Our January-February cover story described an 1884 maritime murder case that has captivated generations of Harvard students: the shipwrecked British crew of the Mignonette was adrift in a lifeboat for 21 days with no food or water before the officers slayed and ate the cabin boy. We asked readers to weigh in on what the crew should have done.
Here’s a sampling of the answers we received.
Eating someone after death may only be permissible if that person has agreed to allow the others to eat them if they should die of natural causes—much like an organ donor agrees that their organs may be used to save the life of others after their death. —JOHN B.
I have no problem with cannibalism per se; it’s the murder that is wrong. Once one person dies, his body should be used for the benefit of the living persons. —MICHAEL D.
The idea that those in the majority or those who are higher on society’s totem pole of power should decide unilaterally on who is killed and used for survival seems abhorrent to me, but not so much the idea of all present in a life-or-death scenario mutually agreeing to submit to random chance. —SARAH D.
Per advice from the highly-respected law firm of Dewey Eadham & Howe. —JUSTIN A.
Richard Parker was killed because he was lowest on the social hierarchy. This is wrong. If they resolved that someone should be sacrificed, it should have been by consensus and by lot, with agreement as to the most humane way to carry out the killing beforehand. —LAUREN G.
It our most basic level, all animals must strive to live. Survival is essential, although individuals came back choices about offering up or taking their own life. Choosing the cabin boy made good sense in a terrible situation as he was the least likely to survive. The fact that the others survived seems to indicate they made a sound choice. —ED E.
The captain was responsible for the safety of the yacht and the lives of the crew. So, why wasn’t the lifeboat properly provisioned? Why wasn’t there fishing tackle on the lifeboat to enable the survivors to catch fish? And yet it was the captain who made the decision to kill the cabin boy. Since he manifestly screwed up, why didn’t the captain sacrifice himself? (Yes, I understand, it was Victorian England.) —DON P.
While it is easy for me to say this from my cozy living room, I cannot imagine a circumstance in which I could eat any human body, or deliberately kill or allow another to kill a fellow passenger to survive. In the grand scheme of things, whom am I to decide that my survival outweighs the right of another to live? —JAY C.
Morally, one needs to do the right thing, even when it is very difficult to do so. And, living with that crime on one’s conscience is not much of a life anyway. —KATHARINE L.
Before there was Professor Sandel, Professor Paul Freund taught this case to undergraduates in his Introduction to Law course, ca. 1970-75. Same case, same arguments, same guilty fascination with cannibalism. Great fun, then and now. —RICHARD K.
I'm just glad I'm not in this situation. —E.G.
Why didn’t they kill and eat the shark? The ocean is full of food, and salt can be removed from ocean water. —Yolanda H.
There have been many shipwrecks where the subjects have survived far longer. —JODY W.
Utilitarianism. —PETER K.
