Funeral Consumers Alliance

In response to Bibb County. I would only comment on one point, which relates to what I said in the post below on grave markers. We should distinguish between issues that are a matter of taste and those that have environmental consequences. The issues of ground pollution through decomposing bodies, concrete, metal or formaldehyde, of scavengers digging up bodies, or of leak-proof containers etc are subject to empirical analysis and objective conclusions. If we care about our environment, we should find out the truth about these and ultimately legislate appropriately nationwide. I have no doubt your conclusions are the correct ones in the current case. But grave markers are a matter of taste, and it is thus fair neither to require grave markers nor to forbid them. Thus, in my opinion, both Bibb County and more radical green burial proponents are wrong, albeit in opposite directions. Or both are right, and each has the right to enforce what they feel is best on their own land. In this context, our free market should decide. We can certainly sort out the environmental side of burial through science and legislation, but the spiritual and psychological factors (which grave markers relate to) can only be worked out in our own hearts and souls. And then the market should provide what people want and need in this respect. We can't enforce taste and spirituality on society. Aside: naturally, the Bibb County argument about law enforcement requirements for markers is a red herring. But I would also be skeptical that current technologies like GPS are reliable long-term. Who knows where our world is taking us and how it will evolve? Not all software and hardware is retro-compatible. Why are we so sure this one will be compatible for centuries, when software generations are measured in months or years? And when the old incompatible technology is buried by the underground among thousands of remains, we are hardly likely to retrofit them! These remains will be as irrevocably lost as those in a mass grave. I make this last point more in regard to relatives looking for their family graves decades down the road than law enforcement authorities....