Mark’s Soap Box

The Joan B. (what a) Kroc Institute of Peace & Justice (right up Joan’s alley) will hold a gum flap talk on whether whiny peacenik protests nonviolent resistance to terrorists military governments can lead to regime government change.

Oh this should be good. Nothing like peaceniks breaking their arms patting themselves on the backs for being cowards.

The speakers include Karma Lekshe Tsono (a Berkeley grad, and Buddhist/Tibetan Nun), and Dr. Joyce Neu Director of the Kroc center (formerly of the Carter Center, great!).

Dr. Tsono claims to have been raised by a “materialistic Dad” and a “Southern Baptist Mom”. I am not sure why they quoted the latter, is it now derogatory to be Southern Baptist? Anyway, she became a surfer in Hawaii, and “found her connection to spirituality”. She traveled and “found” her way.

In the late 80s, she was bit by a poisonous viper that could’ve ended her life. Her arm was paralyzed but she somehow survived. With an iron will and unwavering committment [sic], Karma Lekshe keeps the revolution going

What revolution? Buddhist don’t fight, so you can’t have a revolution. They just don’t get it. Also, I am wondering if anti-venom might have played a role in her miraculous survival? Oh and just fyi: Copperheads, Cottonmouths, and Diamondback Rattlesnakes are all vipers. Viper does sound more menacing I suppose.

Dr. Neu has the stunning success in mediation in such places as: Sudan (that’s working out well), Uganda (what the hell goes on there?), Bosnia (before or after Clinton carpet bombed it?). Oh, and she is quite the talker it seems. Not so much for action though. Guess that stint in the Peace Corps didn’t shed much light on the world situation. The US Institute of Peace has some nice things to say about her.

So What’s the Big Deal?

So Burma Myanmar, is awash in protest; much like Berkeley. The protestors hate their government, and want to run it themselves. They don’t however seem to care enough to fight for it. So we are going to discuss robes vs rifles. Is this really necessary? Well if you are an academic it is, not like you can point to anything you have done.

Remember this is the country who’s Spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama ran away when the Chinese invaded his own country of Tibet. Oh he also won a Nobel Peace Prize just like algore.

War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse. The person who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself.

~~John Stuart Mill

Hear, hear!

Demonstrations won’t cut it, it takes action. Action takes courage. Courage takes a belief in something outside yourself that is worth dying for, because you have to fight. When the Dalai Lama is willing to fight for his own country, then and only then should we side with him. If it’s not worth it to him, why should it be worth it to us?

Tags: san diego, dalai lama, tibet, myanmar, burma, rangoon, buddhist, al gore, terrorists, military