Aboriginals SueU.K. Museum Over Bones

A Tasmanian aboriginal group is suing Britain's Museum of Natural History to keep it from conducting tests on bones, teeth and skulls taken from the island, saying Monday that the experiments would desecrate the corpses.

The museum agreed last year to return the bones - mostly obtained during the 1940s - to Australia, but indicated it wanted first to run tests on them, as they represented some of the few remaining pieces of objective data about the region's original inhabitants.

The Tasmanian Aboriginal Center, which has been awarded custody of the remains, said any tests on the bones would defile the remains of victims of genocide.

The museum said would meet with the aboriginal group, but that it would continue to fight the suit, which goes to court on Thursday.

The museum wants to measure, photograph, X-ray and make casts of the bones, along with drilling and shaving off microscopic bits of material from the teeth and skulls to extract genetic material.


SOURCE:
Physorg.com

I've honestly gotten sick and tired of groups like this, science is
more important tha there silly religion or cultural beliefs.

That said, I do think they should get the bones back, but the
scientists should be able to conduct the tests.


Comments, Opinions?

Well the indiginous peoples of the world have more respect for the dead then people from the Western Cultures do which I dont think is silly at all.

errr
so they had this stuff for 60 years and the aboriginal group only complained when the scientists announced they would do tests on them
so they didn't mind when gt gt gt gt gt gt gt gt gt gt gt gt gt grandaddys head was on a shelf in a museum then
bizarre

Actually, Marduk, the problem was that they didn't have enough legal clout to rescue the remains of their ancestors. The treatment of Native Americans by the European immigrants was horrific... but was a cakewalk compared to what happened to the Australian Aborigines.

Indigenous people who were conqurered by others faced the agony of having their culture and their important artifacts stolen and the humiliation of seeing bodies of their own people stuffed for displays in circuses and sideshows and having their children stolen to be "reeducated."

Eh... I could go on about this for quite awhile because I've read up on it. It tends to make me very angry.

I support letting them have their people back and their artifacts. In cases where this has been done and where some of their people go on to become academics, THEY themselves go back to the communities and negotiate getting the material and having the studies done. The end result is the same, but in this case it's an initiative from them and not Yet Another Brutality forced upon the people by the outsiders who tried to smash their culture and enslave their people.

(Yes. I know. Typical anthropologist speech, here. Guilty as charged!)

I hate how doing something "in the name of science" justifies it. If anything, it's less justification then "in the name of God".

Originally posted by Byrd
Actually, Marduk, the problem was that they didn't have enough legal clout to rescue the remains of their ancestors. The treatment of Native Americans by the European immigrants was horrific... but was a cakewalk compared to what happened to the Australian Aborigines.

Indeed. At one point I believe it was legal and considered a sport to hunt Aboriginies in Australia, that's how low down the pecking order they were.

Having said that, the scientists should be able to do the test's, if only for the natives own sake and history. It could prove invaluable information in the future and it is hardly any different than conducting a post mortem which happens every hour of every day in almost every country to almost every dead person.

Originally posted by iori_komei
I've honestly gotten sick and tired of groups like this, science is
more important tha there silly religion or cultural beliefs.

That said, I do think they should get the bones back, but the
scientists should be able to conduct the tests.


Comments, Opinions?

Wow.

First, the British EXTERMINATE these people, and now they want to conduct "objective" tests on their remains? Sick.

These people should get these bones back WITHOUT any tests being conducted on them...well, by the British anyway.

Does anyone else see the irony of the people who exterminated the Tasmanians "studying" the remains of these exterminated people?

Oh, yeah, Byrd, can you point me in the direction on information about what happened to the aborigines? What I've seen so far makes it seem like you're stretching the truth, you know what I mean? Not that you're lying, of course, but that I can't find good info on this.

This is outragious and even more disrespectful. The First Nations should get these remains back ASAP. No tests no nothing condoned by the British or even in the name of science!! I highly agree with Byrd and truthseeka. I mean it's like a hundred years later someone wants to dig up your dead grandmother and do experiments. DISGUSTING. I mean if anyone knows of a protest, I'm in. This is outright appauling especially after what the twisted dark history of the east has done to its western native people. I mean something like this is asking for even more trouble with a very strong culturual respect for the dead. I mean its SIMPLE. Respect with your family, with your ancestors, life and death. To have a CLEAN SPIRIT. You can sure as well know I have this flagged!! (No disrespect intended to the OP or anyone with what they think is right)

/7A

[edit on 25/3/2007 by 7Ayreon]

Ahhh the aboriginal problem....
I'm in Australia so i'm familiar with it
But you can't say anything here about this issue without having rocks thrown at you.
That's how sensitive it is
So im just gonna shuttup.

They would never dare to do these experiments to the human remains of Jews or Roma or Scots or Manx Islanders," the center's lawyer, Michael Mansell, said in a statement. "They intend to mutilate our ancestors without our consent."

www.sci-tech-today.com...
wanna bet

Here's a site that summarizes a lot of what I've read:
www.cwo.com...

"Tactics for hunting down Tasmanians included riding out on horseback to shoot them, setting out steel traps to catch them, and putting out poison flour where they might find and eat it. Sheperds cut off the penis and testicles of aboriginal men, to watch the men run a few yards before dying. At a hill christened Mount Victory, settlers slaughtered 30 Tasmanians and threw their bodies over a cliff. One party of police killed 70 Tasmanians and dashed out the children's brains."

And then they sent the bodies and skeletons to the museums.
en.wikipedia.org...

These are the bodies that the people are asking to be returned. The bodies that they ask that no further abuse be given.

As with all genocides, there are deniers out there, but the recorded evidence tends to support the accounts given above.

Unless the Aboriginals give their consent (not going to happen, I'll bet), I don't think the tests should go through unless there is some really major kind of scientific breakthrough expected from the tests. The article doesn't really say much, but I'm guessing this is probably just a routine set of tests, where they will examine everything and then throw it into some dusty vault, never to see the light of day again. I really doubt the scientists will get anything from these remains that they don't know already, and so they should go back to the Aboriginals.