4 ms·

> Hand donations are rare, because few families are willing to donate limbs fearing disfiguration of the body even though a prosthetic limb is fitted to the don

by mkl 7y ago

> Hand donations are rare, because few families are willing to donate limbs fearing disfiguration of the body even though a prosthetic limb is fitted to the donor’s body. Can someone explain this? Is it an Indian thing? If I died and donated my hands, I would be proud for them to be missing in the casket. I can only see because two people donated their corneas.

staticautomatic 7y ago
Lots of cultures have strongly-held mystical beliefs about dead bodies, going back thousands of years. There are plenty of famous examples, even, like the fights over Patroclus and Hector's dead bodies in the Iliad.
vsskanth 7y ago
There is a stigma because some people believe your body needs to be whole during your last rites (Even though you cremate the body in the end if you're Hindu). This is pure superstition. This is gradually changing with increasing education and awareness among people, making organ donations socially acceptable and something to be proud of.
- pmarreck 7y ago
  > some people believe your body needs to be whole during your last rites (Even though you cremate the body in the end if you're Hindu). This is pure superstition It's not just superstition, it's easily defeated with reason: If this were true, then every innocent person who has to suffer an amputation due to an accident would be unjustly disadvantaged. It's similar to people who argue against gay marriage since kids aren't produced: This implies every heterosexual marriage without children is worthless
  - thaumasiotes 7y ago
    > it's easily defeated with reason: If this were true, then every innocent person who has to suffer an amputation due to an accident would be unjustly disadvantaged How's that a defeat? Terrible things happen unjustly all the time. Every innocent person who has to suffer an amputation due to an accident already is unjustly disadvantaged; it's not like this is an impossible state of affairs. (Just ask them whether they'd prefer to have their appendages back!)
  - adrianN 7y ago
    Unless you believe there are no accidents.
- spaceandshit 7y ago
  Some Hindus bury, fyi
  - newyankee 7y ago
    I know this is mentioned a lot but this is very rare, i would say < 5 % (anecdotal)
    - fractalb 7y ago
      Buried if unmarried, cremated otherwise. I don't know if it's only our tradition.
      - sn41 7y ago
        nope... I know that some castes like Lingayats in Karnataka and Pisharody in Kerala bury all their dead. Probably there maybe more such castes in other parts of India.
        selimthegrim 7y ago
        Bhils in Sindh
- keiferski 7y ago
  Everything that you don’t agree with or don’t understand isn’t ‘pure superstition.’
- hinkley 7y ago
  Objectively, the funeral is really about the survivors and not the deceased. It’s sometime dressed up in religion so thoroughly that it’s hard to see, but it’s still there. If your perspective is that your loved one is “still with us” more concretely when some other person gets the gift of life from your tragedy, then that may be of great comfort. If not, then it might be more anxiety in an already very difficult situation. Look what they did to my boy. The relative frequency of “nobody went to his funeral” vs “I missed my mother’s funeral and I’m a terrible person” story arcs in movies and tv seems to follow this pattern. Human interest stories about parents who still visit the recipient who got their motorcycle-riding son’s heart pop up at least once a year (please don’t ride motorcycles, kids).
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
sriram_malhar 7y ago
I'd wager it is more than just an indian thing. Most cultures have the body be viewable by people for last rites before they are interred or cremated. But if any part or the whole body is going to be donated, the body has to be worked on right away or kept in the morgue, which is incompatible with a public viewing. I speak from recent personal experience. My father (Indian/Hindu) passed away a few months ago. He had registered with a medical college "to use his body for science". He was a devout Hindu, which made this extremely unusual. And being an atheist and dispassionate about death myself, I was most chuffed and proud of him. When he passed away in the hospital, the med school sent their ambulance and transferred him to the school's morgue. That is when I was struck by how much the lack of last rites mean to people. Many friends and relatives were left feeling adrift, that they didn't have time to say bye. It was too sudden, even for me. You know there is no life in that body, but the thought of him as a cadaver, with med students using him to learn suturing or surgeries or whatever is deeply unsettling. We did have a memorial service later on which was cathartic for all, but it is not at all common in India. For those of you who are reading this and are from Bangalore, I cannot recommend MS Ramaiah hospital highly enough. They showed such kindness and respect to us and to my father that I never felt my father was being "used". I recommend considering body donation for yourself and urging others to consider it. Registered donors get free medical checkups for life! https://www.msrmc.ac.in/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/Donor_Program.pdf https://www.msrmc.ac.in/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/Donor_Pro...

by mkl 7y ago

staticautomatic 7y ago

Lots of cultures have strongly-held mystical beliefs about dead bodies, going back thousands of years. There are plenty of famous examples, even, like the fights over Patroclus and Hector's dead bodies in the Iliad.

vsskanth 7y ago

There is a stigma because some people believe your body needs to be whole during your last rites (Even though you cremate the body in the end if you're Hindu). This is pure superstition. This is gradually changing with increasing education and awareness among people, making organ donations socially acceptable and something to be proud of.

pmarreck 7y ago
> some people believe your body needs to be whole during your last rites (Even though you cremate the body in the end if you're Hindu). This is pure superstition It's not just superstition, it's easily defeated with reason: If this were true, then every innocent person who has to suffer an amputation due to an accident would be unjustly disadvantaged. It's similar to people who argue against gay marriage since kids aren't produced: This implies every heterosexual marriage without children is worthless
- thaumasiotes 7y ago
  > it's easily defeated with reason: If this were true, then every innocent person who has to suffer an amputation due to an accident would be unjustly disadvantaged How's that a defeat? Terrible things happen unjustly all the time. Every innocent person who has to suffer an amputation due to an accident already is unjustly disadvantaged; it's not like this is an impossible state of affairs. (Just ask them whether they'd prefer to have their appendages back!)
- adrianN 7y ago
  Unless you believe there are no accidents.
spaceandshit 7y ago
Some Hindus bury, fyi
- newyankee 7y ago
  I know this is mentioned a lot but this is very rare, i would say < 5 % (anecdotal)
  - fractalb 7y ago
    Buried if unmarried, cremated otherwise. I don't know if it's only our tradition.
    - sn41 7y ago
      nope... I know that some castes like Lingayats in Karnataka and Pisharody in Kerala bury all their dead. Probably there maybe more such castes in other parts of India.
      - selimthegrim 7y ago
        Bhils in Sindh
keiferski 7y ago
Everything that you don’t agree with or don’t understand isn’t ‘pure superstition.’
hinkley 7y ago
Objectively, the funeral is really about the survivors and not the deceased. It’s sometime dressed up in religion so thoroughly that it’s hard to see, but it’s still there. If your perspective is that your loved one is “still with us” more concretely when some other person gets the gift of life from your tragedy, then that may be of great comfort. If not, then it might be more anxiety in an already very difficult situation. Look what they did to my boy. The relative frequency of “nobody went to his funeral” vs “I missed my mother’s funeral and I’m a terrible person” story arcs in movies and tv seems to follow this pattern. Human interest stories about parents who still visit the recipient who got their motorcycle-riding son’s heart pop up at least once a year (please don’t ride motorcycles, kids).

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

sriram_malhar 7y ago

I'd wager it is more than just an indian thing. Most cultures have the body be viewable by people for last rites before they are interred or cremated. But if any part or the whole body is going to be donated, the body has to be worked on right away or kept in the morgue, which is incompatible with a public viewing. I speak from recent personal experience. My father (Indian/Hindu) passed away a few months ago. He had registered with a medical college "to use his body for science". He was a devout Hindu, which made this extremely unusual. And being an atheist and dispassionate about death myself, I was most chuffed and proud of him. When he passed away in the hospital, the med school sent their ambulance and transferred him to the school's morgue. That is when I was struck by how much the lack of last rites mean to people. Many friends and relatives were left feeling adrift, that they didn't have time to say bye. It was too sudden, even for me. You know there is no life in that body, but the thought of him as a cadaver, with med students using him to learn suturing or surgeries or whatever is deeply unsettling. We did have a memorial service later on which was cathartic for all, but it is not at all common in India. For those of you who are reading this and are from Bangalore, I cannot recommend MS Ramaiah hospital highly enough. They showed such kindness and respect to us and to my father that I never felt my father was being "used". I recommend considering body donation for yourself and urging others to consider it. Registered donors get free medical checkups for life! https://www.msrmc.ac.in/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/Donor_Program.pdf https://www.msrmc.ac.in/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/Donor_Pro...