I see the appeal of wanting to leave behind a "pretty corpse" but I also cannot meet that standard unfortunately. I think it may have to do with the fact also, besides some vanity or glamorous romanticism of death...that when we are dead, we cannot hide, we are candidly limp and vulnerable. People can stare and touch and our body can't run away, whoever finds the body will see it, if there is a wake..then a shit ton more people will see it. Hell, even being ugly won't stop people from displaying your corpse if they feel like it. That's what I worry about personally. I am seriously considering maiming myself further to a degree where it will be unacceptable to put me out in the open.
I already know my corpse will be an eyesore, even if it's fresh, I don't care if I will be dead..I still don't want to be seen, I don't want people gawking at an exterior form that caused me a lot of hell in life. I am requesting to have no wake or open casket and no funeral or announcement, the less people know the less they can get in the head of the one person I have told these wishes to.
I don't believe in the after life or god or anything like that, but I still hold firm to the notion that the dead have rights. That body still belongs to them and we should respect what they would have wanted to be done with it. I think wanting one's corpse to be or look a certain way is a form of postmortem control, which is understandable to me. Anyway, people say they won't care when they are dead but noone is dead until they're dead! We are still alive so we are still going to care, and when we are gone, we still leave bits and pieces behind that may be manhandled and disrespected by the living. It's embarrassing having to think about while we still breath air.