The Power Behind the Flame
What is self-immolation, and what’s its impact on society?
Political self-immolation is the act of someone setting oneself on fire as a form of protest. Often, self-immolation stems from activists feeling a sense of guilt, hopelessness, and martyrdom regarding their government, political unrest, colonization, injustices, apartheid, persecution, and genocides. While it’s presumed to date back hundreds of years, hundreds of self-immolations have been recorded since the 1940s.
In the most recent case, Aaron Bushnell, a 25-year-old serviceman of the U.S. Air Force, set himself on fire in front of the Israel Embassy in Washington D.C. He did so to protest the ongoing genocide in Palestine carried out by Israel and the U.S. Bushnell, who live-streamed his self-immolation on Twitch, stated that he “will no longer be complicit in genocide” and that this act was to protest “what people have been experiencing in Palestine at the hand of their colonizers.”
Ironically, as Bushnell continuously screamed his last words, “Free Palestine,” he stood ablaze, and an Embassy officer pointed his gun at Bushnell and yelled at him to “get on the ground” — as if a man who was almost dead posed any threat to anyone. You can then hear an EMT scream, “I don’t need guns; I need fire extinguishers,” as the officer continued to point his gun at Bushnell’s smoke-billowed body. The video had so many layers to it, peeling the onion down from police systems to militarization. Bushnell’s will wrote:
“I am sorry to my brother and my friends for leaving you like this. Of course, if I was truly sorry, I wouldn’t be doing it. But the machine demands blood. None of this is fair.”
“I wish for my remains to be cremated. I do not wish for my ashes to be scattered or my remains to be buried as my body does not belong anywhere in this world. If a time comes when Palestinians regain control of their land, and if the people native to the land would be open to the possibility, I would love for my ashes to be scattered in a free Palestine.”
Mainstream media, as well as Bushnell’s family, deemed this act a cause of mental illness, questioning why anyone would die for someone’s land — but isn’t that what comes with the sacrifice of serving in a military anyway? He would be portrayed as a hero if he died fighting for his country. But because he died for the sake of being against apartheid and genocide, they called him anything but a hero. While it’s known for the military to cause PTSD and mental health issues, Bushnell made the ultimate sacrifice as a display of protest.
In December 2023, another protestor self-immolated at Atlanta’s Israeli consulate. Officials say a Palestinian flag was found at the scene, and the person, who was not revealed, was listed in critical condition. Even then, news outlets shifted this narrative to describe the ongoing genocide as the “Israel-Hamas war.”
One of the most well-known self-immolations was Thích Quảng Đức in South Vietnam to protest the persecution of Buddhists by the government of Ngô Đình Diệm. This 1963 self-immolation, but still not the first recorded, was particularly memorable as the Buddhist monk sat in the street entirely still with his legs crossed as he burned to death. Journalist and photographer Malcolm Browne photographed Quảng Đức, becoming one of the most prominent protest photos.
Kuo-shun was one of the first reported self-immolations in the 1948 Republic of China, which was Communist-controlled at the time. Kuo-shun, like Quảng Đức, protested the persecution of Buddhists and Mao Zedong’s destruction of sacred objects. He self-immolated, sitting on a pile of sawdust and soybean oil. Since then, hundreds of self-immolations have occurred around the world, including almost 200 Tibetan activists self-immolating to protest China’s rule over Tibet since 2009, uprisings against the government during the Arab Spring, and U.S. climate activists and LGBTQ+ activists self-immolating in front of the U.S. Supreme Court.
Many people believe lighting oneself on fire in public is a cry for help to mentally ill people who feel there is no other option. On the other hand, people who are often oppressed or the ones facing apartheid, genocide, or marginalization deem people who self-immolate as martyrs. It would be more mentally ill to remain complicit with 30,000 civilians being killed in just a few months. Bisan Owda, a Palestinian journalist and activist in Gaza, commemorated Bushnell. She wrote in an Instagram post, holding up a photo of Bushnell:
“Our bravest, and the last heart... Was the fire colder than your remorse if you accepted the military orders to bomb the defenseless families of besieged Gaza?
There in the sky... Did you find the 30,000 brothers and sisters from Gaza who were killed by the barbaric weapons of the United States and the terrorism of the Israeli army in 5 months?”“We love you, and we thank you for standing on the right side of history. You are right, FREE PALESTINE.
Rest in Power our soldier🤍🕊️”
Whether self-immolation creates the change they want to see or not, no other form of protest has a more significant effect on society. Circumstances must be so dire that one feels the need to commit such an extreme yet powerful act. It will never fail to catch people’s and the media’s attention, sometimes impacting someone so much that they change their beliefs.
