Op-Ed: No One Came To My Self-Immolation For Climate Change And That’s What Hurt The Most
I told them it was going to be the hottest event of the year—in retrospect that was probably overselling it. Perhaps they misunderstood the liberal use of literal emojis on my Twitter post about it. I probably should have hired an event planner.
I had the most fire playlist, too. Some Rage Against the Machine for the immolating moment, then some Ben Harper during the final burn down, and, if we made it that far before being overtaken by weeping sympathetic mobs, some Enya whale songs. It turns out my Bluetooth speaker was kicked over by a DC police officer who attempted to extinguish me. So, mood ruined.
As a scientist, I understand the importance of documentation, so the photographer I hired did get some excellent party pics, including some great before and after shots. Unfortunately, the only photo that got any attention was the headshot the news sites pulled from my university department website. I heard that the photographer turned the raw files of my last moments into a series of NFTs, but sadly I don’t think she’s donating the proceeds to fight climate change.
That was the theme of the whole thing: Burning For Change ’22. I even made T-shirts (with a hastily appropriated Miami Heat logo), but no one else ordered any, and mine is illegible now. You can imagine how I felt: everything set up and ready to go, the playlist bumping, the photographer in place, myself installed in a beatific pose sitting at the plaza by the Supreme Court building, body glistening with a vaseline-olive-oil mixture, match in hand, and just no one showing up. Not even my mother.
I watched each person that walked by, expecting that at any moment, some of them would turn to me and say something like, “oh, is this the place” and then slowly notice the photographer and start to bop their heads to the music, make their way over to the tray of crudité and soft drinks. But none did.
Remembering that people often like being fashionably late, I asked my photographer to check the Facebook event and see how many were “Going” or “Interested.” She said she couldn’t find the event page, but I think she was just being kind because I know she had already marked herself “Interested”.
For a few moments, I wondered what to do. Maybe I should pack it up and try again next month when people might be less busy. This is always such a busy time of year for climate stuff and it's hard to compete in general with summer events. A lot of people were at the beach when I was burning alive.
My first thought after striking the match was, “I’m doing it! I’m lighting the spark that will blaze like a California wildfire across the conscience of a nation!”
My second thought was, “ow, fuck!”
But the worst feeling is that no one noticed except the police who tried to extinguish me with their water bottles. And, of course, the photographer, but she was paid to be there. Though I saw that she did help herself to the crudité.
