[Buddha-l] Political views of Buddhists

[Jackhat1 at aol.com]

In a message dated 12/14/2006 9:32:32 P.M. Central Standard Time,  
rhayes at unm.edu writes:

> The  results might tell us more about the political views of academics than
>  the political views of Buddhists.

In the United States the vast  majority of Buddhists are highly educated, and 
many are academics or  writers or artists. My guess is that Asian Buddhists 
would be much less  communistic-libertarian than all those who have reported 
to buddha-l have  been. Hell, I don't even have to guess. I know from my own 
experience that  Asian Buddhists tend to have social and political views that 
make their  Western co-religionists cringe.




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I was making the distinction between highly educated Western Buddhists who  
are academics and highly educated Western Buddhists who are not. Most of  the 
people on this list are academics.  I was wondering if an important  variable 
affecting the test results was academia not Buddhism.
 
In my mind Asian Buddhists could be called Devotion Buddhists. Western  
Buddhists could be split into Academic Buddhists and Meditation  Buddhists. It is 
my impression that these  categories are mainly  exclusive. This is not to say 
that any of these categories is the true Buddhism  or better than the others. 
And, of course, there are some people who don't fit  into any one category, 
for example, an Asian Buddhists who meditates and is a  academic. Each category 
would have a different viewpoint on social and economic  issues. 
 
Jack
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