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Palestinian town of Jericho names street after US soldier who set himself on fire (www.theguardian.com)

submitted 10 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

82 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Aaron Bushnell, who died last month, ‘sacrificed everything’ for Palestinians, says mayor of Jericho

A few of the initial paragraphs for context follow - but the article is worth reading fully:

The Palestinian town of Jericho has named a street after Aaron Bushnell, the US air force member who set himself on fire outside the Israeli embassy in Washington to protest against the war in Gaza.

The 25-year-old, who died on 25 February, “sacrificed everything” for Palestinians, said the mayor of Jericho, Abdul Karim Sidr, as the street sign was unveiled on Sunday.

“We didn’t know him, and he didn’t know us. There were no social, economic or political ties between us. What we share is a love for freedom and a desire to stand against these attacks [on Gaza],” the mayor told a small crowd gathered on the new Aaron Bushnell Road.

Bushnell livestreamed his self-immolation on the social media platform Twitch, declaring he would “no longer be complicit in genocide” and shouting “free Palestine” as he started the fire. Law enforcement officials put out the flames, but he died in hospital several hours later.

Israel’s offensive in Gaza has killed more than 31,000 people, the majority of them women and children, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory. The war was triggered by the cross border attack on 7 October when Hamas killed about 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and kidnapped 250 people.

Even as governments in Europe and the US have largely continued to back Israel’s campaign in Gaza as part of the country’s right to self-defence, Palestinians have taken heart from popular protests held from Michigan to Madrid.

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[–] [email protected] 109 points 10 months ago (13 children)

I still question the intentions of the media and how a lot of outlets immediate ran to claim his actions as mental health related.

Like sure, I can see where that's coming from in a sense since self-immolation is inherently self-harm and you have to question a person's mental health for doing so, but at the same time, I don't know of anybody off-hand who says the same about the Buddhist monks who did the same in Vietnam.

Maybe times have changed and people don't see that action the same way as they used to back then, but if they are going to call this a result of mental health, I really hope they keep consistency with that from here on forward.

[–] [email protected] 71 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Mental health is a scapegoat for reasonable reactions to the absolutely horrible times we are living through.

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[–] [email protected] 42 points 10 months ago

Someone does something crazy for a cause I agree with -> Heroic, valiant, inspiring

Someone does something crazy for a cause I disagree with -> Mentally ill, traumatised, brainwashed

Lest I'd have to begin to consider I might have been supporting monsters all along.

[–] [email protected] 30 points 10 months ago

The only mental health issues I see are from the people in power that stand by and let these atrocities go unchecked.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)

I still question the intentions of the media and how a lot of outlets immediate ran to claim his actions as mental health related.

They're beholden to Zionists.

They don't report in good faith.

Ex: Israeli prisoners are "hostages" while Palestinian prisoners are "detainees."

This whole shitshow is a case study of propaganda and indoctrination, along with the war in Ukraine.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 10 months ago (4 children)

along with the war in Ukraine

What exactly do you mean?

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[+] [email protected] 78 points 10 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (5 children)

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[–] [email protected] 16 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)

There was that Islamophobic Buddhist monk who self-immolated in Sri Lanka in 2013 to protest Muslim butchers. People across the spectrum weighed in on the idea of burning yourself alive to protect cattle. I don't recall anyone calling it crazy then. At most, reprehensible, misguided, etc. But the idea you'd kill yourself to protest the treatment of cattle/Muslim butchers wasn't considered "crazy" at the time.

The line seems to be when you'd do it not just for cattle, but also for Palestinians? Is that the conclusion I'm supposed to draw? That's when self-immolation starts becoming "crazy?"

[–] [email protected] 4 points 10 months ago (1 children)

No, the difference is the person who did it. You're probably reading western news and opinions. Those people feel like they have a similar perspective to Bushnell, which they probably don't feel they share with a Sri Lankan monk, so they don't judge- but they do judge the person they relate to. To make it related to just US politics for example, if someone self-immolated in either support or opposition of Trump then most Americans would consider them crazy.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 10 months ago

I'm actually ok with people self-immolating in support of Trump.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 10 months ago

That's so accurate.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (4 children)

I really don't understand, my definition of Liberal has always been "Favoring reform, open to new ideas, and tolerant of the ideas and behavior of others; not bound by traditional thinking; broad-minded" which is something I subscribe to. Before I came to lemmy I never even heard of people refer to liberals as anything other than that.

Now if you were to say "Liberal Party of NY" or "Liberal Party of Canada" etc then I can see how more specific political beliefs across their ranks could be made points out of, but if you just say all Liberals then you sound like a frother to me.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 10 months ago (1 children)

What they mean is neo-liberal which requires some reading. “Classical” liberal politics has been dead for a few decades.

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[–] [email protected] 9 points 10 months ago

Beyond accurate. Malcolm X and Dr King were both correct how Liberals stand in the way of progress.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 10 months ago

At some recent point, we decided that clearly ambiguous, philosophical questions had hard, fast, and absolute answers.

[–] [email protected] 36 points 10 months ago (6 children)

You know this article pissed me off with the self-immolation bit.

Self Immolation in protest couldn't be from preexisting mental illness. He clearly was emotionally impacted by his experience in the environment enough that his rational brain thought that by assuming such agonizing pain and stating the protest, the message would get heard a squeak louder.

Suicidal people don't think rationally. They want the pain to end. Or they become wildly careless. They don't sit there and go "how do I accomplish some good and end my suffering " while selecting the second worst way to die.

[–] [email protected] 22 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)

While I 100% agree with your interpretation in this case, I'm sure we can agree that "mentally ill person setting themselves on fire because the voices in their head told them too" is a plausible scenario. Self-immolation itself can absolutely be mental illness.

This was not mental illness.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 10 months ago

You won't ever know if it was or wasn't a mental illness and stating it as fact that it wasn't is about as misguided as the press calling it 100% a mental illness.

The thing about a mental illness is it's not always visible, not always curable. There is a tiny red line that stands between a person killing themselves in protest, and because of a mental illness.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 10 months ago

I agree with most of your comment, but when I was suicidal I absolutely was looking for ways to achieve something good through my death.

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[–] [email protected] 27 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)

See, in order to assume his act was "crazy," we have to start by making it a normative principle nobody should ever lay down their life for others. I think the divergence over whether his act was political or was he automatically crazy boils down to: are you a bootlicker?

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[–] [email protected] 11 points 10 months ago (4 children)

Wasn't Jericho destroyed by the ark of the covenant or something?

[–] [email protected] 24 points 10 months ago (1 children)

No, it was destroyed by angry men screaming and blowing horns until the walls gave up.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

Heck, it would be cooler if it were destroyed by plasma glassing by the scarier Covenant from Halo, not that pitiful ark from the bible tales /S

[–] [email protected] 8 points 10 months ago

Nope. Just like most of the early books of the Old Testament, that was pure fiction.

https://www.britannica.com/video/179549/Battle-of-Jericho-archaeologists-event-Book-Joshua

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[–] [email protected] 9 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Airmen. He wasn’t a soldier.

[–] [email protected] 45 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Airman, not plural

[–] [email protected] 28 points 10 months ago (2 children)

Airperson, not gendered.

[–] [email protected] 34 points 10 months ago (2 children)

Airbeing, not specied.

[–] [email protected] 31 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Airbender, not avatar.

[–] [email protected] 21 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Air, not solid.

[–] [email protected] 18 points 10 months ago

Nair, not hair.

Also, this is the most Reddit I have seen come from Lemmy, which simultaneously entertains and worries me.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)