Cannibalism, the eating of human flesh, is a universal taboo, and may I say, distasteful for everyone involved. However, there is a huge difference in degree, depending on the case. It's sad and gruesome, but understandable, to eat the bodies of people who are already dead if the alternative is your own starvation. To kill a person in order to eat them is murder. To kill someone and eat them when you're not even hungry is murder with another level of depravity added.
Tales of cannibalism aren't as rare as you might think. Weird History brings us seven cases of cannibalism from history, specifically from the Victorian Era, arranged so that each tale is more horrifying than the one before. It is far from comprehensive, though. The case of American mountain man Alferd G. Packer is not included, even though it occurred in 1873. You can read that story in the Neatorama archives.
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