This video features a really fantastic conversation about engaged Buddhism with Joanna Macy, Venerable Bhikkhu Bodhi, Venerable Pannavati Karuna. While anti-capitalist politics is not explicitly addressed, this "trialogue" nevertheless seems like a fitting way to end our three-part series on Buddhist Anarchism. Enjoy!
Monday, March 31, 2014
Tuesday, February 18, 2014
Exploring Buddhist Anarchism, pt. 2: Challenging Ignorant Mindfulness
After the first article in this series discussed the theoretical foundations of Buddhist anarchism, this is an example of the theory in action (though I don't know whether the protestors would describe themselves using that label). It also delves into the split in the Buddhist and non-Buddhist "mindfulness" community between those who are interested in social engagement and those who tend, consciously or otherwise, to look the other way.
Why Google Protestors Were Right to Disrupt Mindfulness 2.0
by Katie Loncke, Buddhist Peace Fellowship
They Say You Can't Be Neutral on a Moving Train. So Can You be Mindful on a Google Bus?
EVICTION FREE SAN FRANCISCO, the canvas said.
Shouting into a bullhorn, one protester (conspicuously less mellow than the others) began to chant:
“Wisdom means stop displacement!”
“Wisdom means stop surveillance!”
“San Francisco’s not for sale!”
Sound advice, yes — very wise. And yet, something is missing.
I mean, if we exclude them from the picture, then yes, we can calmly check in with our bodies. Things look very mindful and peaceful. Very reasonable, polite, and progressive.
But such deep exclusion invites deep delusion. Something important is missing. Entire groups of relevant people are cut out of the conversation altogether.
The fact is that waves of gentrification have pushed thousands of low-income, disproportionately Black & Brown residents out of San Francisco, and now the city is courting wealthy tech companies (like the ones at Wisdom 2.0) to move in.
Are we just going to ignore the people who are being displaced? Act like we don’t know about this history?
Are we going to pretend that there’s nothing we can do about it?
Hopefully, our friends with the banners won’t let us.
The Tech Bubble
On one hand, of course you can be mindful on a Google bus. You can be
mindful anywhere — that’s the point. It’s uber-portable spiritual
technology.
And you might be mindful of your sensations, your stress levels, your breath. But are you mindful of the ways in which your presence is changing a neighborhood, a region?
I agree with critics who maintain that the tech buses and their riders are not the cause of gentrification, but more of a symptom. Ultimate accountability lies elsewhere. As Al Jazeera America writer Alexandra Goldman notes, the larger issue is that “many of San Francisco’s policy makers are more invested in pandering to the tech industry than in protecting low-income San Franciscans.”
Still, the buses as vehicles also reinforce the insulation and isolation of their passengers. As Allison Arieff pointed out in the New York Times, the overall Google-dome approach to urban planning tends to reinforce the shielding mechanism that allows a blank-slate mentality to flourish among techie newcomers. As though nothing significant were here before you arrived. As though all that matters is what you are creating afresh. (Or discovering on Yelp.)
This is not true mindfulness. It’s selective awareness, optimized for pleasure.
In other words, ignorance.
And the problem is not just ignorance itself (though of course the irony of Oblivious Geniuses is part of what’s making this story go global). The problem is the consequences of this ignorance on the lives of working-class people. Because, like a transit version of the observer effect, these buses transform the city even as they traverse it. Research indicates that “rents within the walkable zones [of Google shuttle stops] rose up to 20 percent more rapidly than rents outside the walkable zones.” (And the median rent rose 12.3% in the past year.)
The Google buses may be sparing the air, but they’re also raising the rent — to prices that many long-time residents simply can’t afford. Hence the banner, the chants, the insistent disturbance. San Francisco is not for sale.
At least, we do not have to conceive of it that way. We have some choices here.
And that’s why I’m grateful to these protesters for disrupting the status quo, offering us the opportunity to rethink, reframe, and re-center. Especially re-centering the people excluded and minimized from the picture.
What if wisdom meant donating all income after $80,000 to a strike fund for victims of wage theft — a problem rampant in the service economy? (Seattle’s new Socialist city councilmember provides a ready example, giving away HALF her income to strengthen local struggles and live more like the average worker.)
What if wisdom meant organizing your co-workers to demand that your company pay in to SF’s public services, refusing tax breaks and instead investing in the well-being of all city residents — especially queer youth, folks on the street, and other oppressed and marginalized groups?
What if wisdom meant using some of your $100,000-a-year, intellectual-worker salary to keep Marcus Books, the nation’s oldest Black bookstore, from being priced out of its own space in the historic Fillmore District?
What if wisdom meant stopping deportations of the undocumented and increasingly unafraid immigrant community (some members of which are almost certainly cooking your food and cleaning your buildings)?
What if wisdom meant countering capitalist-driven gentrification with a demand for the collective Right to the City, and democratic forms of community development?
Where I am certain is that you BPFers have other, brilliant ideas for re-centering wisdom to include social justice: in San Francisco, or in your own town. And some may have disagreements or corrections on what I got wrong.
Regardless, let’s hear ‘em! And let’s keep up the compassionate confrontation.
Why Google Protestors Were Right to Disrupt Mindfulness 2.0
by Katie Loncke, Buddhist Peace Fellowship
They Say You Can't Be Neutral on a Moving Train. So Can You be Mindful on a Google Bus?
Confrontation
This weekend, as three Google presenters took the stage to discuss
mindfulness and tech at the annual Wisdom 2.0 conference, they found
themselves interrupted by a handful of protesters unfurling a large
banner.EVICTION FREE SAN FRANCISCO, the canvas said.
Shouting into a bullhorn, one protester (conspicuously less mellow than the others) began to chant:
“Wisdom means stop displacement!”
“Wisdom means stop surveillance!”
“San Francisco’s not for sale!”
Recentering
After the protesters were yanked off stage by security, the Google
presenters tried to recenter. “Check in with your body and see what’s
happening. What it’s like to be around conflict with people with
heartfelt ideas, that may be different than what we’re thinking.” Sound advice, yes — very wise. And yet, something is missing.
What’s Not Present?
Something similar was missing, too, back in 2010 when I attended the
first Wisdom 2.0 conference. All the talk about kindness, happiness, and
well being (with twin values of creativity, productivity, and
profitability) focused on the users and innovators of technology. There was never any mention of the people who manufacture
the gadgets that techies then outfit with meditation bell apps. What
about the mindfulness, happiness, and well being of the people mining coltan in the DRC, or the people assembling iPhones at the infamous Foxconn sweatshops?I mean, if we exclude them from the picture, then yes, we can calmly check in with our bodies. Things look very mindful and peaceful. Very reasonable, polite, and progressive.
But such deep exclusion invites deep delusion. Something important is missing. Entire groups of relevant people are cut out of the conversation altogether.
The fact is that waves of gentrification have pushed thousands of low-income, disproportionately Black & Brown residents out of San Francisco, and now the city is courting wealthy tech companies (like the ones at Wisdom 2.0) to move in.
Are we just going to ignore the people who are being displaced? Act like we don’t know about this history?
Are we going to pretend that there’s nothing we can do about it?
Hopefully, our friends with the banners won’t let us.
And you might be mindful of your sensations, your stress levels, your breath. But are you mindful of the ways in which your presence is changing a neighborhood, a region?
I agree with critics who maintain that the tech buses and their riders are not the cause of gentrification, but more of a symptom. Ultimate accountability lies elsewhere. As Al Jazeera America writer Alexandra Goldman notes, the larger issue is that “many of San Francisco’s policy makers are more invested in pandering to the tech industry than in protecting low-income San Franciscans.”
Still, the buses as vehicles also reinforce the insulation and isolation of their passengers. As Allison Arieff pointed out in the New York Times, the overall Google-dome approach to urban planning tends to reinforce the shielding mechanism that allows a blank-slate mentality to flourish among techie newcomers. As though nothing significant were here before you arrived. As though all that matters is what you are creating afresh. (Or discovering on Yelp.)
This is not true mindfulness. It’s selective awareness, optimized for pleasure.
In other words, ignorance.
And the problem is not just ignorance itself (though of course the irony of Oblivious Geniuses is part of what’s making this story go global). The problem is the consequences of this ignorance on the lives of working-class people. Because, like a transit version of the observer effect, these buses transform the city even as they traverse it. Research indicates that “rents within the walkable zones [of Google shuttle stops] rose up to 20 percent more rapidly than rents outside the walkable zones.” (And the median rent rose 12.3% in the past year.)
The Google buses may be sparing the air, but they’re also raising the rent — to prices that many long-time residents simply can’t afford. Hence the banner, the chants, the insistent disturbance. San Francisco is not for sale.
At least, we do not have to conceive of it that way. We have some choices here.
And that’s why I’m grateful to these protesters for disrupting the status quo, offering us the opportunity to rethink, reframe, and re-center. Especially re-centering the people excluded and minimized from the picture.
What if SF tech workers actually took up the challenge of the Wisdom 2.0 protesters, and redefined wisdom to include social justice?
What if wisdom did mean stopping evictions: from joining eviction protests & blockades to strengthening rent control policies? (For beautiful data renderings of an ugly history of displacement, check out this map and timeline of the Ellis Act.)What if wisdom meant donating all income after $80,000 to a strike fund for victims of wage theft — a problem rampant in the service economy? (Seattle’s new Socialist city councilmember provides a ready example, giving away HALF her income to strengthen local struggles and live more like the average worker.)
What if wisdom meant organizing your co-workers to demand that your company pay in to SF’s public services, refusing tax breaks and instead investing in the well-being of all city residents — especially queer youth, folks on the street, and other oppressed and marginalized groups?
What if wisdom meant using some of your $100,000-a-year, intellectual-worker salary to keep Marcus Books, the nation’s oldest Black bookstore, from being priced out of its own space in the historic Fillmore District?
What if wisdom meant stopping deportations of the undocumented and increasingly unafraid immigrant community (some members of which are almost certainly cooking your food and cleaning your buildings)?
What if wisdom meant countering capitalist-driven gentrification with a demand for the collective Right to the City, and democratic forms of community development?
What if tech wisdom had less to do with sparkle…
…and more to do with redistributing wealth & power in one of the nation’s most expensive cities?
What if mindfulness enhanced not only our personal well being…
…but also our attunement to the collective well-being?
I see from the Wisdom 2.0 web site that they also had some sessions on corporate responsibility, social change, etc. So who knows — maybe someone at the conference proposed the above ideas, or similar ones. (Let me know!)Where I am certain is that you BPFers have other, brilliant ideas for re-centering wisdom to include social justice: in San Francisco, or in your own town. And some may have disagreements or corrections on what I got wrong.
Regardless, let’s hear ‘em! And let’s keep up the compassionate confrontation.
Monday, January 27, 2014
Exploring Buddhist Anarchism, pt. 1
First of all, I would like to apologize for failing to update this blog in recent months. With the formation of the Anti-Oppression Forum, my attention has been focused on our new blog, Until Victory. However, It do want to make sure that I keep this space for more personal and philosophical writings. Along with radical politics, the philosophy and practice of Buddhism has been a cornerstone of my personal beliefs for a long time. Since the 1960's, the movement of engaged Buddhism has attempted to bring Buddhist lessons into the radical political sphere and radical political lessons into Buddhist practice. I believe that engaged Buddhism and Buddhist anarchism are schools of thought with tremendous power and possibility. Today, I'll feature the first in a series of posts exploring the subject, beginning with Gary Snyder's 1961 text entitled, "Buddhist Anarchism."
Buddhism holds that the universe and all creatures in it are intrinsically in a state of complete wisdom, love and compassion; acting in natural response and mutual interdependence. The personal realization of this from-the-beginning state cannot be had for and by one-“self” — because it is not fully realized unless one has given the self up; and away.
In the Buddhist view, that which obstructs the effortless manifestation of this is Ignorance, which projects into fear and needless craving. Historically, Buddhist philosophers have failed to analyze out the degree to which ignorance and suffering are caused or encouraged by social factors, considering fear-and-desire to be given facts of the human condition. Consequently the major concern of Buddhist philosophy is epistemology and “psychology” with no attention paid to historical or sociological problems. Although Mahayana Buddhism has a grand vision of universal salvation, the actual achievement of Buddhism has been the development of practical systems of meditation toward the end of liberating a few dedicated individuals from psychological hangups and cultural conditionings. Institutional Buddhism has been conspicuously ready to accept or ignore the inequalities and tyrannies of whatever political system it found itself under. This can be death to Buddhism, because it is death to any meaningful function of compassion. Wisdom without compassion feels no pain.
No one today can afford to be innocent, or indulge himself in ignorance of the nature of contemporary governments, politics and social orders. The national polities of the modern world maintain their existence by deliberately fostered craving and fear: monstrous protection rackets. The “free world” has become economically dependent on a fantastic system of stimulation of greed which cannot be fulfilled, sexual desire which cannot be satiated and hatred which has no outlet except against oneself, the persons one is supposed to love, or the revolutionary aspirations of pitiful, poverty-stricken marginal societies like Cuba or Vietnam. The conditions of the Cold War have turned all modern societies — Communist included — into vicious distorters of man’s true potential. They create populations of “preta” — hungry ghosts, with giant appetites and throats no bigger than needles. The soil, the forests and all animal life are being consumed by these cancerous collectivities; the air and water of the planet is being fouled by them.
There is nothing in human nature or the requirements of human social organization which intrinsically requires that a culture be contradictory, repressive and productive of violent and frustrated personalities. Recent findings in anthropology and psychology make this more and more evident. One can prove it for himself by taking a good look at his own nature through meditation. Once a person has this much faith and insight, he must be led to a deep concern with the need for radical social change through a variety of hopefully non-violent means.
The joyous and voluntary poverty of Buddhism becomes a positive force. The traditional harmlessness and refusal to take life in any form has nation-shaking implications. The practice of meditation, for which one needs only “the ground beneath one’s feet,” wipes out mountains of junk being pumped into the mind by the mass media and supermarket universities. The belief in a serene and generous fulfillment of natural loving desires destroys ideologies which blind, maim and repress — and points the way to a kind of community which would amaze “moralists” and transform armies of men who are fighters because they cannot be lovers.
Avatamsaka (Kegon) Buddhist philosophy sees the world as a vast interrelated network in which all objects and creatures are necessary and illuminated. From one standpoint, governments, wars, or all that we consider “evil” are uncompromisingly contained in this totalistic realm. The hawk, the swoop and the hare are one. From the “human” standpoint we cannot live in those terms unless all beings see with the same enlightened eye. The Bodhisattva lives by the sufferer’s standard, and he must be effective in aiding those who suffer.
The mercy of the West has been social revolution; the mercy of the East has been individual insight into the basic self/void. We need both. They are both contained in the traditional three aspects of the Dharma path: wisdom (prajna), meditation (dhyana), and morality (sila). Wisdom is intuitive knowledge of the mind of love and clarity that lies beneath one’s ego-driven anxieties and aggressions. Meditation is going into the mind to see this for yourself — over and over again, until it becomes the mind you live in. Morality is bringing it back out in the way you live, through personal example and responsible action, ultimately toward the true community (sangha) of “all beings.”
This last aspect means, for me, supporting any cultural and economic revolution that moves clearly toward a free, international, classless world. It means using such means as civil disobedience, outspoken criticism, protest, pacifism, voluntary poverty and even gentle violence if it comes to a matter of restraining some impetuous redneck. It means affirming the widest possible spectrum of non-harmful individual behavior — defending the right of individuals to smoke hemp, eat peyote, be polygynous, polyandrous or homosexual. Worlds of behavior and custom long banned by the Judaeo-Capitalist-Christian-Marxist West. It means respecting intelligence and learning, but not as greed or means to personal power. Working on one’s own responsibility, but willing to work with a group. “Forming the new society within the shell of the old” — the IWW slogan of fifty years ago.
The traditional cultures are in any case doomed, and rather than cling to their good aspects hopelessly it should be remembered that whatever is or ever was in any other culture can be reconstructed from the unconscious, through meditation. In fact, it is my own view that the coming revolution will close the circle and link us in many ways with the most creative aspects of our archaic past. If we are lucky we may eventually arrive at a totally integrated world culture with matrilineal descent, free-form marriage, natural-credit communist economy, less industry, far less population and lots more national parks.
Buddhist Anarchism by Gary Snyder
First written in 1961, edited in 1967
In the Buddhist view, that which obstructs the effortless manifestation of this is Ignorance, which projects into fear and needless craving. Historically, Buddhist philosophers have failed to analyze out the degree to which ignorance and suffering are caused or encouraged by social factors, considering fear-and-desire to be given facts of the human condition. Consequently the major concern of Buddhist philosophy is epistemology and “psychology” with no attention paid to historical or sociological problems. Although Mahayana Buddhism has a grand vision of universal salvation, the actual achievement of Buddhism has been the development of practical systems of meditation toward the end of liberating a few dedicated individuals from psychological hangups and cultural conditionings. Institutional Buddhism has been conspicuously ready to accept or ignore the inequalities and tyrannies of whatever political system it found itself under. This can be death to Buddhism, because it is death to any meaningful function of compassion. Wisdom without compassion feels no pain.
No one today can afford to be innocent, or indulge himself in ignorance of the nature of contemporary governments, politics and social orders. The national polities of the modern world maintain their existence by deliberately fostered craving and fear: monstrous protection rackets. The “free world” has become economically dependent on a fantastic system of stimulation of greed which cannot be fulfilled, sexual desire which cannot be satiated and hatred which has no outlet except against oneself, the persons one is supposed to love, or the revolutionary aspirations of pitiful, poverty-stricken marginal societies like Cuba or Vietnam. The conditions of the Cold War have turned all modern societies — Communist included — into vicious distorters of man’s true potential. They create populations of “preta” — hungry ghosts, with giant appetites and throats no bigger than needles. The soil, the forests and all animal life are being consumed by these cancerous collectivities; the air and water of the planet is being fouled by them.
There is nothing in human nature or the requirements of human social organization which intrinsically requires that a culture be contradictory, repressive and productive of violent and frustrated personalities. Recent findings in anthropology and psychology make this more and more evident. One can prove it for himself by taking a good look at his own nature through meditation. Once a person has this much faith and insight, he must be led to a deep concern with the need for radical social change through a variety of hopefully non-violent means.
The joyous and voluntary poverty of Buddhism becomes a positive force. The traditional harmlessness and refusal to take life in any form has nation-shaking implications. The practice of meditation, for which one needs only “the ground beneath one’s feet,” wipes out mountains of junk being pumped into the mind by the mass media and supermarket universities. The belief in a serene and generous fulfillment of natural loving desires destroys ideologies which blind, maim and repress — and points the way to a kind of community which would amaze “moralists” and transform armies of men who are fighters because they cannot be lovers.
Avatamsaka (Kegon) Buddhist philosophy sees the world as a vast interrelated network in which all objects and creatures are necessary and illuminated. From one standpoint, governments, wars, or all that we consider “evil” are uncompromisingly contained in this totalistic realm. The hawk, the swoop and the hare are one. From the “human” standpoint we cannot live in those terms unless all beings see with the same enlightened eye. The Bodhisattva lives by the sufferer’s standard, and he must be effective in aiding those who suffer.
The mercy of the West has been social revolution; the mercy of the East has been individual insight into the basic self/void. We need both. They are both contained in the traditional three aspects of the Dharma path: wisdom (prajna), meditation (dhyana), and morality (sila). Wisdom is intuitive knowledge of the mind of love and clarity that lies beneath one’s ego-driven anxieties and aggressions. Meditation is going into the mind to see this for yourself — over and over again, until it becomes the mind you live in. Morality is bringing it back out in the way you live, through personal example and responsible action, ultimately toward the true community (sangha) of “all beings.”
This last aspect means, for me, supporting any cultural and economic revolution that moves clearly toward a free, international, classless world. It means using such means as civil disobedience, outspoken criticism, protest, pacifism, voluntary poverty and even gentle violence if it comes to a matter of restraining some impetuous redneck. It means affirming the widest possible spectrum of non-harmful individual behavior — defending the right of individuals to smoke hemp, eat peyote, be polygynous, polyandrous or homosexual. Worlds of behavior and custom long banned by the Judaeo-Capitalist-Christian-Marxist West. It means respecting intelligence and learning, but not as greed or means to personal power. Working on one’s own responsibility, but willing to work with a group. “Forming the new society within the shell of the old” — the IWW slogan of fifty years ago.
The traditional cultures are in any case doomed, and rather than cling to their good aspects hopelessly it should be remembered that whatever is or ever was in any other culture can be reconstructed from the unconscious, through meditation. In fact, it is my own view that the coming revolution will close the circle and link us in many ways with the most creative aspects of our archaic past. If we are lucky we may eventually arrive at a totally integrated world culture with matrilineal descent, free-form marriage, natural-credit communist economy, less industry, far less population and lots more national parks.
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