Burma Dharma: What is the Sound of 20,000 Monks Marching?
September 26th, 2007 by DR. CLARISSA PINKOLA ESTÉS, TMV Columnist
Can you imagine 20,000 Rabbi’s taking to the streets of Manhattan to protest the treatment of the poor? How about 20,000 Bishops and Cardinals marching in the streets of say, Venice, holding hands? Could you imagine 20,000 Imams marching in Baghdad protesting the deaths of innocents? It would be awe-striking. Such a searing statement.
But we don’t need to imagine holy men marching in Burma. This week, 20,000 monks gathered at the Shwe-dagon Pagoda, one of the holiest religious sites in Burma, and a historical rallying point for protests, both political and compassionate. From there, the 20,000 monks took to the streets… to protest the junta government’s cavalier cruelty to the poor… which includes huge fuel price hikes, as well as widespread imprisoning of persons who speak out against the government.
The Burmese monks, thin creatures most of them, many elderly, in maroon robes, one arm bare… walking with purpose, no doubt in some kind of anti-vajra hell meditation…. and following them, many young men in long black wraps, holding hands; their faces deadly serious and poignantly soft-eyed at the same time.
And that is just what the post-British occupation Burmese government wants to eradicate: peaceful determined people with clear minds and compassionate hearts… the most dangerous kind of people on earth… to a dictator; to a corrupt government, to anything or anyone inhumane.
Burma’s governance is more and more influenced by China, as China has pegged Burma to be a supplier of oil and other natural resources for the Chinese people. One wonders if the recent fuel price hike in Burma is tied to China somehow.
It is also being said by sources in Burma, none of whom want to be quoted by name, that thus far the Buddhist monks and those who’ve joined their protest are not being slapped down, arrested and murdered as they were in a similar rising up in 1988… mainly because China does not want civil unrest. It wants to continue to build its roads in Burma to bring out its oil and timber.
However, Burma wants no ‘awe-striking or searing’ revelations about its long term and ongoing injustices toward its own people. Though the Buddhists are pleading for the United Nations to become involved immediately, the Burmese government is reportedly closing down websites and internet access as quickly as it can… sparked by cell-phone films Burmese have taken of violence toward the marchers … showing up on YouTube… thereby ‘letting the world know.’
Like Comandante Marcos from Chiapas who broke the gatekeepers of Mexico, bypassing the Mexican media and governmental agencies by going to the internet to tell about the political quashing of natives in that area, and thereby garnering huge waves of support for their travail… the Burmese are also reaching past their government’s usual mouthpieces via ‘new media’ to speak their truths… For instance, this article came about via an internet communiqué alerting me to the situation in Burma… sent from a missionary with a laptop in Rangon.
However, as of this evening the signs in parts of Burma are ominous as tanks and armed soldiers have taken up positions on the streets. The military is beginning to arrest civilians, has called a curfew and also rescinded ‘right of assembly’ limiting meetings to no more than five persons.
Though some accuse the monks of being pawns of extremist groups, and some others accuse the monks of being hypocritical because some of their leaders sometimes ceremonially ’sit in golden chairs’ (each temple often has chairs given by the populace that are anywhere from simple to fancy) it is unlikely that such accusation hold much sway. More sturdy is that this could be China’s chance, despite multiple motives, to show how humane they can be by staying the Burmese government’s violent reactions to the protesters. It could be a chance for the United States to stand up for a people who dearly seem to want a rock-solid democracy instead of a mock democracy…as their government keeps averring they have a stepped plan for a democracy… some day. It would be a chance for the Burmese government to take down its armored bunker mentality and become a governing body instead of an exploitative one.
Meanwhile, 20,000 Buddhist monks with no armor other than their profound belief in compassionate action toward all beings, march in Burma tonight, their faces so deadly serious and their eyes so soft, all at the same time.
This entry was posted on Wednesday, September 26th, 2007 at 1:25 am and is filed under Oil, Freedom of the Press, Internet, Human Rights, Burma, Bush Administration, Psychology, Civil Liberties, Religion, Endangered Species, Energy, Internet News Media, Social Commentary, Freedom of Speech, China. Both comments and pings are currently closed.
