A 7 minute presentation on power dynamics, created by Eric Liu because "too many Americans are illiterate in power". Posted here because too many western buddhists are illeterate in power ;) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c_Eutci7ack 

Meant to cause controversy?

Power is fluid and constantly accumulating or dissipating - reenforces the idea of impermanence. I found myself saying yes here it is again as I watched the video. Good stuff.

Chris you misquoted, there is an emoticon at the end of the sentence. And you should have correctted my spelling

But seriously it is worth watching. I'm not sure it is controversial to say that too many western buddhists are illiterate in power. 

The expression "litterate in power" makes more sense after watching the video. I would translate illiterate as used by Eric Liu and copied by me to mean "not literate enough". I don't consider myself a western buddhist but I would put myself in a not litterate enough category too! 

"too many Americans are illiterate in power" -- Which illiterate person made up that phrase/sentence?

Is it supposed to mean illiterate "about power " ?
Or "too many in power are illiterate" ?
How is "illiterate" defined here? And "power" is also conveniently abstract.

Brains pulped by internet mass-media, few people remain who could even recognize litteracy -- most can't write beyond tweet/texting level, and wouldn't recognize a classic book if they tripped-over it.

The topic is actually somewhat appropriate here, in an ironic way.

I'll take the credit for that Chris. But it is probably Eric Yiu who wrote the original sentence.


No

No

Unaware of their own power and unaware of how to use that power.

It is situation dependent but the 7 minute video does offer a definition. You might call it "how to manipulate other people"


I guess you understand that pretty much each generation has that to say about the previous generation. I empathise with you.


I think so too.

Being "literate in power" rather than "literate about" power is a key point. You naturally objectified power as something to be understood. This alienates you from your own power. Being "literate in power" is about integrating and embodying that power. It is a creative use of the word illiterate or ironic, depending on how someone with power over you has classified the author.

From your other posts I know you have a great academic understanding of buddhism. I find the buddhist notion of self lacks a deep understanding of the social dimension. This seems a fair criticism given that sociology is a very young science. Maybe you see this differently ?

OK, sorta what I meant by "about power", as not being aware of, appreciative of. And the issue is, overall, well-taken. "Power to the people!", becoming "empowered" in this or that cause, etc. – one could get a bit jaded about how that all's been used and abused over the last half-century or so (at least in the USA).
Actually the topic brings to mind a couple memorable things learned from my erstwhile new-age Native American teacher "Sun-Bear" (part hippy-guru, part Chippewa-Cree):*

1) The whiteman's inexorable push to ever greater dependence on (inherently undependable) technology as a serious case of "giving away one's power". I.e. someday, judging from human history, push comes to shove, and Russia or China or India or Jihad or the USA or Israel or Iran, etc. stumble into serious warfare… who knows which but powder-kegs all over the political landscape – then the first casualty will undoubtedly be the entire internet, wifi, etc. It will simply disappear, poof, world-wide, and for more than a couple of days or weeks. Not only no DhO, or facebook, but no gas-pumps, no electronic (i.e. virtually all) cashregisters, no ATMs, no telecommunications, no power-grid, no transportation systems (planes, trains,…). And the auto manufactures are rushing headlong into making automobiles into wi-fi dependent "smart" phones. (So, according to Sun Bear, learn how to raise corn, squash, beans and chickens, learn smoke-signals or get some carrier-pigeons, solar panels, a bicycle, a non-electric meditation timer, etc.)

2) More interesting and relevant ("pragmatic") here, Sun Bear noted that one sure tactic to gain "power" over another person is to make them angry. Anger is the ultimate "giving your power away", i.e. losing it -- mindfulness, discernment, tranquillity – the whole nine yards.

As the Buddha aptly put it: "When one picks up a burning coal to throw at someone else, who gets burned first?"

This observation applies in these discussion forums also. Some one gets a little hot under the collar, others pile on, and the thread spirals off into the petty back-and-forth we all know and love, 'til all are exhausted, or a moderator pulls the plug. It can be guessed that some actually understand this (without naming names), and use it to further "discussion" sometimes.
I suspect that lack of understanding ("of the social dimension") goes along with the sort of spiritual-bypassing modernist Western buddhist romanticism. Another
interpretation might take into account Thanissaro Bhikku's fascinating interpretation of the Buddha's "three knowledges on the night of his awakening":

1) He traversed his own umptine "past-lives" or "rebirths", i.e. examined in depth the roots and conditioning of "his own story";

2) He observed in other's lives (and past lives / rebirths) the conditioning and kamma (intentional actions based on views) that shapes their "stories" – a history with no beginning, no end, generation after generation;

3) He generalized those observations into principles (the 12 links of co-dependent arising), and applied them in the moment-to-moment discerning how "suffering" isfabricated by conditioned mental processes, and tweeking-out how to train the mind otherwise.

This, I would venture, is the basis of a sort of meta-sociology. Lacking vision and knowledge on that basis, how does one hope to go out and change the world from not being "the world" (samsara) ?

* Perhaps both Eric Liu (pronounced, at least in Mandarin Chinese, "leeoh") and Sun Bear, each having one foot, so to speak, in a "foreign" culture, are able able to notice the issues around "power" better than many more unreflectively embedded in modern Western cultures.

Edited some spellings

On one hand I think Sun Bear has a point, but I'd be more worried about nuclear war than conventional or cyber war. It does not help to know how to grow corn in a nuclear winter. On the other hand the interdependence that modernity has created seems like a good thing, I'd like to see the world become even more interdependent. I mean interdependence between humans, which has been achieved through the division of labour. The division of labour has produced a lot of technology as a side effect.  Reducing humanity to an individualistic goal of surviving on corn seems to be missing something. The internet was actually comes out of research into creating a network resistant to nuclear attacks so it might be the last thing left   ;)


Considering an angry politician launching a disastrous war in a far away country I'm not at all sure Sun Bear or the Buddha are correct. The politician got re-elected...


I'm more familiar with those interpretations of Buddhism. But I've not seen early Buddhist texts demonstrating deep knowledge of sociology. In other areas like psychology it seems clear there are a great many insights. The social interpretations I've seen are very thin arguments sitting on a few phrases that allow for broad interpretations.



It is interesting that this seems to go against the notion of evolution. I guess Buddhists like Thanissaro Bhikku don't believe in evolution. Reminds me of the creationists.



My understanding of co-dependent arising is that it it limited to direct experience. It can be interpreted in myriad ways, I'm sure someone will claim it explains quantum mechanics... But the notion that a group of individuals interacting gives rise to dynamics that cannot be found in any of the individuals is something I don't see in Buddhism.



I think we all change the world in some way. Clearly it does not require meditation to have a significant impact, nor does it require sociology. I just don't think the concepts of sociology existed back then. The focus on direct experience and individual suffering reinforces my opinion.


You raise a good point, Liu is second generation immigrant I think. Sun Bear is at the other extreme. It would be interesting to see what both of them would conclude in regards to the power of Indian culture in the US.

Yes, I missed your emoticon. Sorry about that. I was aiming to be provocative, too.

I tend to agree that most westerners and, by extension, most western buddhists, do not grok the interpersonal or social dynamics of power. It's considered a "dirty" area of investigation. Western buddhists prefer to focus on the internal dynamics of being human, not the social aspects. I also suspect, but cannot prove, that much of what we here in modernity face in regard to social dynamics has far, far greater impact (power) over our lives than the social dynamics that existed at the time of the historical Buddha.

I feel somewhat lucky because it was the investigation into anatman that switched me on to an idea that the self might be more than my experience. It seems so obvious now but dependent origination which leads to realizations about anatman can also induce a fixation on experience.

I've not thought about the difference in impact of social dynamics over history. I think I agree with you. The main cause I see is the emergence of sociology which allowed more direct manipulation of some of these dynamics because they could be named and measured. Then later the emergence of psychology in regards to understanding unconscious influence on human behavior. That led to advertising and marketing which has enabled the consumer society we live in.

I feel confident that if the Buddha were alive today she would spend a lot more time talking about the self in terms of social processes. It is erroneous to consider the self to only consist of internal dynamics.

I might have a good example of this. Consider the liver, most people would consider their liver to be a part of them, they would identify with it as being "me". But we have no direct experience of the process the liver is realizing. Likewise there are social processes that we are embedded in and are as much a part of us as the liver. We are better off knowing how to avoid poisoning the liver and likewise for the social processes, but this requires study instead of meditation.

Think of the impact that social media has on each of us. Think of the impact that electronic media of all sorts has on us. There is no isolated self. Such an existence would be impossible unless a person were to live on an uninhabited island without power. We live in a literal churning sea of social influences.

One thing about this that is concerning me is the nature of the social mediums we use, and the unacknowledged power our choices of which "channels" to observe has on us. We are, given the nature of modern media, able to literally create our own social reality by choosing to pay attention only to the version we like, and disregard the rest as delusions. We can elect to live in a "place" governed by only those voices we decide to listen to, and believe. There is less and less shared reality, more and more channeled reality. This, I believe, explains a lot about what I see happening in the U.S. of late.

There is little I see in western buddhism that urges us to observe this and question it.

Sad!

Those are forms of marketing/advertising ;)


Statements like "impact that social media has on each of us" implies a self that is not part of the social media. It is not that social media is impacting the self, the distinction is arbitrary.
It is not that there is a self being influenced. That would imply something that is independent. 

I think a view of the self integrating these processes is far more realistic. The power of these systems is in large part how they alienate us from who we are. That process of alienation is reinforced by the view of "something" outside of me "influencing me". 
I think the realization of anatman is a window into this. The problem as I see it is that Buddhism as a religion does not take the radical stance that anatman implies. Western buddhism largely ignores it. The dharma seems to clearly be an immanent philosophy. It seems to often get recast as a transcendent philosophy e.g. emptiness, consciousness, original face, ultimate reality, human nature, buddha nature  etc. These are all just standins for atman in my opinion.

The implications of anatman are significant I think. Today's social systems function by alienating individuals - even alienating them from themselves. Anatman speaks to this alienation.

There are otherways to get there too I think. "it is not the consciousness of men that determines their existence but their social existence that determines their consciousness" Marx.

This, too, would imply a separate self   

It's not easy to speak in terms that do not imply a separate self since that's how our language is constructed. I'm remembering now why it was sometimes onerous to converse with you.

Bye bye now.

Yes that is right. There is a self that is separate from some things. I am not everything. The question is where you imagine the boundary. What I am implying above is that social processes cause individuals to fall into an erroneous (and more limited) understanding of the self.


It is hard to write about. But I don't think we are running into language issues. I think we have a different understanding. You chose to draw a boundary between "you" and the social processes that "influence" you. I'm drawing a boundary around self that includes those social processes. It can appear like langauge games but I think it reflects a different way of being.

Yeah we have run into this in the past. You are like the ultimate test as to whether I can communicate what I see

For me anatman implies there is no permanent self and experience cannot be grounded. This still allows for a self that is impermanent, changing and potentially suffering.

The understanding of what alienation means seems key. It is something that Marx makes clear I think. There is plenty to disagree on with Marx but alienation is something I think he gets close to right.

You may underestimate the power of language and what it reflects. Alienation is reinforced by the expressions you employed above. It is not the end of the world but worth considering.

I've got a fourth knowledge - you can be the son of the local chief and still get enlightened. Modern political systems are optional.

Did psychology create modern marketing ? There was advertising before Freud and Bernays, there was propaganda before Goebells. Did anyone actually assess whether Bernays' Freudian marketing really yields better sales than Victorian marketing ? Maybe bernays' biggest suckers have been the members of the board.

The video is educational as far as it goes. A real understanding of power, in my view, must account for how and why certain people lie and cheat in order to gain it and maintain it. It must explain why those in power are so often those least deserving of it. How do wolves succeed, and how do sheep continue to enable them? Essential reading: https://www.amazon.com/Political-Ponerology-Science-Adjusted-Purposes-ebook/dp/B009EGBZ64

I quote from Sabazius, by Douglas Lockheart. Sabazius is a fictional, Gurdjieffesque Western occult master.

"It was Sabazius who instigated a part time job in a cardboard box factory. I was to work three days a week, for which I would be paid a small wage.
"Ah!", said Sabazius, "your pride is hurt!"
"I'm a linguist, " I told him. "I've travelled the world first-class. What do you expect?"
"I expect you to make boxes, " was his reply.
Sabazius, I shoud point out, had talked me into doing this kind of work with a very plausible peice of cosmological reasoning. He said that to make and assemble boxes, or anything similar, was like taking a holiday from ego consciousness. Unlike demanding and intricate occupations, where the indivisual was called upon to exert personality projection, or high technical concentration, to assemble boxes produced in you a state of mind equal to, and sometimes greater than, deliberate meditation. Everything in you was working. The intellectual sense was being held in check by an automatic modicum of concentration; the body in all it's aspects was being held in check by a repetition of fluid physical movement; and above all, self, now open to scrutiny by the Central Personality, would slowly manifest, the intensity of it's presence growing as the meditation or awareness cycle lengthened through practice......
When I walked out of the Turks's factory that evening, I was depressed but enlightened. My attempts to Identify self had mostly been abortive.
Continually, on following the instructions Sabazius had given, I found myself retunring from some kind of mental reverie.... I was, to say the least, a monumental flop. But I knew it!
At the end of three days, through, concentrated effort and stubborn alliance with my conscious Central personality, I managed to intensify knowledge of self and, at the same time, look at the boxes I handled. For something like eight minutes, a scattered eight minutes diffused through a twenty-four hour internal battle, I glimpsed self."

... and it goes on. Long story short story, worker alienation becomes access concentration and absorption.

Do you think Marx found somehting similar in his very long and concentrated study and writing endeavours ? I've noticed that when you study into the night it gets like a meditation as you fight your body falling to sleep. Jhana via study. Which jhana did Marx get to , do you think ?

I'm no expert in the field but as I understand it marketing changed radically when the industrial production capacity started outstripping demand. Marketing was developed to create needs. For example if someone has a manual washing machine then there is a lot to be gained by using an automated washing machine. It requires modern marketing to convince you that the washing machine needs to be replaced because it is white and would look better in brushed aluminum.

Marx was concerned about workers needing to do these sorts of jobs for a subsistence living. Child labor was also a concern. A lifetime doing that work is different from a 3 day retreat.

Could you tell us more about the difference between "study" and "meditation"?

IanAnd once explained a simple concept of knowledge:

1st person  - you experience phenomena e.g. knowledge of dependent origination
2nd person - someone is telling you about their experiences e.g. me explaining my experience of dependent origination
3rd person - someone is telling you about someone else'e experiences e.g. a dharma talk about dependent origination in the texts

In a dharma talk I heard this categorization of knowledge:

Experience e.g. noting the pleasure of smoking
Information e.g. facts like smoking can cause cancer
Reason e.g. deciding to stop smoking based on information

Meditation is typically 1st person experience

By study I mean applying reason (critical analysis) to information provided by 2nd person and 3rd person reports.

For example in regards to social processes we can study sociology.

We can't experience social processes so meditation is not a good approach to gaining knowledge about them. Basically social processes have emergent properties that are not part of the individuals involved in the social process. This is why sociology is not a sub-branch of psychology. 
 

My last job did actually involve making cardboard boxes on a line. People who work jobs like that for years tend to look kind of mentally shut down. Or maybe they started like that
I did notice, however, working on production lines, exactly what the fictional account said - moments of waking from reverie, time distortion due to extreme boredom.
It's an under-explored field.

Mark
...Meditation is typically 1st person experience

By study I mean applying reason (critical analysis) to information provided by 2nd person and 3rd person reports.
...

Thanks for the explanation.

I was curious as "meditation" is a commonly used though problematic approximation of the Pali bhavana, which could be called "practice development", and includes all samadhi and vipassana functions, so could be taken to also include "study" in the sense of 1st person evaluation of 1st person phenomena. But understanding that Theravada Dhammais not generally that well-understood.

John:
I did notice, however, working on production lines, exactly what the fictional account said - moments of waking from reverie, time distortion due to extreme boredom.
It's an under-explored field.

A once famous book by Hanna Arendt –"The Human Condition" (1958) – treated related issues: traditional craft-work, which she termed humanizing "work", vs. industrialized endeavor, which she called dehumanizing "labor".
cf: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Human_Condition_(book)

This also might relate to what Mark has said here about "sociology"?

Why is "liferay" acting up again? -- doesn't hold quoted formating on preview/pubish, nor do URL correctly. Sigh.

Yeah part of the move from peasant/hand-made economy to a wage labour one during the enclosures and industrial revolution.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Craftivism