are dead. Back then, it was rarely heard of. How else would they get their bodies? Granted, they did it to the Native Americans because they didn’t really care what they thought as they were considered below the other races. So when does progressive science cross the line? Consider what we have today before concocting an answer.