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Have a subversive Christmas
In David Loy's collection of essays entitled The
Great Awakening: A Buddhist Social Theory,
I recently assigned Loy's essay to a class in Buddhist philosophy. After saying a little about Loy's work and this particular essay, I broke the class up into small discussion groups and asked them to discuss several questions I had provided for them. One of them was a question about Loy's claim that consumerism is the prevailing religion in today's America. It was interesting to hear students talking about various products they had no idea how they could possibly live without. The products at the top of their list were all things that did not exist ten years ago—products that I have lived without for my entire life and probably will never have a hankering to own. If consumerism is the religion of our day, my students would appear to have taken the catechism classes and had their Confirmation. With only one or two obvious exceptions, most of them are not exactly true believers—most of them seem to reject the ideology of consumerism when it is stated in plain language, and they know it is in some way not cool to be materialistic. But if not believers, they appear to be at least observant practitioners.
The Christmas season is upon us, and it has been evident to many observers ever since I can remember that Christmas in America is much more about the practice of materialism than about anything that opposes, or even questions, it. A few American Christians manage to get worked up over what some of them call a “war on Christmas,&rdquo but their main target is not rampant consumerism, but rather merchants and advertisers who prefer to call this time of year “the holiday season” instead of The Christmas Season.
For most of my adult life I have been striving, with only limited success, to ignore the impulse to exchange material gifts and commercial Christmas cards with people I love. I have also struggled with the question of whether it makes sense for someone who does not consider himself a Christian to celebrate Christmas at all, and, if so, to be so resistant to celebrating it as the most holy day in the religion of American Consumerism and so insistent on celebrating as a an important Christian holy day. It is unlikely that I shall resolve any of these issues before my consciousness fizzles out. They are too complex to resolve easily, and frankly not important enough to me to spend much time worrying about.
In the spirit of giving that does not further spread the disease of commercialism and consumerism, my gift of choice this year is an Ubuntu Linux operating system for all my friends who have computers. Everything about Linux in general sits well with me. For one thing, Linux operating systems, and the software that runs on them, are completely open source. That is, they are distributed for free along with the computer code used to build them. There is in principle nothing commercial about a Linux operating system. The only aspect of Linux that can be commercialized is putting together a distribution, which includes the operating system and software packages and a smooth-running installation protocol. Strictly speaking, it is only the installation protocol, and protocols for updating software, that can be sold for profit. There are several commercial distributions.
My reason for specifying Ubuntu Linux is that even the installation protocols are distributed for no cost whatsoever to anyone who requests them. All one has to do is to go to the Ubuntu Linux web page and click on the link entitled Get Ubuntu to begin a download or order a DVD to be sent anywhere in the world free of charge. If one prefers to buy a CD or DVD, that option is available, too. If one wishes to support the Ubuntu movement by making a financial contribution, or by helping to develop or test new products, there are links for all those opportunities as well. Ubuntu is all about community and sharing.
My mother used to intone the mantra “You get what you pay for,” which usually meant that anything that is available at no cost is probably worthless, or close to it. In the case of Ubuntu Linux, nothing could be farther from the truth than that mantra. Ubuntu Linux is very hard to beat as a computer operating system and collection of software programs that will do anything that can be done by commercial programs. Linux rarely crashes; I have experienced two crashes in ten years of using it daily. For a variety of reasons, it is rarely disturbed by viruses; it is, in the first place, constructed so as to be inherently secure, but it is also, unlike Microsoft, a system with few enemies who feel motivated to write destructive viruses to disturb it. Despite viruses for Linux being very rare, there are strong virus protection programs, just in case. In ten years of using Linux, I have never had a virus or Trojan horse or worm. I have lost almost no time to breakdowns or to problems requiring extensive troubleshooting. As the Ubuntu people like to say, Ubuntu Linux “just works.” In contrast to the early days of Linux, using Ubuntu Linux requires very little computer expertise of the user. If one chooses to become expert, there is ample documentation and help available. Almost everything about Ubuntu Linux can be tweaked until one's computer fits one work habits and aesthetic tastes and quirky personality traits like a glove.
Like most (if not all) Linux distributions, Ubuntu Linux can be loaded on a computer that runs some other operating system. If one chooses to install Linux on a computer that uses some version of Windows, for example, then every time one boots up the computer, one will be presented with a choice to start up either Windows or Linux. When I first installed Linux ten years ago, I installed it alongside Windows. After a couple of years I noticed that I never chose to boot Windows, since everything I could do there I could do better on Linux. Eventually I took Windows off my computer. Since then when I have purchased computers, I have bought them with Ubuntu Linux installed as the sole operating system. My story is a common one.
The bodhisattva who put up the initial funding and organizational genius that makes Ubuntu Linux possible is a man named Mark Shuttleworth. Even if one is not at all interested in trying Ubuntu Linux out, it is interesting and inspiring to read The Ubuntu Story. It is a tale of how life could be if it weren't for individual and collective manifestations of greed, hatred and delusion.
There are alternatives to the religion of consumerism. It is worth considering taking a subversive step or two to undermine consumerism and replace it with humanity and sanity.
Posted by Dayamati to New City of Friends at 12/11/2008 02:15 PM
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Provoked by Mozi
Mozi said: In ancient times, when mankind was first born and before there were any laws or government, it may be said that every man's views of things was different. One man had one view, two men had two views, ten men had ten views—the more men, the more views. Moreover, each man believed that his own views were correct and disapproved those of others, so that people spent their time condemning one another.... Those with strength to spare refused to help out others, those with surplus wealth would let it rot before they would share it, and those with beneficial doctrines to teach would keep them secret and refuse to impart them.
Mozi wrote his essays sometime after the time of Confucius and before the time of Mencius, so sometime during the fifth century BCE. His essays have always intrigued me, because I agree so profoundly with much of what he says and at the same time shrink bank in horror at the implications of the life he advocates.
Mozi is best remembered for advocating a doctrine of universal love. Nothing but harm, he argued, comes of letting one's love be limited to one's own family, or to one's circle of friends, or to one's own country or to people who share one's beliefs and convictions. If one loves one's own nation, he said, then let one love all nations. To do anything less is to fail to be fully human, and to fail to be fully human is to fail to be satisfactory in the eyes of Heaven. The doctrine of universal love was intimately connected in Mozi's thought to his condemnation of aggressive warfare. When strong nations attack weaker nations for the sake of gaining more land, more population, or better markets, they rarely achieve what they seek and instead reap a harvest of bitterness that no sane person would want: death, destruction of property, wasted resources, and a general disruption of trust and confidence that results in an atmosphere of fear and resentment. Of all the unrighteous things a man can do, says Mozi, none is more unrighteous than beginning a war. Of all the incompetent actions a government can perform, none is more incompetent and counterproductive than beginning a war. With all these sentiments I have always found myself in full agreement.
Where Mozi begins to leave me feeling less sympathetic is in his uncompromising condemnation of music and the arts, and ornamented clothing and fancy houses and splendid carriages. My lack of sympathy here is not without complexity. Having been brought up by parents who had a disdain for all manner of luxury and who wore plain and functional clothing and avoided jewelry and drove practical and efficient automobiles and favored modest housing, I find that my own tastes are basically in accord with those of Mozi. Where I feel uncomfortable is in the stridency of his condemnation of all enterprises that are carried our purely for pleasure and enjoyment rather than for more obviously utilitarian and commercial purposes. The denial of the legitimacy of the pursuit of pleasure strikes me as founded on an unnecessarily narrow understanding of human nature. I keep wanting to argue that people do not thrive when they deny themselves aesthetic pursuits, or when they disdain doing things just for fun.
For most of my adult life, I have been attracted to disciplined ways of living that have little room for pursuits deemed frivolous. The spare lifestyle of the Buddhist monk has always been a source of inspiration to me, and I have always admired those who pursue it (especially since I myself have never been able to pursue it). The idea of having just one set of robes, one bowl out of which one eats one meal per day, and no hair or beard to trim and maintain has always struck me as the noblest way of living in the world. Having no reason to look at oneself in the mirror to see how one might appear to others, one could devote all one's time and energy to undistracted pursuit of wisdom and service to others.
While the Buddhist monk has always been at the top of my list of people to admire, a close second place is held by what Max Weber called secular ascetics, that is, people who earn a livelihood by the sweat of their brow and get married and have a family but who studiously avoid all luxuries so that they can devote all their spare time to undistracted pursuit of wisdom and service to others. Quakers, Shakers, Mennonites, Hutterites, and the Amish have always seemed the very noblest of Christians, the closest to succeeding in living a life that Christ (and the Buddha) would surely approve in full. Among these people there is not much music to be found, not much in the way of ornamented clothing (aside from some pretty amazing quiltwork) or luxurious housing and furnishing (except for some of the most beautiful furniture and carpentry that has ever been produced with simple tools and bare hands).
And yet, despite all my admiration for the plain and disciplined life of monks and so-called primitive Quakers, I cannot suppress my own hedonistic appreciation of music well performed, theater skillfully produced, painting and sculpture beautifully executed, clothing attractively sewn and dyed, and buildings well designed and carefully constructed. Even if I would probably not spend my own money to support the production of such things, I cannot deny being deeply grateful to those who do. Unlike Mozi (and quite a few of my fellow Buddhists and Quakers), I cannot regard the pursuit of beauty wasteful and frivolous. When Mozi rails against such things, I shudder.
I find myself wondering whether my love of discipline on the one hand and my love of beauty on the other is just another one of the many unresolved contradictions in my character. Can one condemn war and partiality and frivolity and praise discipline and wisdom and service but still have time for pleasure and fun without falling into self-contradiction and delusion? I think one can. But I may very well be deluded in this (as in so many other things).
Posted by Dayamati to New City of Friends at 02/12/2009 03:17 PM
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