Sam Schechner. New cannibalism

Cannibalism has a bad reputation among us. We use this word if we want to designate something terrible, and we consider the eating of human flesh a crime more heinous than even murder. Meanwhile, not everything is so simple: despite all the soul-saving talk, in reality we are so often stuffed with human flesh that we often cannot even digest it properly.

Now I'm just finishing up a human head. And in front of me on the table there are a couple more cute sweet kids. Of course, I don’t limit myself to just children. I eat adults too. I've eaten my fair share of chocolate, ginger, jelly and butter people throughout my life. Moreover, during the Mass I had to taste Christ himself. And there’s no need to talk about all kinds of arms, legs and fingers. Even if the appearance of an edible product does not copy the human body, the product itself is often “humanized” in advertising. And with an eerie verisimilitude. For example, I still wince every time I hear the Brooklyn accent of one of the M&M jelly bean men.

Of course (and, by the way, completely regardless of what you think about our addiction to self-criticism), cannibalism can boast of a long and sometimes quite glorious history. Some of the earliest evidence of cannibalism dates back to the Stone Age. In southern France, a prehistoric site was discovered strewn with charred human bones with knife marks indicating that their owners had been eaten.

Subsequently, the Stoics characterized their “sage” - an example of human perfection (by the way, even Bill Clinton once said that he was a Stoic) - with a whole list of necessary qualities, and this list ended with these words: “And if necessary, he will not refuse to taste and human flesh." By the way, some peoples consider it a disgusting crime to refuse to eat dead relatives. One of the first debates about cultural relativism concerned the disagreement between those who burned their ancestors and those who roasted them.

Speaking about cultures that practice this form of anthropophagy (as cannibalism is scientifically called), some anthropologists argue that eating the dead is intended to demonstrate respect for them and serve as a guarantee of the immortality of their spirit. Other scientists offer a more materialistic explanation: giving up such tasty, good meat was an unacceptable waste for primitive man. However, both of these points of view are based on anthropological theories of recent decades. Earlier anthropological studies looked at cannibalism somewhat differently: it was believed that bloodthirsty cannibals devour their fellows solely out of a desire to enjoy the taste of human flesh, thereby indulging their vicious inclinations. Today's politically correct anthropologists and cultural scientists are convinced that such ideas about cannibalism were propagated by imperialists who wanted to emphasize the difference between savages and civilized people, which in turn could serve as a justification for the colonization of the third world, as if populated not even by people, but by some kind of animals. In general, it is not surprising that now some of our contemporaries are even trying to convince us that there was no cannibalism at all. It's all just a myth. It’s understandable, but it’s still not true.

Meanwhile, all these discussions about the nature of cannibalism indicate the undoubted fascination of the West (and, of course, America) with this phenomenon. How else can we explain the fact that in addition to the wild, bloodthirsty cannibal who makes us proud of our own sophistication and civilization, our culture has produced another type of cannibal - a man with refined taste, undoubtedly civilized. The existence of this type blurs the seemingly so carefully guarded boundary between the sophistication of a complex nature and the savage rudeness of a barbarian.

This inexhaustible interest is eloquently evidenced by all sorts of stories about civilized cannibals, on the basis of which many box-office films were based . What does this interest tell us? It’s just that deep down we like it all. In fact, Americans have never been good puritans simply because any taboo has a special attractive force for us. The question arises: can we really do without this ritual sacrifice, without showing respect to the dead by eating them? Or, more precisely, how can we know humanity without tasting it? There is only one answer: no way. I mean: how could it be otherwise?

Colledge Hill Independent
Original article
Abridged translation by Ilya Kun