RFK Criticized for Disrespecting Roadkill

These days, it seems that everything is about bioethics. Case in point: A zoologist named Sam Zeveloff has criticized RFK Jr. in Stat News for disrespecting a dead raccoon back in 2001 by allegedly dissecting its penis. This act, the emeritus professor claims, raises "critical questions" that must be addressed.

Oh my. One wonders about the possible moral stakes of this historical cadaveric mutilation.

Such phallus-collecting, we are told by Zeveloff, is fine so long as it's done for a valid scientific or educational purpose. In fact, the author brags that he has collected raccoon phalluses himself, some of which are displayed at the Icelandic Phallological Museum. Okaaay.

But Kennedy's cadaveric collecting wasn't, from a bioethical standpoint, properly "scientific":

If Kennedy collected a racoon specimen without a defined scientific or educational purpose, the ethical justification becomes less clear. Indeed, the public has no idea about why he would stop a car filled with his family members and cut out a raccoon's penis from a carcass.