Serious Enquiries Only, Please: Ethical Issues Raised by the Online Human Remains Trade

Abstract

There is a thriving private commercial trade in anatomical, ethnographic and archaeological human remains that make ready use of new social media platforms such as Instagram, Facebook, Etsy, and until recently, eBay. This practice has deep Colonial-era roots, though the ongoing proliferation of e-commerce and social media has only expanded the reach and influence of collectors and dealers and their sense of community cohesion. In this chapter, we discuss a variety of ethical issues underlying this trade that speak to what the community values, how they operate, interrelate and interact with the scientific community. We ultimately seek to argue that participants in the trade engage with or ignore these complicating factors at their own risk, despite the ownership of human remains being legal in many jurisdictions once one's purchase has arrived.

Profiting from public dissection: A new era of unethical practices

“…With the increasingly rapid advances in technology such as the internet and social media, the deceased are entering a new arena in the public sphere. Not only are images and videos of the deceased displayed on social media sites, 50 but human bones are also being traded online among private collectors 51 . The public exposure to human remains which is an area fraught with ethical issues is concerning as it is divorced from the context of anatomical ethics, with the provenance and informed consent of the donor often not known, thus reducing the body to a mere commodity.…”

“…Not only are images and videos of the deceased displayed on social media sites, 50 but human bones are also being traded online among private collectors. 51 The public exposure to human remains which is an area fraught with ethical issues is concerning as it is divorced from the context of anatomical ethics, with the provenance and informed consent of the donor often not known, thus reducing the body to a mere commodity. In many institutions around the globe, health sciences students receive lectures on ethics and the respectful treatment of human remains before being allowed to dissect the human body.…”

To Replicate, or Not to Replicate? The Creation, Use, and Dissemination of 3D Models of Human Remains: A Case Study from Portugal

“…Commercialization of human remains is an ongoing practice, which has expanded considerably via social media [68][69][70][71][72][73]. Would commercializing 3D models of human bones help curb the sale of human remains?…”

The osteology and provenance of a portion of the Parkinson collection, Gazelle Peninsula, New Britain, c. 1897

“…There exists today a multifaceted, complex, human remains collecting community operating across several social media and e‐commerce platforms, despite efforts to control trafficking (Halling & Seidemann, 2016; Huffer et al, 2019, 2021; Huffer & Chappell, 2014; Huffer & Charlton, 2020; Huffer & Graham, 2017, 2018; Huxley & Finnegan, 2004; Kim, 2012; Seidemann, 2017; Vergano, 2016). Human remains allegedly derived from numerous Melanesian, Micronesian, and Polynesian cultures are currently less “famous” among today's collectors when compared with allegedly authentic examples from Southeast Asia, New Guinea, South America, or elsewhere.…”

“…There exists today a multifaceted, complex, human remains collecting community operating across several social media and e-commerce platforms, despite efforts to control trafficking (Halling & Seidemann, 2016;Huffer et al, 2019Huffer et al, , 2021Huffer & Chappell, 2014;Huffer & Charlton, 2020;Huffer & Graham, 2017, 2018Huxley & Finnegan, 2004;Kim, 2012;Seidemann, 2017;Vergano, 2016).…”