Dalai Lama says ‘real gun control’ comes from heart

[uhnope]

Source: SF GATE

SACRAMENTO — In front of state lawmakers weighing a slate of gun-control measures, the Dalai Lama said Monday that ending violence requires inner disarmament and an education system that focuses on teaching moral values, compassion and what it means to be a global citizen.
In a speech to lawmakers in the state Capitol, the Tibetan spiritual leader called a sense of community “the basis of our own happy future.”
His comments came in the wake of the mass shooting in Orlando and the deadly attack in San Bernardino in December, which led California lawmakers to introduce more than a dozen gun-control bills.
“Real gun control must come from here,” the Dalai Lama said, pointing at his heart.

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/politics/article/Dalai-Lama-says-real-gun-control-comes-from-8313907.php

[BlackLivesMatter]

1. I want whatever drugs the Dalai Lama does

[Feeling the Bern]

5. Insulting to Buddhism and Buddhism, Mr. or Mrs. Low Count Poster

Not a good way to introduce yourself to a new community.

[uhnope]

10. lighten up dood

[brett_jv]

2. He's 'right' ... but I'm not sure he fully understands the situation at hand ...

Because the gun lobby and their friends in the GOP who run our Congress have absolutely no interest in 'public schools' in general, let alone those that teach "compassion and what it means to be a global citizen".

[Helen Borg]

3. Yes, but you also need a bulletproof vest to protect the heart...

Dunno, isn't that like saying that we all should be good. A bit disappointed.

[OnDoutside]

4. That's what he was probably wearing, and he just pointed to it !!

[Feeling the Bern]

6. Wow. . .more low count posters insulting his holiness.

[Helen Borg]

8. Low post count shaming has no place at DU.

[Feeling the Bern]

12. Shaming the international symbol of peace has no place anywhere

In my experience, low count posters posting things like this are usually disruptions that will eventually show their true colors.

[OnDoutside]

16. Wow.... no need to be so incredibly thin skinned. In any case D.L. has a very good sense of humor,

which you could learn from and grow up a bit.

[Feeling the Bern]

24. My wife is a Buddhist, read your post over my shoulder and was extremely offended

by the insult of his holiness.

Maybe you should try to think about that before you post something insulting about the international symbol of peace.

[OnDoutside]

27. Perhaps you should advise her to grow up too :) In any case

it is your opinion that he is "the international symbol of peace", don't put your prejudices over on anyone else. He seems a nice man though, and with a sense of humour, you should try it sometime.

[Feeling the Bern]

31. My wife is a Chinese national. Nice cultural understanding.

Welcome to ignore.

[OnDoutside]

33. Thank goodness for that !

There's little worse than an affected slight.

[Igel]

20. Perhaps.

Not all do, though.

And really, the Lama is the "international symbol of peace"?

Like most symbols, the meaning is in the eye (or ear) of the beholder, I guess.

[uhnope]

11. pleeez.

an enlightened monk would just laugh

[OnDoutside]

15. +1000

[hankthecrank]

7. I agree with the Dalai Lama nt

[BlueMTexpat]

9. Unfortunately, we have too many

people in office who have no "heart" whatsoever. They have organs that pump blood throughout their bodies, but that's it.

"Heart" only applies to those who have compassion and respect for other human beings. That's why laws are needed.

[rjsquirrel]

13. I know it's contrarian

But I fail to see why everyone thinks so highly of this guy. He's a hereditary leader of a religion but he has hardly been a simple man of peace despite the robes and the wry smile. And his views on gun control are not particularly helpful in a country with constant mass shootings where real gun control needs to come from the law.

Then again I think the pope is a con artist too.

[Helen Borg]

14. Watch the movie "Habemus Papam"

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1456472/

[femmedem]

17. He is not a hereditary leader. He was born into a peasant family. n/t

[jberryhill]

25. I didn't vote for him

[Igel]

21. His point is simple.

And when you get past simple, sensationalist data it's one that we should take note of.

We see that the US is awash in guns and has a high homicide/suicide rate.

But we ignore knife violence. Now, you think, this is the "if not for guns we'd have a high homicide rate because of knives" argument and the rebuttal, "but it's hard to kill 40+ people with a knife!" is, no doubt, queued up for instant playback.

A while back somebody looked at knife violence in similar communities in Washington State and across the border in Canada. They controlled for ethnicity, education, income. Crime rates for things like theft weren't that different.

But one community had a much higher number of assaults with a deadly weapon using knives, a much higher incidence of deaths from knives and injuries from knives. It was not the community on the Canadian side of the border, and I'll let others work out which country this high-knife-assault community was in.

I'd not, as speculation, that this area in the unmentioned country also had a relatively low gun homicide rate compared to other areas of the country. Perhaps they chose knives because guns were harder to get; perhaps other areas of this country have a high knife-usage rate in committing felonies and this is in addition to guns. Dunno.

However, the difference between the two communities was pretty much entirely cultural. Greater sense of community, social trust, better mechanisms in the culture for tamping down rage and wounded pride and a lesser importance on "look how great I am, how dare you talk to me that way." Which is to say, what the Lama was talking about. So even apart from guns, just fisticuffs, knives, and vehicular homicide he has a point. Whether he's a con artist or not, the point is valid and therefore the logic is valid. When you see this kind of thing, first blame the people using the technology. (I mean, seriously. "Men don't rape women, cocks do. So what we really need isn't education and a different mindset from men, but cock control.&quot

[harun]

29. The root of the problem is cultural, not legal. I think that is what he is saying too.

It is something no one ever addresses in American politics because it is a topic that no one agrees on.

We have a culture of me, not of we.

[LanternWaste]

22. Greatness is never appreciated in youth

"Greatness is never appreciated in youth, called pride in middle age, dismissed in old age, and reconsidered in death. Because we cannot tolerate greatness in our midst we do all we can to destroy it."

~JMS (1996)~

[rjsquirrel]

23. Is that addressed to me?

Unclear but if so I'm a 56 year old scientist not a youth. But it is true that the older I get the less tolerance I have for hero worship or metaphysical woo.

[Rafale]

19. Completely agree with his message but

Few Americans will understand it. #PerpetualWarState

Disappointing people attack the man and ignore the message. People value violence more than human life. If not true, I think our military would be smaller and we would not be involved in at least four wars, supplying the vast majority of weapons around the world, and have a military budget biggest than the next 8 countries combined. We are perhaps the most violent country on Earth so it should come as no surprise that good people are gunned down on our streets. No legislation is the world can changed a poisoned heart. The heart must change first. People must first respect themselves and then respect each other. Otherwise the cycle of violence remains with us/US as the leader.

[BlackLivesMatter]

26. His comment is no different from a pastor saying sin culture is responsible for tragedy

It's overly simplistic and does nothing to solve the societal problems, here of violence and crime.

On edit: I'm not saying talking about racism, rape culture, culutre of violence, etc. is bad. Of course, religious figures tend to label things as bad more broadly, but that alone will not prevent tragedy ... if at all without laws to promote change.

[Alex4Martinez]

28. He's right. Violence is a symptom of a social and spiritual pathology.

You can tinker with the rules around the hardware used in violence, but it takes courage to permanently address the root causes.

We need to do both, we need more thoughtful gun regulation integrated with comprehensive reforms to our entire system of health care, job and food and shelter security, and different cultural messaging than we have today.

[davidthegnome]

30. A wise man.

However... inner disarmament is not really enough. How dangerous is a terrible man with a wooden sword? Perhaps not very. Give him a real one and he becomes a little more so. Give him an AR 15...

In theory... inner peace, kindness towards each other, respect for all life, greater love and compassion... yes, these things make a difference and are grand and noble ambitions. However, we must also recognize the extreme ideologies in this Country, the many groups and individuals that are not so nice and compassionate that have lots of guns. There are those in this Country who would love to kick someone's ass just for being pacifist.

With great respect for the Dalai Lama and for Buddhists in general... when China invaded and conquered Tibet, the people of Tibet had little in the way of modern conventional weaponry. They did not have many soldiers, they did not have many that had enough knowledge of modern warfare (at the time) to repel the Chinese army. Possibly the help of other Nations could have helped them do so - but most of the world, at the time, was already exhausted and devastated from military conflict.

If those like the Dalai Lama ruled the world, or if the world believed deeply enough in their wise philosophies and spiritual ideas... I think it would be a much happier place. Still, we have to acknowledge reality. I'd love it if everyone threw away their weapons right now, but that is not going to happen. We can perhaps, lead the way with good and noble hearts and ambitions, but I think that we must also use whatever legal and political tools are available to us to to prevent, stop, or at least slow down... the terrible violence that we see every year in this Country.

Real gun control comes from the heart, but, respectfully, so does real hatred.

[Aristus]

32. I'm sorry, Your Holiness, but,

Real gun control comes from Congress. Pray with one hand, and vote with the other; see which one brings about real change.