Organ snatching scifi who started it?

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**Ironclad Warlord**

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Repo_Men
The movie with jude law no one saw. A bit underrated.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Headhunter_(series)
The game some people played. Also underrated.

http://www.amazon.com/The-Repossession-Mambo-Eric-Garcia/dp/0061802832/ref=sr_1_cc_1?s=aps&ie=UTF8&qid=1396411888&sr=1-1-catcorr&keywords=The+Repossession+Mambo+by+Eric+Garcia.
The book I never read.

I'm curious who came up with the scifi government/corporation coming to chop you up and take your organs dystopia, are they ripping each other off, or perhaps ripping off someone else we've forgotten or is it just a natural plot for the future given that we have real life organ smuggling rings so its just a matter of time till some corporation or government starts doing it.

**Kinsley**

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Repo!_The_Genetic_Opera

Bit more info there. I presume the idea originated in books somewhere, though I've no idea where my self.

**Sean_OBrien**

Goes back a good bit further than that.

Earliest stories I recall are from the 1960s era sci fi stuff. A Gift From Earth in particular pretty much revolves around the concept as its central plot.

Might be earlier stories too. Really, as soo as we began to think transplants would be possible, authors started to look at organ stealing...either as a criminal enterprise or as a mallet to demonstrate how the rich and powerful will abuse the masses.

Automatically Appended Next Post:
When in doubt, TV Tropes is sort of the go to place for plot devise history (and most other fictional themes...)

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/OrganTheft

Looks like they place the origin in the same book I read.

**TheAuldGrump**

Depending how far back you want to go... you could always look at the work of our good friends Burke and Hare.

Up the close and doun the stair,
But and ben wi' Burke and Hare.
Burke's the butcher, Hare's the thief,
Knox the boy that buys the beef.

Burke and Hare were bodysnatchers in Edinburgh in the early 18th Century - who decided that digging up corpses was a bit too much like work.

So they started killing the residents of Margaret Hare's lodging house and selling the bodies to the anatomist Dr. Robert Knox for dissection... for around 7GBP each. (About $800 in today's US dollars.)

All told they did for 16 people, selling the bodies and robbing them before dropping them off with the unwitting Dr. Knox.

If you ever hear the term Burking in reference to suffocating the victim, that is where it comes from.

*EDIT* Appropriately, the body of Mr. Burke was used as an anatomical cadaver, and his skeleton can still be seen today.

*EDIT 2* In S.F. Larry Niven does claim credit - and has done so publicly. (More accurately, he accepted the blame.) Today there is real world theft of retinas, and occasional brains that is done by medical examiners. (Maine actually had a series of brain thefts in the 1990s, if I recall correctly.)

The Auld Grump

**Jehan-reznor**

I remember this movie
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coma_(1978_film)

Spoiler:

**Koppo**

Also, overtones of Herbert West Reanimator by HP Lovecraft

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herbert_West%E2%80%93Reanimator

**notprop**

Judge Dredd has had Organ Legging (stolen body parts) as a crime since quite early on (late 70's) but I would guess that Mary Shelley's Frankenstein would be the earliest work of fiction, though the body snatching part is minor to the story.

**Kilkrazy**

The internet seems to have eaten the reply I made last night.

A Gift From Earth was one of a number of stories and books by Larry Niven that used the theme of organ transplantation.

Repo Man is based on a story by Philip K Dick. (80% of SF films seem to be.) I don't remember the original story though.

**Leigen_Zero**

While it's not 'stealing' per se (as in, the victim tends to be dead ). But I would stretch to say that the whole organ thing goes way back to primitive tribes, where they believed that you could gain the power/courage/memories/etc of your enemy by eating various organs.

**notprop**

Leigen_Zero wrote:
While it's not 'stealing' per se (as in, the victim tends to be dead ). But I would stretch to say that the whole organ thing goes way back to primitive tribes, where they believed that you could gain the power/courage/memories/etc of your enemy by eating various organs.

One assumes that no one actually enjoyed it though until the invention of good chianti?

**hotsauceman1**

Tijuana started it

**Breotan**

I remember a couple of old shows from the 70s like Coma and The Clonus Project (remade as The Island) that delt with morality vs. ethics of organ "farms". The film, Soilent Green, is a kindred spirit to these.

**KingCracker**

Soilent Green was a good movie. I enjoyed the hell out of it.

**notprop**

But it's people, PEOPLE!

**Jihadin**

What flavor after processing?.....Long Pig in a stick

**Bran Dawri**

My first guess for that would be Larry Niven or Keith Laumer, with Niven being the one who did it more consistently, I recall only two stories/novellas by Laumer about this.
I couldn't say, off the top of my head, who did it first.

Although Mary Shelley is a good couterpoint.

**Breotan**

Mary Shelly didn't really cover organ harvesting. In fact, if you read the novel, the creation of the monster is a "blink and you miss it" moment. No, Frankenstein is all about death. Death and dying and loss. It's a really bleak story that I had to force myself to read - and I lost because I never actually got much farther than the appearance of the monster. Really, really awful novel.

**Bran Dawri**

True, the organlegging is at best an aside in Frankenstein, but that still makes it the first time I can think of that it's been mentioned anywhere.

**Leigen_Zero**

Jihadin wrote:What flavor after processing?.....Long Pig in a stick

Varies from person to person...

**the shrouded lord**

huh repoman, one of the few movies to utilise the "falcon-slap-the-daughter-to-make-her-stop-talking-about-crap" technique. good times...
oh, and dem robotic eye balls.

**Shadow Captain Edithae**

Ironclad Warlord wrote:

I'm curious who came up with the scifi government/corporation coming to chop you up and take your organs dystopia, are they ripping each other off, or perhaps ripping off someone else we've forgotten or is it just a natural plot for the future given that we have real life organ smuggling rings so its just a matter of time till some corporation or government starts doing it.

"Presumed Consent" for organ donation is already being considered in the UK with the British NHS. Some organisations are pushing for an Opt Out system.

Its not at all far fetched.

http://www.organdonation.nhs.uk/newsroom/statements_and_stances/statements/opt_in_or_out.asp

Opting out / presumed consent

Under a system of "opting out" or "presumed consent", every person living in that country is deemed to have given their consent to organ donation unless they have specifically "opted out" by recording in writing their unwillingness to give organs.

Supporters of such a system’s introduction in the UK believe that establishing an automatic right to take organs when the donor has not expressed wishes to the contrary would lead to a significant increase in the number of potential donors. They also conclude that the relatives or those close to a person who has not expressed a wish to donate would be relieved of the burden of making that decision at such a traumatic time.

One fear with presumed consent is that people won’t get round to registering an objection and the subsequent expectation that organ donation should take place could lead to unnecessary distress to their relatives and widespread adverse publicity.

Many transplant recipients add that a donated organ is more easily accepted because they know it has been positively given by the deceased whereas presuming consent would turn donation into an action by default.

Other concerns surround the potential medical risks involved in removing organs without full discussion with relatives. Families are a valuable source of information about their loved one's previous health and relatives are questioned as part of the screening process.

If an individual does not register an objection, it is possible that their silence may indicate a lack of understanding rather than agreement with the policy. It is because of these concerns that in the majority of countries operating an opt-out system, health care professionals still consult the family to establish consent.

**Kilkrazy**

Whoever gets my liver is going to regret it.

**purplefood**

Breotan wrote:
Mary Shelly didn't really cover organ harvesting. In fact, if you read the novel, the creation of the monster is a "blink and you miss it" moment. No, Frankenstein is all about death. Death and dying and loss. It's a really bleak story that I had to force myself to read - and I lost because I never actually got much farther than the appearance of the monster. Really, really awful novel.

I've always enjoyed it. It's hilarious. Frankenstein faints every 5 seconds and his bromance with his best mate is just funny.