[Buddha-l] Re: Greetings from Oviedo

[Joy Vriens]

Dan Lusthaus wrote:

> The fallacious misapplication of the theory of equality (Bush = Bin Laden,
> Hiroshima = Bali), even aside from the misguided moral relativism and the
> ignoring of context, can now be added to the list of fallacies. A visiting
> Zen teacher gave a talk at the Cambridge Zen center last Spring (founded
> near Harvard by DT Suzuki and others back in the 50s, though it is now
> affiliated with Korean Son). Talking about his time in Korea he explained
> that generally he found Koreans very friendly and accepting, except this one
> fellow, who repeatedly slashed him with a knife. He gave all sorts of
> hair-raising details in his lengthy recounting of his many encounters with
> that fellow. He told us he carries the physical scars from those encounters
> today. The punchline was that the fellow was a surgeon who treated him for a
> serious illness while there. He just left out a few contextualizing details,
> and the story sounded like a slasher movie. One doesn't study surgeons to
> stage a revival of West Side Story.

This is the second time that you write that it is fallacious to compare 
purposely killing innocent victims (Bali) and purposely killing innocent 
victims (Hiroshima), which as you wrote earlier will lead to the Great 
Confusion of Values, the age of Mappo. But this time you give a clue 
about why one shouldn't equate Bush and Bin Laden (which I don't by the 
way) and I presume it's also a clue on why Bali and Hiroshima (all 
proportions kept) shouldn't be compared. So Bush is a surgeon, who kills 
to make this world better and those who don't see it that way are mad 
(your exemple about the importance of context) and Bin Laden a murderer 
who kills to make this world a nightmare. I suppose that in this exemple 
in which the patient doesn't die, the patient is to symbolise the world 
and the slashings are the "necessary inventions" that will make it 
better. In reality the "slashing", in the case of Hiroshima, represents 
the intentional murder of innocents, who die and don't survive unlike 
the symbolic patient. That is the big difference. If you think in terms 
of history and universals like nations, peoples, corporations etc. yes 
they will survive and perhaps their situation (of the symbolic "they" 
since individuals don't count) will be "better" than those of their 
predecessors. But the physical reality of the individuals who are the 
victims of intentional violence is *not* that world of ideas.

The suffering caused is real, more real than the notion of a "better 
world". If you kill real innocent people intentionally for an idea 
(including statistics about what would have happened or could have 
happened if...), than according to my ethical values (which some may 
call Mappo) that is wrong.

I am purposely being candid here, but the only difference I can see is 
the alleged intention (which you call context).     Bush wants to make 
the world better. Well, I doubt that. When the Western world was 
standing more united behind its federating values, enlightened values 
like Human rights, democracy, Liberté, égalité and fraternité etc. one 
could be forgiven for letting oneself be carried away by those ideas. 
But Bush, refusing to collaborate with environmental treaties, an 
International Court of Justice competent to condemn war criminals of all 
boards, and to deal properly with issues of the North-South problem, 
including dealing with poverty in his own country (as became obvious 
with Katrina) undermining democracy in his own country etc etc is 
obviously not interested in a better world. So his "necessary 
intervention" doesn't have the benefit of the doubt either. And I would 
never think of comparing him to a surgeon... I must be mad too. Who am I 
to doubt someone directly commissioned by God? 
http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,1586978,00.html