[HN Gopher] Buddhism has found a new institutional home in the W... ___________________________________________________________________ Buddhism has found a new institutional home in the West: the corporation Author : bryanrasmussen Score : 154 points Date : 2022-07-12 07:33 UTC (15 hours ago) (HTM) web link (www.guernicamag.com) (TXT) w3m dump (www.guernicamag.com) | whatever1 wrote: | Nothing new. Religion was always used to keep the oppressed in | check. | | Because you know what happens here is not a big deal. You will | get somehow rewarded for your hardships after you kick the | bucket. | | Also it's a great tool to rally people to a cause. And can | generate cash! | | Best idea ever. | labrador wrote: | > Silicon Valley is the latest player in a history of Western | appropriation of Buddhism | | Well it works both ways with many Asians appropriating | Christianity | | /sarcasm | pessimizer wrote: | The reason you appropriate Christianity is to get some of that | colonizer cash or, farther back, under pain of torture and | death. | labrador wrote: | Corporations are pushing Buddhist mindfulness to calm | employees down, get them to pay attention to their job and | thus increase productivity and their bottom line. It's a win | win! | EdwardDiego wrote: | I get a little tired of Western adoption of values or ideas from | non-Western cultures being called "appropriation". | affgrff2 wrote: | I agree, that is rather stupid. There is a point in the concept | of appropriation if a group actually is negatively affected, | but there should be no IP on ideas on how to live a good life. | blippage wrote: | I agree. The word "appropriation" heavily connotes an | interpretation as theft, and therefore bad. But cultures never | exist in a vacuum, there's always cross-pollination, | inspiration and adaption of ideas. I see this as a good, rather | than bad, thing. Some people make out that their cultural | artefacts are theirs, and theirs alone. | | But I still see that there is a problem with Buddhism being | used in corporate America. It smacks too much of a kind of | "spiritual materialism" for want of better words, which is | precisely the kind of thing that won't work. | | Rather than say "appropriation", I'd say that Buddhism has been | "misappropriated" would be an apt description in this instance. | I reiterate that words like "appropriation" and | "misappropriation" must be used only in rare cases. | | Buddhism does have a place in the West, but I'd prefer people | to seek guidance from genuine monks rather than laymen who | style themselves as "trainers". | pessimizer wrote: | Far more people are tired of Westerners blacking up, dressing | up in a parody of the people that they colonized and doing a | little dance that seems like something a native would do, which | is why it's a discussion now. | lmm wrote: | Citation needed. Is it really far more people, or just a few | more influential (mostly western or westernised and upper- | class) people? | EdwardDiego wrote: | Right. But how does that apply to Buddhism? Haven't noticed | much blackface at the local Buddhist Association. | solardev wrote: | Oops, looks like your mindfulness has expired! Would you like to | renew it for $4.99? | hkt wrote: | Being bullied into long hours by your boss? Why not try a | breathing exercise! | InCityDreams wrote: | Non-reincarnationists hate this trick to get more work | done.... | eurasiantiger wrote: | This Silicon Valley startup only hires unicorns -- | literally | Existenceblinks wrote: | Ironically, it's expired and renew in every point in time. Even | Arahants couldn't stand still in provocative environments. | "Mindfulness" is weird english word that doesn't translate well | into what it actually is. I would describe the state of mind | like "nothingness of soul". At the end of the day, as I | understand, Buddhism is about observing things from distance | (even mind detached from everything, eventually until there is | no mind/soul at all), like "it is what it is". Anger, love, | stress whatever comes and go. Urhggg oh my .. buddhist, the | more I describe the more it becomes inaccurate. | Cthulhu_ wrote: | lmao, reminds me of when in response to a lot of people being | overworked and unable to work, they decided to offer a free | subscription to a mindfulness app. | | I mean, have you tried reducing workload first? | elcapitan wrote: | Ah, the Gavin Belson school of enlightenment. | pc2g4d wrote: | "Chen: What we see is the erasure of Buddhism as a religion or | tradition that Asians or Asian Americans can claim or identify | with." | | She writes from a race-essentialist framing to a degree and that | drives me crazy. | | "white Americans" "white Westerners" x6 | | There's a sort of cultural appropriation shame being layered here | ---as if it's bad to have light skin and be interested in | Buddhism, or adapt Buddhism to your existing worldview. | | If it were non-white people who predominantly led this movement | in the US, she would be praising their adaptability as they | syncretized a religion to meet their needs. | | And are there really no black or latino or asian practitioners of | this kind of Buddhism? Of course there are. | | There's a "cool" factor of foregrounding race these days and I | don't think it's healthy. Westernized Buddhism isn't exclusive to | any race, nor is being "Western". Why reinforce the lines between | racial categories like this, further reifying them? | | That said, I appreciate the critique of corporation-as-organized- | religion. The decline in institutional religion in America has | left exactly the void that is being filled here, but with | probably more fucked up motives than your typical church. At | least when you would leave your employment, you wouldn't get | kicked out of your congregation. But if your employment _is_ your | "congregation"... | | Separation of church and work might not be a bad principle. | thisiscorrect wrote: | Somehow these arguments about cultural appropriation only ever | go one way. I've never heard anyone claim that it's cultural | appropriation when non-Westerners adopt -- and benefit from -- | various Western schools of thought. I've never felt the urge to | gate-keep, say, the germ theory of disease from non-Westerners. | What right do I have to do that? What write does the author | have to gate-keep Buddhism? Why do people do this? | [deleted] | esics6A wrote: | Jokes on the writer because Buddhism originated in India and | evolved from Hinduism and spread as far as Southern Russia and | Central Asia in addition to East Asia and Southeast Asia where | it become popular. Ignorant people everywhere these days get to | write articles who don't have basic history lessons. We learned | this in high school also about Ashoka and how the Indian | emperor spread Buddhism literally everywhere in the world. But | whatever racists aren't known for their learning, understanding | or intelligence. | SunlightEdge wrote: | There is a zen buddhist saying "Be careful not to stink of zen". | And it can apply both to Buddhism as practised in the west and | the east. Its a slightly... provoking saying though, as it may | offend other Buddhist practitioners. | | Zen Buddhism (from Japan/China) can of course vary greatly from | Theravada Buddhism (found in South and South-East Asia). However | I would say, that there seems to me much more variety of Buddhist | schools in zen Buddhism (Japan) and what they believe and | practice than in Buddhism as practised in Thailand, Cambodia etc. | | Buddhism is quite fluid even in Asia - but I do think that its | right that the Buddhism that is in the west (mostly influenced | from Japan zen schools - e.g. soto) came from a more idealised | version than is practiced often in the east. | | There was an article in the BBC a while back (can try and find if | people want) that noted that Buddhism as practised in the west | had issues as it promoted a 'cold selfish' side of Buddhism (it | pointed to some studies of people that meditate feeling less | guilty if they commited a crime). This differed from how its | mostly used in Asia where compassion/karmic practice/social works | and community are more encouraged. | | Personally I wouldn't trust any Buddhist practice organized by a | company - the stink of zen would likely be pretty unbearable | realreality wrote: | Part of the problem is that Buddhist institutions in the west | are organized like non-profits or social clubs. They have | hierarchies of lay people and boards of directors. They have to | appeal to rich people for fundraising, and they become embedded | in a sort of upperclass culture. | | They don't "stink of zen"; they stink of capitalism. | TedShiller wrote: | > LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner calls his leadership style | "compassionate management," which he describes as "putting | yourself in another person's shoes and seeing the world through | their lens or perspective," and claims it is inspired by | teachings of the Dalai Lama. | | It's good corporate marketing but only skin thin: He'd still fire | your ass in a millisecond if he needs to or wants to, regardless | of your personal predicament. | Cthulhu_ wrote: | For sure, that's what managers do; sometimes for good reason, | but often it's just a numbers game. | | I've seen this a few times; companies live by their values, | until it comes down to money, then it's "just business". It's | the public marketing face, and plenty of people are happy to | live under its delusion, only to be confronted with the hard | truth when it's time for reorganizations. | coldtea wrote: | Unless you're also willing to forego maximizing profits for | this, it's just a BS for-show "putting yourself in another | person's shoes". | soulofmischief wrote: | Amazing. Weiner discovered the Golden Rule thought it was his | own creation, repackaged it in corporatespeak. | | "Compassionate management" should be the norm, and I'm | suspicious of anyone who considers their own brand of | management to be special for adhering to such a principle | | I understand that Weiner has probably dealt with a lot of | uncompassionate managers, but that should be treated as the | exception to the definition of management and not the rule. | prox wrote: | There is a practice called "warm capitalism" or some term | like that and the essence is that you not go for the lowest | bidder, but for the one having the best values (say most | environmentally friendly) which in turn creates interest in | being more environmentally friendly. But it could also be | other values like social equality and so on. | rg111 wrote: | > _Chen: For the overwhelming majority of Asian Buddhists, | Buddhism is a devotional practice. Bowing to images of deities, | burning incense, worshiping at an altar -- those are all | fundamental elements of Buddhist practice. There is this | acknowledgement of worshiping higher beings. Meditation was not | at all a mainstream lay practice in Buddhism. It only became | popular in the early twentieth century, when Buddhist reformers | such as the Burmese monk Mahasi Sayadaw, founder of modern | Vipassana meditation, promoted it as a lay Buddhist practice. | Mindfulness, as it was practiced for most of its history in Asia, | was a very elite practice reserved only for advanced monastics. | But Jack Kornfield, who is one of a number of influential | teachers responsible for making Buddhist meditation go | mainstream, understood that devotional Buddhism would be an | obstacle for white Americans. He emphasized meditation because he | understood that devotional Buddhism would be too associated with | "religious" practice._ | | This paragraph is so so wrong. Where do I even start? | | She says that others are appropriating Buddhism, and she goes on | to do just that. | | Yuck. | | And no, meditation wasn't reserved for the monastic elites. Did | she even study Buddhism at all? | | Buddha said in his address to Ananda, that thousands of his | disciples who are in households, and not monks, have attained | Nirvana. Not only did they meditate, they attained Nirvana- the | highest goal. | | This person is saying all sorts of wrong things. | | If you go by Gautama Buddha's teachings only, you will know that | none of the common practices nowadays are kind of forbidden by | Buddha. The bowing down, the incense sticks- these are later | additions, and never encouraged by the Buddha. | pessimizer wrote: | That paragraph has specific names and references so I can | verify what is being said. You're just offering bare contrary | claims and drama. | | > Where do I even start? | | Start with a claim you think is wrong, and explain how it is | wrong with enough information that I don't have to trust you. | rg111 wrote: | Read Walpola Rahula's "What the Buddha Taught". You will know | how far deviated incense burning and bowing to pictures are | from Buddha's teaching. | | Buddhism is a very rational philosophy. If you study Buddhism | in the light of it being a protest against established | thiestic, ritualistic religion in India, these will start | making much more sense. | | As far as McMeditation is from Buddhism, the same is true for | regular people worshipping Buddha like a god. | | Religion might have democratic elements, but truth isn't | democratic. | realreality wrote: | If you read the "Inquiry of Ugra", you'll see that the ideal | layperson is nothing like the average American Buddhist. The | layperson is supposed to live like a monk and hope to be reborn | as a proper monastic. | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ugrapariprccha_Sutra | rg111 wrote: | This is just an answer to one person's enquiry. | | I have read another which I cannot remember the name for. | | Buddha, with the help of ten directions, tells a layman to do | his ten-fold duties. | | One of them is keeping his wife happy, another one is about | having friends, another one is about earning money and | growing wealth. | | Please read Walpola Rahula's "What the Buddha Taught". | realreality wrote: | I think it's folly to try to essentialize "the Buddha", | when it's likely that Siddhartha Gautama never even | existed. | | My point in bringing up Ugra was to show that many/most | sects of Buddhism have been predominantly focused on | monasticism. In the sutras, advanced lay people are the | exception, not the rule. And the surrounding societies | understand that there's a difference. But in the west, lay | people have higher expectations for spiritual attainment... | akprasad wrote: | You seem to take the author's language here as describing early | Buddhism, but I think she is describing the observed history of | _Asian_ Buddhism, presumably East and Southeast Asian Buddhism. | I think this is a clearer reading given that she starts with | "Asian Buddhists," focuses on the Burmese tradition, mentions | again "for most of its history _in Asia_ ," mentions Jack | Kornfield who studied in the Thai tradition, etc. | | For the language at the end of your comment, this kind of _sola | scriptura_ [1] approach is valuable and worthwhile, and it is | part of how lay meditation traditions were revived in Asian | Buddhism [2] -- but when you describe Asian Buddhist traditions | as "later additions ... never encouraged by the Buddha," isn't | this what the author has in mind with her next paragraph? | Copied for your convenience: | | > I want to clarify, by the way, that I'm not necessarily | critical of American Buddhist entrepreneurs. The problem is if | you mistake this white American Buddhism for all Buddhism, or | claim that this is the "right" or "only" way to practice | Buddhism. | | [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sola_scriptura [2]: | https://vividness.live/protestant-buddhism | rg111 wrote: | It's fair is she mentions that she is describing Buddhism as | per _current SE-Asian practices_. | | Then it is fair. | | > The problem is if you mistake this white American Buddhism | for all Buddhism, or claim that this is the "right" or "only" | way to practice Buddhism. | | But she wants to make the readers believe that _her_ version | of Buddhism is the "right" way to do it? And she is rebuking | the white Buddhists for deviating from it? | gnramires wrote: | I haven't had the time to read this article carefully (I will do | so later), but it's very problematic to "gatekeep" religion or | knowledge. If you're learning from eastern masters, if the | original intent of the religion was to spread widely to any | interested party, if you're being curious and respectful (you can | even respectfully criticize, reject, or condemn _any_ culture -- | this is what enables rejecting and criticizing fascism even if | not in your own nation; and this is what enables us to improve | our society with cultural exchange). So on the surface the | criticism here isn 't valid at all. | | Second, no person is obliged to adhere to a standard defined | hundreds of years ago (or otherwise). Buddhism, and all cultures, | are allowed to evolve according to our better understanding of | science, the universe, ourselves, even philosophy, etc.. And also | to fit well into people's lives and local culture. Most of the | spirit of the Buddha is that of finding the truth and achieving | enlightenment -- being too stuck to his every word is contrary to | the spirit of his teachings. Secularity (I am a secular Buddhist) | wasn't even too well defined in the time of Buddha I think. | | If you don't want to learn anything about Buddhism, only the | basics of meditation, no one should stop you. I think most | teachings are very beautiful and well worthy of study, but that's | ultimately up to yourself. | | If you want to learn more, I thoroughly recommend masters like | Thich Nhat Hanh and reading (perhaps commentated) Buddha's | original thoughts (I believe Dhammapada summarizes many of them). | pawsforthought wrote: | Quite right, and you'll find that Chen (the author and | interviewee) is not really pointing to the aspect of adaptation | as being problematic, more so the ends to which Buddhist | practice is being repurposed. | | A few relevant excerpts: | | > The Dalai Lama was instrumental in advancing the | secularization of meditation. For him it was in part a | political calculation. He wanted to make Buddhism relevant and | useful to the West. | | > I think all the teachers had some qualms about being forced | to leave the ethical aspects of Buddhism out of the workplace. | They were not being hired to make the employees more ethical; | they were being hired to make them more productive. | | > Interestingly enough, I think that companies have been able | to command great self-sacrifice from Americans in a way that no | other institution can today. I would argue that companies or | workplaces have become the new faith communities that are | replacing organized religion. | | > But there are downsides to this. We start to organize our | selves, communities, and spiritualities around capitalism's | goals of efficiency and productivity, ignoring other possible | ethics of justice, kinship, and beauty. Ultimately, companies, | which are driven by the bottom line, cannot offer us a | "solution" for a flourishing life. | | When I think of the startup I left, and which took so much of | my life, it's easy to characterize it as a quasi cult. | mola wrote: | Read the article. You are fighting a strawman. And it's | detrimental for a discussion about this article. | | There's no gate keeping there, but an analysis of how Buddhism | as a concept evolved in the US and "the west". | omarfarooq wrote: | How would these people react if they learned that the Buddha said | his teachings were to last only 1000 years* if women were not | included in the Sangha? And will only last 500 years after women | were included?: | | > "But, Ananda, if women had not obtained the Going-forth from | the home life into homelessness in the Dhamma & Vinaya made known | by the Tathagata, the holy life would have lasted long, the true | Dhamma would have lasted 1,000 years. But now that they have | obtained the Going-forth from the home life into homelessness in | the Dhamma & Vinaya made known by the Tathagata, the holy life | will not last long, the true Dhamma will last only 500 years. | | Source: AN 8:51 Gotami Sutta, Pali Canon: | https://www.dhammatalks.org/suttas/AN/AN8_51.html | | Curiously, this sutta is left out of accesstoinsight.org, which | is the leading source on the Internet for deriving the Buddha's | authentic words (translated to English). What's your agenda, | Bhikku Thanissaro _? Certainly not truth if your way is the way | of omission. | | *Then, what is it that is being practiced today that is called | Buddhism? Or are Buddhists unaware of the mentioned sutta of the | Buddha... or do they reject it?_ | cuteboy19 wrote: | For what its worth Buddhism did die out entirely in India. | [deleted] | cyberpunk wrote: | It was 2500 years ago. | | We do not care at all. | | Buddhism is not a philosophy based on a magic book or some | unprovable god; it's just people. The Buddha was a normal | person, and absolutely could and did make the kinds of mistakes | common in his time. | | I don't think that stops it being useful, personally. | solardev wrote: | I think it depends on your particular fork of Buddhism. It's | a pretty open source religion, and some sects and scriptures | are more devout to tradition and mysticism than others. | coldtea wrote: | > _Then, what is it that is being practiced today that is | called Buddhism? Or are Buddhists unaware of the mentioned | sutta of the Buddha... or do they reject it?_ | | Well, there are many things the Buddha said that they could not | care less about. That would just be one more. | | A religion is not about precisely what some founder said, but | how it was adopted, intepreted, and developed (including what | parts were given precedence and which were ignored). | meotimdihia wrote: | I don't know how to explain it in English. But he didn't say | his teachings were to last only 1000 years. | | Buddha said it is super hard or impossible to achieve Nirvana | or became Arahant after 1500-2000 years. | | But if you never practice, you'll never achieve anything. | | Even Buddha needs 4 Asamkhyeya to become a Buddha. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asa%E1%B9%83khyeya | omarfarooq wrote: | > Buddha said it is super hard or impossible to achieve | Nirvana after 1500-2000 years. | | Well, that I can agree with. Also according to the Buddha, | there are signs that an enlightened being can display to | prove their enlightenment. A simple one is that fire does not | affect them. To prove his enlightenment, "Ananda performed a | supernatural accomplishment by diving into the earth and | appearing on his seat at the council (or, according to some | sources, by flying through the air.)" | | This is the only modern evidence of anyone meeting the | criteria: https://allthatsinteresting.com/wordpress/wp- | content/uploads... | nicky0 wrote: | You seem to be rather a literalist. | omarfarooq wrote: | And how should I take those signs of enlightenment then? | If not literally then Buddhist scripture is no better | than fiction. | carapace wrote: | Ramana Maharshi got cancer. When the doctor operated to | remove the tumor anesthetic was refused. Ramana watched | the operation without evident discomfort. He said after | that he experienced the sensations of the operation but | did not suffer. | tiborsaas wrote: | All religions are fiction. | nextlevelwizard wrote: | Think you are mixing things. I don't think people are actually | "budhists", but instead have found something useful from | meditating. | bowsamic wrote: | Sutta central is the main Pali canon English translation source | nowadays, also access to insight is mainly home of Thannisaro, | not Bodhi | | Sutta central has it | https://suttacentral.net/an8.51/en/sujato?layout=plain&refer... | | As for that sutta, the Pali canon is absolutely huge, the | Mahayana sutras even more so, the majority of the latter | haven't been translated into English even. Most Buddhists, even | historically, do not follow the sutras to the word, they use | them as teaching guidance. There is nothing wrong with not | accepting a sutra because you don't think it is a good teaching | or one that is helpful to you | | EDIT also Buddhists I've spoken to generally reject that sutta, | Mahayana Buddhists see all Pali suttas as lesser and | provisional. The founder of my sect, Dogen, rejected the idea | of mappo (age of dharma decline) entirely. | | It is not historically accurate to think that all Buddhists | generally accept all Buddhist texts and concepts, unless you | specifically only mean some of the more hardcore Theravada who | accept all of the Pali canon. Unfortunately in the west | Buddhism is often conflated with just the Theravada, since the | Mahayana seems scarier and more difficult to get into, however | the latter is more popular and has developed more historically | guai888 wrote: | Buddism has always adopt in order to stay relevant. There are | many ways to achieve enlightenment. Maybe US Buddhists will | find their own unique path forward. | blippage wrote: | There was a great saying by Ajahn Chah, who always seems to | be quotable. He said "How come everyone says Buddhism is | old-fashioned and needs to be adapted? No-one ever accuses | the defilements as being old-fashioned and outdated; no, | they're always up-to-date." | bowsamic wrote: | Yes I expect so, but usually it takes a couple centuries to | happen in a reliable and organic way | InCityDreams wrote: | dang wrote: | Please don't take HN threads into religious flamewar. We're | trying to avoid that here. | | https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html | | Edit: can you please not post unsubstantive and/or | flamebait comments in general? It looks like you've been | doing that repeatedly, unfortunately. If you wouldn't mind | reviewing the guidelines and taking the intended spirit of | the site more to heart, we'd be grateful. | metta2uall wrote: | Well, I don't think there's a conspiracy - accesstoinsight.org | is actually an old site that is missing many suttas. It even | links to a new updated website (e.g. from https://www.accesstoi | nsight.org/tipitaka/an/an08/an08.053.th...) and if you change | the URL the sutta you mentioned is actually there: | https://www.dhammatalks.org/suttas/AN/AN8_51.html. | | But regarding this, and other, anti-women references in the | Pali canon, the passages could be corruptions that don't | reflect what the Buddha actually said. Or they could be | authentic statements the Buddha made due to genuine beliefs | and/or wanting better cultural acceptance to help the survival | of early Buddhism. In either case it's not a disaster for | Buddhism, which emphasizes the need for individual wisdom & | compassion, rather than blindly following some real or imagined | leaders. | | Personally I think these are most likely to be corruptions | because the suttas contain many more passages that are | respectful of women & nuns. For example | https://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/mn/mn.044.than.html | omarfarooq wrote: | This issue at hand here is not limited to the question of | women in the sangha, but of the Teacher's claims as to the | potency and longevity of his Teachings. | | I'm not sure if pointing out there are contradictions in the | suttas helps the case. | | In any case, whether through having contradictions or through | rejection via cherry picking, modern Buddhists are eating the | fruits of a poisoned tree. | lewispollard wrote: | The suttas were already cherry picked when they were | written down. In fact, they were cherry picked when the | oral tradition first developed. | | See also, Digha Nikaya 16, the Maha Parinibbana Sutta, one | of the foremost suttas detailing the Buddha's awakening, in | which he refuses to achieve full enlightenment in the | presence of Mara unless his _monks and nuns, male and | female lay followers_ were fully established in the dhamma. | | https://www.dhammatalks.org/suttas/DN/DN16.html | metta2uall wrote: | If modern "Buddhists" are skillful their practice won't be | poisoned by a couple of problematic/corrupt passages within | the huge Pali cannon.. | | There's the now-famous Kalama Sutta where the Buddha | specifically encourages people to not rely too much on | canonical texts: https://suttacentral.net/an3.65/en/sujato | prox wrote: | Reminds me of chapter one of the Dao te Ching : | | >The tao that can be told is not the eternal Tao The name | that can be named is not the eternal Name. | | The unnamable is the eternally real. Naming is the origin | of all particular things. | | Free from desire, you realize the mystery. Caught in | desire, you see only the manifestations. | godmode2019 wrote: | Why use the correct word in the title but the western | mispronunciation in the quote. | | Dao | jan_Inkepa wrote: | The Dao De Jing was not written in the last century, and | the ancient pronunciation is only approximately known. | Yes it's written in Modern Standard Chinese/pinyin as | "Dao De Jing" but the text has existence in the western | world older than the Modern Standard Chinese language, | certainly longer than modern Chinese orthography. | | Looking at Zhengzhang reconstruction of the title, for | instance, we get the pronuciation /l'u:? tW:g ke:NG/ (I | don't know old Chinese phonology at all, I'm just working | from wiktionary - please forgive any errors/take with a | grain of salt). I don't see any particular reason for | English-speakers to use the Modern Standard Chinese | pinyin orthography/pronunciation to write terms that come | from a considerably older way of speaking. (I say this as | someone learning Classical + Middle Chinese using Middle- | Chinese pronunciation). | | Okay one possible reason is that it might be seen as good | if the main inheritors of the tradition (the modern | Chinese state+people) get given 'ownership' of it, and | that outsiders speak using their preferred | terminology/pronunciation. But I'm not personally on | board with that, any more than I'd insist that people | pronounce Shakespeare in American English. | | [ I apologise for any snark that might be residual in | this reply (and acknowledge that the remark is slightly | tangential to the topic of this page) - I've tried to | keep it constructive. ] | prox wrote: | My Daoist teacher doesn't really mind either way, | although his english usage is the "Dao" form. I am | assuming that is the more modern/current form. | denton-scratch wrote: | The way I was taught, suttas/sutras were treated as interesting | historical documents, and sometimes as useful aids to | understanding. They were _not_ considered to be "gospel" | truth, because they are not associated with a practice lineage. | That is, there is only a text; there is no handing-down of a | lived experience from teacher to practitioner. | | My teachers favoured more "modern" texts, such as Asanga's | works, and the Prajnaparamita literature. They have practice | lineages that can be traced back to their authors. Statements | from the sutras/suttas were met with remarks of the form "Very | interesting; it may be true, or it may be not true". | yunohn wrote: | Disclaimer: I'm an atheist. | | I don't believe this is the gotcha that you think it is. | | Every single school of thought, religion or otherwise, has good | and bad parts. Taking the overwhelmingly good aspects of | Buddhism to understand how to lead a better life, is not | invalidated because the Buddha said one thing you dislike. It's | naivety to desire 100% perfection from everyone/thing. | eurasiantiger wrote: | One of the agreed-upon principles common to the largest | Buddhist denominations is that our world was not created and | is not ruled by an omnipresent, omniscient God. | fendy3002 wrote: | I don't know why this good advice is downvoted, and looks | like mine will too. | | I don't understand why people still consider literature | written by human with nowadays language to must be either | perfect or it's worthless. | | Also how they see a form of government that declared they're | adopting one religion teaching and using it as argument proof | / point. | | We will spiralling down to whataboutism soon like this. | Cherry picks the good ones are fine, and people do that | everyday. Just don't cherry pick a bad one to justify your | agenda and your bad action. | Cthulhu_ wrote: | It's like people want these things written down in no-holes | legalese. While at the same time people will misinterpret | what others are saying (see "straw man argument"; people | are quick to jump to conclusions about people about what | they say and don't say). | | Here's a religious code people can live by: "Don't be a | dick". I'm sure that summarizes all the good parts of | organized religions and philosophies. It's also the most | difficult one to adhere to for a lot of people. | omarfarooq wrote: | nabla9 wrote: | As someone who has spend long time meditating in Buddhist | monasteries, I would say they don't care. | | Sutras are just teachings. You may learn from them and value | them, but Buddhists are not "people of the book" like Abrahamic | religions are. You don't have to parse everything Buddha and | ponder it endlessly. Sometimes he just wondered about the | future of the discipline. He also changed his mind when others | presented arguments, just like in this case. | | Buddhism as a religion is considered just a vehicle for some | truth that people can discover, not the goal itself. Requiring | perfect gym to practice is not for people who really want to | train. | omarfarooq wrote: | > but Buddhists are not "people of the book" like Abrahamic | religions are. | | You mean modern Buddhists aren't. Early Muslims considered | the Buddhists they encountered as "people of the book." | | Source: https://www.shs- | conferences.org/articles/shsconf/pdf/2018/14... | coldtea wrote: | I don't think parent meant that Buddhist's aren't "people | of the book" with the muslim meaning of the term. | | Given the context, he probably meant they aren't "by the | book", not strict about their scripture. | denton-scratch wrote: | Buddhists are not "people of the book" because the Buddha | was not a God, and didn't have prophetic access to the | teachings of a God. His views on karma and rebirth, for | example, were those of the society he sprang from; they | were not the result of transcendent insight. He was not | some kind of perfect being. | | Buddha became more God-like as the centuries passed; some | Prajnaparamita and later texts describe him as being the | height of seven palm trees, for example. But he's never | been considered infallible, like a prophet. | nprateem wrote: | > they were not the result of transcendent insight | | That's exactly his selling point, that through deep | meditation he had profound insights, regarding | impermanance and no-self. But yeah, that was his own | realisation, not just some words some god said to him | that are supposed to be infallible. | selimthegrim wrote: | Shahrastani, whose book Kitab al milal wan nihal is sitting | in front of me right now, had a lot of things to report | about Buddhists, and not only that verdict. Have you read | him? Furthermore, Biruni on this subject alone is | notoriously unreliable, relying on secondhand sources. | riskneutral wrote: | > had a lot of things to report about Buddhists | | Would love to know more ... | dym_sh wrote: | was it b/c muslims also lived by the book and buddhists | just retaliated in kind? | nabla9 wrote: | The earliest Buddhist texts were written down centuries | after the death of the Buddha. Buddhism started as an oral | tradition. | thx2099100 wrote: | so did islam. | omarfarooq wrote: | Correct, Quran means lit. recitation. | JetAlone wrote: | For that matter, the New Testament wasn't written until | long after the life of Jesus, the canon wasn't | established until long after many oral traditions were, | and some of Old Testament canon the status of | "deuterocanon/apocrypha" has been controversial. | | Religions start with key important figures, events and | practices long before they get encoded as text. The only | one I can think of off the top of my head that might have | gone somewhat in the reverse direction was L. Ron Hubbard | writing Dianetics and other books to develop a schema and | theory for psychological healing before he officially | started Scientology. But I don't know all the details | about early Scientology so it's hard to say precisely how | much was pre-encoded there. I've heard rumours that | Hubbard was involved in Freemasonry before starting | Scientology so if it's true, it's likely that some of his | experiences in it shaped his writings. I also heard that | Paul Twitchell, founder of a lesser-known group called | "Eckankar" spent some of his earlier days in Scientology. | But I digress. | | When you strip practices away from dogma in an attempt to | further enrich corporations, it's almost like trying to | start over with the practices borrowed from some past | heritage, the corporation's leadership as the key figures | who give advice or select practice consultants to confer | with, and with some milestone of success as the promised | "awakening event". It definitely runs the risk of turning | the corporation into a personality cult where your boss | directly or indirectly tells you how to reach a spiritual | objective... Of making them money. | mudita wrote: | My own personal experience differed from yours. In a retreat | in Burma I observed a lot of traditions, which made it very | clear that men had a higher standing than women. When forming | a line for going to lunch, the monks were first, then the | laymen, then the nuns and then the laywomen; only the monks | ate on a raised platform, but not the nuns or laypeople etc. | | This was not just old books, which nobody cared about, but | pervasive everyday practice. | | I very much believe that you had different experience and am | happy for it. There's a lot of Buddhists and different | traditions and it's very difficult to generalise. I myself | also practiced in - more western - communities, where there | was no noticeable gender imbalance. But I am also sure, that | there are Buddhist traditions and communities, which are | sexist. | nabla9 wrote: | The reason why you saw what you saw is twofold. | | 1) You did not see nuns. Formal lineage of nuns died in | Theravada lineage hundreds of years ago. Women were wearing | white robes right? Those are the robes of novices. You need | 5? female nuns to ordain a new nun. Sri Lankan monk, Bhante | Henepola Gunaratana (aka Bhante G) asked Tibetan nuns so | bootstrap the tradition in Theravada, but it's just | starting and there is resistance. | | 2) Women are considered less than men in Asian cultures | (equality of sexes is new in the West too). Religions are | not separate from the culture around them. | | >But I am also sure, that there are Buddhist traditions and | communities, which are sexist. | | Yes there are and that is to be expected. (Unless you | believe that Buddhism makes people somehow perfect. _" | After the Ecstasy, the Laundry: How the Heart Grows Wise on | the Spiritual Path"_ by Jack Kornfield is a good book that | explains how full of shit Buddhists are no matter how much | they train. | | Buddhism is not about creating perfect world in this world | or in afterlife. | mudita wrote: | Yes, thank you for this explanation. I didn't know that | they were not fully ordained, I learned something from | you today: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thilashin | (although one could argue whether to call them nuns or | not in English. The wikipedia article still calls them | "Burmese Theravada Buddhist nun" and they were called | nuns in English where I practiced - I'd say their | culture's concept of "nun" does not map perfect to the | Western concept, so details get lost in translation, but | your explanation is fundamentally correct and very | helpful. ) | | This definitely makes clear again my lack of deeper | understanding of their culture and the hubris of me | judging their culture after having been in Burma for only | a month. | | That being said, there definitely were signs of sexism, | women did not have the same standing and we should not | close our eyes to this part of Buddhism. I don't mean | "and therefore Buddhism is bad", but "as a Buddhist I | think we can and should strive to do better". | | When Buddhism supports and reinforces misogyny, racism or | jingoism from the surrounding culture, this is also a | failing of Buddhism. | | There are many Buddhist teachers (including Jack | Kornfield) who absolutely do emphasise more virtuous and | emphatic living as a core teaching and result of Buddhist | practice. As a simple example, metta meditation is often | advertised as actually helping you be more compassionate | in "real life". | nabla9 wrote: | > When Buddhism supports and reinforces misogyny, racism | or jingoism from the surrounding culture, this is also a | failing of Buddhism. | | Buddhism as a religion has constantly and reliably failed | throughout history. "This is not true Buddhism" is | putting head into the sand. Buddhism that is deeply | embedded into culture and tradition carries the baggage | of the culture. Often when it transfers to a new culture | there is a nice break from the tradition. | | >There are many Buddhist teachers (including Jack | Kornfield) who absolutely do emphasise more virtuous and | emphatic | | Yes. The wisdom of Jack Kornfield is taking western | secular values adopting them into Buddhism and getting | rid of the bad. Buddhism like any religion can be changed | to anything you like, good or bad. | michaelt wrote: | _> Women are considered less than men in Asian cultures | (equality of sexes is new in the West too). Religions are | not separate from the culture around them._ | | Sure - but aren't monks and priests also supposed to be a | model, demonstrating what a _really dedicated, pious_ | follower of the religion should look like? | nabla9 wrote: | Buddhism is not some progressive movement to change the | world. | | Ethnic Buddhist traditions are usually among the most | conservative forces in the society. They try to be | conservative models. In Burma and Sri Lanka many of the | politically most active monks favor ethnic cleansing and | preach religious intolerance. | CiPHPerCoder wrote: | You're begging the question. Why should monks and priests | be a model, rather than a reminder of human nature? | michaelt wrote: | For the same reason I'd expect the pope to be catholic :) | | Wouldn't you expect a full-time professional | footballer/dancer/poet to be better at | football/dance/poetry than the average person on the | street? | CiPHPerCoder wrote: | How does one measure "better" when it comes to philosophy | or spirituality? | | The notion that priests and monks should be _holier_ than | the common folk strikes me as very Abrahamic. This forms | a hierarchy in the mind. | | I'm not a Buddhist, but if I were, I would interrogate | (and probably reject) such hierarchies. | brodo wrote: | There is sexism in Buddhism. I stayed at a Buddhist temple | in Germany and there where way more rules for the nuns than | the monks. | | > "It is extremely important to note that world religions | [...] are, naturally and inevitably, in large part | compendia of rules for managing daily life." - John A. | Hall, Ideas and the Social Sciences, 1993 | | This is why I think it's a good thing that western Buddhism | exits. It gets rid of all the bad stuff. And there are | really interesting insights in Buddhism, like the concept | of non-self or the four noble truths. | realreality wrote: | > It gets rid of all the bad stuff. | | That's laughable. Who decided what "the bad stuff" was? | The early adopters were people who rejected western | religions but projected western, individualistic culture | onto eastern traditions. | oneepic wrote: | >imbue work with a spiritual aura | | What? | | >"turn workplaces into productivity-centered 'faith | communities.'" | | Huh? | | >"Silicon Valley is the latest player in a history of Western | appropriation of Buddhism" | | Appropriation feels like a strong word. Are we not supposed to | try new ideas from outside the tech industry? Ever? Chen's thesis | in this article feels like a dramatic take. | mkmk3 wrote: | You can try whatever you like, I think the angle is more about | how meditation of various kinds are being adopted while other | pieces of their source may be neglected, and this is in service | to corporations and capitalism. I don't think it's inherently | bad, but the insinuation is it's putting more of the | spiritual/community stuff that we got from religion into our | work, by moving stuff like mindfulness and conscious 'loving- | kindness' into the corporate setting. Centralizing your needs | into the hands of big corp :) | | I don't feel like I can speak to the usage of appropriation or | other wokespeak though. | pawsforthought wrote: | I think one extremely problematic part of this trend is that | civic participation necessarily suffers when one's life is in | such close orbit around the workplace. | | If one scarcely has the time to be _informed_ about the state | of the world, then forget being _engaged_ or even | _organizing_ others. | odiroot wrote: | I always find it weird how western "promoters" of Buddhism are so | gung-ho on the meditation part, pretty much disregarding | everything else. | | Having met quite a few Buddhists (also my partner) who were | raised by Buddhist parents, I'm yet to find a single one who | meditates at all. That's not even that big of a part of | "mindfulness". | | After reading a monk's book (Essential Chan Buddhism by Guo Jun), | I have a feeling it's all cargo-cultish in the west. | lewispollard wrote: | Historically, it's because of imperialism. Buddhism, for a long | time, had turned into a faith religion, suffered many close | encounters with dying out completely in several regions, | resulting in the 3 major traditions of Buddhism we see today, | the earliest version of Buddhism died out long ago. | | When Western imperial forces began to systematically take over | regions of Asia for trade, the Buddhist monks in areas such as | Burma/Myanmar felt that this was the second time their | tradition would die out, and sought to preserve the parts that | they felt were essential. In their case, it was the path of | vipassana meditation, and though Buddhism didn't die out there, | from then on it was strongly influenced by this more refined, | less faith-driven teaching. | | So when Westerners started to go over to these regions of Asia, | this is what they were taught, not the religious faith of the | local lay practitioners, which existed mainly to support the | monks in their vipassana. | | Vipassana meditation _is_ mindfulness practice. | plsbenice34 wrote: | There are many varieties of Buddhism. It is a mixture of | eastern culture and knowledge in general, including many | generations of empirical psychotherapy, religion, philosophy, | etc. Some varieties of Buddhism, like some schools of Zen, do | focus heavily (or entirely) on meditation practice. Scientific | research suggests that meditation has a real effect on the | brain. | | To me it seems completely rational and expected that the west | would be drawn to the varieties that don't carry as much | religious dogma because that is more incompatible with western | thought. Of course we can take some aspects from it which we | find useful. So I don't find it weird at all. | | Despite this, I still absolutely think that 'mindfulness' is | often becoming bastardised and a lot of the value is being lost | in the process of translation. People will of course try to | take advantage of it and try to profit from it. | | Your comment also makes me imagine picking a random barely | religious American that never goes to church and using them as | a model for 'real Christianity' | bowsamic wrote: | > There are many varieties of Buddhism. It is a mixture of | eastern culture and knowledge in general, including many | generations of empirical psychotherapy, religion, philosophy, | etc. Some varieties of Buddhism, like some schools of Zen, do | focus heavily (or entirely) on meditation practice. | | Zen does not traditionally focus heavily nor entirely on | meditation practise, for example it has a heavy amount of | ritual and chanting. The idea of a return to Zen being just | meditation is a modern resistance in the early 20th century | by certain Japanese teachers (many of whom brought Zen to the | west) who thought that the spiritual aspects of the tradition | had been lost entirely to public service rituals (basically | becoming "the people who do funerals" in Japanese society). I | agree with those modern teachers, but it isn't representative | of Japanese Zen in general, and certainly not of Chan, Seon, | or Thien. | | Overall there is no Buddhist lineage over a century old that | I'm aware of that has its primary focus on meditation. | | > Scientific research suggests that meditation has a real | effect on the brain. | | I don't see how that's relevant to the rest of your comment. | It seems kind of like a subtle materialism insert. | | > To me it seems completely rational and expected that the | west would be drawn to the varieties that don't carry as much | religious dogma because that is more incompatible with | western thought. Of course we can take some aspects from it | which we find useful. So I don't find it weird at all. | | That's not really true, since all forms of Buddhism require | some kind of "blind faith". For example, in Zen we have the | three pillars of Zen practise: great faith, great doubt, and | great endurance. Great faith means that we should have faith | in our practise and Buddha-nature, even if we have not yet | realised it directly. Letting go is an act of faith after | all. There are purely faith-based sects of Buddhism, like | Pure Land, or like Tibetan Buddhism (not well in my realm of | knowledge) which generally has more faith required than Zen, | and I think you'll be surprised how popular those traditions | are in the west. I don't personally see western thought as | being incompatible with dogma or faith at all | | > Despite this, I still absolutely think that 'mindfulness' | is often becoming bastardised and a lot of the value is being | lost in the process of translation. People will of course try | to take advantage of it and try to profit from it. | | I agree, there is a lack of good teachers and instructions, | but I want to point the finger more at the students than at | the teachers. They don't want to learn, they don't want to | practise. They want a quick release or an easy way out. If a | doctor prescribes a mindfulness program to a patient | struggling with anxiety, it's an absolute miracle if they | stick at it for even 10 minutes a day for more than a year. | Doubly so for the ethical principles, which are even harder | to stick to (as I know from personal experience). The problem | isn't so much that Buddhist principles are bastardised, it's | more that very few people have a strong intent to follow | them. That's why the faith based practises above are | generally so useful for the laity: Pure Land Buddhism can be | done by anyone at any time, you simply recite the nembutsu | (namo amida butsu) whenever you remember. It isn't clear to | me what an equivalently easy and straightforward practise | would look like for someone who can't handle the faithful | aspects | | > Your comment also makes me imagine picking a random barely | religious American that never goes to church and using them | as a model for 'real Christianity' | | I think the idea of equating a Buddhist who doesn't meditate | to a Christian who doesn't go to church is a bit strange, | since likely you think that it is somewhat essential for the | latter to go to church, and therefore do you think that | meditation is essential for Buddhism? I don't quite get this | point | mtalantikite wrote: | > Overall there is no Buddhist lineage over a century old | that I'm aware of that has its primary focus on meditation. | | Do you mean specifically in Japan? Because many of the | Tibetan lineages have Dzogchen [1] or Mahamudra [2] | meditation as their primary focus and go back a thousand | plus years. There are even lineages of householder or | itinerant yogis called Ngagpa [3] that have long traditions | of meditation training, going back to Tilopa, Saraha, and | the other Mahasiddhas of Bengal. I practice with a Tibetan | Ngagpa from time to time (Dr Nida) [4] and have also gotten | a chance to practice with a Baul teacher from modern Bengal | [5], and it's interesting to note how even though the | lineages have split in their outward appearances, there are | quite a lot of similarities in their teaching of | meditation. | | Anyway, that's all to say that in many Tibetan Buddhist | lineages the meditation practice has been an unbroken, | primary focus of the teachings. It wouldn't be surprising | if that wasn't the case in other traditions. | | [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dzogchen | | [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahamudra | | [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ngagpa | | [4] https://perfumedskull.com/2017/05/30/the-white-robed- | dreadlo... | | [5] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7JZ4__GTbjA -- here | Parvathy Ma is performing a doha attributed to Bhusuku aka | Shantideva and is referencing the burning Nalanda. | notahacker wrote: | It's not just a Western thing. The likes of Goenka have made | the case for Vipassana meditation as a universally beneficial | secular practice compatible with a variety of religious beliefs | and amenable to scientific study in India too. This approach | inevitably attracts more attention and new adherents than more | longstanding cultural traditions, rules and suttas. | | I asked a friendly volunteer outside the Global Vipassana | Centre (which emphasises the secular universal nature of its | meditation practices, but also contains holy relics of the | Buddha) how often he personally meditated. He paused for a | moment, looked a bit sheepish and then said "not very often". | corrral wrote: | Is there any kind of documentation of how modern religions are | experienced by normal practitioners? A book [edit: or, more | realistically, a book series] would be great, but some kind of | film documentary series seems to me like an even better fit. | I've gone looking for that sort of thing in the past and come | up empty-handed. I'm thinking interviews and a combo of | descriptions or footage of any religious practices or services | that aren't considered too secret or sacred or whatever to | allow outsiders to see it. | | It's easy to find teachings and scattered accounts of some | elements, but I'd be very interested in this kind of thing even | for relatively familiar-to-me things like various Christian | sects (to be any good, this would surely need a _bunch_ of | entries for every major religion, including Buddhism, because | there are so many difference in how they 're experienced by | different traditions or in different cultures) | | Material about priestly or monastics experience of religions is | easy to find, but the experience of lay practitioners and their | views on the religion (which may differ _a lot_ from what the | priests or monastics say) seems harder to come by, especially | any kind of systematic or cohesive treatment rather than just | scattered pieces here and there. | haswell wrote: | Sam Harris explores a bit of this. | | The thing that fascinated me was his exploration of the | realness of experience among practitioners and where that | experience seems to comes from. | | As a child of Christian fundamentalism who ran away as fast | as I could, it was eye opening to start to see the basis on | which many of these religions were founded, which religion | manifesting as a symptom of something deeper within | ourselves. Not a mystical or metaphysical deeper, but | remnants of tens of thousands of years of evolution and | humanity's wrestling with consciousness and meaning. | | As an atheist, I find it fascinating. | denton-scratch wrote: | > Mindfulness, as it was practiced for most of its history in | Asia, was a very elite practice reserved only for advanced | monastics. | | I don't think that's true; or at least, it depends on what you | mean by "mindfulness". That claim is made in the context of | vipassana, which _can be_ an advanced practice. But mindfulness | as such is one of the spokes of the Wheel of Dharma; it 's simply | paying attention, and it's a necessary pre-requisite to doing | anything right. You can't maintain any kind of morality, for | example, if you don't really know what's going on around you. | | McMindfulness is not a trend that I admire. | teddyh wrote: | Ye cannot serve Buddha and mammon. | throwaway71271 wrote: | aren't they the same thing? | | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lb13ynu3Iac | CPLX wrote: | Sure and the corporation has so mangled Christianity that it is | now most associated with massive mandatory shopping sprees every | December. | | So what? Corporatism fucks up and subverts everything it can get | its hands on. Buddhism remains a powerful and compelling | religious practice. | | Like most religious practices most people dip their toes in or | only take the parts they like the best. It's not like most | Catholics are running around washing the feet of the poor. | | Not sure exactly what insight this story thinks it's conveying. | | This article basically says Buddhism has two key elements, the | more important devotional worship that westerners are ignoring, | and meditation, which is sort of a fringe practice. | | That's pretty confusing as I think most people would say the main | concept of Buddhism is the teachings of the Buddha. This article | appears silent on the concept of dukkha, enlightenment, the | eightfold path, the four noble truths, and so on and so forth. | | As such it is utterly and completely missing the point. | pessimizer wrote: | It's missing _your_ point, but it seems to communicate its own | point well. | | > This article basically says Buddhism has two key elements, | the more important devotional worship that westerners are | ignoring, and meditation, which is sort of a fringe practice. | amriksohata wrote: | For Hindus, Buddha was just one of the 10 avatars of Vishnu and | he came for a time and purpose. It was never meant to be a | separate religion but just took Hindu teachings on meditation and | enlightenment and got adapted into another "ism". All the core | teachings lie in Hindu scriptures, including Yoga, Meditation | etc. | robinsoh wrote: | > All the core teachings lie in Hindu scriptures | | What does "scripture" mean in this context? Scripture normally | means messages 'directly' from the 'Abrahamic God' received by | certain 'special individuals' (prophets, etc), such as the | Bible, Quran, Torah. I thought Hinduism did not have any belief | in any messages being sent from "God" to humans. So could you | give some examples on what would be Hindu scripture and other | examples of what would NOT be Hindu scripture? | unmole wrote: | > What does "scripture" mean in this context? Scripture | normally means messages 'directly' from the 'Abrahamic God' | | Oxford disagrees: https://www.oxfordlearnersdictionaries.com/ | definition/englis... | | And _Hindu scriptures_ is the example the lexicographers | chose. Besides, the Old and New Testaments are traditionally | attributed to specific authors. Only the Quran qualifies as | scripture by your definition, not even the Hadith. | | > I thought Hinduism did not have any belief in any messages | being sent from "God" to humans. | | The Vedas are considered revelation from the ultimate | reality. There are other scriptures considered _apauruseya_ | i.e. of non-human origin. | robinsoh wrote: | > The Vedas are considered revelation from the ultimate | reality. | | As far as I can tell from googling, they are just | considered to be stories from Aryans that entered India. | "The Vedas are considered the earliest literary record of | Indo-Aryan civilization" | unmole wrote: | > As far as I can tell from googling, they are just | considered to be stories from Aryans that entered India. | "The Vedas are considered the earliest literary record of | Indo-Aryan civilization" | | I'm guessing you got that quote from: | https://www.learnreligions.com/what-are-vedas-1769572 | Just a few paragraphs down, it says: | | "Tradition has it that humans did not compose the revered | compositions of the Vedas, but that God taught the Vedic | hymns to the sages, who then handed them down through | generations by word of mouth. Another tradition suggests | that the hymns were "revealed," to the sages, who were | known as the seers or "mantradrasta" of the hymns." | harpic wrote: | selimthegrim wrote: | According to Shahrastani some Muslims had pretty positive | views of Vedas. Moreover Dara Shikoh famously considered | Upanishads the "guarded tablet" mentioned in Quran 85:22 | bowsamic wrote: | That was something that came after the Buddha though. No | Buddhist teaching or text would suggest this | unmole wrote: | > For Hindus, Buddha was just one of the 10 avatars of Vishnu | | The Bhagavatam mentions 22 avatars of Vishnu. The arbitrary | selection of 10 which sometimes include Buddha is a later day | invention. | | > never meant to be a separate religion but just took Hindu | teachings on meditation and enlightenment and got adapted into | another "ism". | | This is revisionist nonsense. | amriksohata wrote: | There are many more avatars but the dashavatars are | considered most well known. | | Ah the revionist calling out revisionism , the irony of the | comment on isms | democra wrote: | For Hindus, claiming everything in the subcontinent as their | own seems like a favorite passtime. Jainism, Buddhism are not | part of Hinduism and never were. | zozbot234 wrote: | I think most people would agree that Buddhist doctrines first | originated within a Hinduism-informed general milieu, and | they can only be understood comprehensively in this light. | Whereas Jainism seems to have developed in parallel with | Vedic religion, and to have shared some of the same | underlying concepts. Whether this means either are "part" of | Hinduism probably depends on whom you ask. | amriksohata wrote: | There are thousands of sects of Hinduism and most still list | themselves as such until the British came in | throwawayacc2 wrote: | I stopped reading upon seeing at the very stop this " Silicon | Valley is the latest player in a history of Western appropriation | of Buddhism" | | I was very curious about the article. I am wondering if it treats | ideas such as "hire fast fire fast" - In a way a concept related | to the Buddhist ideas of detachment, or the opposite, "bing your | whole self to work" which in a way seems contradictory - you have | attachments, continue to have them even at work. | | But it is a genuinely off putting sensation to see someone | referring to cultural exchanges and transformations as | "appropriation". Adopting and transforming ideas is the bedrock | of humanity. Opposing or denigrating this seems like a | fundamentally evil thing to do. It feels anti human. | gumby wrote: | > I stopped reading upon seeing at the very stop this " Silicon | Valley is the latest player in a history of Western | appropriation of Buddhism" | | I think you jumped the gun. The extended interview with the | book author showed that her position is aligned, or even the | same as yours (your comment is naturally too brief to tell | whether I should have used only "aligned" or "same"). | | And indeed it's Buddhism we're talking about: a belief system | appropriated by other cultures to the point where its origin in | India was forgotten for centuries. | rawgabbit wrote: | He did jumped the gun. The author Carolyn Chen made some very | compelling arguments saying corporatized Buddhism is | unrecognizable. Carolyn Chen is arguing corporatized Buddhism | is a new religion that celebrates 70+hour work weeks and the | celebrity CEO. | | "What we see in American religion, even if it is practiced in | a corporate setting, is often the question, "How can the | group help the individual realize themselves?" Whereas in | other cultures this question tends to be reversed: "How can | the individual help realize the goals of the group?" | Interestingly enough, I think that companies have been able | to command great self-sacrifice from Americans in a way that | no other institution can today. I would argue that companies | or workplaces have become the new faith communities that are | replacing organized religion." | emptysongglass wrote: | I had a coworker recently tell me I was culturally | appropriating the Buddha (I'm a Buddhist) presumably because I | am "from the West". Apart from being one of the most offensive | things I've ever been told (before anyone jumps on me for this: | I can still observe it as offensive regardless of my attachment | to the offense) it confirmed for me that whatever is going on | in the US with identity politics has jumped the shark. | | You do not need to be of a skin color, creed, gender or class | to take refuge in the Buddha's teachings. The dharma is for | all. | cyberpunk wrote: | I also find it funny. I wonder if that's why bodhidharma | spent so long in the cave, to stop all those Han Chinese | appropriating his mind bending techniques of not being a | dickhead and sitting quietly observing life ;) | | If someone said that to me (also a Buddhist) I would probably | burst out laughing :) | spicymaki wrote: | > You do not need to be of a skin color, creed, gender or | class to take refuge in the Buddha's teachings. The dharma is | for all. | | Agreed on all points! The Buddha's teachings are foundational | to my world view, and I too am "from the West." | | I do want to push back a little bit though (gently). Your | coworker's critique is not necessarily wrong (even if they | were making it from a place of ignorance). When I was a | practicing Zen Buddhist, I saw a lot of teachers | appropriating the dharma to sell their own teachings. | Buddhist teachers consulting on the side to corporations | (selling the teachings is inappropriate in Buddhism), | starting companies to sell services, etc. The teachings were | so far removed from the original ideas that they are | incomprehensible. Vague spiritual statements, go with your | gut morality, confusing dialog, going through the motions | (rituals) was all that mattered. How could it be any other | way? The West's values are counter to the teachings in just | about everyway possible. It could not possibly be transmitted | to the West without this kind of modification. | | Cultural appropriation has happened with every culture | Buddhism has encountered from it's origins in North India, | through China and Southeast Asia, Korea and Japan, and now | the West. We all have changed it somewhat and now claim what | we have is more original than the original. | | However, none of these adaptations can compare with the basic | insight of the original teachings in my opinion. | prox wrote: | Indeed. There seems to be a lot of misunderstanding on the | word "appropriate" , "to make it your own." Basically the | more academic wording of "you made this? I made this." meme. | | As long as you don't pretend you created Buddhism or are an | infallible authority of Buddhism it's not appropriation. | | Personally I find the word not really appropriate with what | we are trying to convey which I assume would be something | along the lines of "disrespectful usage of other peoples | cultures or practices." | markdown wrote: | I think "appropriation" is when you take cultural ideas | from colonised places of the world and use them in | inappropriate ways. | | Cultural appreciation = wearing a chinese cheongsam in a | culturally appropriate situation because you think it's | beautiful and you love the dress. | | Cultural appropriation = wearing grass skirts and coconut | shell brassiers and getting wasted at a "tiki" frat party. | squabbles wrote: | There is no inappropriate way to use clothes you own, | unless you're using it to strangle someone. The people | who get upset about people wearing things from "their" | culture are always deracinated diaspora with no real | connection to the culture. People who are healthily | embedded in a culture don't get upset about foreigners | "misusing" their cultural bric-a-brac, they have real | lives to attend to. And if you're getting upset at a | party goer wearing a grass skirt then you're in need of | psychiatric help. | nprateem wrote: | I wouldn't get offended. They just don't understand what | cultural appropriation is by the sound of things. Their | problem, not yours. | mihaic wrote: | Unfortunately this sort of thinking spreads and it will | eventually become everyone's problem unless we address it | head on. | [deleted] | max51 wrote: | >Their problem, not yours. | | Until your get a call from HR, the twitter mobs decides to | target you, or when that "woke" person gets promoted and | starts dictating policies in the office. | supertofu wrote: | Your coworker needs to read the Suttas. Shakyamuni explains | again and again and again that the teachings are for | _everyone_. | rg111 wrote: | Yes, this Chen person is so so wrong. | | She says that meditation is for some monastic elites, but | that is far from the truth. Who even chose to publish her | book? | | Buddha himself said to Ananda that several thousand of his | household desciples attained Nirvana. Not only did these | "laymen" did meditation, they even attained Nirvana. | TedDoesntTalk wrote: | > She says that meditation is for some monastic elites | | She did not quite say that. She said that it was only | practiced by monastic elites up until the early 20th | century: | | "Meditation was not at all a mainstream lay practice in | Buddhism. It only became popular in the early twentieth | century, when Buddhist reformers such as the Burmese monk | Mahasi Sayadaw, founder of modern Vipassana meditation, | promoted it as a lay Buddhist practice. Mindfulness, as | it was practiced for most of its history in Asia, was a | very elite practice reserved only for advanced | monastics." | rg111 wrote: | > She said that it was only practiced by monastic elites | up until the early 20th century: | | Very wrong, too. | | In Buddha's time itself, there were laypeople doing | meditation. | | I am wondering who even published her book? | fredgrott wrote: | The appropriation tone becomes apparent in the middle of the | article where the author explains that its not all of Buddhism | and is neither wrong or right. | | But then again I would not know how those of the religious | tones of Buddhism might look upon my non-religious practice of | the Buddhism teachings except that they might see it as neither | wrong or right but hope for my future progress towards Nirvana | javajosh wrote: | _> It feels anti human._ | | Because it is. The zeitgeist on the left (so, academia) is | consumed by personal shame, guilt, and self-loathing, and a | great deal of intellectual work has been done to _post hoc_ | rationalize these feelings and package them in catchy phrases. | Terms like "cultural appropriation" and "privilege" or | "systematic racism" or "toxic masculinity", may have some | technically useful meanings to anthropologists, but within the | public sphere they function only as a combined virtue signal | and rhetorical weapon. What makes these weapons difficult is | that they are so tightly wrapped in an image of compassion such | that even those that wield them may not understand their true | nature. A clever design. | | This is a good example of how anything can be used as a weapon, | even compassion. I really wish all these academics pushing the | narrative of privilege etc would chill out for a second and | just enjoy the world as it is, in all it's messiness. To stop | seeing the world as purely an evil constructed on the mass | graves of the innocent. Even if it were true (and in some sense | it is) _this is still the world we have_. This is where kids | are growing up, people are falling in love, where discoveries | are being made. Sometimes you gotta just say 'fuck it' and | enjoy the world you have without constantly speculating about | how it should be, how it should have been, about whether the | fruits you are enjoying were earned with blood. We cannot, in | each successive generation, reform ourselves to undo the | injustices of the past, not only because it's practically | impossible but because the meaning of injustice changes. And | society is finite in its malleability. To be sure, some things | can be done, within a generation or two. Maybe three. But after | a while, what's done is done and you have to move on. | | EDIT: It's curious how sometimes a post gets upvoted, then | downvoted, then several more cycles. Now its at 1. I'd be | curious to know the "velocity" on this one, dang. | andsoitis wrote: | > personal shame, guilt, and self-loathing | | Do you think the Christian concept of "original sin" planted | (at least some of) the seeds for this mental model? | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Original_sin | mensetmanusman wrote: | self-loathing is technically a type of sin... but that | doesn't mean peoples conceptions match the teachings (they | often don't). | | CCC 405 | | " Although it is proper to each individual, original sin | does not have the character of a personal fault in any of | Adam's descendants. | | It is a deprivation of original holiness and justice, but | human nature has not been totally corrupted: it is wounded | in the natural powers proper to it, subject to ignorance, | suffering, and the dominion of death, and inclined to sin | -- an inclination to evil that is called "concupiscence." | | Baptism, by imparting the life of Christ's grace, erases | original sin and turns a man back towards God, but the | consequences for nature, weakened and inclined to evil, | persist in man and summon him to spiritual battle." | NoraCodes wrote: | > To stop seeing the world as purely an evil constructed on | the mass graves of the innocent. Even if it were true (and in | some sense it is) this is still the world we have. [...] To | be sure, some things can be done, within a generation or two. | Maybe three. But after a while, what's done is done and you | have to move on. | | Putting aside the rhetorical tools you're discussing, what | would you say to people who currently feel the effects of | these historical, and contemporary oppressions? People with | unwanted pregnancies who find themselves unable to access | abortions, African-Americans who are descended from families | that were unable to purchase property they would have been | able to afford due to redlining and are thus at a | disadvantage, Gen X Jews whose parents were denied entry to | elite schools and whose families thus suffered economically, | gay and trans people who are currently, in the US, facing a | government that has all but stated it wants to eliminate even | the tenuous hold on legal existence they have? | | I am all for telling people to find the good in the world. | There is a lot of it! But some of these negative phenomena | that sociologists describe have real consequences for real | people in the present day, and I don't really see how "just | stop thinking about it" is a solution for them. | javajosh wrote: | _> what would you say to people who currently feel the | effects of these historical, and contemporary oppressions?_ | | I would have quoted me a bit more generously. This is what | I would tell them (and myself, since we are all oppressed, | and all of our ancestors were oppressed, at some point, by | someone): | | _> We cannot, in each successive generation, reform | ourselves to undo the injustices of the past, not only | because it's practically impossible but because the meaning | of injustice changes. And society is finite in its | malleability. To be sure, some things can be done, within a | generation or two. Maybe three. But after a while, what's | done is done and you have to move on._ | NoraCodes wrote: | Fair enough - I didn't mean to imply that you hadn't said | that, the quote was merely to delimit the area I was | addressing. | | Am I correct, then, in thinking your response to people | currently harmed by social structures they have no choice | in interacting with is, basically, "I agree that this | sucks, but I don't support changing anything to fix it."? | throwawayacc2 wrote: | > Terms like "cultural appropriation" and "privilege" or | "systematic racism" or "toxic masculinity", may have some | technically useful meanings to anthropologists, but within | the public sphere they function only as a combined virtue | signal and rhetorical weapon. | | This is so true. It's a very beautifully expressed feeling I | had trouble articulating before. Thank you for putting it | into words like this. | | It's also ridiculous to me there is a push to "teach" these | concepts to kids when it's fairly obvious they'll just | abstract them away to something stupid like "man bad" or | "white people bad". I feel like it's sort of like trying to | explain to kids with no CS experience some nuanced tradeoff | like, I don't know, the CAP theorem for example. They'll | probably understand that if you go with AP instead of CP you | risk losing data and that's bad so now we always use CP. All | they'll be left of with is "AP bad, CP good". | [deleted] | javajosh wrote: | Thanks. George Orwell made this point well in "Animal | Farm". The nuance of the initial revolution was gradually | lost, and became "four legs good, two legs bad". | mekoka wrote: | _The goodie-goodies are the thieves of virtue_ - Alan Watts, | attributing the original thought to Confucius. | | https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=cegl1BZ-0tI | TheOtherHobbes wrote: | Only narcissists and not very aware people are able to "enjoy | the world as it is, in all its messiness." | | Because that's what it takes to ignore abusive levels of | inequality and systemic threats to the continued survival of | the species. | | The point is not about what happened in the past, it's about | _what is still happening now_ - and how the narratives from | the past continue to be used to justify it. | | Ignoring this is neither compassionate nor realistic - | although it is toxic, pretty much by definition. | cm42 wrote: | I'd say "only people who live in their parents basements | and haven't put in The Work are able to make comments like | this", but then I'd look like the big dumb-dumb. | | Complaining without action is equivalent to ignoring it. | Sharing the same news headline everyone's already read with | your "This is bad!" caption isn't helping. We all know, we | can read the words and see it's bad. | | Enjoying the world in all its messiness means engaging with | it - not this woke schtick of avoiding touching the entire | subject because of some trigger word, then spewing generic, | inactionable drivel like "did you know the world is bad?" | | Yes, we know. We all know. Every single one of us. Welcome | to the conversation. Work on yourself so you're not | bringing more misery and uselessness into an already- | miserable world that needs help. | | (Have you tried meditation? /s) | [deleted] | namlem wrote: | Obsessing over injustices you have no control over is | neither normal nor healthy. | AnIdiotOnTheNet wrote: | Except we do have control over it, if we didn't people | wouldn't be complaining so loudly about being shunned for | the biggotted and ignorant crap that comes out of their | mouths. | InitialLastName wrote: | Right, but we've built a world where people are loudly | obsessed with issues they have (infinitesimal) control | over because if they paid attention to issues closer to | home they might look up from their phones, and the | advertisers can't have that. | blitz_skull wrote: | If it requires being "not very aware" to enjoy life without | frothing at the mouth in anger at all the messiness of the | world, I consider myself a proud narcissist / "not very | aware" person. | | I think you've missed the commenters main point which is | that all this hand-wringing about how terrible things are-- | isn't actively solving any problems we have today, or any | problems we had yesterday. I would even dare to guess it | won't solve the problems we'll have tomorrow. | lolinder wrote: | > Only narcissists and not very aware people are able to | "enjoy the world as it is, in all its messiness." | | I don't know if you meant to come off as harshly as you | did, but this is needlessly reductive, which is especially | ironic in a discussion about Buddhism. | | What you propose is that there are two extremes: enjoyment | of the world while ignoring suffering and self | mortification while trying to solve it. These are, in | essence, the two extremes which the Buddha argued against | in favor of the Middle Path[0]: | | > There is an addiction to indulgence of sense-pleasures, | which is low, coarse, the way of ordinary people, unworthy, | and unprofitable; and there is an addiction to self- | mortification, which is painful, unworthy, and | unprofitable. Avoiding both these extremes, the Perfect One | has realized the Middle Path; it gives vision, gives | knowledge, and leads to calm, to insight, to enlightenment | and to Nibbana. | | I don't think that OP is saying we should ignore suffering | and not try to address it, but they are saying that self- | flagellation is unhelpful and toxic, and we should approach | suffering with a forward eye not a backward one. | | [0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Middle_Way | throwawayacc2 wrote: | > Only narcissists and not very aware people are able to | "enjoy the world as it is, in all its messiness." | | I do not believe myself to be a narcissist and I think I am | at least somewhat aware of the world and it's problems. | | Yet, despite this, I do " enjoy the world as it is, in all | its messiness". | | I think what is preventing you from doing the same is | ideology and close mindedness. From the comment, you come | across like a fundamentalist christian refusing to enjoy | life because "the world is sinful". | | Enjoy life man. Since we're on the article, take a page | from the Buddhist philosophy and let go, for a moment at | least :) | blitz_skull wrote: | It's funny you say this, because it's precisely because | of my fundamentalist Christian worldview that allows me | to love and accept the world as it is. | | Sounds like you've had some bad run-ins with Christian | fundamentalists. Sure the world is broken, but most | Christians realize the world is inherently beautiful (not | to be confused with 'good'). | | If the God of the universe died to save it, there's got | to be fundamental value there. Therefore if someone | thinks the world is ugly and can't enjoy it, that's an | internal thing they gotta fix, not an immutable, self- | evident truth about the world... again it's precisely | because of the Bible that I believe these things. | throwawayacc2 wrote: | What you describing doesn't sound fundamentalist to me. | | I was referring more to the sort of people who, for | example, see homosexuals having gay pride and start | worrying it's the end times and they must cleanse the | world through adherence to their religion or something | like that. | | Let me re-write the comment I was responding as a | fundamentalist would write it. | | --- | | Only sinners and heathens are able to "enjoy the world as | it is, in all its messiness." | | Because that's what it takes to ignore abusive levels of | homosexuality and systemic threats to the continued | survival of the church. | | The point is not about what happened in the past, it's | about what is still happening now - and how the | narratives from the past continue to be used to justify | it. | | Ignoring this is neither compassionate nor realistic - | although it is heretical, pretty much by definition. | | --- | | I am 100% percent convinced that there are fundamentalist | christians or islamists or whatever who would read that | re-written comment as go "oh yeah, that makes complete | sense". | wrycoder wrote: | > _consumed by personal shame, guilt, and self-loathing_ | | I'd suggest that it's not about those things for the accusers | themselves. It's simply about gaining power. And they do it | by preying upon "personal shame, guilt, and self-loathing" in | other well-meaning people. They've discovered that yelling | "cultural appropriation" works quite well with people who are | constantly looking for other people to feel sorry for - which | of a kind of projection. | namlem wrote: | I don't think so. I think it really is about guilt and | shame, because these people just rebranded Catholicism | without realizing it. Most of them probably grew up | Catholic I bet, and internalized Catholic ideology to such | a degree that they can't help but view everything through | that lens. | mensetmanusman wrote: | Europe was Catholic long before the US, so it's something | else unique to the US... | prewett wrote: | If so, they missed the key part of | Catholicsm/Christianity: the death of Jesus atones for | our sin, guilt, and shame. | | I've slowly come to the opinion that it is about a power | play / emotional manipulation, because there is no way to | atone. If you're white (for example), you're just an | oppressor by the structure of society you were born into, | so the sin is membership in a structurally advantaged | group defined by race. You can't change your race nor | change the past, so the best you can do is hope that | supporting the political agenda of your accusers is good | enough. | prox wrote: | While I find some parts of your sympathetic, conflating the | left with academia is not really a valid approach. That some | (on the left) have picked up on academic usage of some words | or models is perhaps more accurate, and the misuse of words | and terms. Which is far more prevalent in my experience. | | There was an interesting article about some social | inequalities where when we talk about something more -is | actually making it worse-. Apparently doing sensitivity and | diversity trainings have the effect of making outcomes worse | or ineffective , counterintuitively (its this part of your | comment I find most sympathetic) | https://hbr.org/2019/07/does-diversity-training-work-the- | way... | HKH2 wrote: | > While I find some parts of your sympathetic, conflating | the left with academia is not really a valid approach. | | The parts of academia that are relevant to this discussion | (humanities and social sciences) are certainly dominated by | the left. | rayiner wrote: | Your criticism is fair, but I'm not sure there is a better | framing. Between corporations, political elites, and the | media, the most influential and highly visible folks that | identify as being "on the left" are much more influenced by | Judith Butler than by any socialist thinker. | javajosh wrote: | _> That some (on the left) have picked up on academic usage | of some words or models is perhaps more accurate, and the | misuse of words and terms._ | | That is absolutely true. And there has even been some | pushback from the academics who coined these terms. But, in | the end, words are tools, and tools meet a need, and there | was apparently a great need for a new narrative that | explained personal feelings of failure and self loathing. | So it was inevitable that these terms would be used in this | way. These words, as tools, are also potent for those who | desire power, and look for any means to win, including | invocation of race and gender stereotypes. It is galling | for anyone who values liberty to see this, when the goal | has always been to deprecate the prejudice function, and | not merely to call the same function with different | arguments. | | It is fascinating, though, how the desire to improve, to be | more virtuous than before, can turn out so badly! It's a | real slippery slope situation - we made progress, civil | rights, women's rights, interracial marriage, gay marriage, | sexual identities, gender identities acknowledging the | momentum of racist policies in our demographics...but then | it turns into: gender is purely a construct, lets modify | children's bodies if they think they're trans, lets force | people to use certain pronouns, lets have teachers share | their sex lives with kindergarteners, lets give women and | students of color the power of professional life and death | over white teachers, lets teach reverse CBT. And if you try | to make this point, you're called a racist and a bigot! | Social justice warriors push an insidious form of injustice | that harms everyone. Because, as the GGP put it, it's anti- | human. | haswell wrote: | I recently discovered Sam Harris, and started going down | a bit of a rabbit hole that is his body of work. He has | his critics, and I haven't spent enough time in his | materials to have a fully formed opinion of my own, but I | found that following his work unearths some interesting | insights about these culture wars. | | His arguments about religion and society's collective | unwillingness to have an honest conversation about it are | compelling. But what's fascinating to me is that he | manages to piss off both the religious right and the SJW | left, and I think he's onto something important. | | The _reason_ he pisses them off is that his fundamental | position boils down to: dogmatism is the problem. And no | one wants to admit they are dogmatic. | | The same instinct in a right-wing pro-life person to shut | down any consideration whatsoever that their position is | suspect is the same instinct in the SJW who can only see | the world as an unjust manifestation of the patriarchy, | or systemic racism, etc. This is not to say that those | things don't exist or have no impact, but it seems those | things have been used to harness the same base behavior | we're all capable of, to effectively form what resembles | an entirely new religious dogma. | | This dogmatism shuts down substantive dialog, and | perpetuates the same kinds of problems one finds with | folks who insist Jesus is coming back to earth in the | next 50 years. | | A mindset that removes willingness to engage in | conversation - even if the person holding the mindset | happens to be right (or at least closer to right than | some others) - is a mindset every bit as dangerous and | problematic as the mindset held by right-wing extremists. | | I'm not trying to just parrot Sam's message here, but | he's saying things that I've long believed, and didn't | know how to articulate, and the basic takeaway is this: | dialogue is the only thing that can change the collective | consciousness. | | The current trends around identity politics, cancelling | people for the things they say, creating taboos so strong | that people don't feel comfortable even touching on some | topics is the antithesis of liberalism, and I'll repeat | what you and GGP said - anti-human. If dialogue is the | only path forward, and our current path involves the | complete demonization of certain dialogue to the point | that you are no longer allowed to participate in the | conversation, we are at what can only be called an | impasse as a culture. | | We should properly put bad ideas to bed, absolutely. We | should address systemic issues where they exist, | absolutely. We should learn from our major mistakes, | absolutely. | | But the current climate is somewhat terrifying. One need | only try to make the argument I just made on Twitter, | Facebook or Reddit to see what I'm talking about. You'll | quickly be branded a right-wing or alt-right sympathizer | (despite the fact that in terms of policy, I'm about as | liberal as they come, identity politics notwithstanding). | People will manufacture a version of you that they | believe to be true, and then abuse you for it, _while | feeling righteous and justified in the process_. | | It's a sad state of affairs. | writeinpencil wrote: | "Above all, no zealotry." --Talleyrand | prox wrote: | You state more eloquently what I wanted to respond as a | comment. I am not interested in left/right, I am | interested in outcomes that make people feel more valued, | more part of a community, more prosperous. If there is | one thing I know for sure is that entrenching yourself in | your _insert favourite beliefs here_ and shutting others | out is not helping or helpful. | | Certain outcomes seem to be more favorable using typical | left wing policies and others using what's thought of as | right wing. Finding out which is which is far more | interesting. | fundad wrote: | Remember that academic findings compete with divine truths. | Reality has a known liberal bias. | haswell wrote: | Reality has a known liberal bias, yes, only in that | liberals tend to believe in science - the one discipline | that helps us understand what is objectively real. | | I would be careful not to confer this to issues of | culture, where dogma currently reigns supreme, and | liberals are no less susceptible than conservatives to | the kind of thinking that leads absolutely nowhere | productive. | stared wrote: | Ad cultural appropriation - in the US, it seems that no matter | what you do (in some eyes), at the same time, you ignore | another culture and appropriate its traditions. | | For me, there is a distinction: | | - Adapting, mixing, etc. is (as you said) the bedrock of | humanity. It is learning from other cultures. | | - Claiming that one is doing "real Buddhism" (when it is a | version far from any tradition) or serving pepperoni pizza as | "genuinely Italian", or being a "true Christian" for having | Xmas with a Coca-Cola Santa Claus. | | The latter is essentially a Cargo Cult of some other traditions | and cultures. | | I asked a few Italians about "pizza as an international dish". | One opinion was that there is nothing wrong with baking "bread | with other ingredients". What pissed her off was when people | said such a dish was similar to one food prepared by her mother | or in her town. | umanwizard wrote: | > What pissed her off was when people said such a dish was | similar to one food prepared by her mother or in her town. | | Most people overestimate how old traditional recipes are, | anyway. Italians didn't have tomatoes or potatoes before | Columbus; nor did Indians, Thais or Chinese people have chile | peppers... is all global cuisine just a huge cultural | appropriation from the Mexicans and Peruvians? | abeppu wrote: | I think this calls for a more nuanced distinction than I think | your comment draws. Yes, cultural exchange and transformation | is fundamentally how culture happens. Buddhism started from one | guy in what we'd now call India, built on some ideas that were | already in the area, and has shifted and changed as it moved | across time and space. Buddhism isn't owned by any one people | or place. | | But that doesn't mean that there's no such thing as | appropriation, or that it doesn't occur in Silicon Valley. | | I've participated in multiple work-place meditation trainings. | In each case, the teacher was American, spoke English as a | first language, and had done teacher-trainings at American | institutions, and I think they were always white. Would my | company have been equally willing to hire a Thai immigrant who | spoke English but not with an American accent, whose | credentials were years of monastic training? Or, is there an | institutional preference for hearing Buddhist practices from | someone who, as Chen says, looks just like the people they are | teaching? | | If one population is able to profit off of communicating the | cultural practices of others who are not able to access the | same opportunities, would you agree that could be called | "appropriation"? If not, what should it be called? | [deleted] | SpicyLemonZest wrote: | Cultural exchange of food and clothes and such is great. I'm a | lot more sympathetic to the complaint here, though, which seems | to be that people have taken the surface level of Buddhist | religious practice while tossing out all the parts that make it | meaningful to the interviewee. I'm imagining how I would feel | if my company hosted prayer sessions where you speak to your | unconscious mind rather than God and the sign of the cross | represents the intersection of personal and professional | responsibilities, and... yeah, that'd be pretty weird. (Or | maybe a better analogy would be some kind of monastic liturgy, | since she mentions meditation is uncommon in traditional | practice.) | md_ wrote: | I think the key point is that it becomes "appropriation"--vs | cultural mixing or exchange--when the ideas are removed of | their source context and used in a way that is contrary or even | disrespectful of their original intent. | | I'm far from an expert, but it seems like a reasonable argument | to advance that the linkage of Buddhist practices with | corporate and material advancement--and the removal of | spiritual or ethical content--is "appropriation", and not | merely respectful mixing. | goodpoint wrote: | Spot on. This is a perfect example of appropriation. | | --- | | Cultural appropriation is the inappropriate or unacknowledged | adoption of an element or elements of one culture or identity | by members of another culture or identity. This can be | controversial when members of a dominant culture appropriate | from minority cultures. | | According to critics of the practice, cultural appropriation | differs from acculturation, assimilation, or equal cultural | exchange in that this appropriation is a form of colonialism. | When cultural elements are copied from a minority culture by | members of a dominant culture, and these elements are used | outside of their original cultural context - sometimes even | against the expressly stated wishes of members of the | originating culture - the practice is often received | negatively. | | --- | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cultural_appropriation | | EDIT: instead of more stupid downvotes people could bother | reading the wikipedia page. | cuteboy19 wrote: | The whole concept is absurd, reading Wikipedia won't fix | that. | umanwizard wrote: | Why are Americans the "majority" and Asian Buddhists the | "minority" in this exchange? And what makes this | "colonialism" ? | goodpoint wrote: | "majority" and "minority" are not about raw numbers but | power dynamics in this context. | | "colonialism" refers to extracting whatever idea or | artifact is seen as valuable from a culture or a land | without consent and/or without respecting the moral | rights of who invented or made it. | | Additionally, you can read the wikipedia page. | | (edited for clarity: different people use | majority/minority differently depending on the context. | In this context it's not about raw numbers.) | | (edit: an example of power dynamic could be a large | multinational food chain that takes a lesser-known dish | from some culture and sells a butchered version worldwide | without clearly indicating the origin and/or that it's | not the real thing. By doing this it can easily distorts | the idea of the dish in the minds of millions of people.) | umanwizard wrote: | > "majority" and "minority" are never about raw numbers | but power dynamics. | | Sure, I'm aware of this distinction. I'm asking what are | the power dynamics between Asian Buddhists and random | American businessmen hypocritically adopting Buddhism? | They don't even live in the same countries, and there is | not any colonial relationship or other power relationship | between them as far as I can tell, so what makes one | "majority"? | | Sure, in general, the West has exploited Asia many times | throughout history; is this the only reason? If so, then | wouldn't any cultural exchange whatsoever between Asia | and the West count as appropriation? | | > "colonialism" refers to extracting | | This is a really vague and ahistorical definition of | colonialism that seems made up to justify your point, but | anyway, nothing has been "extracted" -- people in | traditionally Buddhist cultures have the same access to | the same Buddhism that they did before. Unlike actual | historical colonialism in which physical resources are | stolen, people are forced to work, traditional culture is | banned or heavily distorted in the places where it's | practiced, and so on. | amadeuspagel wrote: | > "majority" and "minority" are never about raw numbers | but power dynamics. | | So the concept "minority rule" is a contradiction in | terms, since if a group rules it's per definition the | majority? | goodpoint wrote: | If you are talking about power, it is an oxymoron. | | If you are talking about numbers, it is not. | | In this context it's the first. | honkdaddy wrote: | I've heard the power dynamics argument before and | admittedly it's never held much weight for me. There are | just too many edge cases for a heuristic like that to | make any sense, in my mind. | | So culturally powerless people may extract from | culturally powerful people until what point? If a | Ukrainian appropriates a part of Russian culture to be | their own, who is the victim here? Recently, being | Ukrainian has become a much more respected cultural | identity than being a Russian, does that mean the power | dynamic has shifted? | | The more you pick away at the idea of cultural | appropriation, you realize that the rules people set out | for it make very little sense outside of the egregious | examples of something like headdresses at Coachella, etc. | My personal rule is just not to disrespect people and | parts of their culture they find important. The color of | my skin or the actions of either of our ancestors | shouldn't play into it, IMO. | burrows wrote: | > My personal rule is just not to disrespect people and | parts of their culture they find important. | | What even is named by the word "disrespect"? | | Is disrespecting me just any behavior that I call | "disrespectful"? | | Seems like bullshit to me. | ffwszgf wrote: | This definition is so broad you can basically classify | anything you don't like as "cultural appropriation" | depending on how loosely you define "minority", "majority" | and "context". And in fact that's what usually ends up | happening. Certain forms of blatant "cultural | appropriation" are not criticized or even considered as | such as long as they conform to the cultural zeitgeist of | Western academia. | | For example, famous BLM activist Blair Imani is convert to | Islam. After her religious conversion she soon after came | out as a proud queer woman and upon being questioned she | claimed there is no conflict between homosexuality and | Islam. She subsequently gave media tours proudly | proclaiming to the world her marginal view of Islam. This | idea obviously only exists in some marginal Muslim | communities in the west and goes against the beliefs of 99% | of Muslims in the global south. Is this not blatant | cultural appropriation? She took Islam and warped it to fit | her western morality much to the anger of its emotional | adherents. | | Obviously we will never see an article calling her or the | Nation of Islam cultural appropriators. | umanwizard wrote: | That's indeed contrary and disrespectful of their original | intent, but why does it matter what culture does it? | | If people from a traditionally Buddhist country like Nepal | disrespected Buddhist ideas, it would presumably be just as | disrespectful as if people from America did, so I don't think | "cultural appropriation" is the right way to analyze this. | | By the way, practically every religion has been transformed | and warped so much over time as to be almost unrecognizable. | This again is normal human behavior. | md_ wrote: | I'm not sure which is more disrespectful, but I do think | the two situations are _different_. If I 'm immersed in a | culture or practice and I reject some aspects of it, from a | place of familiarity, that means something different--maybe | something more disrespectful!--that if I display the | trappings of a culture without understanding what they | mean. | cuteboy19 wrote: | > removed of their source context and used in a way that | is contrary or even disrespectful of their original | intent. | | Ironically all this talk of cultural appropriation is | "contrary or even disrespectful of the original intent" | of Buddhism. Buddhism never belonged to Magadha, India or | Asia, so it is not possible for anybody to appropriate | it. It is not anyone's property to begin with | md_ wrote: | Who said anything about geographic locality? | lolinder wrote: | Each of those places has a very different culture. | | Buddhism is not a monolithic entity. It took on vastly | different forms in each of the places it landed. Chinese | Buddhism and Tibetan Buddhism have different scriptures, | different approaches to bodhisattvas, different paths to | awakening. | | Was it disrespectful of the Chinese to take Buddhist | teachings when they arrived and transform them to fit | their cultural context? Should we go eliminate Buddhism | from China because it's not native there and they twisted | it to fit their culture? | throwawayacc2 wrote: | The exact same thing can be said about anything. Judaism | appropriated pre existing ideas and disrespected them by | insisting on a single god. Christianity appropriated judaism | and disrespected it by removing covenant practices such as | circumcision and adding new ideas such as the kingdom of | heaven being available to anyone not just "the chosen | people". Islam appropriated christianity and disrespected it | by demoting Jesus from the son of god to a mere prophet. | | This is how ideas work. And it's not just religion. Think of | left wing thought. The original communist ideology was | revolutionary. Social democrats appropriated ideas from them | but believe working within the system. Many hard left people | despise social democrats and believe they do more harm than | good. | [deleted] | TheOtherHobbes wrote: | The original communist ideology wasn't original at all. The | roots go back at least to the time of the Gracchi in Rome. | | It's clear hardly anyone commenting here has any idea what | appropriation really is. It's not just disrespecting | existing cultures. | | It's _destroying_ them by removing the meaning from them. | And then repackaging the symbols - usually with a vague | implication of profundity and exoticism - as a marketable | commodity. | | The purpose isn't to spread the original culture but to use | the trappings to promote the usual Western corporate | neoliberal value system. | | Corporate Buddhism is a perfect example. It's clearly a lot | more corporate than Buddhist. The goal isn't enlightenment, | detachment, or compassion, it's cultural conformity with | the aim of increased productivity and a higher share price. | | This shouldn't be controversial. All you need to do is look | at how people behave to see what motivates them. | throwawayacc2 wrote: | > It's destroying them by removing the meaning from them. | And then repackaging the symbols - usually with a vague | implication of profundity and exoticism - as a marketable | commodity. | | Sort of like the monarchies of Europe have been turned | into republics in all but name, the culture of "divine | right of kings" destroyed but the trappings of monarchy | are still used but devoid of meaning. And often used as | marketing material. | | But, surely you don't yearn for the return of absolute | monarchies ruled by gods appointed ruler, do you? | | This is the path of humanity. Some things die off, some | things survive and some are transformed beyond all | recognition. There is nothing intrinsically good or bad | in this. It simply is a phenomenon that happens. | kmeisthax wrote: | A better analogy would be what Disney did to the Brothers | Grimm. In fact, Disney is probably the poster child for | this shit, given how much they lobbied to extend | copyright law so that nobody could do to them what they | did to Europe's fairy tales. | umanwizard wrote: | How have original Buddhist cultures in Asia been | destroyed by "corporate Buddhism" catching on in the | West? They haven't. They are still around. | md_ wrote: | In this post alone you've written, what, four times as many | words as the length you read into the article? | | This is peak HN. | | Edit: I take it back. What's peak HN is that this is the | top voted comment on the entire post. | goodpoint wrote: | The downvotes are only proving you right. This is what HN | has become, pretty much 4chan. | amadeuspagel wrote: | "Jazz drew from ragtime, also "coded" Black, but ragtime drew | from marches, drawn in great measure from white men John | Philip Sousa and (eep) Wagner."[1] | | In your view, is this appropriation or cultural mixing or | exchange? | | [1]: https://freddiedeboer.substack.com/p/theres-no- | alternative-t... | md_ wrote: | I wasn't claiming to be the authority on what's | "appropriation." I was pointing out that the poster--who | admitted he didn't read the article past the | subheadline[1]--doesn't seem to understand how people use | the term "appropriation." | | That said, since you asked, no, it's never occurred to me | that jazz is appropriation. | | [1] Amusingly, the folks who admit to not actually, you | know, reading the thing they are debating, are the ones who | claim to be defending the free exchange of ideas. I think. | Or maybe they're just angry online. | bsedlm wrote: | absolutely agree, but I take it further | | The language of appropiation implies a sort of 'property'-like | dynamic for ideas. | | If I learn, get to know, understand an idea from somebody else, | I have not appropiated them in any way. I merely have adopted | their idea. | | This way of copying/adopting of other's ideas is what makes a | cultural society thrive. On the other hand, a society where all | idea transfers are in fact an exchange of something, is exactly | what I consider the essence of a market. | | The critical difference is that in a market, widgets are | exchanged. And whenever somebody takes a widget from somebody | else, only one widget remains. | | However when somebody adopts another's idea, the idea is now it | two places (and quite possibly, with a slight difference); that | it, until "the idea" becomes a digital artifact, then it's the | exact same "digital" copy which exists in more than the one | original instance. | | It's the dumbest action to try and enforce that digital | artifacts (and later on, ideas themselves) behave like widgets | in a market. | ImageXav wrote: | I suspect you might enjoy reading the rest of the article. It | goes into some depth on what Buddhism was, is and how it has | been adapted in the West to mostly focus on meditation and why. | Rather than a critique of "Western Buddhism" it is an | exploration of it in a wider context. The term appropriation | might have been off-putting due to its current cultural load, | but in this context it is not wrong. | | For others that are curious about meditation and Buddhism, I | would suggest reading the article and making up your own mind, | rather than the comments here. | [deleted] | temptemptemp111 wrote: | lappet wrote: | I am not an expert on Buddhism, but I grew up in India and | noticed similarities with Hinduism in two countries: Bhutan and | Thailand. The Buddhist temples were very ornate and seemed to be | focused on the devotional aspects. If you apply what Chen is | saying to Hinduism, it strikes true to me: meditation and yoga | are very recent trends in India, and most people focus on the | ritualistic and devotional aspects. | shp0ngle wrote: | I'm a Catholic (so I have ... my own view on Buddhism) but I | lived in SEA for a long time. | | I want to say, this article is very good. | | The buddhism as practiced in the west has very little to do with | actual practices in the east. But, Buddhism is also very | confusing, and it's hard to say "what is the true buddhism" | (mahayana, therevada, vajrayana and zen buddhism in Japan | (formally mahayana) are all very different) | spaetzleesser wrote: | ". But, Buddhism is also very confusing, and it's hard to say | "what is the true buddhism" (mahayana, therevada, vajrayana and | zen buddhism in Japan (formally mahayana) are all very | different)" | | That seems to to be the case with most major religions. It | always boggles my mind how different the conclusions of | different Christian groups from the reading the same Bible are. | Same for Islam. | rg111 wrote: | What makes you think what goes on in SEA today is the _actual_ | Buddhism? | | This is so wrong. | | The current practices in SEA is so far from what the Buddha | actually taught. | neonate wrote: | That's the opposite of what the comment said. | bowsamic wrote: | > The buddhism as practiced in the west has very little to do | with actual practices in the east | | Really it depends on your specific sect. If you join a Pure | Land sect in the west I think that it is generally quite | similar to the east | shp0ngle wrote: | True. Pure Land is very close to Chinese mahayana | prox wrote: | Focussing on all these different ways also occludes the general | idea that there is a thing such as enlightment and a way to see | all beings interconnected. You can have the same experience as | a Catholic if you move beyond words (remember Jesus primary | teaching (love God completely and love your neighbor like | yourself) | | Many things we notice in our minds are just labels and people | are crazy easy to get hung up on them as being the thing in | themselves. | nprateem wrote: | > The buddhism as practiced in the west has very little to do | with actual practices in the east | | Is it possible to make a more sweeping statement? | soulofmischief wrote: | To be fair, Catholicism has seen many branches over the year | and only skirts by this "it's confusing" stuff by claiming it's | the OG Christian sect, despite having massive shifts in policy | over the years. | [deleted] | collyw wrote: | McBuddhism | blippage wrote: | > In an industry where 70+ hour workweeks are normal, | | Well, there's part of your problem right there. I have great | scepticism about businesses getting involved with things like | Buddhism. From what few anecdotes I've heard, it ends up being | some kind of twisted take on the source religion. | | Buddhism is not some kind of pill that you swallow to move from | working 70+ hours per week to 80+ hours a week. | | Ultimately, Buddhism is a withdrawal. You become nobody in | particular. This is the opposite of the Cult of Personality, and | Manifest Destiny, that seems to permeate the tech industries (I'm | looking at you, Google, Microsoft, etc.). | fendy3002 wrote: | Religion has some passages that can be cherry picked to mislead | the masses and especially useful for the ruler class to direct | them. Buddha is not an exception to it. | | As I've always feel, most traditional religion teachings | doesn't fit with modern way (globalization, capitalism) of | living. | fundad wrote: | I had to stop reading when it claimed this was ubiquitous in | Silicon Valley because that isn't true by any measure or crosstab | nathias wrote: | if you see Buddha in a suit, kill him | nonrandomstring wrote: | Sold to the highest Buddha, eh? I can't see this working. | Business already has a God - The Market. | bigpeopleareold wrote: | Haha - come for the salary, stay for the religious | indoctrination! :) | brigandish wrote: | If it implements the 8 fold path, an abstract framework, then it | is Buddhism. If not, it's not. | toyg wrote: | In Italy, in the '90s, we had a popular tv program with comedians | doing sketches. One of those sketches was written and interpreted | a guy who used to work in important advertising agencies. The | sketch had a corporate manager who always started as a calm and | devout supporter of buddhist-like tranquility in the workplace, | all meditation and zen and care for personal wellbeing; by the | end of the sketch his schizophrenic double (or rather true | persona) would violently emerge, utterly angry and materialistic. | | This sort of attitude, at the time, was lampooned because it was | limited to the upper echelons of society (sure enough, the only | buddhist in my extensive family was a corporate manager). I bet | such a sketch would cause outrage these days. | foobarian wrote: | That reminds me of Monty Python's cheese shop sketch. [1] | | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hz1JWzyvv8A | mjfl wrote: | Is Steve Jobs a great example of this? | tim333 wrote: | Jobs wasn't really like that as in "zen and care for personal | wellbeing" at the start and then switching to "angry and | materialistic". He seemed to combine a fairly consistent zen | like focus, more on great objects like the iPhone rather than | care for people, and a fairly consistent edge of angry | materialism. It didn't really flip from one thing to the | other. | | A well known video of him for example on changing the world | https://youtu.be/kYfNvmF0Bqw?t=7 He was a complex character | fendy3002 wrote: | I don't think it's worth to be outraged, logically. After all, | if the manager can stay calm and all, that means he's close to | attain (or one step closer to attain) buddhahood, which is a | very difficult thing to attain. | RicoElectrico wrote: | > I bet such a sketch would cause outrage these days. | | I remember the times when people whose pastime was to get | offended at stuff were ridiculed by most of the society. | | For all our social progress in this millennium, we regressed in | many ways people don't readily notice. This was mostly an | American thing in the past; but it spilled into Europe over | time. | KennyBlanken wrote: | https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Political_correctness | vkou wrote: | > I remember the times when people whose pastime was to get | offended at stuff were ridiculed by most of the society. | | Which specific time period are you speaking about? The time | period when the existence of gay people (not even speaking | about married gay people) was offensive to the point of | intolerance? Or perhaps the time period when interracial | marriages offended the majority of the United States? Or | maybe the time period when half the country was offended by a | black person sitting in the front of a bus? Or by a flag | hanging upside down? | | People taking offense at stuff that does/doesn't affect them | isn't some woke 21st century invention. | [deleted] | lmm wrote: | > Which specific time period are you speaking about? The | time period when the existence of gay people (not even | speaking about married gay people) was offensive to the | point of intolerance? Or perhaps the time period when | interracial marriages offended the majority of the United | States? Or maybe the time period when half the country was | offended by a black person sitting in the front of a bus? | Or by a flag hanging upside down? | | I came of age in the late '90s. I don't think most people | were offended by any of your list. A few churches would | complain about gay people, but they were ridiculed for it. | | > People taking offense at stuff that does/doesn't affect | them isn't some woke 21st century invention. | | It isn't, but it's something that we had seemed to be | finally moving past. It's frustrating that only a few years | after casting off the oppression of religious attitudes we | now seem to be diving back into much the same thing. | sg47 wrote: | We have regressed by overturning abortion, enacting | subversive election laws and in general destroying the fabric | of democracy. | rayiner wrote: | > overturning abortion | | More accurately, the US Supreme Court returned the | situation in the US to the status quo in most advanced | countries: regulating abortion as a legislative matter, not | a "right." It did what the EU Court of Human Rights has | repeatedly done in declining to recognize a "right" to | elective abortions,[1] that can override legislation. A | putative right that, 100 years from now, may well be seen | alongside eugenics (alongside which it originated) as a | mistaken wrong turn in the arc of progress. | | [1] In a series of cases, most recently _RR v. Poland_ , | the EHCR has declined calls to overturn Poland's near ban | on abortions, deciding them on narrow grounds that the | government had prevented abortions that were legal under | exceptions to Polish law. It has gone only so far as to | suggest there is a right in case of risk to maternal life. | wavefunction wrote: | Abortion has existed since before recorded history. | Eugenics is 150 years old at most. I certainly wouldn't | advance such a dishonest and immoral argument and it | certainly illustrates why people like you should have | little input into the definition of civil rights or | society in general. | sg47 wrote: | Should US also offer free healthcare like most advanced | countries? Why compare where it's convenient? I'm talking | about progress. | rayiner wrote: | Yes we should. We already took major steps in that | direction with Obamacare. I hear it's popular. | vkou wrote: | I doubt that a century from now, eugenics and | _fundamental body autonomy_ will be spoken of in the same | breath, despite the intervening efforts to conflate the | two. | markdown wrote: | Did you just liken abortion to eugenics? | helloworld11 wrote: | There's certainly a certain relation between them. What's | more, as genetic screening of early-term pregnancies | becomes more common, the inevitable abortions that result | due to real or perceived defects or other random personal | reasons are things that many eugenicists of the past | would have probably been keenly interested in, and even | applauded in certain ways. | [deleted] | Jerrrry wrote: | Are you implying they aren't related at all? | stn8188 wrote: | I'm no expert on the topic but there are articles that | contain both words... | | https://www.npr.org/sections/itsallpolitics/2015/08/14/43 | 208... | mise_en_place wrote: | Well, what's the data on the types of pregnancies that | get aborted? You could then use such data to make the | argument that abortion achieves some of the same goals of | eugenics, even if only loosely related in the currents | that made these ideas mainstream. I predict this will | become even more interesting when embryo modification | becomes more popular and mainstream. | merlincorey wrote: | The history is that it did start that way and one of the | current discussion points is whether or not to allow | people to abort children that are found to have genetic | abnormalities such as pre-natal screening for Down | Syndrome. | | Oxford Languages defines eugenics as "the study of how to | arrange reproduction within a human population to | increase the occurrence of heritable characteristics | regarded as desirable." | | Of course the unspoken corollary here is that to increase | the occurrence of desirable heritable characteristics one | must prevent the reproduction of undesirable heritable | characteristics. | | It's plainly obvious to many of us today that such a | policy is dangerous if we decide to select on | characteristics such as color of skin, but as the GP | says, maybe in 50 years we will find that people with | Down Syndrome will consider today's approved abortions | for their condition to be just as barbaric. | terr-dav wrote: | >Oxford Languages defines eugenics as "the study of how | to arrange reproduction within a human population to | increase the occurrence of heritable characteristics | regarded as desirable." | | So, for abortion to be a eugenics project, they should be | arranged by some central governing body - a "board of | eugenics" or "baby optimization committee" if you will - | and not simply done by the choice of each pregnant | person. Maybe you could argue that a high-level | propaganda campaign could have the same effect, but | that's beyond the realm of the legislative or judicial | branches of government, and possibly beyond government | entirely. | | I think the biggest implication of any type of abortion | being outlawed is that it subjects all pregnant people to | the potential violence of the state on behalf of anyone | close enough to know about their pregnancy. Add to this | the massive grey areas introduced by the base rate of | miscarriage, drugs that can be used for multiple things | including abortion, what defines a threat to the life of | the mother, and you've got a recipe for endless | justifications for violations of privacy, bodily | autonomy, and completely arbitrary prosecutions of | uterus-havers. | vkou wrote: | Abortion has a millennium-long history that precedes | eugenics. | merlincorey wrote: | "Recent history" if you would prefer. | | They say Sparta practiced eugenics with late-term | abortions according to legend though we don't have any | physical evidence of this to my quick search. Wikipedia | offers this quotation as a source[0] | | Haeckel, Ernst (1876). "The History of Creation, vol. I". | New York: D. Appleton. p. 170. "Among the Spartans all | newly born children were subject to a careful examination | or selection. All those that were weak, sickly, or | affected with any bodily infirmity, were killed. Only the | perfectly healthy and strong children were allowed to | live, and they alone afterwards propagated the race." | | [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_eugenics | vkou wrote: | Sparta was a small, barbaric slave city state that after | a flash in the sun, quickly faded into obscurity due to | its ossified economic and political structures. | | There's six orders of magnitude more people who have | lived in political, and ethical systems over those | thousands of years that had nothing to do with Sparta. | I'm not sure why you are cherrypicking needles out of | haystacks, but it's as much a fallacy as pointing out | that since Ghenghis Khan wore pants, ergo, pants are | evil. | merlincorey wrote: | I'm not sure what you think my position is as you seem to | be arguing past me about something else completely. | | My position is that I agree with a specific claim of the | GP whose exact words were "A putative right that, 100 | years from now, may well be seen alongside eugenics | (alongside which it originated) as a mistaken wrong turn | in the arc of progress." | | The specific parts that I agree with are that: | | 1) Abortion and Eugenics are related and originated | somewhat together, and | | 2) 100 years from now Abortion as a Right instead of as | Legislation may be seen as a wrong turn much like | Eugenics is now | | In your first response to me you only addressed point #1 | by stating erroneously that "Abortion has a millennium- | long history that precedes eugenics". I clarified in my | response that I meant "recent history" in which Abortion | and Eugenics were very intertwined; however, I also | provided a link to a Wikipedia page that starts out | telling us that Plato in Ancient Greece was a proponent | of Eugenics which shows that concept also has a millenium | long history. I didn't quote that section, but instead, I | quoted a section referring to the legendary tales of | Sparta engaging in eugenics and late term abortion. | | In your second response you failed to read the source | link I provided detailing the history of Eugenics and | pick up on your mistake; instead, you have gone down some | strange argument disparaging Sparta and claiming I am | cherry picking needles out of haystacks. | | It doesn't matter that you view Sparta as a "barbaric | slave city state" which "faded into obscurity" -- that | doesn't change the fact that they are a millenia old | example of eugenics and potentially very late term | abortions. | | Even if it did, none of this works to refute my position | that possibly 100 years from now Abortion as a Right | instead of as Legislation may be seen as a wrong turn | much like Eugenics is now. The specific example I gave of | Down Syndrome stands as a current issue that may turn | into a future view of our current peoples as barbaric for | aborting babies with Down Syndrome. | | Do you have any arguments against that, or do you think | I'm just anti-abortion in general and you're having a | general argument with me about abortion? Because I am | neither anti-abortion nor am I arguing against abortion. | rayiner wrote: | Abortion legalization is an offshoot of the same early | 20th century progressive anti-natalism as eugenics. | Planned Parenthood was, of course, founded by a | eugenicist. In most of the developing world, like my home | country of Bangladesh, abortion is still justified | primarily to avoid poor women having too many children. | | There's other justifications for it now, of course, but | I'm not drawing a novel comparison here. In those | hypotheticals of "what do we do that future generations | will view as evil" eating meat and elective abortions are | probably near the top of the list. (In both cases, I | suspect technological and economic change will make us | forget why we did it in the first place.) | open-source-ux wrote: | The TV show _Silicon Valley_ also satirises the aggressive, | egotistical CEO (a character called Gavin Belson). | | Belson spends some time at a Buddhist retreat which seems to | impart nothing from his experience. The attraction to Buddhist | ideas are only at shallow, surface level. | | He also employs a full-time spiritual adviser. Even the adviser | looks out for opportunities advantageous to him and manipulate | situations. | | It's a cynical (but honest?) look at personality traits in | tech. | soco wrote: | Oh well this reminds me of a certain prime minister of a | certain two letter country starting with U and ending in, K | having a full time ethics adviser, which he subsequently | fired... | WJW wrote: | My favorite moment in perhaps the entire show is where Gavin | Belson has a (mild) flash of self insight and asks: | | > GB: Have I just surrounded myself with sycophants, who tell | me whatever I want to hear, regardless of the truth? | | > Spiritual advisor: <swallows awkwardly> ... no? | | > GB: Thank you Denpok, I really needed to hear that. | nicbou wrote: | It also shows an opportunistic, career-driven teacher. | There's a whole bit about the teacher losing his parking pass | and finessing his way back into the CEOs council. | | And doesn't Gavin kill someone at his Buddhist retreat? | [deleted] | victornomad wrote: | I'd love to watch it. Do you mind sharing a link? | toyg wrote: | Sadly it doesn't seem to have made it to YouTube. The | character was called _Dottor Frattale_ , by comedian Walter | Fontana https://it.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_Fontana | | If you read Italian, I'd recommend tracking down his short | comedy novel _L 'Uomo di Marketing e la Variante al Limone_, | which satirizes the _milanese_ advertising industry of the | '90s (but I bet it's still mostly like that, lol). | kinow wrote: | Found one on FaceBook, I think: | https://www.facebook.com/Mai-Dire- | GialappaS-109451077867913/... | matfior wrote: | There's a couple facebook videos: | | https://www.facebook.com/MaiDireGol/videos/tutti-vorremmo- | pe... | | https://it-it.facebook.com/MaiDireGol/videos/la-filosofia- | de... | | It was one of my favorite as well! | anoy8888 wrote: | It is a stretch to say that Practicing meditation and Buddhist | philosophy ( just like any other company culture) is bringing | religion to the corporation. | bigpeopleareold wrote: | True - frankly, I can find my God or my gods elsewhere (unless | it is a religious organization!). It's the same as treating | your job like a job and not a social club. | eurasiantiger wrote: | Buddhism explicitly denies the existence of gods. | odiroot wrote: | I don't think Chinese Buddhists seem to care. | Lutzb wrote: | False. Even with a cursory understanding of buddhist | tradition you should know that the many schools accept the | existence of god-like beings, but differ on their influence | of the buddhist practitioner. | | You could start to increase your understanding by reading | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddhist_deities or | https://www.learnreligions.com/atheism-and-devotion-in- | buddh... | eurasiantiger wrote: | Let's not start an ecumenical debate that has been | settled for decades. | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_points_unifying_Thera | vad... | | Some traditions do not agree, of course. | Lutzb wrote: | You are using broad unsubstantiated statements to make | your points: | | > Buddhism explicitly denies the existence of gods. | | Where does it state that? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B | asic_points_unifying_Therav%C... says nothing about the | denial of the existence of gods. | lsrinivas wrote: | It's sad that in the US Buddhism stands for some kind of a woolly | notion of peace and peacefulness. In the countries where it is in | majority, it is as bad as any other institutionalized religion. | Sri Lanka and Burma (now Myanmar), known for the worst kind of | pogroms against minorities, have the dubious distinction of a lot | of riots against minorities and many, if not most, of these are | led by Buddhist monks in their holy saffron garb. | | Re corporate America, meditation and mindfulness were waiting to | be incorporated into the corporate 'feel good' mantra. | qzx_pierri wrote: | Anyone who has read the Dhammapada can tell you exactly why the | rise of Buddhism is a good thing. America's tendency to wrap | everything up in a fancy package and slap a dollar sign on it | might be annoying, but meditation is free - Ignore the noise. | | Transcendental Meditation (TM) has been doing this for a while | now[1]. But it's not a big deal because outrage bait articles | didn't make it a big deal. Please argue about gun control or roe, | or some other hot button issue. Leave the Buddha's teachings out | of it. | | 1: https://www.tm.org/course-fee | scrollbar wrote: | I recall a former cult member turned therapist and cult expert | Steve Hassan mentioning TM as problematic, he is the first | reviewer quoted by this book about the topic | | https://www.tmdeception.com/ | routerl wrote: | In the 21st century, in the West, "Buddhism" is treated as a set | of stress-relief techniques and slogans. | | This isn't strictly limited to the West: at least two of Taiwan's | Four Great Mountains (i.e. schools of Buddhism) are similarly | inclined, with additional cultish elements thrown in for good | measure. | | The cultish elements had already developed independently within | corporate cultures, but adding Buddhist slogans and techniques | (rather than the philosophical and devotional elements), has | given it a new edge. | | Buddhist cults focus on fate, inevitability, acceptance, | detachment. You are helpless against the world, which by the way, | works the way we say, because we are the enlightened bearers of | the great tradition. And because of this helplessness, here's a | set of doctrines you should follow. Corporate Buddhism | additionally tries to appropriate mindfulness as "focusing on | work". | | And, yes, that stuff is historically there, in Buddhism. It's | present in many many of the fractally complex historical branches | of the Buddhist taxonomic tree. But too many people only ever see | one leaf on that tree, and think "oh so this is Buddhism". | | Except Buddhism is also a philosophy of action, and a set of | guides for _correct_ action. Acting rightly entails _seeing_ | rightly, and so Buddhism includes an appreciation for and guide | towards empirical inquiry. This was always terrifying to | authority figures, and Asia only didn 't develop modern science | first because Buddhist logic and experimentation were among the | casualties of The Burning of Books and Burying of Scholars. | | And here, in the 21st century culture of global megacorporations, | we see this pattern again; the pleasant, passive parts of | Buddhism are allowed in, while pretending the other parts don't | exist. | | But Buddhism _did have_ rebellious warrior monks. Ashoka, the | greatest Buddhist King, made it clear that the law would be | enforced, and his borders protected. Acting correctly _always_ | requires brutality towards oppressors, but this part of Buddhism | is unpalatable within corporate culture. | djokkataja wrote: | > Buddhist cults focus on fate, inevitability, acceptance, | detachment. You are helpless against the world, which by the | way, works the way we say, because we are the enlightened | bearers of the great tradition. And because of this | helplessness, here's a set of doctrines you should follow. | | Reading this, it struck me how closely this fits with the | popularity of Lovecraftian fiction in our current era. If we | see corporations as monolithic, inhuman, malignant entities | that trample humans simply for being in the way, with little | concern for consequences for themselves (because "they" are too | far beyond "us", too big to fail), and if we see the universe | as ultimately not even apathetic towards humans, because there | is no mind there at all, just incomprehensible vastness that | swallows us all in eventual oblivion -- then this superficial | Buddhist take makes a great deal of sense. An inevitable fate, | nothing to do but accept it and detach ourselves to try to | minimize the unpleasantness. | | But then, accepting this perspective personally makes it a | self-fulfilling prophecy for oneself. | mekoka wrote: | A way in is better than no way at all. | | A friend of mine was concerned about a similar (mis)use of | psychedelics in the service of productivity. Except that | neither Buddhism, nor psychedelics discriminate in the kind of | insights you end up with. So as workers are encouraged to boost | creativity through microdosing, employers might be surprised to | see some employees quit after they got curious, took a bit too | much Ayahuasca one weekend, like it's described in some part of | the microdosing forum, and started reevaluating their life as a | result. | | Similarly with mindfulness, first you dip your toes with some | guided stuff, organized twice a week by HR. Next thing you know | YouTube is suggesting you check out this Osho guy and Thich | Nhat Hanh, where you find out you've only been scratching the | surface. Then one day you quit your job because it disagree | with your conception of _right action_. | | A way in. | pmoriarty wrote: | _" Acting correctly always requires brutality towards | oppressors"_ | | This directly contradicts a central tenet of Buddhism: ahimsa | (or non-violence). | corrral wrote: | > Except Buddhism is also a philosophy of action, and a set of | guides for correct action. Acting rightly entails seeing | rightly, and so Buddhism includes an appreciation for and guide | towards empirical inquiry. This was always terrifying to | authority figures, and Asia only didn't develop modern science | first because Buddhist logic and experimentation were among the | casualties of The Burning of Books and Burying of Scholars. | | Marcus Aurelius' _Meditations_ includes a sentence that, in a | translation I read long ago and no longer have, read something | like: | | "You can pass your life in calm flow of happiness--if you learn | to think the right way, and to act the right way." | | It took me way too long to realize that the "think the right | way" is, by far, the easier part, and how dangerous it can be | without the "act the right way". It also feels better. Fresher. | Trendier. The "act the right way" looks and feels an awful lot | like following all the advice your grandpa gave you. Very "gods | of the copy-book headers" stuff. And isn't as immediately | gratifying as the "think the right way" bit. | Konohamaru wrote: | Of course it would. Buddhism teaches karma, the law of strict | retribution from which there is no escape. And because there is | no loving creator God in Buddhism, there's no one you can appeal | to for mercy, grace, or forgiveness. A perfect fit. | amadeuspagel wrote: | > [Zen at War] meticulously documents Zen Buddhism's support of | Japanese militarism from the time of the Meiji Restoration | through the World War II and the post-War period. It describes | the influence of state policy on Buddhism in Japan, and | particularly the influence of Zen on the military of the Empire | of Japan. A famous quote is from Harada Daiun Sogaku: "[If | ordered to] march: tramp, tramp, or shoot: bang, bang. This is | the manifestation of the highest Wisdom [of Enlightenment]. The | unity of Zen and war of which I speak extends to the farthest | reaches of the holy war [now under way]." | | > The book also explores the actions of Japanese Buddhists who | opposed the growth of militarism. | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zen_at_War | visiblink wrote: | An entire piece on Buddhism and corporations doesn't use the word | "suffering" once. | harveywi wrote: | The mass exodus from MS Outlook and desktop email clients to | webmail with cloud-based virus scanning has removed the | greatest source of suffering in the corporate world: | Attachments. | TedDoesntTalk wrote: | Because clearly working for our corporation is not suffering! | Show gratitude to trading your limited time on earth to be with | us. /s | javajosh wrote: | Fun fact: Buddhist monks, after having given up everything, still | fought over "right view". Even during the lifetime of the Buddha. | Even though there were many arahants around. The urge to be | right, and the antagonism toward those that we perceive as wrong, | runs very very deep. | spicymaki wrote: | I appreciate that in the Pali Cannon recorded all of these | internal disagreements and mistakes as the Buddhist communities | grew, as well as challenges and debates with other communities. | devdiary wrote: | > you have only one game in town -- the workplace -- and | essentially everything else orbits around it | | That hits hard | fithisux wrote: | It is like Ralph Fiennes in Schindler's list, "I pardon you" ___________________________________________________________________ (page generated 2022-07-12 23:01 UTC)