Home Forums Who owns the past? Who owns the past? Reply To: Who owns the past?

#6734
tmbergan
Participant

I don’t necessarily think anyone can “own’ the past, or should be entitled to owning the artifacts found from the past. While I do understand the mindset of “I found it first, therefore I should be the one to keep it or have a say in where it goes,’ I don’t entirely agree with it. What if the person that found it gets greedy and wants to make a huge profit from it? It would make more sense to leave it to the nation/person that’s now living on the lands on which it was found, but it is nice to have the pieces on display to help us learn about the past cultures. If the culture that made it no longer exists, the artifacts should be passed off to the culture that is currently there or the closest relative to the older civilization. From there, they should be the ones that are to determine where it’ll go. If it were like this, maybe there would be more museums in these countries that would increase the number of tourists to the bigger towns, though that could have some downsides as well if it’s overflowing and makes the town a lot more expensive than it already was for the people already living there. It’s a tricky topic because it is a grey area. Everyone would have different opinions on this topic and there’s really no right or wrong answer.