Suicide Contagion

I just read a breaking news item in Aljazeera that an Egyptian man has burnt himself in front of the Egytpian parliament. Obviously, the man is seeking to emulate the now mythical Mohammed Bou Azizi who single-handedly sparked the Tunisia revolution by setting himself on fire in frustration.

I remember reading somewhere that public suicides are contagious (I think it was in a Malcolm Gladwel book). I looked it up and turns out suicide contagion is a well documented observation.

But that doesn’t mean that whenever someone burns one’s self, a revolution will take hold. That’s because the copycats won’t have the same effect as the trail blazer. The Egyptian man won’t be able to shock his people the same way Bou Azizi did. He has lost the power of originality. Unfortunately, his death and that of all other would-be Bou Azizis will be in vain.