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Don't bury or cremate – soon you may compost your corpse

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Re: Don't bury or cremate – soon you may compost your corpse

#21

Post by heavenlyblue »

tr33house wrote: post #2

While composting has a lot of benefits, I would be very sad to attend a friend's burial if they were to be composted. Feels like a disrespectful way to let someone go. I'm also concerned about disease transmission. Cows' diseases may not necessarily affect us but humans' certainly will. The need to disinfect kinda defeats the purpose (pollution with chemicals) Hope about we just compost other things and let human bod…

>> Feels like a disrespectful way to let someone go.

What is a respectful way to let someone go?

Re: Don't bury or cremate – soon you may compost your corpse

#22

Post by wielebny »

karka91 wrote: post #16
masklinn wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> is still standard in Europe AFAIK that's not really true, europeans are not usually highly embalmed but they're mostly buried in coffins in vaults rented for years or decades (depending on the country). AFAIK https://i2.wp.com/www.talkdeath.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/... is a pretty typical-looking cemetery for western europe at least (some countries tend towards just the headstone and no vault, but as an other co…

hi, european here. Never heard about composting here. Those are not vaults. Those are just holes in ground with a cover on top. It's mostly decorative and there so that you don't walk on top of the coffin. We don't usually own these also. Usually city where you live has a cemetery that must provide a place for the coffin.

In Poland municipality provides a place in ground, but for at most 20 years. After that the place is recycled for another burial. You're free to buy it though to prolong that term and in my opinion it's quite common among the elder ones.

Re: Don't bury or cremate – soon you may compost your corpse

#24

Post by ARandomerDude »

ggm wrote: post #11

The introduction of cremation and the establishment of the first necropolis' in Paris (I think) and London was a huge social advance. Being able to talk openly and frankly about modes of interment, the recognition of a growing class of atheists, deists but not christians, a migrant population created many new states. London had a special railway line to the cemetary, and you got black-lined ticket to ride the coffin-…

> ending of routine embalming in many cultures

Interestingly, routine embalming is actually relatively new. While embalming itself has of course existed for millennia, it wasn't widely practiced (at least in the West) until the American Civil War.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embalming#History

Re: Don't bury or cremate – soon you may compost your corpse

#25

Post by ChrisRR »

tr33house wrote: post #2

While composting has a lot of benefits, I would be very sad to attend a friend's burial if they were to be composted. Feels like a disrespectful way to let someone go. I'm also concerned about disease transmission. Cows' diseases may not necessarily affect us but humans' certainly will. The need to disinfect kinda defeats the purpose (pollution with chemicals) Hope about we just compost other things and let human bod…

I don't find it disrespectful if that's what the person wanted.

I don't see why it's any worse than burying them and letting the worms eat them, or burning them, crushing them into dust and scattering that dust into the sea.

Re: Don't bury or cremate – soon you may compost your corpse

#27

Post by ChrisRR »

NeedMoreTea wrote: post #20
tr33house wrote: post #2

While composting has a lot of benefits, I would be very sad to attend a friend's burial if they were to be composted. Feels like a disrespectful way to let someone go. I'm also concerned about disease transmission. Cows' diseases may not necessarily affect us but humans' certainly will. The need to disinfect kinda defeats the purpose (pollution with chemicals) Hope about we just compost other things and let human bod…

What if your friend sees no value in their body after they're done with it and wants to be composted? Perhaps they found it the least impactful way to go. Wouldn't respecting their wishes seem more important?

Or if they do see value in their body as returning it to the earth and continuing the circle of life.

Re: Don't bury or cremate – soon you may compost your corpse

#28

Post by naravara »

tr33house wrote: post #2

While composting has a lot of benefits, I would be very sad to attend a friend's burial if they were to be composted. Feels like a disrespectful way to let someone go. I'm also concerned about disease transmission. Cows' diseases may not necessarily affect us but humans' certainly will. The need to disinfect kinda defeats the purpose (pollution with chemicals) Hope about we just compost other things and let human bod…

Some cultures, like Tibetans and Zoroastrians, practice “sky burial” where they literally leave the bodies out for carrion, sometimes even cutting it to pieces to make it easier for the vultures to get at.

So our ideas about what’s respectful are based on the expectations that are culturally coded into us. When new systems arise, we’ll come up with new ways to imbue then with gravity and respect.

Re: Don't bury or cremate – soon you may compost your corpse

#29

Post by myvoiceismypass »

tr33house wrote: post #2

While composting has a lot of benefits, I would be very sad to attend a friend's burial if they were to be composted. Feels like a disrespectful way to let someone go. I'm also concerned about disease transmission. Cows' diseases may not necessarily affect us but humans' certainly will. The need to disinfect kinda defeats the purpose (pollution with chemicals) Hope about we just compost other things and let human bod…

If said friend wanted to be composted after they expire, I don’t see anything disrespectful about it.

I don’t particularly enjoying thinking of my own demise, but I do know I would rather my death be as least impactful on the environment as possible, and I’d hope that friends & family will at least smile knowing that was my choice.

Re: Don't bury or cremate – soon you may compost your corpse

#30

Post by apo »

Given the dwindling space for burials:

https://www.forbes.com/sites/bisnow/2017/11/03/urban-cemeter...

and the energy/greenhouse gas emission costs of cremation, I can see this taking off.

There's a picture and caption not discussed in the text:

> Katrina Spade, upper left, the founder and CEO of Recompose, a company that hopes to use composting as an alternative to burying or cremating human remains, looks on Tuesday, May 21, 2019, as Washington Gov. Jay Inslee, centre, signs a bill into law at the Capitol in Olympia, Wash., that allows licensed facilities to offer "natural organic reduction," which turns a body into soil in a span of several weeks. (Ted S. Warren/AP Photo)

Was Spade involved in bringing that legislation about?

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