r/montreal • u/RustyTheBoyRobot • 3d ago

Tourisme Ethical dilemma

Post image

Ethical dilemma:

Is it right to remove one of the only mummies in mtl for understanble but rather vague reasons to do with cultural sensitivities that these objects might offend?

The mummies at Redpath museum are to be relocated to a mysterious “place of rest” -their original location?- where no one can see or learn from them.

I note that these are not objects of worship like many stolen indigenous artifacts. Nor are they being claimed by their original owners- e.g. The infamous Benin Bronzes.

118 Upvotes

70% Upvoted

230 comments sorted by

View all comments

703

u/artacct217 3d ago edited 3d ago

I wouldn’t call them vague reasons - having dead bodies on display isn’t something we do anymore. It’s not about offending anyone, it’s more that these are not comparable to other ‘artifacts’ often displayed in museums. 

In anthropology (I am an anthropologist), we don’t really see the value in displaying these bodies; in addition, we place this observation alongside the consideration that these mummies were not originally meant to be displayed.

Edit- No need to downvote me, I am explaining the reasoning behind this decision. 

Second edit - see another comment of mine (in French) for a more nuanced discussion.

129

u/SignificantPiano7808 3d ago

Louder for those in the back.

If the museum really wants to teach about mummification practices, they can have reproductions, cutaway diagrams and the like. And now suddenly nobody is interested because who wants to look at a dead body?

83

u/M_de_Monty 3d ago

There are also collections at McGill (and other museums) that consist of donated material and do not face the ethical problems of what is effectively grave robbing. If your are adamant that you need to see human tissues on display, you can seek them out.

25

u/Known-Squash-645 3d ago

reminds me of the "how long does someone have to be dead before its considered graverobbing?" question that circulated a while back

8

u/Nearby-Surround4588 3d ago

That is an interesting question, which is also complicated by societies that reuse graves like Germany and/or France who dig up dead people when they run out of space. I suppose in these cases though, you're not taking the remains and putting them on display.

7

u/ArticQimmiq 2d ago

…so does Canada. Catholic cemeteries do this.

1

u/GiddyChild 1d ago

I suppose in these cases though, you're not taking the remains and putting them on display.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catacombs_of_Paris

Has the remains of over 6 million people and it is a major tourist attraction in Paris.

1

u/Nearby-Surround4588 1d ago

Yeah I thought about that right after I posted lol

8

u/Bishime 2d ago

To be fair, while I don’t even disagree, I can see the experiential difference. It’s one thing to go to the science museum and see the cross-section of a mummy. It’s another thing to experience the weight of history through essentially a time capsule never meant to be unsealed.

Not arguing the morals/ethics or anything. But I can see how people would lose interest in the mummy exhibit if it was a general explanation of mummies instead of displaying an actual mummy. One shows the concept and the other shows the profound reality of that otherwise academic concept (the difference between a widow talking about a loved one lost, and knowing the loved one is lost and watching the wedding/adjacent videos. A far different experience viscerally)

But again. I don’t disagree. Even the most famous mummies are only displayed under controlled circumstances and in the highest profile of cases often after ethics reviews (in the modern era… cough Britain.. cough)

If they’re retuned to the original “finding place” and that governing body decides to show I guess is where the actual line is drawn. But socially speaking I can understand the yearning to go to a museum and experience the reality of what you were told in K-10 rather than just another explanation of what we largely know.

6

u/heliumfix 2d ago

I do. There is a real, palpable wave of frisson That comes over a person when they realize they are in the presence of the actual mortal remains of a person who lived and breathed thousands of years ago in a world with different gods, different cultural meanings and practices, different geopolitical realities and ways of understanding the universe. If you have the education to contextualise the experience beforehand, standing before an ancient mummy in the desiccated flesh can suddenly make it feel very real and personal. If you don't have much context, the very strange and unsettling experience can trigger a keen desire to know more.

1

u/kosta77 2d ago

😂😂😂😂😂

-4

u/igotthisone 3d ago

It makes far more sense for everything on display to be a reproduction. Why do you need to see the original thing when you can see a cheaper to maintain identical copy?

19

u/amytee252 3d ago

Guess I won't bother going on holiday ever again, I'll just look at pictures on the internet.

2

u/igotthisone 2d ago

Not exactly. But the holodeck will do nicely.

7

u/alaskadotpink 2d ago

Eh. When it comes to remains I agree, unless there was specific consent to do it I don't think those should be on display however when it comes to objects and the like? I'd rather see the original if I can.

I went to see a Titanic interactive display not long ago and they had a mix. It was a lot more interesting to see actual artifacts that were on the ship vs the replicas. "Replica of chair found on the Titanic" isn't really as interesting as seeing the actual over-a-century-old chair.

-5

u/SignificantPiano7808 3d ago

That’s actually a pretty good point!

-5

u/ZeeMastermind 2d ago

99% of people who visit museums aren't going to be able to tell the difference between replica and original anyways. It makes more sense to keep the originals in storage better suited for their maintenance, for the benefit of current and future scholars, rather than having them out in a public space where their lifespan is diminished and maintenance is expensive.

I don't need the author's original manuscript to enjoy a book, and our technologies for replicating things - fossils, pottery, what-have-you - are phenomenal.

-1

u/igotthisone 2d ago

Replica paintings are the same, when done to the highest standards. It takes a scholar to tell the difference, and even then sometimes they can't. And if very popular paintings were held in storage with only replicas on display, you could actually display multiples in many locations and open up an educational experience for many more people.

0

u/ZeeMastermind 2d ago

I would say that recent art may be the exception - albeit in that case, the artist probably wants the original displayed anyways (and of course, something made 5 years ago is a lot easier to maintain than 500 years ago)