29-Sep-17 World View -- Burma's (Myanmar's) leaders may be inspired by Pol Pot's Cambodian 'Killing Fields' genocide

[John]

> In fact, no religion would exist for long as a "religion of
> peace," since its population would soon be exterminated by people
> of other religions who do NOT follow "religion of peace"
> policies.

> No "religion of peace" would survive more than a few decades, if
> it weren't willing to become a "religion of war."

> This is contrary to historical fact. You should look at the
> Mennonites or Amish for example. These and some other sects
> descended from the Anabaptists are have existed for over four
> hundred years. They are strict pacifists and they live it. There
> are many examples of these strictly pacifist religious minorities
> being willing to die, rather than fight back.

> Their survival is owed to two reasons. First they have often been
> protected by the resident majority who do not share their
> beliefs. These are not others of their own but of a different
> religious sect, and often of a different race and language too.
> Second, when they fall under harsh persecution, they have shown a
> historic willingness to leave the land in which they dwell, rather
> than stand their ground. This tendency to flee, rather than fight
> is typical of pacifist religions.

> Religions of peace are rare and no major world religion can be
> classified as pacifist, in all its sects. But they do exist and,
> if 48 is more that a few, they can survive for more that a few
> decades.

You make a good point, but how large does a religious cult have to be
before it can be called an actual religion? There's a big difference
between the Amish, who are not looking to expand to larger and larger
regions, and the Buddhists, who have conquered several large nations.

[FishbellykanakaDude]

> In fact, no religion would exist for long as a "religion of
> peace," since its population would soon be exterminated by people
> of other religions who do NOT follow "religion of peace"
> policies.

> No "religion of peace" would survive more than a few decades, if
> it weren't willing to become a "religion of war."

> This is contrary to historical fact. You should look at the
> Mennonites or Amish for example. These and some other sects
> descended from the Anabaptists are have existed for over four
> hundred years. They are strict pacifists and they live it. There
> are many examples of these strictly pacifist religious minorities
> being willing to die, rather than fight back.

> Their survival is owed to two reasons. First they have often been
> protected by the resident majority who do not share their
> beliefs. These are not others of their own but of a different
> religious sect, and often of a different race and language too.
> Second, when they fall under harsh persecution, they have shown a
> historic willingness to leave the land in which they dwell, rather
> than stand their ground. This tendency to flee, rather than fight
> is typical of pacifist religions.

> Religions of peace are rare and no major world religion can be
> classified as pacifist, in all its sects. But they do exist and,
> if 48 is more that a few, they can survive for more that a few
> decades.

You make a good point, but how large does a religious cult have to be
before it can be called an actual religion? There's a big difference
between the Amish, who are not looking to expand to larger and larger
regions, and the Buddhists, who have conquered several large nations.

The Amish are not a religion. They are a tiny sect OF a religion.

Individuals can be pacifistic, but societies cannot, and the Amish are the equivalent of an "individual".

The point is that societies must be sporadically genocidal, regardless of their so-called "premise" (purported societal basis).

There is actually no such thing as a "Buddhist Society", or a "Christian Society", or any other "Prefix Society", other than "Human Society".

Human Society, and most likely any "animal (predator/prey oriented) society", with the capability to nearly exhaust the local resources (food or expansion enabling "stuff") as perceived by some bordering competing society, which could include an "internal" group with "separatist tendencies", will always make "war" on it's perceived competitor (whether real or not).

War means genocide. It's been convenient for some time now (but only historically recently) to distinguish "war" from "genocide", but on the very real level of biology, and ancient "wisdom", it is simply KNOWN by humans that war equals genocide.

In an era where there are rationally better solutions to inter-group resource inequities than war/genocide, the equation of "war" with "genocide" SHOULD be motivation enough to avoid war/genocide in every case.

But it's not, BECAUSE people DON'T equate war with genocide. They think that limited war is possible, as a kind of "sport", instead of this redefinition of "war" (as pressure relieving sport) simply feeding the inevitable "larger wars" that culminate invariably in true genocidal war.

So, what does this suggest as a way to "minimize" actual war/genocide? Firstly, accept that any war is genocide and will culminate in genocidal acts. The "interwar periods" are not "not war", they are simply pauses in battle, even if they highly resemble "peace" and last decades. Secondly, either accept that genocide is occasionally necessary (though always ultimately unwise) and utterly annihilate the "bad actors" (usually an entire society or subsociety) as quickly and thoroughly as possible with the knowing expectation that the cycle of revenge will continue; or do whatever is possible, however difficult and uncomfortable, to resolve the resource inequity problem.

The interesting thing is that nothing is actually lost by "doing genocidal war" intentionally and consciously as soon into the cycle as possible, other than one thing: The cumulative "Humanity" of humanity is lessened.

Maintaining the illusion that "long cycle genocide" (the GD Cycle) is "More Humane™" than the "tough love" approach that "Do It Consciously!™"-type genocide is, keeps the addict on the wheel of addiction.

We remain addicted to our breaking-wheel, our cycle of torture and comparative relief, because bowing to the reality that we must become "less humane", "less human", to force greater appreciation of what "Human" truly means, and what "not war" and "just resource allocation solution" actually means, is too painful.

Animals (non-human) are inherently limited in addressing this problem because they have little to no "institutional memory" and are forced to repeat the Four Generation GD (genocidal) cycle interminably. (Or some variant of the cycle based on "Malthusian" principles.)

This keeps the "planetary" ecosystem dynamic and balanced. But since we are NOT (non-human) animals, we must break this self-limiting cycle if we are to fulfill our role as "The Singular (or A) Maximally Space-Filling (Extra-Planetary) Species", which we SEEM to consider ourselves to be.

We CAN short circuit the cycle, via annihilation or allocation, but our fear of "Inhumanity" and/or "Humiliation" keeps us from even SEEING that those are the only two non-war/non-genocide solutions to the single greatest "test" of what it means to be human.

..of course, one of those "solutions" IS genocide, so actually there is only one solution that isn't genocide.

Aloha!

[Coordinated fires]

I think "guest" is missing the forest for the trees.

Religion, like language, ethnicity, shared history, etc form the shared characteristics that define membership in a nation. When one nation, defined by it's common religion, language, ethnicity, etc, comes into conflict with an "other'", these differences tend to exacerbate the hate and enmity that each side has toward the other and help fuel the various conflicts that one group may have with another regarding any number of issues.

In my opinion, it has nothing to do with the tenets of any specific religion, but just the tribal nature of mankind which tends to cause us to divide ourselves along these lines. To be clear, it is not a knock on any one religion, or religion in general, it's just one of the many characteristics that cause fault lines to form between groups of people, and therefore give rise to the opportunity for conflict.

[FishbellykanakaDude]

I think "guest" is missing the forest for the trees.

Religion, like language, ethnicity, shared history, etc form the shared characteristics that define membership in a nation. When one nation, defined by it's common religion, language, ethnicity, etc, comes into conflict with an "other'", these differences tend to exacerbate the hate and enmity that each side has toward the other and help fuel the various conflicts that one group may have with another regarding any number of issues.

In my opinion, it has nothing to do with the tenets of any specific religion, but just the tribal nature of mankind which tends to cause us to divide ourselves along these lines. To be clear, it is not a knock on any one religion, or religion in general, it's just one of the many characteristics that cause fault lines to form between groups of people, and therefore give rise to the opportunity for conflict.

Yup.

Adrenaline trumps habits. Run from or join the mob.

..the great sin is joining due to desperation too soon, and the great killer is fleeing due to desperation too late.

[Guest]

The Amish are not a religion. They are a tiny sect OF a religion.

Individuals can be pacifistic, but societies cannot, and the Amish are the equivalent of an "individual".

Whether you call them a religion, sect, cult, or denomination is a matter of semantics. The fact is that the Amish, Mennonites and similar groups form distinct ethno-religious communities. They usually live in towns inhabited entirely by their own group. They are highly endothermic rarely intermarry with outsiders. The old orders (in both Brazil and the united states) continue to speak a distinct dialect incomprehensible to speakers of English, Portuguese, or standard German. These are small and scattered societies to be sure, but this is much more than an individual or a random group of individuals.

I think "guest" is missing the forest for the trees.

Religion, like language, ethnicity, shared history, etc form the shared characteristics that define membership in a nation. When one nation, defined by it's common religion, language, ethnicity, etc, comes into conflict with an "other'", these differences tend to exacerbate the hate and enmity that each side has toward the other and help fuel the various conflicts that one group may have with another regarding any number of issues.

In my opinion, it has nothing to do with the tenets of any specific religion, but just the tribal nature of mankind which tends to cause us to divide ourselves along these lines. To be clear, it is not a knock on any one religion, or religion in general, it's just one of the many characteristics that cause fault lines to form between groups of people, and therefore give rise to the opportunity for conflict.

Of course I see that this is a rare thing, and probably by its nature confined to small groups. But these groups do not hold merely to the tenants of pacifism. They have a long history of living them out. Their habit is whenever war occurs they abandon their homes and their homeland and flee to another place. Every time this happens, many are slaughtered for refusing to fight.

Ask for example, on what side the Mennonites fought during the thirty years war? The answer is they didn't fight. Most of them simply left Europe. Some came to America and became known as the Pennsylvania Dutch. Others fled to Russia where they were tolerated until the early twentieth century, having received a charter of immunity from armed service. When this charter was revoked, most of them left for the US or Brazil. The rest were wiped out in the Russian Revolution in which they again refused to fight. There are many other wars with similar patterns. The Anabaptist groups are not alone in this although they are probably the longest standing example.

The point is this: it is not merely individuals who have chosen pacifism. It is whole tribes, demarcated be religion, that have with great sacrifice chosen pacifism. There are of course one or two people in the history of these groups that have broken this pattern. But there are always individual exceptions.

Yes, we must see the distinction between small religious minorities and major religions that encompass large nations and control vast lands. In fact my their very nature, pacifist religions will get the worst of every war and can never be as large as those willing to use force. However it is not accurate to say that the natural forces of hatred, vengeance, and violence will always trump religious beliefs. Because sometime (albeit not usually) people, even whole groups of distinct people for broad swaths of history, are willing to live out their beliefs, even when it means going against their instincts for retaliation and self-preservation.

[Guest]

They are highly endothermic rarely intermarry with outsiders.

I meant to say:

They are highly endogamic and rarely intermarry with outsiders.

Please remind me to hang my spelling auto-corrector.

[John]

What's the dynamic that holds these small groups together for
generations? Why don't the younger generations rebel, become
nationalistic and xenophobic like everyone else, and demand change?

[Guest]

What's the dynamic that holds these small groups together for
generations? Why don't the younger generations rebel, become
nationalistic and xenophobic like everyone else, and demand change?

These are very good questions. I Don't have a full answer. But I can start by saying that these groups are anything but immune to xenophobia. They have a tendency to be very suspicious of outsiders. I can also say with confidence that they have their fair share of generational conflict. A major theme of this conflict is modernization and connection with the outside culture conflicting with traditionalism and connection with their roots.

Detailed study of the generational pattern will be complicated by the fact that the isolated minorities may at times be on a different generational timeline than the national majority.

[FishbellykanakaDude]

What's the dynamic that holds these small groups together for
generations? Why don't the younger generations rebel, become
nationalistic and xenophobic like everyone else, and demand change?

The younger ones DO rebel,.. against the older ones/

The older ones DO become nationalistic (their group being the "nation").

Nationalism and xenophobia ARE what holds them (their nation) together.

The demand for change is posited as, "We must change the young ones from their natural desire to join the dominant surrounding society!"

They possess all the characteristics of any society, and have their 4 Generation GD cycle, but the "genocide" is the expulsion of their younger generation that simply won't be limited by their "Patriarchs". The resulting "agony of shunning/shame" is very hard on the rest of their society.

They have a constant "genocide" going on, which "dilutes" their timeline, making it more "manageable", but every few generations a "large event" happens which "calms things down" for a while.

..and no, I don't have any evidence of when this last happened, or whether it ACTUALLY has ever happened. Pure conjecture on my part. I'll leave it to someone else to look up this weirdness.

BUT,.. my main point is that while they ARE a rather cohesive subsociety, they are NOT large enough to be considered separate from their surrounding dominant society, and therefore don't merit having their own GD timeline, per se.

Aloha gangies! <shaka!>

[Guest]

These peaceful religious insular communities are protected by countries populated by men who are willing to kill and die to protect the country. These religious minorities, if small, are tolerated. If these communities ever really become large and are unwilling to protect the nation, they are subject to derision. Look at want is going on in Israel with the Orthodox Jews who live off welfare and refuse to serve in the Israeli military. They are being dragged off to prison now.

“We sleep soundly in our beds, because rough men stand ready in the night to do violence on those who would harm us"

These ''peaceful people' are entirely dependent on the willingness of the warlike to protect them. I have no respect for them at all.

JCP