Christina wrote to me and she asked me to discuss this recent story of a man
who died on the National Mall in Washington DC after setting himself on
fire and more broadly that
increased number of self-immolations that have been going on
if you're but first let's get you up to speed on the story
with this particular incident NBC News is reporting that a man who apparently
set himself on fire
at the National Mall in Washington DC
has died a spokesman for the Metropolitan Police Department told NBC
Washington that the man died around 9 p.m. a few days ago friday nite
the man was not immediately identified because of the severity of his burns
but was eventually identified as a 64-year-old resident have new jersey
named John Constantine 0 he was from Mount Laurel
New Jersey and it or an attorney representing his family
released a statement saying that Constantine 0 acted not out of political
motives as is often the assumption when it comes to self-immolations
but rather is the result up a long battle with mental
illness joggers actually who were passing by and saw Constantina on fire
ripped their shirts off and try to extinguish the flames using their shirts
during the incident which happened
at 4:24 p.m. on 7th Street Southwest
you the National Air and Space Museum witnesses said they saw the man pour
gasoline on himself
from a red canister and then set himself
ablaze horrible horrible story Louis
and you know II did a little bit every search
into this rising trend of self-immolation people burning
themselves
traditionally considered kind of a political method of protest thing and
often when people were asked why they did it there's there's some examples
from France
Bulgaria several other countries of course tibet as well
but that has been more common in tibet historically
and when it is for political reasons a lot of times the self ima leaders tend
to say that
it is the only way they figured they could get
attention and and it they say if I just held the sign because whatever political
problem I had
nobody would really pay attention and this is the only way the ones who
survive
that they felt they were able to get attentions for them
attention from themselves is this Luis kind of like a broader reflection
above culture and how people are expressing their dissatisfaction the
same way that we've discussed
that deciding to acquire and commit violent acts with a gun
maybe something that now comes to people's minds when they say
or realize they may not be saying explicitly
I am dissatisfied with my life I'm dissatisfied with my position in society
and I'm going to take out that this satisfaction by doing a mass shooting
for example
is the self-immolation in your mind to something similar or is there something
in particular that makes it different
I mean other than the fact the obvious fact that the logistics which is
the self-immolation typically does not hurt anyone else
right I'd say that's pretty much the key difference and
I don't know if I were to guess at the thought process I mean I would say that
these people who want to conduct Nash you things
also I have decided that they
don't feel the need to live any longer accept these people have some serious
ill will these malicious people and they want to take people out with them
I guess when you're self-immolating you think you have nothing left to live for
and you want your
your last message to be a powerful one except I think that the one difference
there might be
that with the case a in both cases we may be we may have people that
for for whatever combination reasons have decided it's not worth living
anymore
however rarely do we really get very specific
activist type messages from those who are doing the shootings whereas
more often the self ima later seem to be doing things for political reasons
yes sometimes the shooter say their angry with the government or whatever
but really it's more a reflection a broader dissatisfaction with their own
lives
that could very well be yeah I mean I you from the point of view of the
tibetan self-immolate urs I mean I understand their plight I see what
they're going for their
white I do have a hard time wrapping my brain around I
ending your life in such a way to get your message across
in this particular case as we said John Constantine 0
just the result the mental illness not a political
message