partypoisonsfursona - Tumblr blog

[partypoisonsfursona]

My opinion:

No, because the definition of necro relies on a definition of death which is only a collectively agreed-upon definition rather than an actual fixed meaning. Even with collectively agreed-upon definitions, the medical definitions, the moral definitions, and the spiritual definitions of death can vary greatly.  These all differ from a cluster concept understanding of death, which is in itself a lack of explicit definition (Degrazia, 2021). The cluster definition is also fallible due to no individual symptom being exclusive to death and therefore any combination of symptoms being possible without death. The relevant points mentioned generally fit into the same guidelines as a cluster definition of death.

Explanation regarding relevant points & why they don’t explicitly denote death & necrophilia:  

Sentience: We have no hard evidence of how death actually relates to sentience so defining necrophilia by sentience would be based on a false association. We also can’t define necrophilia by the ability to measurably demonstrate sentience because fucking someone unconscious wouldn’t be necro. 

Decay: a living human body can have tissue die and decay, and the amount of dead tissue alone can’t be used to define death. It can just cause the phenomena of death. Fucking someone with necrotizing fasciitis isn’t necro. 

Level of movement: Movement and death aren’t mutually exclusive (Roach, 2003). Fucking dead bodies that move from various postmortem phenomena is still necro and fucking non-moving bodies is not necessarily necro (revisiting unconsciousness as well as severe paralysis).

Amount of time since death: I’m understanding this as measuring a certain level of time since death as a more permanent death which feels very arbitrary to me. We define death by time only based on the current estimate of an incredibly low (negligible to the point presumed but inherently unprovable impossibility) likelihood of return of life after this time frame. If the timeframe in which someone could come back to life extended because zombies existed we would have to redefine death to account for that. It’s also worth noting the time used to define death medically already isn’t universal (Dhanani et al., 2011).

Final answer: Throughout history, our definition of death has changed dramatically, from unconsciousness to the cessation of heartbeat and respiration to putrification back to a more advanced understanding of the cessation of life-sustaining organ function. Still, it’s been recognized for centuries that all of these methods of defining death are potentially fallible (Tebb et al., 1896). Presumably, the existence of zombies would alter our definition of death to consider zombies in a (possibly grey) category of life rather than account for them as dead. Because an accepted definition of necrophilia relies on an accepted definition of death, and it’s unlikely zombies would fall into an accepted definition of death even if they had previously been dead, I would not consider them necro.

Additionally, the definition in necrophilia is also dependent on the experiences of necrophiles which means in order to be considered necro, the zombie would have to fulfil the motivation for necrophilia. I am hard pressed to believe any sort of animated body would do this in a consistent enough manner to be considered necro the same way vore is not considered cannibalism regardless of technical overlap in definition. 

DeGrazia, D. (2021, May 17). The definition of death. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/death-definition/#DeaCluConNotAmeClaDef. 

Dhanani, S., Hornby, L., Ward, R., & Shemie, S. (2011). Variability in the determination of death after cardiac arrest. Journal of Intensive Care Medicine, 27(4), 238–252. https://doi.org/10.1177/0885066610396993

Roach, M. (2003). Stiff: The curious lives of human cadavers. W W NORTON. 

Tebb, W., Vollum, E. P., & Hadwen, W. R. (1896). Premature burial: How it may be prevented. Hesperus Press Limited. 

I couldn't figure out how to fit this in so I could cite as a source but it really deserves an honorable mention: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/26337347_A_new_classification_of_necrophilia