[Buddha-l] Getting real about Buddhism and capitalism

[Chan Fu]

On 9/30/05, Erik Hoogcarspel <jehms at xs4all.nl> wrote:
> jkirk schreef:
>
> > Lately some of us have been finding opportunities to critique current
> > national affairs
> > via a Buddhist critique as well as a Marxist or some other critique.
> > That being the case, it is time, IMHO, to get real about what it is
> > that is corrupting and terrorizing the ordinary peoples of the entire
> > world and ruining their habitats and means of survival:
> > the arms industry and trade. With that in mind, here are some
> > pertinent data, and I do not want to hear back the NRA argument that
> > weapons don't kill, people do.
> > Joanna
> >
> You're right of course , Joanna. People kill... with weapons. If
> everything would depend on people, there would be no reason to prohibit
> any drug or poison. Since Marx philosophers have discovered the power
> things have on us, see Marshal McLUhan, Foucault, Heidegger, Latour and
> Baudrillard. Capitalism depends on greed. This is clear from The Wealth
> of the Nations by Asam Smith, who took the idea probably from the Fable
> of the Bees from Bernard de Mandeville. Mandeville argues that the
> economy thrives on wickedness and I think he is right. What strikes and
> annoys me is that some (mostly Tibetan) big shots of the sangha claim
> that their financial succes is a consequence of their holyness.
>
>
> --
>
> Erik
>
>
> www.xs4all.nl/~jehms

"I can picture in my mind a world without war, a world without hate.
And I can picture us attacking that world, because they'd never expect
it."
-- jack handy