Foreign Policy looked at “Do graves of dictators become shrines?”[1] and answered “in short, yes” with evidence of burials from Qaddafi to Hitler. The present condition of the graves were analyzed, but it did not talk about why these graves turn in to shrines and what would happen if the governments decided not to burry the dictators.
Beliefs of people, or whom they have respect for, cannot be controlled by governments nor by law, but they can be restricted in some ways. The act of restriction does not mean not burying the dictators, even though they have caused the downfall of a country or have killed lots of people. This solution suggests that governments are scared from the thoughts of society, because they are not carrying out the same process for the prisoners who have massacred groups of people.
“Back in May, U.S. officials cited concerns about creating a shrine as the reason why they committed Osama bin Laden’s body to the sea.” Instead of declaring that they have gotten rid of the body in an unknown area as they did with Osama Bin Laden -which resulted on some conspiracy theories-, they should bury the dictators in an unmarked grave or they should simply not allow people (besides the family) to visit the grave, for an x amount of years. Even though, the governments think that they are prohibiting the followers of the dictators, all they are doing is gathering new opponents for themselves.
Despite the great suffering and the great impact the dictators have inflicted the world with, shrines do not just mean worshipping a bad man, it also means that people are learning a lesson from it and it has a historical value. Shrines of dictators are a reflection of the life experience which every human have. Their mistakes were a period of time to learn what NOT to do, as everyone learns not to touch fire when they are young. Human kind as a whole evolves like every single person who gets born, lives and grows old by making mistakes.
In the long run, graves of dictators have a different aspect, which is their value in history and evolution of humanity. Governments should be careful and consider the consequences of prohibiting the burial of dictators, creating new targets for their opponents; they could be gaining new reasons of hatred for not clarifying deaths and the graves of the dictators.
[1]http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2011/10/25/do_graves_of_controversial_leaders_really_become_shrines?page=0,0
