This casino entertainment will knock you DEAD
By Darren Garnick | Related entries in NewsBored with the slots? Check out the latest entertainment offering at my local gambling hole, the Foxwoods Resort Casino.
For $20 (or $18 in Foxwoods “Dream Points”), gamblers can enjoy “BODIES REVEALED,” a traveling museum exhibit featuring rubberized human cadavers frozen in cutesy sports poses.
I’ve been a relentless critic of competing corpse shows. Let’s just say that I am no fan of playing with dead people like they are action figures. And that the mad scientists who make these creepy corpse action figures are not fans of mine.
Maybe I was brainwashed with all the God talk and respect-for-life babble in Hebrew School. But dipping human flesh in plastic and posing it with soccer balls and tennis racquets is UNETHICAL. And perhaps even a tad bit evil.
Even if they have the permission slips to do it.
Check out the contrite disclaimer on the official BODIES REVEALED site, which no doubt refers to fears that China may have found a new way to make political dissidents disappear:
Premier Exhibitions’ suppliers certify that the specimens in the BODIES REVEALED exhibitions have been donated by the deceased or their authorized family member for education and that the specimens died of natural causes. Premier employs a retired anatomy professor and a biological anthropologist to examine the specimens and they have never found any evidence of trauma associated with bodily injury.Premier cannot, however, independently guarantee the origins of the specimens.
But my favorite public relations BS has to be the marketing of this exhibit as the ultimate dieting aid.
From the Foxwoods Resort Casino Press Room:
“Authentic human specimens illustrate the damage caused to organs by over-eating and lack of exercise.The Exhibition will change the way people see themselves. It is designed to enlighten, empower, fascinate, and inspire.”
Any way to buy one of these obese human figurines to stick next to your treadmill?
This entry was posted on Monday, June 1st, 2009 and is filed under News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
June 1st, 2009 at 6:15 pm
Bodies Revealed came through Kansas City a while back, and most of the same arguments were given by protesters here. I completely disagree. I see nothing wrong with corpses being used to educate people – especially if the deceased themselves wished that. Also, as a religious person, I’ve never understood the comments that this is wrong from a religious stand point and respecting the dead. As a religious person, I belief there is an afterlife and that the physical body is no more than a shell for the soul, the true essence of a person. So once that has left, why are we hung up on what happens to the shell?
I am concerned about the possibility that has been raised both by you and others that some of the bodies have not come from people who consented. But that’s a whole separate issue if someone is trying to make certain bodies disappear. In the ideal situation where all of these bodies were obtained lawfully, I see nothing wrong with Bodies Revealed.
June 1st, 2009 at 7:12 pm
I believe there is an afterlife and that the physical body is no more than a shell for the soul, the true essence of a person. So once that has left, why are we hung up on what happens to the shell?
Jesi, even if you were not religious, much the same reasoning can still apply. If you’re gone, why are you worried about the remains? “You” are no longer there. My directions follow the John Prine song–take and use any parts that can help others, and I really don’t much care what you do with the rest. Though I think I’d prefer to skip being an exhibit, or handed over to the med students. Just me.
I took the eldest to see Bodies Revealed. The youngest showed no interest in going.
June 1st, 2009 at 7:18 pm
I also went to a show that revealed bodies, but it was in Vegas and the girls looked pretty alive to me.
June 1st, 2009 at 7:34 pm
They won’t let me take the kids to those, Michael. Which prevents me from claiming to the missus that it’s a family outing. Which makes me sad. :-(