6 ms·

> Is this about religion again? Yes. Islam vs Buddhism or Buddhism vs Islam, whichever way you wanna look at it.

StudentStuff 9y ago
Basically an Islamic minority being systematically executed or ejected from their homes. Thing is this has been going on for at least a decade, I remember going to a tech meetup about mesh networks that had a few Rohingya's who were about my age at the time that were going to Seattle Central College or similar. IIRC they took some phones running Serval Mesh back, but not much else happened. They were pretty interested in building communication infrastructure so they could document the (at the time) slow moving atrocity.
- DanBC 9y ago
  They were also interested in building methods for people who've left the country to communicate with family. http://news.trust.org//slideshow/?id=356b4ab3-7e12-440f-9781-b40d97df7b89 http://news.trust.org//slideshow/?id=356b4ab3-7e12-440f-9781...
optimalsolver 9y ago
I'm with the Buddhists.
- tnorthcutt 9y ago
  So you support the genocide of the Rohingya people?
  - optimalsolver 9y ago
    My priors based on all previous conflicts involving Islam lead me to believe the native Burmese are most likely acting in self defense, having to resort to extreme measures to preserve their ancient way of life.
- nickpeterson 9y ago
  Ermm, what??
khein11 9y ago
There is a large community of Islam living peacefully in Myanmar. If you look around Yangon (the largest and most popular city of Myanmar), you could find a lot of mosques (some even closed to famous pagoda). So this issue is much more complicated than Islam vs Buddhism.
- toomanybeersies 9y ago
  The last Mughal Emperor (a Muslim) was also exiled to, and eventually buried in Yangon.
- thrwyxzw1 9y ago
  An interesting litmus test in situations like this is: are the Burmese Muslim population allowed to speak out about events around the Rohingya? If, say, some Burmese Muslims held a large protest march in Yangon, would they run the risk of being targeted as a group? If so, I'd say that their silence is as a result of fear rather than support.
jansho 9y ago
That’s an extremely simplistic way of seeing it though. The Rohingya were simple people, mostly poor, and lived in Myanmar for generations; religion would be a code of life for them, not a political tool. It’s likely the opposite for the monks and their followers though; Buddhism is about peace, fundamentally and (in nearly all cases) in practice. My patience with Aung San Suu Kyi has run out completely. Too little said, too little done, too late for anything else.
- DanBC 9y ago
  > Buddhism is about peace, fundamentally and (in nearly all cases) in practice. Normally, yes, but there are several violent buddhist groups. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democratic_Karen_Buddhist_Army https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democratic_Karen_Buddhist_Army https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/969_Movement https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/969_Movement https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bodu_Bala_Sena https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bodu_Bala_Sena
  - gressquel 9y ago
    Sei lankan war was “led” by buddhist monks and their hatred for hindus
- jdietrich 9y ago
  >Buddhism is about peace, fundamentally and (in nearly all cases) in practice. There's a slight subtlety to this. Buddhist ethics are very different to Judeo-Christian ethics. The Buddhist equivalent to "thou shalt not kill" is the first of the five precepts, "panatipata veramani sikkhapadam samadiyami", which loosely translates to "I undertake the rule of training to refrain from killing living beings". This is not so much an absolute proscription as a broad axiomatic principle. In western terms, Buddhist ethics are most closely aligned with negative utilitarianism - broadly speaking, Buddhists seek to minimise net suffering. One study found that, when presented with the trolley car problem, Buddist monks were drastically more likely to push the man off the footbridge than Americans. https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2017/06/how-do-buddhist-monks-think-about-the-trolley-problem/532092/ https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2017/06/how-d... The main religious support for the ethnic cleansing of the Rohingya comes from monks affiliated with Ma Ba Tha, a hardline nationalist group. From their perspective, the Rohingya represent an existential threat to the Rakhine people and the republic of Myanmar. If this assessment were true, then the expulsion of Rohingya people could be interpreted as the least-harm option, even if it involves substantial violence. Although the vast majority of Buddhists condemn the ethnic cleansing of the Rohingya, it is not intrinsically incompatible with Buddhist ethics. This conflict is not new. Rohingya Islamist groups have been fighting the government of Myanmar/Burma since 1947, with the aim of establishing an Islamic regime in Rakhine state. The current crisis was most likely precipitated by an attack on border guards in 2016, which Islamist militant groups claimed responsibility for. There is clear evidence that Rohingya guerrilla groups are being trained in Bangladesh; there is also substantial evidence of ties between Al-Qaeda and militant Islamists in Myanmar. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rohingya_insurgency_in_Western_Myanmar https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rohingya_insurgency_in_Western... I strongly disapprove of the oppression of the Rohingya people and the silence from the civilian government, but I do think that the western media has presented a grossly over-simplified narrative that frames the actions of the Myanmar people as senseless and unprovoked. I would ask the reader to consider how their country would react if Islamist guerrillas were active in their own back yard, sponsored by a neighbouring Muslim nation.
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]

Basically an Islamic minority being systematically executed or ejected from their homes. Thing is this has been going on for at least a decade, I remember going to a tech meetup about mesh networks that had a few Rohingya's who were about my age at the time that were going to Seattle Central College or similar. IIRC they took some phones running Serval Mesh back, but not much else happened. They were pretty interested in building communication infrastructure so they could document the (at the time) slow moving atrocity.

DanBC 9y ago
They were also interested in building methods for people who've left the country to communicate with family. http://news.trust.org//slideshow/?id=356b4ab3-7e12-440f-9781-b40d97df7b89 http://news.trust.org//slideshow/?id=356b4ab3-7e12-440f-9781...

optimalsolver 9y ago

I'm with the Buddhists.

tnorthcutt 9y ago
So you support the genocide of the Rohingya people?
- optimalsolver 9y ago
  My priors based on all previous conflicts involving Islam lead me to believe the native Burmese are most likely acting in self defense, having to resort to extreme measures to preserve their ancient way of life.
nickpeterson 9y ago
Ermm, what??

khein11 9y ago

There is a large community of Islam living peacefully in Myanmar. If you look around Yangon (the largest and most popular city of Myanmar), you could find a lot of mosques (some even closed to famous pagoda). So this issue is much more complicated than Islam vs Buddhism.

toomanybeersies 9y ago
The last Mughal Emperor (a Muslim) was also exiled to, and eventually buried in Yangon.
thrwyxzw1 9y ago
An interesting litmus test in situations like this is: are the Burmese Muslim population allowed to speak out about events around the Rohingya? If, say, some Burmese Muslims held a large protest march in Yangon, would they run the risk of being targeted as a group? If so, I'd say that their silence is as a result of fear rather than support.

jansho 9y ago

That’s an extremely simplistic way of seeing it though. The Rohingya were simple people, mostly poor, and lived in Myanmar for generations; religion would be a code of life for them, not a political tool. It’s likely the opposite for the monks and their followers though; Buddhism is about peace, fundamentally and (in nearly all cases) in practice. My patience with Aung San Suu Kyi has run out completely. Too little said, too little done, too late for anything else.

DanBC 9y ago
> Buddhism is about peace, fundamentally and (in nearly all cases) in practice. Normally, yes, but there are several violent buddhist groups. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democratic_Karen_Buddhist_Army https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democratic_Karen_Buddhist_Army https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/969_Movement https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/969_Movement https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bodu_Bala_Sena https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bodu_Bala_Sena
- gressquel 9y ago
  Sei lankan war was “led” by buddhist monks and their hatred for hindus
jdietrich 9y ago
>Buddhism is about peace, fundamentally and (in nearly all cases) in practice. There's a slight subtlety to this. Buddhist ethics are very different to Judeo-Christian ethics. The Buddhist equivalent to "thou shalt not kill" is the first of the five precepts, "panatipata veramani sikkhapadam samadiyami", which loosely translates to "I undertake the rule of training to refrain from killing living beings". This is not so much an absolute proscription as a broad axiomatic principle. In western terms, Buddhist ethics are most closely aligned with negative utilitarianism - broadly speaking, Buddhists seek to minimise net suffering. One study found that, when presented with the trolley car problem, Buddist monks were drastically more likely to push the man off the footbridge than Americans. https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2017/06/how-do-buddhist-monks-think-about-the-trolley-problem/532092/ https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2017/06/how-d... The main religious support for the ethnic cleansing of the Rohingya comes from monks affiliated with Ma Ba Tha, a hardline nationalist group. From their perspective, the Rohingya represent an existential threat to the Rakhine people and the republic of Myanmar. If this assessment were true, then the expulsion of Rohingya people could be interpreted as the least-harm option, even if it involves substantial violence. Although the vast majority of Buddhists condemn the ethnic cleansing of the Rohingya, it is not intrinsically incompatible with Buddhist ethics. This conflict is not new. Rohingya Islamist groups have been fighting the government of Myanmar/Burma since 1947, with the aim of establishing an Islamic regime in Rakhine state. The current crisis was most likely precipitated by an attack on border guards in 2016, which Islamist militant groups claimed responsibility for. There is clear evidence that Rohingya guerrilla groups are being trained in Bangladesh; there is also substantial evidence of ties between Al-Qaeda and militant Islamists in Myanmar. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rohingya_insurgency_in_Western_Myanmar https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rohingya_insurgency_in_Western... I strongly disapprove of the oppression of the Rohingya people and the silence from the civilian government, but I do think that the western media has presented a grossly over-simplified narrative that frames the actions of the Myanmar people as senseless and unprovoked. I would ask the reader to consider how their country would react if Islamist guerrillas were active in their own back yard, sponsored by a neighbouring Muslim nation.

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]