Human Composting is Legal in New York—Now What?

The Takeaway

WNYC and PRX

Politics, Wnyc, Daily News, Radio, Takeaway, National, News, News Commentary

4.6 • 716 Ratings

🗓️ 13 April 2023

⏱️ 21 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

In the face of so many environmental crises caused by climate change, more and more Americans have been thinking about their carbon footprints. Not only the footprints we make by living — but also the ones we make by dying. An alternative method to burial and cremation has been gaining interest across the country, and it recently became legal in New York: human composting. But legalization is really just the start of the story. Human composting still faces a few major barriers before New Yorkers can actually choose it, and competing interests between businesses in the death industry are complicating matters. The Takeaway producer Mary Steffenhagen reports on what’s next for human composting and what it says about how we commemorate our time on earth.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hey, Lulu here, whether we are romping through science, music, politics, technology, or feelings,
0:05.9	we seek to leave you seeing the world anew. Radio Lab adventures right on the edge of what we think
0:11.9	we know wherever you get podcasts. It's the takeaway. I'm Melissa Harris-Perry. As we face the realities
0:19.9	of climate change, many are thinking about our
0:22.5	carbon footprint, not only the effects we have while living, but also the ones we make when dying.
0:30.3	Takeaway producer Mary Steffen Hagen reports.
0:33.7	It's a Saturday in Brooklyn. Finally, a sunny day above 50 degrees.
0:38.3	I'm taking my girlfriend Haley to one of my favorite spots in the city.
0:42.3	Can you describe what we're looking at?
0:45.3	A very gothic looking gateway that looks like the front facade of a church.
0:52.3	I want to have the Gothic entrance and all of the headstones,
0:59.0	and then there's just New York living in the background.
1:03.0	You know, just sitting on top of Brooklyn,
1:06.0	looking at the skyscrapers of Manhattan, no biggie.
1:10.0	It seems like there's a lot of different varieties of
1:13.0	trees, which is cool. It's kind of blocking the skyscrapers, which is kind of nice. It's,
1:20.1	like, isolating you inside a little bit. Yeah, it's a cemetery. Brooklyn's Greenwood Cemetery, actually. It was founded in 1838, and it's become one of the most populated cemeteries in New York City. It was one of America's first rural cemeteries. Now, it's surrounded by concrete jungle.
1:42.6	Kind of bizarre that the apartment building literally steps away from all these gravestones.
1:47.0	I don't know if that would be very settling.
1:49.0	Living in an apartment that looks over an entire grave site.
1:54.0	What's unsettling about it?
1:56.0	I don't know if you're a little superstitious person, maybe living right on top of a bunch of deceased people,
	...

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