Burning

I think that some of the major differences between Thich Quang Duc (The Burning Monk) and Mohamed Bouazizi is that Thich Quang Duc did it for his religion. I’m not saying what he did was right but in my eyes that is a little more acceptable but not okay. I think that Bouazizi did what he did because he was fed up with being treated the way he was. He wanted to be treated fairly and as an equal. He didn’t like how the government could just come up and take his scale and make him pay money for it back. Why he took those kinds of measures I have absolutely no idea. But Thich Quang Duc did it for his religion. He did not agree with the fact that the government could ban them from what they believed in especially because it was his belief. I think that he took to action like that because he wanted to show the government that people did not agree with this and it was there religion. So in both cases they wanted to show that the government had no right to do what they did but they were done for different reasons. I think that both of there messages were right but the way they were executed was wrong. I found it very interesting that the Buddhist religion does not believe in suicide but this act of defiance was classified as a way to call attention to Duc’s case, a religious suicide.


From the remains
of his cremation,
the monks recovered
the seat of Thich Quang Duc's
consciousness—
a bloodless protest
to awaken the heart
of the oppressor
offered
at the crossing of
Phanh Dinh Phung
& Le Van Duyet
doused in gasoline &
immolated by 4-meter
flames the orange-robed
arhat folded in
the stillness
of full lotus
his body withering
his crown blackening
his flesh charring
his corpse collapsing
his heart refusing to burn
his heart refusing to burn
his heart refusing to burn

This shows that it was a terrible act and it shouldn’t have come to this that a man shouldn’t have to kill himself for people to realize that this is what some one has faith in and that this shouldn’t have been the only option to get people’s attention.

Discussion question (sort of): Do you think that it is okay for what the Monk did because he was doing it for his religion?