Is There a Single U.S. Mainstream News Story About the Mass Burial of 30 People Outside Chicago Last Wednesday?

January 23rd, 2012

Unfortunately, the source of this story is the Daily Mail. What’s worse is that I’m not able to find any other source that doesn’t reference the Daily Mail piece. It says that the mass burial took place on Wednesday (January 18, 2011).

This is not a new practice.

I found this, from last year:

After uncovering the desecration scandal at Burr Oak Cemetery in 2009, Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart on Thursday called for legislation to reform indigent burials in Cook County.

Dart pointed to complaints at Homewood Memorial Gardens, which has held the county contract for indigent burials since 1980. He cited babies being buried 10 to 15 to a box, some with animal remains.

“From a law enforcement standpoint, it’s disturbing,” Dart said. “From a human standpoint, it’s appalling.”

Is this just par for the course in the U.S. now? The new normal? Nothing to see here?

Via: Daily Mail:

It’s a practice more closely associated with third world countries, but in bleak times in a Chicago-area suburb, 30 people were buried in a mass grave on Wednesday.

The pauper’s burial section at Homewood Memorial Gardens was established for those who could not afford to pay for a burial plot.

And it is a problem that’s sweeping America as tough economic times have led to an increase in the number of indigent burials the morgue must perform.

7 Responses to “Is There a Single U.S. Mainstream News Story About the Mass Burial of 30 People Outside Chicago Last Wednesday?”

  1. pessimistic optimist says:

    as far as im concerned, as long as the ghettos remain and the inner-city doesnt secede, all of these can accurately be described as USSA wartime coping strategies. all enemies foreign and domestic as they say.

  2. Miraculix says:

    This one strikes an odd note, as it seems to me that in this scenario cremation options are far more “sanitary” — and easier to hide from prying public eyes.

  3. steve holmes says:

    My German MIL told me that in Germany, burial space has been in such short supply for so many decades that it is common practice to yank the head stones after 40 years and plant someone else in the same hole.
    I discover via Google earth that north Korea typically burries their dead in mass burial mounds.
    In very cold places, corpses are kept in cold storage until the ground thaws out. If a drunk dies face down spread eagle and freezes solid out in some roadless village…chainsaw.
    It’s not uncommon for embalmed bodies to be kept in mortuaries for months if they are unclaimed.
    We all know about ancient Egyptians, Incas, etc. But did you know that many north American indigenous people kept slaves from other tribes and when they tired of them they simply killed and ate them?
    How about old or sick vikings being sent off to valhalla on burning boats?
    Many cultures wouldn’t think of anything but creation, and yet there are cultures in America that will NOT cremate under any circumstances.
    To be buried at Arlington national cemetery can take months due to full schedules.
    The ancient Egyptians and Chinese were buried with their servants…who were still alive.
    The local cemetery in Kasilof, Alaska has an odd Custom: family and friends of the deceased dig the grave after the cemetery folks mark the boundaries.
    Most interesting to me is the graves of neanderthals. Buried “respectfully” by recent western culture standards.
    But what I personally find odd is cemeteries. Walk through one that is full and tell me it’s not a mass grave….
    My point is that burial practices are influenced by local customs. There is no right and wrong.

  4. HongPong says:

    Look up Cook County Morgue on google news – a bunch of stories in last few days about overcrowding. DailyMail sucks but the Chicago Tribune et al have noticed the morgue lately.

  5. dermot says:

    Hell, they’re dumping military body parts and remains in landfills:

    http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/dumping-of-partial-remains-of-war-dead-in-va-landfill-spurs-wider-probe/2011/12/08/gIQAwjYdgO_story.html

    “Rep. Darrell Issa (Calif.) and Rep. Elijah Cummings (Md.), the top Republican and Democrat, respectively, on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, said they found “appalling” revelations in The Washington Post on Thursday that the Air Force shipped incinerated remains from at least 274 troops to the King George County Landfill before ending the practice in 2008.”

    Which makes their obscene war-mongering/fear-mongering cant even more obscene than it already is.

    Oh yeah, in as bodily resurrection is important to many Christians, so much for the “Amurka is a Christian country” BS.

  6. pessimistic optimist says:

    @dermot
    oh god, that link is something else. even without the anti-cremation argument, just dumping the ashes in a trash heap does come off a little distasteful. like i say about walter reid and other hospitals, its really very obvious what the nation thinks of its broken machine parts. disposal and replacement post-haste. if only people would realize before they signed away their rights.

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