It's not just about the rights of the person being executed, but also those of their loved ones.
You may say you wouldn't care if your dead carcass was, say, grotesquely abused for someone else's amusement—after all, you're dead and no longer around to have any feelings about it—but how would your children feel? How would you feel if that was the fate awaiting your life partner?
The shared endeavor of human society entitles people to dignity even in death. That includes the right to bodily integrity.
Yeah that would be disrespectful. Kind of moving the goalposts though to use that example when talking about organ transplant, something that helps people who might otherwise die. Obviously I am not saying execution is worth it for that. Just more that if someone is dead already for whatever reason, it's hard to see it as a bad thing to help the living, if that can be done.
I mean if we're going to fashion extreme examples for dramatic effect, that can be done on the other side too. Imagine if the relatives have racist objections to donating an organ, and let someone die because their own feelings would be hurt if they saw a person of the "wrong" race being helped. How do you weigh their racist feelings, versus the life being saved? It's not that clear to me that their feelings should be at the forefront when other factors are considered.
I agree that dignity in death is a good thing. Just not so certain as you that there is only one way to get there. And none of this is to claim that China does what they do with dignity... I highly doubt that. But organ transplants are not such a terrible thing.
> I have trouble understanding why a dead person would care about anything after their death
Examining the unstated implications of your argument, taken on its face, is not the same as moving the goalposts. Saying "I don't care what happens after I die, so no need to even ask if you can take my organs... except hang on, no, don't abuse my body in weird ways, I'm not okay with that"–THAT'S moving the goalposts.
> it's hard to see it as a bad thing to help the living
except to the extent that 1) harvesting organs from political prisoners is just about as close to a bad thing as you can imagine, and 2) even if we're not talking about China in particular, involuntary organ extraction harms the dignity of living kin.
> Imagine if the relatives have racist objections to donating an organ, and let someone die because their own feelings would be hurt if they saw a person of the "wrong" race being helped. How do you weigh their racist feelings, versus the life being saved?
The right to bodily integrity, to the choice about how your body is used, is unaffected by your motives. A right does not cease to become a right once you disagree with how someone wishes to exercise it.
You don't want your organs to go to a black man? Exercise your right to bodily integrity by not agreeing to be an organ donor.
True, but you can find a religious belief from some random major or minor religion to justify or prohibit just about anything.
Including things that harm others or infringe on their rights.
So if that is guiding policy, policy is going to be a mess at worst or severely hobbled at best.
China doesn’t generally hold religion in high regard when formulating policy. They are more guided by practicality and expediency.
That puts them in conflict with many western values but it’s interesting to look at it from their perspective.
For those people who believe that organ donation is a grotesque abuse, that is bad but it should be weighed against other bad things. People dying is also bad. Which is worse? Grotesque abuse of a corpse, or letting someone die? China appears to have made a decision on this question.
You may say you wouldn't care if your dead carcass was, say, grotesquely abused for someone else's amusement—after all, you're dead and no longer around to have any feelings about it—but how would your children feel? How would you feel if that was the fate awaiting your life partner?
The shared endeavor of human society entitles people to dignity even in death. That includes the right to bodily integrity.