Citation

Park BCB. Suicidol. Online 2015; 6(2): 69-85.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2015, The author(s), Publisher Medical University of Vienna, Department of Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy)

DOI

unavailable

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

This exploratory study compares the act of self-immolation in Korea and Vietnam with the acts of suicide attackers in Palestine. Both of these self-destructive behaviors are intentionally committed as a means of conveying a challenge or a message, to one's own group as well as to the powerful group against which their groups were struggling, that more should be done to overcome wrongs or injustices. Based on an analysis of suicide notes, this piece not only identifies important similarities and differences between these self- immolators and those who killed themselves for Palestinian and radical Islamic causes but also finds interesting developmental problems of those politically-motivated youth suicides, a controversial but little studied phenomenon which has had profound impacts on modern societies.

Keywords: self-immolation, suicide attack, public self-destruction, altruistic/fatalistic suicide, politically intended act

Copyrights belong to the Author(s). Suicidology Online (SOL) is a peer-reviewed open-access journal publishing under the Creative Commons Licence 3.0.

Language: en