[Buddha-l] Sightings - Buddhism and Violence

[JKirkpatrick]

Marty claims that both Buddhists and Muslims are exclusive, that
they separate themselves in ways that Christians, for ex.,
supposedly don't.  

Looks like the Faith Matters survey of 2007 (which would be
considered outdated by now)
wasn't well-constructed so as to elicit replies that
distinguished between social separation and other factors, such
as perceptions of cultural alienness based on dress, houses of
worship, deities, etc. 
Questions about method: How many in their samples, for ex.? How
sampled?
I tried to find links to the above-mentioned survey and found
that I had to go through at least 2 different funding
organisations, but still never found a link to anything titled
'Faith Matters surveys' + dates.
Maybe someone else can come up with this info, crucial to
evaluating the findings reported.

Off the cuff, my intuitive take on 'lack of warmth toward
Buddhism' is that it could be a consequence of the foreignness of
the most prominent variety of Buddhism in the US, Tibetan
Buddhism, with it's fancy viharas, and colorful costumes and
websites.  Protestantism might be on the decline in this country,
but its iconophobic spirit still I think influences the way the
newer arrivals of Buddhism are received. (Has anyone noticed that
the oldest type of Buddhism practiced in the US is Shin,
supported by the Japanese among us, which organised itself into
churches with non-flamboyantly costumed priests, such that they
could almost resemble Protestant churches and practices.) 
Did the survey distinguish among various types of Buddhism here?
I doubt it.

Cheers, Joanna

=========================

Perhaps apropos of the earlier discussion of Buddhism and
violence...

Sightings

November 22, 2010
Buddhism and Violence

- Martin E. Marty


Buddhism and Islam came off as the two "faith communities" to
whom other Americans feel least warm, according to a Faith
Matters survey of 2007. Robert Putnam and David Campbell ponder
this in American Grace: How Religion Divides and Unites Us, which
Sightings has visited twice before. Mormons come in third as a
stimulator of "least warm" feelings among others. The authors
comment that negative media attention hurts Mormons and Muslims,
but "Buddhists do not get the same negative media attention" as
do those two. So something else must account for the negative
ratings of Buddhism.

http://divinity.uchicago.edu/martycenter/publications/sightings/a
rchive_2010/1122.shtml