Brad Warner says that being a soldier is right livlihood

www.hardcorezen.blogspot.com/

Because: "The military is necessary. No doubt about that. Anyone who argues otherwise is just deluded and overly idealistic.Since if this is so, actual people have to serve in the military and they have to be trained to kill when needed.

If you do something that is necessary to society, that is right livelihood. Serving in the military is right livelihood. Absolutely.

Most of us agree that it would be nice if there was no need for the military, if the whole world were stable and at peace and that peace didn't need to be defended by deadly force. But we are not there now. Peace has to be defended by people who are trained to kill those who would destroy it. I'm sorry. But that's the way things are.

I wish this was not true. And I can wish all I want but that won't make it so.

The way to change things is to take the real situation and make it better. If Buddhist teachers are telling people military service is not right livelihood, they are standing in the way of the day when real peace finally prevails. The more people in the military who have a Zen practice, or some kind of meditation, the better.

I'm glad there are people like you in the military. I wish there were more."

while I couldn't disagree more, I think it is cool that he has an opinion on this that is so different from the typical American buddhist convert type.

What's your take, Mike?
-jake

I'm against war and killing for any reason.
The reason that we have war and killing is because most people believe this:

"Most of us agree that it would be nice if there was no need for the military, if the whole world were stable and at peace and that peace didn't need to be defended by deadly force. But we are not there now. Peace has to be defended by people who are trained to kill those who would destroy it. I'm sorry. But that's the way things are."

However, I understand that point of view and I do respect people who have it. I also understand that my point of view is extreme and may not make sense to the majority.

Also, now that I've put this up here I'm nervous that I've maybe brought in a more political point of view and discussion topic than really needs to be here.

"Also, now that I've put this up here I'm nervous that I've maybe brought in a more political point of view and discussion topic than really needs to be here.

"

I think you broke the board.

"I'm against war and killing for any reason.
The reason that we have war and killing is because most people believe this:

"Most of us agree that it would be nice if there was no need for the military, if the whole world were stable and at peace and that peace didn't need to be defended by deadly force. But we are not there now. Peace has to be defended by people who are trained to kill those who would destroy it. I'm sorry. But that's the way things are."

However, I understand that point of view and I do respect people who have it. I also understand that my point of view is extreme and may not make sense to the majority.

Also, now that I've put this up here I'm nervous that I've maybe brought in a more political point of view and discussion topic than really needs to be here.

"

Maybe so, Mike- point well taken. It's in the general discussion area, though, and I don't see why matters of ethics are any less on-topic than all the philosophical and conceptual stuff we usually get so worked up about on this side of the forum. But not my forum, of course, and this is certainly a break with tradition at KFD.
You also make a good point in your response to Brad; I really sympathise with your position. I guess for me there is a difference between violence in response to violent provocation and violence in response to, say, being offended because you percieve someone as dissing you or your ethnic group. Buddhist cultures usually look pretty good in this regard, tending to have a more live and let live attitude where this is concerned than Abrahamic traditions, for sure. However, it's also rather naive to suppose that everything the U.S. military does in simply a response to being provoked. We certainly like to keep our hold on resources; we've funded death squads in Central America on behalf of United Fruit for heavens sake. Viva la cheap pineapples. ZSo the more I consider it, I guess the problem with justifying violence is... well, justifying violence.
I was listening to a dharma talk the other day in which the teacher mentioned the triune brain theory-- that we have a reptilian brainstem, mammallian limbic system, and human neo-cortex. He joked (grain of truth, I'm sure) that "scientists are discovering that we pretty much use the neo-cortex to come up with rationalizations for what the other two brains are doing". Point taken; humans are rationalizing animals more than rational ones! I suppose there may be some ethnocentrism in Brad's opinion, as if we're simply the good guys in geopolitics.

"I think you broke the board. "

Ha! I've been feeling so oddly paranoid lately that I actually thought that

"I think you broke the board."

Weighty karma.

"Viva la cheap pineapples."

Zinger. LOL. (And tears.)

""that we have a reptilian brainstem""

That wily old serpent!

"That wily old serpent!"

damn lizard likes pineapples and gets his monkey to go grab em. and the politicians say....

Personally I find Brad's writings pretty boring. I loved the "Hardcore Zen" when it was published but after a while he started to sound like a broken record.. It's so obvious that he is just trying to find provocative arguments that make some fundamentalists angry thus keeping himself in the spotlight of buddhist discussions. I guess that's ok strategy for an author trying to make money with writing.

About the military service - I did mine in 1994, 11 months. I do think it is necessary thing to have armies in the world, that's just how the politics are still working. I don't think it will change in the near future. However, killing people isn't right livelihood, it's just stupid to say that. Every person knows that in his guts, we are naturally against violence and killing other people. But that doesn't meant that killing wouldn't be necessary sometimes in some situations. That's also something that we can clearly see in our reality and nature.

Perhaps only "right livelihood" that I can think of, where killing would actually be acceptable, is that of an doctor performing euthanasia.

Conquest versus defense

This, as Mike points out is a very Political Question. It veers from practice based discussions, but not entirely separated from the world one would like to create one day.

Chogyam Trungpa mentioned that when he saw the Chineese armies pouring into Tibet along with all the committed atrocities, he thought "there must be some other ways of organizing society".

When talking about whether the law enforcement system (that includes the military - international law enforcement), one should probably focus on the best possible solutions and not the best of "what we have". If one asked about the best political organization in the 18th century, the question should not have been "What is the best kind of FEUDALISM can we have?" but, is there something else (parlimentary democracy?).

Slave trade working is another job that is described as unwholesome livelihood in the Pali Cannon. If one was going around the early 19th century Rural, we might have the same discussions about the people that need to make a living. I'm sure we would have known people that worked in the slave trade and there were probably decent people to some extent. It was a horrible system.

Anyway, this is more of a dissertation topic. So that was my two (non practice related) cents...

p.s. As an aside, there are already countries with no military:

- Costa Rica
- Liechtenstein
- Andorra
- Monaco
- Vatican City
- Haiti

Some may find the analysis in the links here relevant :

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zen_at_War