I remember the first time that I encountered "self-immolation." I was in high school, studying in an empty science lab for a test, when I came across a picture that was forever imprinted on my mind. The picture was of a man sitting cross-legged and meditating silently, but he was completely engulfed in flames. Initially, I didn't understand that at which I was looking. I couldn't process the picture in front of me. I was filled with shock. What led to this horror? Why was he burning? Did he do this himself? What would bring him to do such a thing? These questions rattled my mind; I was unable to understand this harrowing photograph, this paradoxical burning. What forces could ignite such action? On June 11, 1963, Thích Quảng Đức self-immolated in Saigon, South Vietnam. [1] An elderly Vietnamese Buddhist monk, Quảng Đức lit himself on fire to protest the persecution of Buddhists in South Vietnam by the Diệm regime.[2] Under the then-current regime of Ngô Đình Diệm, Bu...