ShrinkWrapped writes on Decadence:
Anthropologists have pointed to evidence of the reverential treatment of the deceased as one of the first signs of humanity’s advance from the primitive to a nascent civilized state.
…
At one time it was universally accepted in the heirs to Judeo-Christian Civilization that each life was precious; for most, the idea that a Creator had endowed each of us with “certain inalienable rights” was a baseline; all else followed. Now, the sanctity of life and of the body has been eroded in this most post-modern of post-modern times. The body has become commodified, that is, it is no longer a holy vessel but merely an hedonic avatar.
Which is hardly surprising, considering how the bodies of living people have become commoditized in so many ways. But it’s still appalling and shameful to see that commodifying rewarded by an institution:
‘Devotional’ painting of artist’s dead mother shortlisted for award
Jonathan Brown reveals the three BP portrait prize finalists The so-called “devotional” painting portrays
The emaciated and lifeless body of 100-year-old Annie Mary Todd lies propped up in the refrigerated room of the undertaker’s funeral parlour.
Poor Annie Mary Todd was not spared indignity even after death. As ShrinkWrapped said,
The “artist” used her mother’s body for her own purposes, to help herself feel better. In our idiotically therapeutic age, such an excuse allows anything, no matter how foolish or misguided. This is the use of a body as a commodity.
How sharper than a serpent’s tooth it is
To have a thankless child, even in death.
