Hmmm, well I have mixed opinions about this one. I don't think the guy is anywhere near on the level of stealing from (living) kids with cancer though.
I have very mixed opinions on grave robbing, since the dead don't need what is buried with them anymore. I see no real moral issues with scavenging from ruins during a zombie apocolypse, and similar things. Likewise I've also spoken in defense of the old school archaologists and "tomb raiders" back in the 1800s and such. Guys who tracked down the tombs of ancient kings, and looted all the stuff. Some of it going to museums, some of it going to private collections. I remember reading a contreversy years ago about how there were families in Britan who actually owned mummies as decorations (as in the bodies along with the sarcophigi) and the Egyptian authorities wanted them back, and there was an ongoing fight over it and other things.
The issue with Egyptian, Persian, etc... tombs being that when a lot of that stuff was going on the people there, and even the goverments supported it due to the money those expeditions were bringing into the country. The goverments themselves more or less took a cut from the overall proceeds. Years later these guys decided to start screaming "Noes, we want our cultural artifacts back" even though they basically sold them. I find it distressing how seriously these guys have been taken. The mummies apparently being on the high end of things, and admittedly the idea of keeping a dead king's body in your house for a conversation piece is kind of disturbing, but at the same time I don't think the guys who sold it and thought they were getting a good deal at the time have much right to complain.
I'm going of on a massive tangent here, but the bottom line is that while it makes me somewhat irreverant, on the overall scheme of things I don't consider grave robbing that big a deal. I mean, especially nowadays why are you burying the dead with the valuables that attract the thieves to begin with? Isn't that kind of a waste.
Robbing this funeral was tasteless, and the guy was probably after drug money (the implication being that he's scum), but at the same time burying the guy with a video game console like that is sort of strange and wasteful.
This was bad given how it went down, but it's not high up on my personal list of heinous crimes.
Some day my attitude on this might change, but I've put some thought into it over the years, and I really don't think one can "steal from the dead" so to speak. I'm typically far more upset about the vandalism of graves, or disrespecting the remains themselves, than the taking of items that would otherwise just sit there, or be left to rot in of itself.
I know many will disagree with me, but to my way of thinking this was a pretty petty thing. Since no grave was actually dug up, and they were planning on burying the game system to begin with, if I was in the area I'd rather have the police focus on other things, since this crime to me seems like it should be pretty low on the priority list.
I have very mixed opinions on grave robbing, since the dead don't need what is buried with them anymore. I see no real moral issues with scavenging from ruins during a zombie apocolypse, and similar things. Likewise I've also spoken in defense of the old school archaologists and "tomb raiders" back in the 1800s and such. Guys who tracked down the tombs of ancient kings, and looted all the stuff. Some of it going to museums, some of it going to private collections. I remember reading a contreversy years ago about how there were families in Britan who actually owned mummies as decorations (as in the bodies along with the sarcophigi) and the Egyptian authorities wanted them back, and there was an ongoing fight over it and other things.
The issue with Egyptian, Persian, etc... tombs being that when a lot of that stuff was going on the people there, and even the goverments supported it due to the money those expeditions were bringing into the country. The goverments themselves more or less took a cut from the overall proceeds. Years later these guys decided to start screaming "Noes, we want our cultural artifacts back" even though they basically sold them. I find it distressing how seriously these guys have been taken. The mummies apparently being on the high end of things, and admittedly the idea of keeping a dead king's body in your house for a conversation piece is kind of disturbing, but at the same time I don't think the guys who sold it and thought they were getting a good deal at the time have much right to complain.
I'm going of on a massive tangent here, but the bottom line is that while it makes me somewhat irreverant, on the overall scheme of things I don't consider grave robbing that big a deal. I mean, especially nowadays why are you burying the dead with the valuables that attract the thieves to begin with? Isn't that kind of a waste.
Robbing this funeral was tasteless, and the guy was probably after drug money (the implication being that he's scum), but at the same time burying the guy with a video game console like that is sort of strange and wasteful.
This was bad given how it went down, but it's not high up on my personal list of heinous crimes.
Some day my attitude on this might change, but I've put some thought into it over the years, and I really don't think one can "steal from the dead" so to speak. I'm typically far more upset about the vandalism of graves, or disrespecting the remains themselves, than the taking of items that would otherwise just sit there, or be left to rot in of itself.
I know many will disagree with me, but to my way of thinking this was a pretty petty thing. Since no grave was actually dug up, and they were planning on burying the game system to begin with, if I was in the area I'd rather have the police focus on other things, since this crime to me seems like it should be pretty low on the priority list.
