Human beings burn surprisingly quickly….. "This is how David - TopicsExpress



          

Human beings burn surprisingly quickly….. "This is how David Halberstam, the New York Times journalist who witnessed the event [of the]…self-immolation of Thích Quàng Đúc (the Vietnamese Buddhist monk who set himself on fire in June 1963, to protest the persecution of Buddhists under the Ngô Đình Diem regime)…, describes what happened: Flames were coming from a human being; his body was slowly withering and shriveling up, his head blackening and charring. In the air was the smell of burning human flesh; human beings burn surprisingly quickly. Behind me I could hear the sobbing of the Vietnamese who were now gathering....As he burned he never moved a muscle, never uttered a sound, his outward composure in sharp contrast to the wailing people around him.” Source: Costica Bradatan, “A Light for the Future: On the Political Uses of a Dying Body,” DISSENT: A Quarterly of Politics and Culture, May 23, 2011.
Posted on: Wed, 18 Sep 2013 18:56:02 +0000

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