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This company sells real human skulls. It claims all of its skulls are ethically sourced. How do you ethically source a human skull for sale to a random buyer? (www.skullsunlimited.com)

submitted 2 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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No, I don't want to buy one. This came out of a discussion about my brother, who is so much weirder than me if you can believe it, who owns a real human skull.

I don't know how he got it. I don't know where he got it from, maybe this company, more importantly, I don't know why he would want such a thing. He is not a scientist, he works in IT. He did get an MFA in theater, wanted to be a professional theater director and loves Shakespeare, I can't believe the reason was because he wanted Hamlet to be super authentic.

We're not all that close, so it really hasn't come up in conversation. I only know about it because he posted elsewhere a while back that he was on a Zoom meeting at work and he showed it off and couldn't understand why everyone stopped laughing and got silent. So obviously he thinks it's cool to own it.

It used to be a person. I'm an atheist and I don't believe in an afterlife, but that's just basic disrespect.

Anyway... how can you ethically source a skull and then sell it on the open market?

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[–] [email protected] 95 points 2 months ago (14 children)

I used to teach anatomy 20+ years ago. Sadly many of the skulls are sourced from the poorest people in impoverished countries. Companies pay a death benefit to the families or to the individual and then "harvest" the skull after death. They used to be priced based on the number of teeth and the presence of mandibular/maxillary degeneration. The highest priced skulls would come from donors and would have all their teeth.

Here's a link to the UCLA scandal if you want to get a feeling for how scummy the entire industry is

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 months ago (3 children)

Okay... But... Outside of conflicts of interest, wouldn't those families be worse off without this unconventional life insurance policy?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Are they any better off with it? I don't the current rates but it used to be around a few pounds of rice. It's desperation rates for desperate people.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 months ago (1 children)

If they aren't better off, why wouldn't they just say no?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 months ago

Dude. Seriously?

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