[Buddha-l] Bhutan lets down its guard, to dissonant effect

[jkirk]

http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/05/06/news/bhutan.php
Excerpts:

MTV was quietly taken off the air, too, along with Fashion TV, which Karma
Ura, a prominent academic here, described as antithetical to Bhutanese
Buddhist tradition. Fashion TV, as he put it, had "no suffering alleviation
value."

He disconnected his own television set altogether, having discovered that
despite the occasional stimulation, it was ruining his eyes and his mind.
"You basically give away your consciousness," said Ura, director of the
Center for Bhutan Studies, a government-funded organization that cogitates
on issues of culture and identity.
 

"Television," she said, "has been the medium through which our people get to
find out about other cultures," including learning about Valentine's Day,
which she considered good education for her compatriots. "We Bhutanese are
very - what do you say - unromantic," she said.

At the same time, foreign television has wrought changes that make her
deeply uncomfortable. Even her grandparents now watch Indian soap operas in
Hindi, a language that would have been foreign to their ears a few years
ago. "Before we would sit together at home and eat dinner," she said. "Now
everyone is watching television."


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