An American Buddhist on Thanksgiving

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Serenity509
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An American Buddhist on Thanksgiving

Post by Serenity509 »

As an American Buddhist, I am thankful for the blessings we often take for granted, despite our country's imperfections. Even when adjusted for differences in currency value between countries, the bottom five percent of Americans have a higher standard of living than 68% of the world's people, and the median household income is higher than 93% of the world's people.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oP60sIKKJWQ

http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/ ... have-nots/

Our gratitude for Amida's unconditional compassion can extend into a profound sense of gratitude for all the causes and conditions that sustain our lives and give it meaning. This is a Thanksgiving-related adaptation of a well known Buddhist text:
Countless are those are born without physical or mental health.
I have been born with all limbs and faculties complete.

Many are those who live in lands of strife and conflict, and who are deprived of security and safety.
I am living in a place where there is peace.

Incalculable are those forced to toil without end, and who are driven by hunger and want.
I have enough to sustain my body and time to give it rest.

Numerous are those who live as slaves, unable to go where they wish and think as they like.
I enjoy great freedom.

Without number are those who live in regions where the light of the truth does not shine and its message is not heard above the racket of doctrines that cause suffering.
I have heard the good teachings.

Truly precious and great are the blessings I enjoy.
Here I contemplate on my good fortune and the good of others.

To repay these gifts, I will use my efforts to overcome the obstacles of hatred, greed and delusion.
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/philfoxros ... tradition/
I am also profoundly thankful for the Dharma itself, and my freedom as an American Buddhist to learn and practice it.
I realized, what I was most thankful for, as a Buddhist, was indeed the Triple Jewel. Without that, I wouldn’t be able to be thankful for all those other things... I’ve been through alot over the last few years, well, all my life, and it wasn’t until my conversion to Buddhism about three years ago, that things began to make sense, and I had a way to make it through the tough times, and not only make it through, but to understand and make sense of them. I was thankful that I had something that would help me make sense of life, of existence, and to give my life meaning and purpose. The Mahayana teachings of the bodhisattva vows give my life meaning and purpose, and make me better at all the things I try to be. This, in my mind, is what I am most thankful for.
http://americanbuddhist.tumblr.com/
Malcolm
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Re: An American Buddhist on Thanksgiving

Post by Malcolm »

Serenity509 wrote:As an American Buddhist, I am thankful for the blessings we often take for granted, despite our country's imperfections. Even when adjusted for differences in currency value between countries, the bottom five percent of Americans have a higher standard of living than 68% of the world's people, and the median household income is higher than 93% of the world's people.
Yes, at the expense of 400 years of systematic ethnic cleansing and genocide of an indigenous population.
Schrödinger’s Yidam
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Re: An American Buddhist on Thanksgiving

Post by Schrödinger’s Yidam »

the bottom five percent of Americans have a higher standard of living than 68% of the world's people
An economist might buy that statistic. However the level of addiction and criminality in the bottom 5% of America changes the actual quality of life so that the numbers are misleading.

Nit-picking aside, I'm grateful for being a (white/male) American.
1.The problem isn’t ‘ignorance’. The problem is the mind you have right now. (H.H. Karmapa XVII @NYC 2/4/18)
2. I support Mingyur R and HHDL in their positions against lama abuse.
3. Student: Lama, I thought I might die but then I realized that the 3 Jewels would protect me.
Lama: Even If you had died the 3 Jewels would still have protected you. (DW post by Fortyeightvows)
Serenity509
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Re: An American Buddhist on Thanksgiving

Post by Serenity509 »

smcj wrote:
the bottom five percent of Americans have a higher standard of living than 68% of the world's people
An economist might buy that statistic. However the level of addiction and criminality in the bottom 5% of America changes the actual quality of life so that the numbers are misleading.

Nit-picking aside, I'm grateful for being a (white/male) American.
Doesn't every country have addiction and crime? Nit-picking aside, I am thankful for America, despite its imperfections and shortcomings.
amanitamusc
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Joined: Mon Nov 08, 2010 3:32 am

Re: An American Buddhist on Thanksgiving

Post by amanitamusc »

Serenity509 wrote:
smcj wrote:
the bottom five percent of Americans have a higher standard of living than 68% of the world's people
An economist might buy that statistic. However the level of addiction and criminality in the bottom 5% of America changes the actual quality of life so that the numbers are misleading.

Nit-picking aside, I'm grateful for being a (white/male) American.
Doesn't every country have addiction and crime? Nit-picking aside, I am thankful for America, despite its imperfections and shortcomings.
Don't forget the ethnic cleansing.

Happy thanksgiving.

Don't choke on it.
Serenity509
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Re: An American Buddhist on Thanksgiving

Post by Serenity509 »

Again, I think American history should be compared to the histories of any other country. America has its shortcomings, but it's also done a great deal of good for the world. For example, did you know that Americans, per capita, give more money to charity than any nation on earth? Regardless of income level, Americans give more to charity, especially when it comes to humanitarian crises like the 2004 tsunami. We should also be mindful of how America's government, despite its shortcomings, has done a great deal of good for the world as well.
Serenity509
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Re: An American Buddhist on Thanksgiving

Post by Serenity509 »

Malcolm wrote:
Serenity509 wrote:As an American Buddhist, I am thankful for the blessings we often take for granted, despite our country's imperfections. Even when adjusted for differences in currency value between countries, the bottom five percent of Americans have a higher standard of living than 68% of the world's people, and the median household income is higher than 93% of the world's people.
Yes, at the expense of 400 years of systematic ethnic cleansing and genocide of an indigenous population.
Let's begin by asking whether the white man was guilty of genocide against the native Indians. As a matter of fact, he was not. As William McNeill documents in Plagues and Peoples, great numbers of Indians did perish as a result of their contact with whites, but, for the most part, they died by contracting diseases-smallpox, measles, malaria, tuberculosis-for which they had not developed immunities. This is tragedy on a grand scale, but it is not genocide, which implies an intention to wipe out an entire population. McNeill points out that, a few centuries earlier, Europeans themselves contracted lethal diseases, including the bubonic plague, from Mongol invaders from the Asian steppes. The Europeans didn't have immunities, and the plague decimated one-third of the population of Europe, and yet, despite the magnitude of deaths and suffering, no one calls this genocide.
http://www.heritage.org/research/report ... ut-america
It would be wrong to say that whites never killed natives. But again, we must judge American history by the same standards we'd judge any other country's history. For example, wasn't India, the country in which Buddhism was born, established by Aryan invaders who displaced the native peoples? Does that make India or Buddhism all bad?
amanitamusc
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Re: An American Buddhist on Thanksgiving

Post by amanitamusc »

Free Leonard Peltier.
Serenity509
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Re: An American Buddhist on Thanksgiving

Post by Serenity509 »

amanitamusc wrote:Free Leonard Peltier.
I don't know about that, dawg. What if he's guilty?
In January 2002 in the News from Indian Country, the publisher Paul DeMain wrote an editorial that an "unnamed delegation" told him, "Peltier was responsible for the close range execution of the [FBI] agents. ..." DeMain described the delegation as "grandfathers and grandmothers, AIM activists, Pipe carriers and others who have carried a heavy unhealthy burden within them that has taken its toll."[28] DeMain said he was told the motive for the execution-style murder of the AIM activist Anna Mae Aquash in December 1975 "allegedly was her knowledge that Leonard Peltier had shot the two agents, as he was convicted." DeMain did not accuse Peltier of participation in the Aquash murder. In 2003 two Native American men were indicted and later convicted for the murder.

On May 1, 2003, Peltier sued DeMain for libel for similar statements about the case published on March 10, 2003, in News from Indian Country. On May 25, 2004, Peltier withdrew the suit after he and DeMain settled the case. DeMain issued the following statement:

I do not believe that Leonard Peltier received a fair trial in connection with the murders of which he was convicted. Certainly he is entitled to one. Nor do I believe, according to the evidence and testimony I now have, that Mr. Peltier had any involvement in the death of Anna Mae Aquash.[29][30]

DeMain did not retract his allegations that Peltier was guilty of the murders of the FBI agents and that the motive for Aquash's murder was the fear that she might inform on the activist.[31]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonard_P ... and_Aquash
Here are more arguments as to why he shouldn't be freed:
http://legendofpineridge.blogspot.com/2 ... s-why.html

I wouldn't be surprised if Peltier's more radical supporters see it as, whether he is guilty or not, the FBI agents killed deserved it anyway.
Malcolm
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Re: An American Buddhist on Thanksgiving

Post by Malcolm »

Serenity509 wrote:
Malcolm wrote:
Serenity509 wrote:As an American Buddhist, I am thankful for the blessings we often take for granted, despite our country's imperfections. Even when adjusted for differences in currency value between countries, the bottom five percent of Americans have a higher standard of living than 68% of the world's people, and the median household income is higher than 93% of the world's people.
Yes, at the expense of 400 years of systematic ethnic cleansing and genocide of an indigenous population.
Let's begin by asking whether the white man was guilty of genocide against the native Indians. As a matter of fact, he was not. As William McNeill documents in Plagues and Peoples, great numbers of Indians did perish as a result of their contact with whites, but, for the most part, they died by contracting diseases-smallpox, measles, malaria, tuberculosis-for which they had not developed immunities. This is tragedy on a grand scale, but it is not genocide, which implies an intention to wipe out an entire population. McNeill points out that, a few centuries earlier, Europeans themselves contracted lethal diseases, including the bubonic plague, from Mongol invaders from the Asian steppes. The Europeans didn't have immunities, and the plague decimated one-third of the population of Europe, and yet, despite the magnitude of deaths and suffering, no one calls this genocide.
http://www.heritage.org/research/report ... ut-america
  • In the beginning, Anglo settlers organized irregular units to brutally attack and destroy unarmed Indigenous women, children, and old people using unlimited violence in unrelenting attacks. During nearly two centuries of British colonization, generations of settlers, mostly farmers, gained experience as “Indian fighters” outside any organized military institution. Anglo-French conflict may appear to have been the dominant factor of European colonization in North America during the eighteenth century, but while large regular armies fought over geopolitical goals in Europe, Anglo settlers in North America waged deadly irregular warfare against the Indigenous communities. Much of the fighting during the fifteen-year settlers’ war for independence, especially in the Ohio Valley region and western New York, was directed against Indigenous resisters who realized it was not in their interest to have a close enemy of settlers with an independent government, as opposed to a remote one in Great Britain. Nor did the fledgling US military in the 1790s carry out operations typical of the state-centered wars occurring in Europe at the time. Even following the founding of the professional US Army in the 1810s, irregular warfare was the method of the US conquest of the Ohio Valley and Mississippi Valley regions. Since that time, Grenier notes, irregular methods have been used in tandem with operations of regular armed forces.

    The chief characteristic of irregular warfare is that of the extreme violence against civilians, in this case the tendency to seek the utter annihilation of the Indigenous population. “In cases where a rough balance of power existed,” Grenier observes, “and the Indians even appeared dominant— as was the situation in virtually every frontier war until the first decade of the 19th century—[ settler] Americans were quick to turn to extravagant violence.”

    Many historians who acknowledge the exceptional one-sided colonial violence attribute it to racism. Grenier argues that rather than racism leading to violence, the reverse occurred: the out-of-control momentum of extreme violence of unlimited warfare fueled race hatred. “Successive generations of Americans, both soldiers and civilians, made the killing of Indian men, women, and children a defining element of their first military tradition and thereby part of a shared American identity. Indeed, only after seventeenth- and early-eighteenth-century Americans made the first way of war a key to being a white American could later generations of ‘Indian haters,’ men like Andrew Jackson, turn the Indian wars into race wars.” By then, the Indigenous peoples’ villages, farmlands, towns, and entire nations formed the only barrier to the settlers’ total freedom to acquire land and wealth. Settler colonialists again chose their own means of conquest. Such fighters are often viewed as courageous heroes, but killing the unarmed women, children, and old people and burning homes and fields involved neither courage nor sacrifice.

    So it was from the planting of the first British colonies in North America. Among the initial leaders of those ventures were military men— mercenaries— who brought with them their previous war experiences in Britain’s imperialist, anti-Muslim Crusades. Those who put together and led the first colonial armies, such as John Smith in Virginia, Myles Standish at Plymouth, John Mason in Connecticut, and John Underhill in Massachusetts, had fought in the bitter, brutal, and bloody religious wars ongoing in Europe at the time of the first settlements. They had long practiced burning towns and fields and killing the unarmed and vulnerable. “Tragically for the Indian peoples of the Eastern Seaboard,” Grenier observes, “the mercenaries unleashed a similar way of war in early Virginia and New England.”
Dunbar-Ortiz, Roxanne (2014-09-16). An Indigenous Peoples' History of the United States (ReVisioning American History) (pp. 58-60). Beacon Press. Kindle Edition.

  • There is one feature in the expansion of the peoples of white, or European, blood during the past four centuries which should never be lost sight of, especially by those who denounce such expansion on moral grounds. On the whole, the movement has been fraught with lasting benefit to most of the peoples already dwelling in the lands over which the expansion took place.
    —Theodore Roosevelt, “The Expansion of the White Races,” 1909


    I did not know then how much was ended. When I look back now from this high hill of my old age, I can still see the butchered women and children lying heaped and scattered all along the crooked gulch as plain as when I saw them with eyes still young. And I can see that something else died there in the bloody mud, and was buried in the blizzard. A people’s dream died there. It was a beautiful dream … the nation’s hoop is broken and scattered. There is no center any longer, and the sacred tree is dead.
    —Black Elk, 1930, on the massacre at Wounded Knee
Dunbar-Ortiz, Roxanne (2014-09-16). An Indigenous Peoples' History of the United States (ReVisioning American History) (p. 162). Beacon Press. Kindle Edition.


You said:
As an American Buddhist, I am thankful for the blessings we often take for granted, despite our country's imperfections. Even when adjusted for differences in currency value between countries, the bottom five percent of Americans have a higher standard of living than 68% of the world's people, and the median household income is higher than 93% of the world's people.
And:

The word "blessing" is very apt here. Why? The verb "to bless" comes from:
  • Old English bletsian, bledsian, Northumbrian bloedsian "to consecrate, make holy, give thanks," from Proto-Germanic *blodison "hallow with blood, mark with blood," from *blotham "blood" (see blood (n.)). Originally a blood sprinkling on pagan altars.
So, yes, our "blessings" comes from the blood our ancestors spilt on the altar of European incursions into the the new world.
It would be wrong to say that whites never killed natives. But again, we must judge American history by the same standards we'd judge any other country's history. For example, wasn't India, the country in which Buddhism was born, established by Aryan invaders who displaced the native peoples? Does that make India or Buddhism all bad?
Yes, for in fact Europeans frequently killed natives, more often than not. As for India, we do not have an accurate historical record of the movements of Indo-aryans into India, all we have is myth and guesswork. But Europeans were so callous in their disregard to the First People's here, they willing wrote down accounts of murder and pillage without a second thought.
  • Documented policies of genocide on the part of US administrations can be identified in at least four distinct periods: the Jacksonian era of forced removal; the California gold rush in Northern California; the post– Civil War era of the so-called Indian wars in the Great Plains; and the 1950s termination period, all of which are discussed in the following chapters. Cases of genocide carried out as policy may be found in historical documents as well as in the oral histories of Indigenous communities. An example from 1873 is typical, with General William T. Sherman writing, “We must act with vindictive earnestness against the Sioux, even to their extermination, men, women and children … during an assault, the soldiers can not pause to distinguish between male and female, or even discriminate as to age.” As Patrick Wolfe has noted, the peculiarity of settler colonialism is that the goal is elimination of Indigenous populations in order to make land available to settlers. That project is not limited to government policy, but rather involves all kinds of agencies, voluntary militias, and the settlers themselves acting on their own.
Dunbar-Ortiz, Roxanne (2014-09-16). An Indigenous Peoples' History of the United States (ReVisioning American History) (pp. 9-10). Beacon Press. Kindle Edition.

Our blessings also come from the fact that as Americans, our colonial policies are so successful that indeed "the bottom five percent of Americans have a higher standard of living than 68% of the world's people" as you note. America is thus far the most successful experiment in European colonialism ever tried.
Malcolm
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Re: An American Buddhist on Thanksgiving

Post by Malcolm »

Serenity509 wrote:
Malcolm wrote:
Serenity509 wrote:As an American Buddhist, I am thankful for the blessings we often take for granted, despite our country's imperfections. Even when adjusted for differences in currency value between countries, the bottom five percent of Americans have a higher standard of living than 68% of the world's people, and the median household income is higher than 93% of the world's people.
Yes, at the expense of 400 years of systematic ethnic cleansing and genocide of an indigenous population.
Let's begin by asking whether the white man was guilty of genocide against the native Indians. As a matter of fact, he was not. As William McNeill documents in Plagues and Peoples, great numbers of Indians did perish as a result of their contact with whites, but, for the most part, they died by contracting diseases-smallpox, measles, malaria, tuberculosis-for which they had not developed immunities. This is tragedy on a grand scale, but it is not genocide, which implies an intention to wipe out an entire population. McNeill points out that, a few centuries earlier, Europeans themselves contracted lethal diseases, including the bubonic plague, from Mongol invaders from the Asian steppes. The Europeans didn't have immunities, and the plague decimated one-third of the population of Europe, and yet, despite the magnitude of deaths and suffering, no one calls this genocide.
http://www.heritage.org/research/report ... ut-america
  • In the beginning, Anglo settlers organized irregular units to brutally attack and destroy unarmed Indigenous women, children, and old people using unlimited violence in unrelenting attacks. During nearly two centuries of British colonization, generations of settlers, mostly farmers, gained experience as “Indian fighters” outside any organized military institution. Anglo-French conflict may appear to have been the dominant factor of European colonization in North America during the eighteenth century, but while large regular armies fought over geopolitical goals in Europe, Anglo settlers in North America waged deadly irregular warfare against the Indigenous communities. Much of the fighting during the fifteen-year settlers’ war for independence, especially in the Ohio Valley region and western New York, was directed against Indigenous resisters who realized it was not in their interest to have a close enemy of settlers with an independent government, as opposed to a remote one in Great Britain. Nor did the fledgling US military in the 1790s carry out operations typical of the state-centered wars occurring in Europe at the time. Even following the founding of the professional US Army in the 1810s, irregular warfare was the method of the US conquest of the Ohio Valley and Mississippi Valley regions. Since that time, Grenier notes, irregular methods have been used in tandem with operations of regular armed forces.

    The chief characteristic of irregular warfare is that of the extreme violence against civilians, in this case the tendency to seek the utter annihilation of the Indigenous population. “In cases where a rough balance of power existed,” Grenier observes, “and the Indians even appeared dominant— as was the situation in virtually every frontier war until the first decade of the 19th century—[ settler] Americans were quick to turn to extravagant violence.”

    Many historians who acknowledge the exceptional one-sided colonial violence attribute it to racism. Grenier argues that rather than racism leading to violence, the reverse occurred: the out-of-control momentum of extreme violence of unlimited warfare fueled race hatred. “Successive generations of Americans, both soldiers and civilians, made the killing of Indian men, women, and children a defining element of their first military tradition and thereby part of a shared American identity. Indeed, only after seventeenth- and early-eighteenth-century Americans made the first way of war a key to being a white American could later generations of ‘Indian haters,’ men like Andrew Jackson, turn the Indian wars into race wars.” By then, the Indigenous peoples’ villages, farmlands, towns, and entire nations formed the only barrier to the settlers’ total freedom to acquire land and wealth. Settler colonialists again chose their own means of conquest. Such fighters are often viewed as courageous heroes, but killing the unarmed women, children, and old people and burning homes and fields involved neither courage nor sacrifice.

    So it was from the planting of the first British colonies in North America. Among the initial leaders of those ventures were military men— mercenaries— who brought with them their previous war experiences in Britain’s imperialist, anti-Muslim Crusades. Those who put together and led the first colonial armies, such as John Smith in Virginia, Myles Standish at Plymouth, John Mason in Connecticut, and John Underhill in Massachusetts, had fought in the bitter, brutal, and bloody religious wars ongoing in Europe at the time of the first settlements. They had long practiced burning towns and fields and killing the unarmed and vulnerable. “Tragically for the Indian peoples of the Eastern Seaboard,” Grenier observes, “the mercenaries unleashed a similar way of war in early Virginia and New England.”
Dunbar-Ortiz, Roxanne (2014-09-16). An Indigenous Peoples' History of the United States (ReVisioning American History) (pp. 58-60). Beacon Press. Kindle Edition.

  • There is one feature in the expansion of the peoples of white, or European, blood during the past four centuries which should never be lost sight of, especially by those who denounce such expansion on moral grounds. On the whole, the movement has been fraught with lasting benefit to most of the peoples already dwelling in the lands over which the expansion took place.
    —Theodore Roosevelt, “The Expansion of the White Races,” 1909


    I did not know then how much was ended. When I look back now from this high hill of my old age, I can still see the butchered women and children lying heaped and scattered all along the crooked gulch as plain as when I saw them with eyes still young. And I can see that something else died there in the bloody mud, and was buried in the blizzard. A people’s dream died there. It was a beautiful dream … the nation’s hoop is broken and scattered. There is no center any longer, and the sacred tree is dead.
    —Black Elk, 1930, on the massacre at Wounded Knee
Dunbar-Ortiz, Roxanne (2014-09-16). An Indigenous Peoples' History of the United States (ReVisioning American History) (p. 162). Beacon Press. Kindle Edition.


You said:
As an American Buddhist, I am thankful for the blessings we often take for granted, despite our country's imperfections. Even when adjusted for differences in currency value between countries, the bottom five percent of Americans have a higher standard of living than 68% of the world's people, and the median household income is higher than 93% of the world's people.
The word "blessing" is very apt here. Why? The verb "to bless" comes from:
  • Old English bletsian, bledsian, Northumbrian bloedsian "to consecrate, make holy, give thanks," from Proto-Germanic *blodison "hallow with blood, mark with blood," from *blotham "blood" (see blood (n.)). Originally a blood sprinkling on pagan altars.
So, yes, our "blessings" comes from the blood our ancestors spilt on the altar of European incursions into the the new world.
It would be wrong to say that whites never killed natives. But again, we must judge American history by the same standards we'd judge any other country's history. For example, wasn't India, the country in which Buddhism was born, established by Aryan invaders who displaced the native peoples? Does that make India or Buddhism all bad?
Yes, for in fact Europeans frequently killed natives, more often than not. As for India, we do not have an accurate historical record of the movements of Indo-aryans into India, all we have is myth and guesswork. But Europeans were so callous in their disregard to the First Peoples here, they willing wrote down accounts of murder and pillage without a second thought.
  • Documented policies of genocide on the part of US administrations can be identified in at least four distinct periods: the Jacksonian era of forced removal; the California gold rush in Northern California; the post– Civil War era of the so-called Indian wars in the Great Plains; and the 1950s termination period, all of which are discussed in the following chapters. Cases of genocide carried out as policy may be found in historical documents as well as in the oral histories of Indigenous communities. An example from 1873 is typical, with General William T. Sherman writing, “We must act with vindictive earnestness against the Sioux, even to their extermination, men, women and children … during an assault, the soldiers can not pause to distinguish between male and female, or even discriminate as to age.” As Patrick Wolfe has noted, the peculiarity of settler colonialism is that the goal is elimination of Indigenous populations in order to make land available to settlers. That project is not limited to government policy, but rather involves all kinds of agencies, voluntary militias, and the settlers themselves acting on their own.
Dunbar-Ortiz, Roxanne (2014-09-16). An Indigenous Peoples' History of the United States (ReVisioning American History) (pp. 9-10). Beacon Press. Kindle Edition.

Our blessings also come from the fact that as Americans, our colonial policies are so successful that indeed "the bottom five percent of Americans have a higher standard of living than 68% of the world's people" as you note. America is thus far the most successful experiment in European colonialism ever tried. It is important that we remember how we arose as a country, and not smother it in Hallmark sentiment.

I am not saying we need to feel some kind of white guilt about it all. I certainly don't. I am saying that we need to remember and never forget where our "blessings" come from and how they were gained.
Serenity509
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Re: An American Buddhist on Thanksgiving

Post by Serenity509 »

Malcolm wrote: I am not saying we need to feel some kind of white guilt about it all. I certainly don't. I am saying that we need to remember and never forget where our "blessings" come from and how they were gained.
I don't know, dawg. It would be unfair to judge American history from a different standard than we would judge any other country's history. Furthermore, I think you are neglecting the immense good that America has done for the world. Why is America, for example, the preferred destination for the world's immigrants? Also, why do immigrants in the United States own small businesses at a higher rate than the general population?
Malcolm
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Re: An American Buddhist on Thanksgiving

Post by Malcolm »

Serenity509 wrote:
Malcolm wrote: I am not saying we need to feel some kind of white guilt about it all. I certainly don't. I am saying that we need to remember and never forget where our "blessings" come from and how they were gained.
I don't know, dawg. It would be unfair to judge American history from a different standard than we would judge any other country's history. Furthermore, I think you are neglecting the immense good that America has done for the world. Why is America, for example, the preferred destination for the world's immigrants? Also, why do immigrants in the United States own small businesses at a higher rate than the general population?
I think you really need to look into the history of US foreign policy and incursions, and evaluate "all the good" we have done in that light.

Rome had a pretty brutal track record in the ancient world, but it sure did not stop people from wanting to be close to the center of world power, back in the day.
Serenity509
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Re: An American Buddhist on Thanksgiving

Post by Serenity509 »

Malcolm wrote:
Serenity509 wrote:
Malcolm wrote: I am not saying we need to feel some kind of white guilt about it all. I certainly don't. I am saying that we need to remember and never forget where our "blessings" come from and how they were gained.
I don't know, dawg. It would be unfair to judge American history from a different standard than we would judge any other country's history. Furthermore, I think you are neglecting the immense good that America has done for the world. Why is America, for example, the preferred destination for the world's immigrants? Also, why do immigrants in the United States own small businesses at a higher rate than the general population?
I think you really need to look into the history of US foreign policy and incursions, and evaluate "all the good" we have done in that light.

Rome had a pretty brutal track record in the ancient world, but it sure did not stop people from wanting to be close to the center of world power, back in the day.
I do happen to have a bachelor's degree in history from one of the most leftist colleges in the nation, so I do know a thing or two about American military interventions from the Indian wars to the present. At the same time, I am also aware of the immense good that America's done for the world.

One of the themes in U2's album The Joshua Tree is that America is a nation of contradictions. Bono admires America for its ideals and how those ideals have helped change the world for the better, while also recognizing the times when America has fallen short of its ideals. I give this as an example because Bono is Irish, not American, and it's just one example of many people in the world who admire America, while recognizing its shortcomings.
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Re: An American Buddhist on Thanksgiving

Post by Redfaery »

Serenity509 wrote:I do happen to have a bachelor's degree in history from one of the most leftist colleges in the nation, so I do know a thing or two about American military interventions from the Indian wars to the present. At the same time, I am also aware of the immense good that America's done for the world.

One of the themes in U2's album The Joshua Tree is that America is a nation of contradictions. Bono admires America for its ideals and how those ideals have helped change the world for the better, while also recognizing the times when America has fallen short of its ideals. I give this as an example because Bono is Irish, not American, and it's just one example of many people in the world who admire America, while recognizing its shortcomings.
I also happen to have a bachelor's degree in history from a VERY liberal college, but I think I have a very different impression of the "immense good" America has done in the world. Imperialism is imperialism, no matter who is doing it, and just because plenty of other cultures have done it doesn't make it any less wrong for the US to do it.
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amanitamusc
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Re: An American Buddhist on Thanksgiving

Post by amanitamusc »

Serenity509 wrote:
amanitamusc wrote:Free Leonard Peltier.
I don't know about that, dawg. What if he's guilty?
In January 2002 in the News from Indian Country, the publisher Paul DeMain wrote an editorial that an "unnamed delegation" told him, "Peltier was responsible for the close range execution of the [FBI] agents. ..." DeMain described the delegation as "grandfathers and grandmothers, AIM activists, Pipe carriers and others who have carried a heavy unhealthy burden within them that has taken its toll."[28] DeMain said he was told the motive for the execution-style murder of the AIM activist Anna Mae Aquash in December 1975 "allegedly was her knowledge that Leonard Peltier had shot the two agents, as he was convicted." DeMain did not accuse Peltier of participation in the Aquash murder. In 2003 two Native American men were indicted and later convicted for the murder.

On May 1, 2003, Peltier sued DeMain for libel for similar statements about the case published on March 10, 2003, in News from Indian Country. On May 25, 2004, Peltier withdrew the suit after he and DeMain settled the case. DeMain issued the following statement:

I do not believe that Leonard Peltier received a fair trial in connection with the murders of which he was convicted. Certainly he is entitled to one. Nor do I believe, according to the evidence and testimony I now have, that Mr. Peltier had any involvement in the death of Anna Mae Aquash.[29][30]

DeMain did not retract his allegations that Peltier was guilty of the murders of the FBI agents and that the motive for Aquash's murder was the fear that she might inform on the activist.[31]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonard_P ... and_Aquash
Here are more arguments as to why he shouldn't be freed:
http://legendofpineridge.blogspot.com/2 ... s-why.html

I wouldn't be surprised if Peltier's more radical supporters see it as, whether he is guilty or not, the FBI agents killed deserved it anyway.
You may be right dawg or is it Dim.
Serenity509
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Re: An American Buddhist on Thanksgiving

Post by Serenity509 »

Redfaery wrote:
Serenity509 wrote:I do happen to have a bachelor's degree in history from one of the most leftist colleges in the nation, so I do know a thing or two about American military interventions from the Indian wars to the present. At the same time, I am also aware of the immense good that America's done for the world.

One of the themes in U2's album The Joshua Tree is that America is a nation of contradictions. Bono admires America for its ideals and how those ideals have helped change the world for the better, while also recognizing the times when America has fallen short of its ideals. I give this as an example because Bono is Irish, not American, and it's just one example of many people in the world who admire America, while recognizing its shortcomings.
I also happen to have a bachelor's degree in history from a VERY liberal college
You went to Evergreen too?
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Techno Yogi
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Re: An American Buddhist on Thanksgiving

Post by Techno Yogi »

Thanksgiving Reflections from Bhikku Bodhi:

This past Sunday I attended an interfaith Thanksgiving service at the St. Peter’s Episcopal Church in Peekskill, New York. I spoke extemporaneously. This is a polished version of my talk.

Thanksgiving is a time when we all gather to give thanks for the blessings we have received over the past year. Here, in the US, we have much to be thankful for, but as I reflect on the blessings that I have experienced, I also realize that almost every one of them represents a privilege that I enjoy but which too few people in the world share.

First, I realize that I live in a country that has not been subjected to devastating military assaults, and thus I enjoy relative security in my physical person. When I recognize this, I think of the millions upon millions of people around the world, especially in the Middle East, who do not have this sense of security. I think of the civilian populations in Iraq, Syria, Yemen, and Afghanistan who have seen their own countries shattered by war, their homes demolished, their livelihoods destroyed; whose loved ones have been killed right before their eyes; who have had to flee their native lands for distant shores, often at great peril, or who stay behind, where they live in the shadow of fear and danger. I realize that I should not take my own security for granted, knowing that it is part of a global system that entails devastation and despair for many millions.

Next, I reflect on the fact that I am a white male. When I consider that this accident of birth guarantees me some degree of social and economic security, I think of the many African Americans and other people of color who are deprived of this privilege merely because of their skin color or place of origin. I think of the many young black men—and women as well—who have to worry what will happen to them whenever they step out on to the street or ride the subway train. I think of the shocking accounts of young men, women, and even children who have had their lives snuffed out merely because their dress or demeanor or gestures provoked an over-volatile police officer. I think of those who live in degrading poverty, unemployed or under-employed, herded into soul-less housing projects, their humanity slighted, their potential blocked.

I think too of the subtle war against the poor: the low wages, the reduction in social services, the cutbacks in food stamps, and maybe most appalling, the evisceration of the Voting Rights Act by a Supreme Court decision, reversing decades of inspired struggle. And I wonder why, as the wealthiest nation on earth, we can’t recognize the inherent dignity of every human being and give everyone the resources they need to unfold their potential.

Then I reflect that although I am a monk, and thus have renounced material possessions, I live in a beautiful monastery, I have sufficient clothes to keep me warm, and I never have to worry about where my next meal will come from. Each day, the gong will ring twice, and I need only walk to the dining hall to find food awaiting me. I don’t even have to cook for myself.

This leads me to think of the 900 million people around the world who are plagued by chronic hunger and malnutrition, and also of the billion more who subsist on sub-standard diets. I think of the six million people, over half of them children, who die each year from persistent hunger and related illnesses. While I give thanks that I do not share their fate, I wonder what kind of world we have created that allows a few to live in exorbitant luxury while billions must stumble at the edge of survival.

Next I consider that I’m a male, and thus don’t have to face the challenges that women face all around the world. In this country, I think particularly of the recent attempt to undermine Planned Parenthood, which provides essential health services to women. While on ethical grounds I personally don’t approve of abortion except under extenuating circumstances, I believe that women should have the right to make their own choices in such matters, and I recognize how crucial access to these services is especially for poor women.

Yet now I see access to critical health services being blocked off by the meddling hands of politicians, backed by religious zealots. In so far as I can determine, the purpose of these legal maneuvers is not to protect the right to life—if it were, one would expect the advocates to show equal enthusiasm for abolishing the death penalty. The purpose rather, in my opinion, is to punish and humiliate women and ensure that they remain under the thumbs of a patriarchal social order.

Finally, as a Buddhist monk, I realize that I have found a spiritual path that gives my life a deep meaning and purpose, a teaching that aligns my life with a transcendent ground of truth and value and leads to wisdom, contentment, and inner peace. As I give thanks for this, there comes to mind the affluent oligarchs, especially here in the US, who lack any vision of a higher purpose in life than the accumulation of wealth and power. In my mind’s eye I also see the wider population blindly revolving in the merry-go-round of consumerism. I think with sorrow of those whose entire happiness depends on getting and spending, who see no deeper source of meaning in life than the acquisition of material goods and the enjoyment of fleeting pleasures. And, I wonder, perhaps it is for them that I should feel the strongest compassion.

At Thanksgiving I am not at all inclined to revel in the blessings I have enjoyed this past year and in years further back. Instead, I believe the way I can best demonstrate thanks is by creating opportunities for others to enjoy blessings. This means bringing the light of wisdom into regions shrouded too densely in darkness, contributing to the emergence of a more peaceful world, a more just and respectful society, and a more equitable economy based on life values rather than naked market values.
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