https://husseini.substack.com/p/self-immolator-matt-nelson-reportedly
Last night I was on Flashpoints with Dennis Bernstein about Matt Nelson, who is by all indications the person who immolated themselves across from the Israeli consulate in Boston on Sept.
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They were suicidal
I've not heard any reporting say this. I've seen internet commenters presume this, but just because someone engaged in an action that could result in their death, doesn't mean they're suicidal.
Starting ones self on fire is a suicide attempt, regardless of political motive. This isn't the same as sky diving or even trying to see the Titanic in a carbon fiber pod, this is pure and simple, self immolation to death that failed, so far.
You are technically correct, which I hear is the best kind. Equating this individuals self-immolation to draw attention to and emphasize the situation in Gaza to someone who is struggling with mental health is disingenuous.
Starting ones self on fire is a suicide attempt, regardless of political motive.
Is being a soldier assigned to conduct an assault operation also a suicide attempt?
Knowingly doing something that might kill you is not the sole criteria for a suicide attempt. If they weren't suicidal it wasn't a suicide attempt.
Trying to take your own life out of depression and being willing to give your life to a cause differ in intent, goals, context and likely methods.
What benefits do you see from classifying them as the same thing? They seem very different to me.
Suicide: the act or an instance of taking one's own life voluntarily and intentionally
You shouldn't try to answer clinical questions with Merriam-Webster. It's a very redditor thing to do and just as incorrect as that would suggest.
Lol. I'm a therapist, and you're being pedantic. Suicide means killing yourself. He may not have been clinically "suicidal" but he still attempted suicide
Edit: I thought you were the original commenter when I said you were being pedantic
I agree, but Merriam-Webster remains a bad way to try to squash claims of nuance. You are correct independent of the bad and redditor-esque method of argument you chose. You should know very well that texts with actual authority exist that better establish these things, like the DSM in this case.
There is a substantial difference between "being suicidal" in the clinical sense and having decided to commit suicide. We have no reason to believe, lacking an avenue for the "self expression" of immolation, that he would have jumped from a bridge or hung himself in the attic. As far as we can tell, he looked at the present political situation and judged that the most effective thing he could do to accomplish what he believed had to be accomplished was by doing something that required the investment of dying. That's not the same thing as "being suicidal", though you and I both disagree with his choice for our respective reasons.