- This is an article on the ritualistic suicide practice. For the record company, see Self Immolation.
Self-immolation is often used to refer to suicide by fire. The Latin root of immolate means sacrifice, rather than referring to burning, so more generally self-immolation means suicide without specifying the method.[1][2] It is also called bonzo because Buddhist monks self-immolated in protest of the Vietnamese regimen in 1963. In English literature prior to the mid-20th century, Buddhist monks were often referred to by the term bonze, particularly when describing monks from East Asia and French Indochina. This term is derived via Portuguese and French from the Japanese word bons- for a priest or monk, and has become less common in modern literature.
History
Self-immolation is tolerated by Mahayana Buddhism and Hinduism, and it has been practiced for many centuries, especially in India, for various reasons, including Sati, political protest, devotion, and renouncement. Certain warrior cultures, such as in the Charans and Rajputs, also practiced self-immolation.
During the Great Schism of the Russian Church, entire villages of Old Believers burned themselves to death in an act known as "fire baptism". Scattered instances of self-immolation have also been recorded by the Jesuit priests of France in the early 1600s. Their practice of this was not intended to be fatal, though. They would burn certain parts of their bodies (limbs such as the forearm, the thigh) to signify the pain Jesus endured while upon the cross. [3]
A number of Buddhist monks (including Thích Qu-ng --c, pictured) self-immolated in protest of the discriminatory treatment endured by Buddhists under the authoritarian administration of President Ngô -ình Di-m in South Vietnam - even though violence against oneself is prohibited by most interpretations of Buddhist doctrine.
These events spawned a large number of self-immolations in protest to the Vietnam War.
In 1970, Kostas Georgakis a Greek Geology student at the University of Genoa, set himself on fire in protest of the oppressive Greek military junta of 1967-1974.
Czech students Jan Palach and Jan Zajíc and Czech businessman Ev-en Plocek performed self-immolation in 1969 to protest the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia of August 1968. Polish philosopher Ryszard Siwiec did the same in September 1968 in Warsaw to protest against the involvement of Polish troops in this invasion.
Sándor Bauer and Marton Moyses were Hungarians who committed self-immolation as a political protest respectively against the Hungarian and Romanian communist regimes in 1969-1970.
University of California, San Diego student George Winne Jr., protesting the Vietnam War, self-immolated on May 10, 1970 at the university's Revelle Plaza before dying the next day.
Lutheran pastor Oskar Brüsewitz killed himself by self-immolation August 22, 1976, protesting the East German communist regime.
Crimean Tatar named Musa Mamut set himself on fire in protest against violations of the individual rights of the Crimean Tatars by Soviet regime. He lived for five days, dying from his burns on June 28, 1978. Before dying, he is reported to have said, -I feel the pain of every Tatar who is not allowed to return to his Crimean homeland.-
Artin Penik, a Turkish-Armenian set himself on fire protesting the 1982 ASALA attack at Esenbo-a International Airport in which they opened fire on travellers in a crowded waiting room.
Sebastián Acevedo was a Chilean miner who committed self-immolation on November 1983 as a protest against the kidnapping of his children by the Chilean police during the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet[4].
On April 29, 1993, Graham Bamford doused himself with gasoline and set himself on fire in front the British House of Commons in London. Bamford did it in hope to draw attention to atrocities committed the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina particularly the Ahmi-i massacre.
Kathy Change was a West Philadelphian performance artist and activist who killed herself in an act of self-immolation on the University of Pennsylvania campus in 1996.
Alfredo Ormando, an Italian writer, burned himself alive in Saint Peter's Square, in Vatican City on 13 January 1998, in protest against the Roman Catholic Church's policy of condemning homosexual acts as sinful.
In April 2001, Shahraz Kayani, a Pakistani refugee settled in Australia set himself alight on the steps of Parliament House, Canberra. Dying days later in hospital, he was protesting against the refusal of the government to grant the entry of his wife and daughters into Australia, one of whom suffered from Cerebral Palsy.[5]
In 2001 a group of people self-immolated in Tiananmen Square, Beijing, China, known as the Tiananmen Square self-immolation incident. China Central Television broadcast the event nationally on Chinese new year and claimed the immolators were practitioners of the Falun Gong. Falun Gong supporters point to inconsistencies in state media reports and maintain it was setup by the Chinese government to persecute the group.[6]
Malachi Ritscher was a Chicago musician and anti-war protester who committed suicide in 2006 by self-immolation as a political protest against the War in Iraq.
In 2008 Son Jong Hoon attempted self-immolation to halt the Olympic torch; however, he was intercepted by police before he could set fire to himself.
On August 9, 2008, Dean Lorenzo Turnbull Jr. of Waldorf, Maryland committed suicide by setting his house on fire and refusing to leave.[7]
On October 1, 2008, the indigenous Mexican leader Ramiro Guillén Tapia attempted self-immolation during an act of protest against the local government in the city of Xalapa, Veracruz, Mexico. He died the day after.
On October 30, 2008, a former staff member of the University of Washington self-immolated at the campus's Red Square. He was 61 years old.[8]
On Halloween night, October 31, 2008, a University of Rochester student was found scorched beyond recognition in a remote area of Mt. Hope Cemetery beside a gas can and a book bag after security personnel reported a fire. The apparent self-immolation victim is currently unidentified.[9]
See also
References
- The Copycat Effect. New York: Paraview Pocket-Simon and Schuster, 2004, ISBN 0743482239
External links
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