Just yesterday, a man died in Brisbane, Australia. He self immolated, reportedly after going through the family court system.
Let me repeat that. After experiencing the family court in Australia, the man doused himself with gasoline and set himself afire, resulting in 3rd degree burns to over 90% of his body. The scene was apparently so disturbing that the local police who responded would not comment on what they saw.
There is something else that was set afire in the aftermath of this tragedy. The facts, and the main one being that this type of death only really disturbs those who have it shoved in their face as an occupational hazard.
After searching through several on-line news accounts of what happened, most of them reported that he was a 39 year old man who had received a bad outcome in the family court (imagine that). Two of them said he was 60 years old, and one of those said his suicide was unrelated to the family court.
What none of them even attempted to do was tell us this man’s story. Not of his life, and not really of his death, save the headline value of such gruesome business. For underneath the headline, we learned more about his burning body for the traffic problems it caused than for why he set himself on fire in the first place. There was one story, the one that quoted an unnamed police as source saying the event had nothing to do with court proceedings, also said that he was “mentally ill.”
As usual with the mainstream media, it is headlines first, facts a distant second. So we may never know what happened or why. But it would be hard to argue against the possibility of an impaired mental state in anyone who would choose death, especially in such a horrifying and painful manner. The problem here is that with men, that emotional dysfunction is not a reason to ask more questions, but the main reason to quit asking questions at all.
He was mentally ill, end of story.
Such was also the case of 26 year old Daniel Shaull, who died Wednesday after setting himself on fire in front of a fur store in Portland, Oregon. Of course, he was mentally ill, as well. We needn’t bother with exploring that any more.
And that is what it is like for men lost for a million unknown reasons. They were crazy; they were impediments to traffic; they were less column space than your average classified ad.
They were just more dead men.
And as we live in a culture that has men committing suicide at epidemic rates in much less newsworthy fashion, we can, at least in this corner of the manosphere, take pause to wonder:
What would the reaction be if women were lighting themselves up in the streets?
Perhaps those that continue to deny that the world is woman centered will answer that one. But of course I have an answer of my own. I wonder if that fact that the world actually cares about the lives of women has anything to do with the fact that they are so much less likely to kill themselves?
Nah, that can’t be it.
Right?
