Rhode Island Home > The Jewish Voice & Herald > Letters - 10.13.06
Letters to the Editor
Plastic corpses turn miracles into mockery
Body Worlds, now at the Museum of Science in Boston, consists of numerous real human bodies that have been plasticized There are similar exhibits in several places in North America and abroad. Body Worlds claims that the deceased donated their bodies. Premier Exhibitions, their major competitor, says that the bodies are from China, and that they were legally obtained.
China, however, is a dictatorship, not a nation of law, and Chinese assurances may be taken with a grain of salt. Did the deceased really give permission for the use of the bodies? These exhibits may well be violation of human rights.
But even if permission of the deceased was obtained, these exhibits still violate human dignity. As Jews we believe a human being is not only a wondrous machine of flesh but also that we have a soul. We should treat each other with respect, because we are created in the image of God. Flaying, plasticizing and using bodies to sell tickets to blockbuster exhibits is abhorrent. Jewish law mandates that bodies be treated with respect in honor of the living person they once gave a home to.
Ideas, especially well-marketed ones, have the incredible potential for good or evil. The exhibits claim to be about science, but being in a science museum doesn’t make it science. They say that the exhibits are educational, but so is everything in life. And there are better ways to educate; Hundreds of my relatives are buried in a pit in Belarus because someone thought it was a good idea.
These exhibits are wrong. Vote with your feet by not going. Or visit http://dignityinboston.googlepages.com/home and sign a petition. Stand up for human dignity.
Aaron Ginsburg
Sharon, Mass.
Aaron Ginsburg is the creator of the Dignityinboston website.
________________________________________
I wrote the following letter to the editor of theJewish Journal on Boston's North Shore.
September 15, 2006
Don't Exploit the Dead to Attract Crowds
I have been campaigning since the beginning of June to make the public
aware of the ethical issues regarding the Body Worlds 2 exhibit at the
Museum of Science. I have demonstrated several times in front of the
museum, and have also created a website,
http://dignityinboston.googlepages.com/home, that fully explains my
opposition. The public has a right to know why the exhibit is
"controversial."
Sadly, one of the prime audiences for this exhibit is school children.
Rest assured, the museum is not going out of its way to make students
or teachers aware of the ethical questions.
I believe it is wrong to exploit the bodies of the deceased to bring
in the crowds. These exhibits are extremely de-personalizing. Our
remains should be treated with dignity and respect to honor the living
soul that they once contained.
You will hear that the exhibit is educational. This is a smoke screen,
since the educating could just as well have been done without the use
of "real" human bodies. The news media, Hollywood, and even museums
teach us without the use of real objects all the time.
You will hear "but we have permission from the donors of the bodies."
In a nutshell, my answer is "So what?" It is very sad that renowned
institutions such as the Museum of Science feel it necessary to take
cover behind the dead.
Aaron Ginsburg
Sharon
______________________________________
Exhibit Offends Jewish Traditions
You ran a piece in the Sept. 8 issue of the Journal about Gunther von Hagens' Body Worlds 2 exhibit at Boston's Museum of Science. Studying cadavers may be important to medical students for the advancement of treating patients. But in my opinion, the Museum of Science's display of dead people to the public provides an entertainment frowned upon by traditional Judaism.
At Jewish funerals, the deceased is generally buried within 24 hours of death. This tradition of not delaying burial is derived from the book of Deuteronomy. "If a man will have committed a sin whose judgment is death and he shall be put to death and you shall hang him on a tree. His body shall not remain on the tree, rather you shall bury him that day, for a hanging person is an insult to G-d."
The medieval Rabbi Rashi explains the verse saying that the spectacle of the unburied corpse is an insult to G-d because a person is created "in the image of G-d."
Hersh Goldman
Swampscott
_________________________________________
I recently wrote the following letter to the Boston Herald after a column by the Working Stiff. Thanks to the Herald for cleaning up the language slightly. The parts in bold(approximately half of the letter) were printed in the paper on Friday August 25, 2006:
Dear Editor,
Actually, there have been protests in front of the Museum by me on several occasions and on one occasion someone actually joined me(“Where are the protesters at Body Worlds?” Aug. 16).
I believe that many of those who are uncomfortable with the exhibit vote with their feet by not going. There is also the enormous propaganda machine that the creator of the exhibit and the museums have spun around the subject to try to avoid dealing with the issues. The failure to admit that there is an issue of human dignity here strikes me as "See no evil, hear no evil."
The use of real bodies here may be fascinating, but is hardly necessary to make an educational point. Thus they are being used to attract attention and to bring in the crowds. There are very effective ways to educate with
out using real objects-and museums and textbooks and audio-visual media (movies, TV, Radio) do this well, as do successfully all the time, not to mention newspapers. The museum's claim to the contrary
make me wonder its management is in the wrong business.
No one can give you permission to do something wrong, and it is absurd for the museum to hide behind the permission of the deceased. It is the same as when Johnny explains that he hit Billy because Joey told
him to. Is this the level of morality at the Museum of Science?
This exhibit deprives the deceased of their humanity. The propaganda in the exhibit that tries to convince one that it the latest and greatest technique is abhorrent, and it is baloney.
I feel so strongly about this that I have created a website at http://dignityinboston.googlepages.com/home to explain what is wrong with this exhibition. Unlike the Museum I have also posted the comments of people
that do not agree with my point of view. Perhaps the Museum of Science could learn something about what education is about, and cut out responding as if this is an inconvenient public relations problem.
Why are the leaders of the Museum avoiding the issue of human dignity? Perhaps, in their heart of hearts, they actually agree that the exhibit is wrong.
Aaron Ginsburg
Sharon, MA
I have also posted the following comment at the boston.com site of The Boston Globe, which was also kind enough to publish a link to this site at "The Dead Body Show Protest That Won't Die."
Message #77.21 in response to #77.20
Posted by AaronGinsburg on Aug-22 11:49 PM
Ken,
I agree that the show is fascinating. I did not criticize the intent of the people who donated their bodies, but I did criticize the exhibit creator and the Museum of Science.
The bodies have been plasticized, so actually, your children were convinced, if they were, by plastic models. The bodies were used as templates, and the relation of the exhibits to real bodies is more theoretical than real.
There are obese people who can barely move, and smokers who can't breath all around us. These are very real, yet seem to have very little pervasive effect to make us stop gorging ourselves, and stop smoking.
Hundreds of my relatives were killed in Europe during WWII because someone named Adolph Hitler said it was the right thing to do. In this case, and many others, ideas, sometimes bad, and sometimes good, can be more persuasive than reality. They know this in Hollywood. They just don't know it at the Museum of Science.
Aaron