- Aristotle once observed that the plot of a tragedy should be so framed that, even without witnessing the events, simply hearing of them should fill one with “horror and pity”—even lead to insight and action. But the amphitheater of the 21st century has fallen into decay, scattered and fragmented into a multitude of media platforms. There are too many actors in too many theaters and their tragedies—overwhelming, lacking in context, incoherent, truncated or badly reported—have lost their grip on the human psyche.
Studies about desensitization of the modern mind are aplenty, but the general consensus is that over-saturation of images and narratives of violence have resulted in a collective numbness. A profound act of public death cannot hope to sway a world in which horror itself has lost its power.
I'm actually starting to be against all suicide protests in general. I'm starting to group hunger strikes, self immolation, and suicide bombings together. While of course I think suicide protests which intend to harm others are objectively worse, no one talks about how many of the Tibetans have been minors, or the emotional manipulation that goes into recruiting them. All it would take, for instance, is the Dali Lama saying 'if your going to burn yourself to death... don't do so as a minor....' and Tibetan children would stop burning themselves. He knows he has that power over his subjects, and he uses it to do FAR less noble things like haveing Tibetans in exile in India antagonize those who worship Dorje Shugden, even to the point of denying them medical attention. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n5sOm-uQH9Y I think most of the time suicide protests are far from noble, and are just another form of social manipulation. I'm of the opinion that it's likely many of the Tibetans are looking for a way to make their suicide 'holy'. I certainly feel they could make greater contributions to the world then just being kindling. One notable example right now is the hunger strike happening at Guantanamo Bay. I agree with them, and I agree with their right to self determination ESPECIALLY when it comes to not eating to raise awareness of their plight. Although, it's a much different situation when you've been tortured for a decade because you happened to have the wrong brand watch (seriously, look it up) and have been cleared for release for years and are still locked up. At that point stopping eating is the ONLY degree of control they have left over their lives. Why exactly can't these Tibetans figure out more effective ways to use their resolve? I have a hard time stomaching Tibetan children being assured they will just be reincarnated, and that they will be heroes, and their families will be taken care of etc. They might as well start giving a number value to how many virgins they will get in the after life. I guess its emotional manipulation techniques are evident here... "How fucked up that the world doesn't care enough about these self immolation protests." I am kinda of the opinion that it's fucked up to expect the whole world to stop just because you kill yourself. It's tragic, no doubt. It makes a compelling photograph, but I think human beings are worth more then just a photo-op. I guess the equation changes if you are certain of your immortality, and think of it as just one of your many lives. I hope for their sake they are correct. Burning yourself to death obviously isn't changing Chinese policy, and the Dali Lama won't even tell his subjects to stop because he likes the pressure he perceives it puts on Beijing. All in all I think it's just a sad ineffective technique. To me its growing ineffectiveness doesn't say something bad about humanity, but rather something bad about a culture that continues to encourage people to do so even when it doesn't create meaningful change. Eventually the shock value fades.
I feel like self-immolation is more successful when dealing with more internal struggles as opposed to the Tibet-China situation. Tunisia, for example, was likely already teetering on the edge and that action was literally the flame needed to set everything off. Tibet, on the other hand, has been in conflict for quite some time now against a country much larger and powerful than itself and it's indigenous population. The rest of the world is not willing to take up arms and protests for Tibet, not against China, and thus these acts of self-immolation go largely wasted.
Self-immolation in Vietnam had a big impact on the world's perception of that conflict. It created more internal and external pressure on the U.S. to get out. I always figured that these immolations were primarily directed at the rest of the world and China (I guess directing at China is internal from a perspective, but I think they are occupiers even though they have a holiday celebrating their "liberation" of Tibet). The rest of the worlds lack of will to pressure Chinga on domestic anything makes the efficacy of this protest questionable. I listened to George Shultz give a talk on CFR a while back in which he gave a few minutes to the question of Tibet. He contended that whenever the U.S. war more preoccupied with maintaining the "relation" then to trying to make change little got done between the two countries and that over time relations tended to get worse. He thought that putting pressure on expanding the rights and freedoms of Tibetans was the kind of thing that would set the chinese back on their heels and force them to make some policy adjustments. I'm sure that my summary of his argument is thin and poor, but that's the gist at least. If the U.S. made Tibet even a small issue then immolations would get a lot more media coverage and goverment attention world wide.
I hear that. It's an alien concept and for many of us, it's an alien form of protest. I mean, for many of us, yes it raises questions in that it's shocking, but it's hard to understand and empathize with. I am dissatisfied with a great many things, but self-immolation doesn't come to mind, particularly in regard to political things. I am wary of attributing self-immolation to a Buddhist mindset, to the point where I don't do so, but I wonder if it's the Western analog of rioting, in a way. Burning flesh smells wicked gross though. I've been to a clinic with my father when he decided to get some moles excised and man, I felt like puking.
Side note, because @humanadon@ we've talked about poetry before, I actually had read about the self-immolation going on in Tibet about Chinese rule and written a poem about it a few months ago. I kind of wanted to respond to the author of this and let him know some people are aware of what's going...but I also would have felt hipster and pretentious doing it. I think self-immolation is an extremely violent way to go. Although, according to my reading, you stop feeling pain within a matter of minutes as your nerve endings die, and you generally die from suffocation as opposed to burns.
I think that the whole - shall we say - meme of claiming you have known something, especially knowing it first, or knowing it before a majority of people know about it, has become a trope and perhaps even one of the defining characteristics of "hipsterdom." It isn't something necessarily bad on its own but it's certainly an attribute that has been satirized with the rise of hipster culture, especially in regards to pop culture and music. So letting the author know I'm already aware of the problem he's talking about makes me feel hipster in that way. I think it's also important that I recognize that, while I may have already known about this issue (due to some news article I stumbled upon; couldn't even tell you how I found it, probably on some obscure subreddit somewhere), that still doesn't mean that people's ignorance isn't still a problem. I'm fascinated right now by grotesque things which is why it stuck with me. Also I believe the two self-immolaters I read about were among the youngest on record, 17 and 18 at the time.