Bushnell's friend, a conscientious objector named Levi Pierpont, met Bushnell in 2020 during basic training at an air force base in Texas. When you watch the interview you can immediately see why the two clicked; Pierpont has the same tender, gentle air to him that Bushnell displayed in his final video, very much unlike what you picture when you think of members of the world's most murderous and destructive military. Neither of them belonged there, and they each took their exit in their own way.

Toward the end of the interview, longtime Democracy Now host Amy Goodman asked Pierpont a question which drew an answer that's worth highlighting and reflecting upon.

"Would Aaron have described this as suicide?" Goodman asked Pierpont.

"No, absolutely not," Pierpont replied, adding, "He didn't have thoughts of suicide. He had thoughts of justice. That's what this was about. It wasn't about his life. It was about using his life to send a message."

This point is worthy of our consideration at this time because as soon as it became clear what Aaron Bushnell had done and the impact it was having on our collective consciousness, there was a mad rush to pathologize his act of protest and frame it as something other than what it was. The phrase "glorifying suicide" came up over and over again from Israel apologists desperate to mitigate the damage Bushnell's act had done to US and Israeli information interests, and we constantly saw Bushnell described as mentally ill and suicidal by spinmeisters acting in bad faith.