--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, "dhamiltony2k5" <dhamiltony...@...> wrote: > > --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Vaj <vajradhatu@> wrote: > > > > I can't say such groups do not exist. They might. But I > > suspect FF is seen as a Hindu style New Age town, based > > on the what I get from posts on FF spiritual teachers. > > If they are there, I'd expect them to keep a > > low profile or be occasional visitors. > > Yes, that is fairly true. When i've seen it in FF it is > fairly clandestine. For instance, the Weds group meditation > i go to that is effectively transcendental vipasannaic has > a lot of people who also go to the dome, so it is kept under > wraps mostly to protect those folks.
To protect them FROM WHAT, Doug? Do you realize what you are saying? You are suggesting that these people need to be "clandestine" to protect them from the TM organ- ization, which would excommunicate them if they found out they were attending a "Buddhist" teach- ing, or one by a non-TM teacher. The fact that what you're suggesting is TRUE makes it all the sadder. We're back to my earlier advice -- GO PUBLIC. Take it to the newspapers. Take it to the TV stations. Let the cat out of the bag. TELL the greater public what the TMO does to its members on a regular basis. If you DON'T do this, you are helping to perpetuate the problem. Simple as that. > Figure also that the TM movement is culturally so > pre-disposed against what they see as buddhist > meditations. A profound pre-disposition that is > defined from the Transcendental Meditation second > lecture that is always given to people as they would > start TM. Exactly. What was shocking about Alex's snark was that he didn't know how bigoted it was. I'm *never* surprised when Nabby spouts eltist nonsense he's been taught it by the TMO, but *Alex*? The reason people don't realize how thoroughly they have been indoctrinated against other techniques and other spiritual traditions and teachers is precisely that it was done so regularly, and from the Intro lecture on. It was a core part of the TM teaching. Since they don't question what Mahsrishi said about that, they also don't question what he said about other techniques *that he had never practiced* and knew nothing about. > That preparatory lecture is a complete argument against > buddistic type meditations both in theory and with > scientific charts from the old days of TM. Plus, it's imprecise and inaccurate. Not all of the meditation techniques taught under the umbrella of Buddhism involve concentration; many are as effort- less as TM, or more so. (No mantra, no object of focus, less effort.) > That argument was an integral part of presenting TM. > It was always hard-hitting. And it was always untrue, and always spiritual bigotry. > So figure the TM culture is not very flexible on this > point. Worse, that culture *does not even realize* that it is inflexible on this point. They say things like, "If only Buddhism (or Christianity, or whatever) understood that at their basis they were "really" TM, and that TM is far superior to what they misunderstand their tradition to be, they'd get results the way we do," and *don't even realize* that they are being insulting spiritual bigots. It's the absolute unawareness of their bigotry that surprises me. Its source is clear. But how can people *be* so incredibly elitist without realizing it? > To the TM culture, buddhism would equal the wrong way. Which is fascinating, because Buddhism doesn't even present itself as the "right" way. It presents itself merely as "a way." > That is from way back in TM culture. There just is not a > lot of reception or even respect towards Buddhism within > Transcendental Meditation. Hence buddhism has never really > taken hold i, in FF. The bookstores do have books on it. That's white of them. When I was growing up in the South one or two bookstores carried books by Martin Luther King and other civil rights leaders, too. No one bought them, of course, and the white customers wouldn't be caught dead reading them in public, but the bookstores offered the books, gathering dust on a back shelf. Those folks weren't bigoted, either.
