Home > WHY MEDIA HIDE THE SUICID PROTEST OF MALACHI RITSCHER

WHY MEDIA HIDE THE SUICID PROTEST OF MALACHI RITSCHER

by Open-Publishing - Saturday 18 November 2006
2 comments

Music Wars and conflicts USA

I read to day ,in the french diary"Le Monde", this information :Emotion après l’immolation d’un musicien à Chicago pour protester contre la guerre en Irak( Emotion as a musician of Chicago immolate himself to protest against the war in Irak) .

http://www.lemonde.fr/web/article/0,1-0,36-834560,0.html

When the monks in Vietnam did this all the world had information . When Jan Palach in Czechoslovakia every body knew it .

We have to now and remember the act of Malachi Ritscher whose last words were "Thou Shalt Not Kill" .

Malachi Ritscher’s apparent suicide

by Peter Margasak on November 7th - 4:06 p.m.

http://blogs.chicagoreader.com/post-no-bills/2006/11/07/malachi-ritschers-apparent-suicide/

On Saturday the Sun-Times ran a small item about a man who had set himself on fire during rush hour Friday morning near the Ohio Street exit on the Kennedy. His identity has still not been officially determined, but members of the local jazz and improvised music community say they are certain it was Malachi Ritscher, a longtime supporter of the scene. Bruno Johnson, who owns the free-jazz label Okka Disk, received a package yesterday from Ritscher that included a will, keys to his home, and instructions about what should be done with his belongings. Johnson, a former Chicagoan who now lives in Milwaukee, began making calls. Police are still awaiting the results of dental tests, but Johnson says an officer told one of Ritscher’s sisters that all evidence pointed to the body being his; his car was found nearby and he hadn’t shown up for work since Thursday.

Buried on Ritscher’s web site Chicago Rash Audio Potential, a compendium of invaluable show postings, artwork, and photography, are a suicide note and an obituary. Both indicate that he was deeply troubled by the war in Iraq and pinpoint it as a motive for suicide (no method is specified), though there are indications that he may have had other issues as well. "He had a son, from whom he was estranged (at the son’s request), and two grandchildren," reads the obit. "He had many acquaintances, but few friends; and wrote his own obituary, because no one else really knew him." Ritscher was a familiar face at antiwar protests, and he was arrested more than once for his involvement, including this time this past May. A note found at the scene of the immolation reportedly read "Thou Shalt Not Kill."

Although Ritscher, who was in his early 50s, had played music off and on over the years, he was best known for his devotion to documenting other people’s shows. Several nights a week for at least the last decade he could be found at places like the Empty Bottle, the Velvet Lounge, and the Hungry Brain; by his own count he recorded more than 2,000 concerts. Over the years he invested more money in equipment and as his skills improved, many of his recordings went to be used on commerical releases—by Paul Rutherford, Gold Sparkle Band, Isotope 217, Irene Schweizer, and Ken Vandermark among others. Ritscher was fiercely modest about these pursuits—I once tried to do a piece on him for the Reader but he declined, saying he didn’t want publicity.

Feel free to contribute your own comments or memories below

Forum posts

  • MORE ABOUT MALACHI RITSCHER :

    Chicago Indymedia : http://chicago.indymedia.org

    ON NOV. 3RD, CHICAGOAN MALACHI RITSCHER IMMOLATED HIMSELF TO PROTEST THE WAR.

    Saturday Demo For Malachi and Against the War

    http://chicago.indymedia.org/newswire/display/74933/index.php

    Demonstration for Malachi Ritscher: Saturday, Nov. 18th, 1 p.m. at the Elastic Arts Foundation, 2830 N. Milwaukee Ave., 2nd Floor

    Details and destination site will be announced on-location. Sign-making materials will be provided. Bring a little cash to help cover expenses. It’s anticipated that people will be in action downtown by two-thirty.

    On November 3rd, Chicagoan Malachi Ritscher immolated himself in front of rush hour traffic to protest the war. The only objective news coverage it got was a tiny blurb in the back of the Sun-Times and a brief "breaking news" spot on a local TV station. Malachi’s friends and concerned citizens are planning a demonstration on Saturday to respond to the lack of coverage around Malachi’s death and to protest the war in Iraq.

    Demonstration for Malachi Ritscher
    Saturday, Nov. 18th, 1 p.m. at:
    The Elastic Arts Foundation
    2830 N. Milwaukee Ave.
    2nd Floor

    Details and destination site will be announced on-location. Sign-making materials will be provided. Bring a little cash to help cover expenses. It’s anticipated that people will be in action downtown by two-thirty.

    The following op-ed piece was written by Jennifer Diaz.

    I heard you, Malachi
    Jennifer Diaz
    November 9, 2006

    Did you ever burn your hand on a stove? Do you remember the pain of it?

    On Friday, November 3, a man doused his body with gasoline and set himself afire to protest the war in Iraq . He died quietly in flames. His name was Malachi Ritscher.

    Haven’t seen it in the news? Me neither, which is kind of strange if you ask me, considering that it happened right here in downtown Chicago in front of hundreds of commuters during morning rush hour. The only conventional newspaper coverage to date was a tiny paragraph that appeared in the Saturday edition of the Chicago Sun-Times. Since then...nothing.

    Should we concerned about the lack of coverage? This is serious, friends. You don’t have to be a communication scholar to know that the news media go by the maxim, "When it bleeds, it leads." In a time of intense controversy over war, a man offers up his life and endures prolonged, excruciating pain to make a tangible statement of his belief in peace - are we to believe that this isn’t newsworthy?

    When Thich Quang Duc, the Vietnamese Buddhist monk, set himself on fire in 1963 to protest the corrupt and brutal regime of Ngo Dinh Diem, it was all over the media. A lucid, well respected American citizen makes the ultimate sacrifice on American soil four days before a national election - I ask again: is there no story here?

    I would assert that there are two stories here. One is that A MAN SET HIMSELF ON FIRE NOVEMBER 3rd FOR WHAT HE BELIEVED IN. The other is that, in a society where a rogue government is afforded the power to "create reality" and where the once objective news media have become politicized conglomerates either owned by or cozy with the powers that they are supposed to be watchdogging, a lack of coverage on a newsworthy story warrants close scrutiny.

    Deeply disturbed by this event since I got word of it, I felt compelled to investigate it further. In memory of Mr. Ritscher, I write now of both stories.

    As you read, I implore you: agree or disagree, but do not be indifferent. This man’s message was important enough to him to choose an excruciatingly painful death - so that you and I would hear it.

    A traffic nuisance

    Malachi Ritscher had a home-made sign with him when he left the house Friday morning. Firefighters found it next to his charred remains. It read, "Thou shalt not kill."

    A jazz aficionado who produced professional recordings of countless performers in local venues, Ritscher was well loved in the Chicago jazz community and has been described by members of that scene as being a warm, modest and selfless individual. A long-time music enthusiast, Ritscher was a fixture at several local jazz haunts. He was said to be very generous - band members tell that he would pay the admission fee for their gig, record their performance, and then offer them the recording he had made free of charge. Many of the recordings were later sold commercially. Others corroborate Ritscher’s generous nature. "He gave me peppers from his garden!" cried bartender Janice W., tearing up when she heard what he had done.

    Ritscher was deeply disturbed by the United States’ waging of war in Iraq , which has led so far to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Iraqis. In his mission statement, posted on his homepage along with a self-written obituary, he writes of his morbid actions:

    "I refuse to finance the mass murder of innocent civilians...What is one more life thrown away in this sad and useless national tragedy? If one death can atone for anything, in any small way, to say to the world: I apologize for what we have done to you, I am ashamed for the mayhem and turmoil caused by my country."

    One can only imagine what Ritscher must have been thinking as he made his way to the site of his self-immolation - the aptly chosen "Flame of the Millenium" sculpture west of Chicago ’s downtown loop. Would Americans appreciate his sacrifice? Would it be a force for good in the world? One thing he surely didn’t expect, as he watched a sea of morning commuters crawl by on the nearby Kennedy expressway: that it would go unnoticed.

    But that is just what has happened. At some point after Ritscher’s ordeal began, a motorist called police to report that a statue was burning. Except for those who happened to read the blurb in the Sun-Times or to see a short "breaking news" spot on Chicago’s CBS2 local news station, the hundreds of motorists who drove by the incident still know it only as a traffic annoyance - that "statue-fire" that was slowing things up on the I-90 Friday morning.

    A different kind of news hole

    Because there has been no further coverage of it in any of the main news outlets, they - and most other Americans - will never know what Ritscher did - what one man was willing to do to make a difference in the world.

    "I don’t understand," people have told me. "Why wouldn’t the papers run it?" Their puzzlement comes from a lingering, tenacious belief in the objectivity of the news. Moments like these - high news value, no story - are particularly valuable in that they expose our news media for what they have become: corporate black boxes from which the only news that escapes is that which cooperates with profit margins and political allegiances.

    In the new era of "synergy," or coordinated advertising among corporate affiliates, media conglomerates have formed alliances with some of the (other) largest companies in the world. Time-Warner/AOL, the globe’s largest media conglomerate and owner of CNN, is affiliated with cooperative giant Kraft and Viacom, another corporate behemoth. Additionally, the generous campaign contributions invariably made by such conglomerates to politicians suggests another kind of synergy - a political one. As it pertains to objective news reporting, synergy means that there are more toes to step on - and therefore more rules to follow - about what types of stories reporters can run (and more importantly, not run).

    The fact that Ritscher’s bold anti-war message came right before an election, combined with the conspicuous lack of coverage on the event suggests a conservative bias to the news, not a liberal one, as goes the government-sanctioned myth on the topic.

    Some will suggest "copycat prevention" as an explanations for the lack of coverage; news outlets are known to occassionally self-censor sensational acts of murder or suicide in order to avoid glamorizing them and inspiring similar behavior in others. But they routinely break this rule when the murder or suicide is deemed important enough for the public to know about. Reports of school shootings have been followed by more school shootings, but we still hear of those. Why? Because the American public needs to know what’s going on in our schools. We also need to know the effect the war is having on its citizens.

    Ritscher’s passion

    Although his act might have had some influence on the midterm elections, had it been heard, the relevance of his message extends beyond any short term outcome. Instead, Ritscher entreats Americans to change their attitudes.

    Lamenting what he saw as a moral vacuousness in American culture, the would-be martyr felt that Americans are "...more concerned with sports on television and ring-tones on cell-phones than the future of the world." Ritscher saw the problem as being due to a gross deficiency of personal responsibility in American culture, and offered his self-immolation in a spirit of unified atonement.

    Some have suggested that Ritscher’s actions can be explained by mental illness. It seems clear that the man was deeply troubled. But it is not clear how that negates his message. At a time when 10% of Americans are taking psychiatric medication, the marginalization of "the mentally ill" as an identifiable group of people radically different from ourselves is making less and less sense. Besides "disturbed," Ritscher is also described by those who knew him as being an animated, friendly person who talked enthusiastically of his many interests and travels in addition to his political beliefs.

    Another description that people have applied to Ritscher’s mind-boggling choice is "senseless." But his own mission statement offers an elegant response to that notion:

    "My position is that I only get one death, I want it to be a good one. Wouldn’t it be better to stand for something or make a statement, rather than a fiery collision with some drunk driver? Are not smokers choosing death by lung cancer? Where is the dignity there? Are not the people the people [sic] who disregard the environment killing themselves and future generations?"

    In addition to intent, the mission statement reveals a strong sense of moral duty and a faith in the God of his understanding. In the document, he presents his act as an example of a lived, choice-based faith that he feels is lacking from modern religious life.

    In a gentle - but pointed - rebuke to Christian pop culture, which is said to have been a key factor in both of George W. Bush’s presidential campaigns, Ritscher asks, "Who would Jesus bomb?" And alluding to the intense and politicized culture warring of recent years, he implores Christians, Jews and Muslims alike to believe that "God’s message is tolerance and love, not self-righteousness and hatred."

    As beings we are born with a life currency and the administrative powers to spend it as we see fit. Some will denounce Malachi Ritcher for squandering his life-money. Others will love him for putting it where his mouth was. No matter where you fall on that continuum you must agree: his act should buy him more than a mere traffic mention. Unfortunately, all the papers want these days is the green stuff. —

    Jennifer Diaz is a graduate student of communication at the University of Illinois at Chicago . She can be contacted at iheardyoumalachi.org or at indiejennn (at) gmail.com.

    More resources:

    Ritscher homepage, "Mission Statement":
    www.savagesound.com/gallery99.htm
    Ritscher homepage, Obituary:
    www.savagesound.com/gallery100.htm
    Ritscher homepage, March, 2005 protest:
    www.savagesound.com/gallery83.htm
    Sun-Times article:
    www.suntimes.com/news/metro/123692,CST-NWS-bodyfire04.article
    CBS2 news spot:
    cbs2chicago.com/local/local_story_307085813.html
    Chicago Reader online music blog:
    blogs.chicagoreader.com/post-no-bills/2006/11/07/malachi-ritschers-apparent-suicide/
    FAIR media watchgroup:
    www.fair.org/index.php

    **More links, as of Nov. 13:

    Main website:
    www.iheardyoumalachi.org
    Good blog entry:
    bicycle-diaries.blogspot.com/2006/11/political-suicide.html
    Recent Suntimes column pieces:
    www.suntimes.com/news/roeper/126361,CST-NWS-roep07.article
    www.suntimes.com/news/roeper/130292,cst-nws-roep09.article
    Wikipedia entries:
    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malachi_Ritscher
    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-immolation
    Malachi list of recordings: www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll|RITSCHER&sql=11:l6ue4j674waw~T4http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&searchlink=MALACHI|RITSCHER&sql=11:l6ue4j674waw~T4

    • Your post information - and your practical reflective commentary - along with the Links that you provided on this very important event: may perhaps function as a gathering point for a few ethical, and honest people to contact each other. If more perceptive, courageous people CONTACT each other they will become in effect one more small added pressure that ousts the despicable, greedy liars who are responsible for all this TORTURE and slaughter of Afghans, Iraqis, Palestinians and Arabs in general, in the world - along with the world’s continued poverty.

      Thanks very much for this effort you have made.

      I will be in touch with you.

      Mark At gordonmark5@yahoo.com