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The Death Of Christopher McCandless ("Into The Wild")

It has seem weird to me the shear amount of interest in the guy who seems as misguided as that missionary who tried to canoe to one of the the last remote tribes and got killed. But what elements if the story make him an ideal to some and not the passionate preacher? The attempt to live outside of society's bounds? The fact that he died?

Interesting question ...

Off hand, I'd say the difference derives from the contexts in which each person (however misguidedly or unwisely) pursued his personal quest.

McCandless set off to risk himself (and himself alone) in pursuit of his own personal objective (fulfillment; isolation; whatever ... ). He did so by trekking off into the wide open spaces. Neither his objective(s) nor his actions intruded on anyone else. McCandless offered himself up to fate to see whether he could survive. He couldn't, but he gets credit for having tried.

Chau, on the other hand, set off to risk himself and others (via illegal actions and possible infection) in pursuit of an objective that involved acceptance, if not compliance, by others - in this case an indigenous group that had made it clear they would tolerate no visits, much less any intrusions on their beliefs or allegiances. Chau offered himself up to fate to see whether he could influence others who clearly didn't wish to be influenced.

McCandless was conducting an experiment in personal development. Chau was pulling a stunt aimed at miraculously imposing his belief system on an obviously unwilling audience.
 
Many, many people go through this internal existential struggle and have a personal quest to find themselves and their own definition of happiness. One of those routes is to become a hermit, an explorer, a tramp.
I understand this myself a bit because I once entertained this notion of dropping out and becoming a tramp. Ditching worldly demands upon my time and energy, dropping the need to become tied to materialistic possessions, that kind of thing.
I eventually snapped out of that mode of thinking as I got older, although I do still (mostly) live a reclusive existence.
 
...McCandless was conducting an experiment in personal development. Chau was pulling a stunt aimed at miraculously imposing his belief system on an obviously unwilling audience.

Precisely. McCandless was trying to teach one man how to live his life. Chau was one man trying to tell an entire group of other people how to live theirs. McCandless may have been misguided - his actions may have had knock on effects which inevitably involved other people, but I'd argue that his levels of presumption in regard to his own rectitude were way at the opposite end of the scale from Chau.
 
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