Individual wrote:It has often been said that Buddhists are not dogmatic or sectarian, and it isn't true. The way they are dogmatic is simply very cute, compared with western religion. In western religion, dogmatics and sectarians simply blatantly say to your face, "You're an idiot, a heretic, and you're going to hell." With Buddhist dogmatics and sectarians, they might hold the same view, but don't explicitly state it, and it's simply subtly implied by what they say they believe... In the open, they are respectful to one another, but in private circles, among like-minded people, or hidden within the literature they publish, suddenly the respect for other views ceases to exist.
I think that is a superficial read of people of every kind. What makes a noble being noble is non-sectarian and what makes someone aspire to be a noble being is not dependent on a sectarian process or it is not happening at all. I might say someone is speaking idiocy because they have said something idiotic. It wouldn't make me sectarian, it would make me blunt and harsh speaking.
Individual wrote:For a similar mindset, as an analogy: I once told my father of a psychology experiment where researchers intentionally bumped into people in major cities to see how they reacted (apologetically or rudely). They found a sharp contrast between New York City and London, whereas New Yorkers tended to react more rudely, Londoners tended to react more apologetically. I told my father of this (who is British), and he said that doesn't mean English people are nicer, only superficially more polite. They'll be deeply apologetic, then walk 10 feet and mutter to themselves, "Friggin' clumsy idiot". When it comes to religious dogmatism, western religion has more of the mindset of the New Yorker, but Buddhist dogmatics tend to have the mindset of the superficially polite English.
Again, this is all reaching. It is like painting over a billboard with a thin lacquer, does it change the picture? Not much. Does it penetrate the truth in that image? Not at all.
Would it be so disappointing if a lot of buddhists did turn out to be wonderful people as well? Whether they speak sweetly or bitterly or not? Would it be so disappointing if underneath the proselytization of anything there existed some-thing(s) of value? Not really, something has value or not for each person that values it or doesn't.
If I bump into an Londoner or a New Yorker why should I be surprised at any kind of reaction to my lack of mindful attention? Even if they bump into me from behind and then curse me as they pass, why should I give it even a moments thought? That is their perception and their expression. I probably only see a busy and crowded street where many people are bumping about and doing or saying whatever they are apt to be doing or saying. Whether they are buddhist or somethingelseist doesn't have much to do with the wandering around and bumping into each other or how much civility anyone displays.
Any politeness or civility I have reflexively arises from my childhood conditioning and is modified by ongoing social conditioning. Any real self restraint I do or don't have is a product of my self discipline or a lack thereof and I may or may not apply that discipline to the given circumstances. Those two variables alone are enough to make an external appraisal of the overall makeup of my nature impossible to gather from any amount of external observations of my expressed forms of social behaviors and interactions. People can appear a given way because they are that way or they aren't that way but want to appear that way or because they have no choice but to appear that way but aren't actually that way but some other way. So even why people appear to be this way or that way can have all or nothing to do with what they be.
Buddhists are generally exposed to the idea that all of this appearance is illusory. That is a pretty basic notion of buddhism. It is pretty much a given amongst long term buddhist practitioners of all kinds. So buddhists probably generally appear quite dismissive of the issues arising from concerns about appearances. Buddhists will want to get at why appearances arise at all and are not as directly focused on appearances arising in any particular forms to the exclusion of other forms. To the extent that they are concerned with what arises in a buddhist sense it is a non sectarian concern that is not based on how someone else feels about their appearances or how they feel about someone else's appearance. Those are all societal concerns that buddhists share with all other beings in a shared world.
But whoever walking, standing, sitting, or lying down overcomes thought, delighting in the stilling of thought: he's capable, a monk like this, of touching superlative self-awakening. § 110. {Iti 4.11; Iti 115}
