Hello fellow thinkers,

I found Christianity/New Age to be finally fading away under the influence of rational thought and scientific evidence, but there is one little thorn of insanity stuck in the world that is often mistaken to be our ally, often being equated to atheism and ration, namely -- Buddhism.

In this essay I would like to attack this notion and reveal Buddhism for what it really is -- Culturally constructed religion of beliefs and not "truth" based on ration or evidence.

Buddhism appeals to many Americans as it promises what most lack - Happiness and contempt. In our society it is just another business of the "happiness industry" abused so much by marketing schemes. We have a number of depressed and unsatisfied individuals and the promise of happiness is hard to resist in the face of all the smiling faces you see on the pictures of gurus and especially the compassionate look of Dali Lama that seem to be empirical evidence that Buddhism does in fact work. The pictures seem to talk for themselves but as I will go into it later in my essay, looks can be deceiving.

We are bombarded with adds saying "you are not happy because you lack X product and by getting it you will be accepted by society and be happy". While Buddhism seems to attack this idea directly and promote simplicity of living and Letting Go to whatever condition, it nevertheless uses the same psychological scheme to trick people in. (perhaps without realizing it.) Buddhism will make you happy they say; the magical cure is to practice the 8fold path and meditate daily (and of course number of other things).

Now before I make my next claim I would like to talk about a simple fact of human cognition, namely the idea that we often “appeal to nobler motives� instead of the truth for why certain thing happened or our real motives behind our actions or how we feel. The best way to understand it is through examples, for instance instead of admitting to failing the class because we were lazy or lacked the intelligence we often appeal to another reason like saying that the teacher was unfair or the class was stupid or anything of that nature – we blame it on someone else or make a complete bullshit excuse to diminish the blow to our ego, because had we accepted the truth, the blow would be much more drastic. Or for example people who do not have sex very often would rather say that they just don’t care about it rather then saying that they can’t get it. Or people who do not understand a certain philosopher would rather say that he is completely illogical rather then admitting the fact that they simply do not understand and the real reason might be their lack of knowledge or intelligence.

Now assuming you got the jest of, it I will make a highly controversial claim and I will say it bluntly – Buddhism is “appeal to nobler motives� in case depression, unsatisfaction, body image problems or practically any other psychological disorder that would make one want to believe the first noble truth – Life IS Suffering and the idea that one need to realize that his own ego doesn’t really exist and that one needs to reach enlightenment which is ceasing to be completely and escaping the wheel of rebirth. As Nietzsche often said that we cannot separate philosophy from those who follow it, there are always reasons for why they follow this one and not the other. Think about it, if you have body image problem, you would love to believe the whole ego thing where people claim it can be gotten rid of and would cure their suffering. The promise lures them in and instead of admitting their pathology they start saying that anyone who has healthy egos are suffering and ignorant to Buddhist truth(complete delusion) and somehow label them as “bad� and him/her self as “good�, which is exactly why Nietzsche would call Slave Morality or I just call Jealousy inspired morality. In a case of depression one would love to believe that it is not pathology but “a realization of the first noble truth!�; the contrast being something like being considered blessed as opposed to sick.

Buddhism can also be thought of Nihilism in disguise of Spirituality or simply what Nietzsche criticized so much as “the other worldly philosophy�, meaning a philosophy that creates aversion to this world, this self, the way things are and instead putting all the focus on a goal outside of it. Of course you can claim it is not so but I think beyond the superficial beliefs Buddhism is exactly that – an escapism in disguise as evident in almost all the “teachings� given by its masters.

Now to go back to the Happy Faces on the pictures I offer the following examples. Look at the faces of some deluded Christians when they pray or are “possessed by holy spirit�. They are deluded as delusion can be and yet they are smiling. Now the reason why they smile is simply – they are told to smile. They act as if they are happy like all those fake smiles you see in America that is considered to be part of our culture. They are conditioned to present themselves as happy and they lie that they are happy but inside they have the hardest conflicts and turmoil that anyone imagine. In a case of Christians it is turmoils of guild, doubt and resisting sinful thoughts, in a case of Buddhists it is turmoil of trying to reach and impossible ideal of loss of ego, enlightenment and karma and the similar “deluded� states of mind such as anger. Now it is possible that some Buddhists are happy but the happiness is from successful escapism that they have in monastery isolated from any problems a person integrated in society might have like job, children and so on. Of course if you sit for days at a time doing nothing but breathing, you have not much to worry about but what kind of pussy existence is that? But of course they will not admit that they escaped the world, they will say they did it out of some kind of spiritual awakening which I will argue is simply depression.

Now why I said that Buddhism is not ally of reason is because it holds a number of beliefs claimed to be truth but are in fact having zero evidence. Of course they never say that it is complete bullshit – they will just say that you have to find out for yourself by meditating and or brainwashing yourself to their philosophy every day. They will say things like Buddha was enlightened and he knew the truth so basically the only evidence you have is someone word for it. Of course there are a number of people that I don’t argue probably came to feeling the same was as Buddha and claimed to be enlightened but I think it is just a delusion or error in brain cognition after years of conditioning. In fact Buddhism is very anti reason, especially in Zen as evident in their teachings like “it is the mind before the question.�

Having said all that I will confess that I myself is a former Buddhist with a few years of extensive experience including meditation practice and meeting very known people following the philosophy. Buddhism has to offer a lot of interesting ideas and wisdom but nothing worth going through piles and piles of bullshit, cultural baggage or something you will not get from a few western existentialist philosophers like Nietzsche or Sarte. In fact I learned MUCH more from them and my quality of life was improved greatly which I cannot say Buddhism did that much.

Basically let me save you some time. Meditating will not get you anything but mild relaxation and detachment from the world, which can be achieved much more efficiently by smoking pot or taking a hot bath. Buddhism is not the noble truth discovered by some lunatic but rather it is just another philosophy based on escapism and people unable to deal with life. Buddhism is not your road to happiness or self realization or even inner change. Masters will teach you how to tame “negative� emotions but they themselves suffer from them as much as you; ask them yourself they will tell you. The ideals Buddhism builds is against our biological nature and is impossible.

I hope this essay will save some years of bullshit, suffering and in the end realizing as many do today that Buddhism is just another Fad in our society.

I agree with most of what you said, and when I first started reading about buddhism I had a lot of the same problems with it that you've expressed.

Where I disagree, is as you already know, with your blanket value placed on meditation being useless. When all you do is meditate and learn scripture, that is useless. Its too inactive, and you are likely to suffer from things as you described such as depression, flatness etc; I did also. But when it is combined with more active components it adds to them. Meditation is merely a tool to be used to gain something from it, if you are using it to 'lose all attachments', 'experience no thoughts' etc you will end up 'losing all attachments' and 'experiencing no thoughts' and that isn't what people think it is. That's like being dead. You use it focus your thoughts, connect your mind and body, achieve a state of rest and healing in your body and to remove the filters that are inhibiting self knowledge.

I presume that both of you have heard of the work of the great inventor, Nicola Tesla. Do a google on his name and find out what a great mind he was.

NTesla--a devoutly spiritual Christian--recommended that Christianithy and Buddhism be combined. I agree with him. What do you think?

I think that they should be completely stripped to leave behind any useful insights that they might have, and the delusions/widely accepted inaccuracies, left behind. Combining them will only make people more confused without refining them.

I think people should pull the stick out of their a** on both ends of the debate, and realize that religion has a purpose in the same sense as mythology--we are metaphoric thinkers...

I have no problem with religion being taken as mythology. I wish people would.

Freudian slip here I think hehe, I take it you meant contentment.

How many celebrities have official photos taken of them with huge smiling faces, yet when they're caught in there normal disposition they're often moody and/or angry at being photo'd. Maybe the Dali Lama should be stalked by paparazzi to reveal his true nature! lol.

I wonder if an enlightened master still feels the biological fury of emotions when he is bullied/attacked/called names. The premise and texts would make you assume not, but I'm sure the words and actions are translated and related to the subconscious before the conscious mind can act to 'block' them. What I'm saying is that although they keep smiling vacantly whilst abuse is hurled, they must have human emotions bubbling around inside of them. Anger that is not acted upon is still anger, I doubt any human can rise above the roots of emotion.

One thing I can relate to is the idea of a void, of nothing. It makes a lot more sense now we have settled on the Big Bang theory, something from nothing is illogical, but if only the void exists then this almost-counteracts how illogical it sounds. It is possibly a little silly and deluded on my behalf, but I can take the imagery and apply it to my personal reality.


If the emotion of happiness is strong and stable, then that is the 'holy spirit'. If passion burns for a good cause, then that is 'gods will'. Its just terminology, whether you want to convey it as human emotions and spirit or put a religious slant on it. I'm not 100% sure they are deluded, maybe people who think they are deluded are themselves deluded - if you know what i mean.

I can somewhat agree here, but there is evidence that the brain activity and function actually alters with meditation by'enlightened' masters, both temporarily and permanently. So something is happening, they're not just relaxing. Unfortunately what exactly is happening subjective and beyond our means to test.

But the mind forms the question? Maybe I'm taking this out the context you were thinking when you wrote it.

I just wish some 'enlightened' individual could come along and strip away the bullshit and leave the relevant teachings. If this is an impossible task, then its all bullshit, if not then there is valuable information in there somewhere.

What would that person have to be to meet the standard? Do you know enough about what enlightenment is to recognize an enlightened person, and would you really accept what was offered?

Jesus once told his disciples that he came with a sword to cut away the crap rather than to come and lift everyones spirits and save the world for them. The ones who talked about God, religion and enlightenment the most and spoke of what it was were the ones who nailed him to a cross.

Unfortunately no one can strip away the bullshit from anyone when they won't let go of it and they refuse to believe in anything else.

I would agree with most of what has been written about Buddhism being just as irrational as other religions, however as with a few others I disagree with what you have written on meditation.

I have been meditating for several years now, on a semi-regular basis. Sometimes I will go a month or so without meditating at all, or sometimes I will meditate several times a day for several months. I have noticed, that when I take the time to meditate my life improves in a number of ways. For instance, clarity of thought is greatly increased. Perhaps it is just me, but meditation appears to genuinely help me quiet the incessant commentary that goes on in my mind. Meditation also has increased my attention span considerably. In addition being able to let go of irrational emotions (not that all emotions are irrational, but they can be sometimes) is a great thing. Being able to assess whether your anger, sadness, or anxiety is rational or justified is a great benefit.

In addition to my subjective statements, there is some scientific evidence that meditation is beneficial: I cannot post links due to my low posts, but check out sciencedaily and do a search on meditation. It will bring up quite a few summary articles of scientific studies on meditation and its benefits for concentration.

However, I do agree with the bulk of what you have written, Buddhism is just as wacky as other religions, but meditation is genuinely useful.

In addition, smoking pot does allow you to reach similar insights as meditation but only when used properly. I enjoy cannabis about 4 times a week, and it is great when used for relaxation, or as a tool for insight, but I am sad to say that I have several close friends who use cannabis inappropriately to escape life.

Buddhism is just as wacky as other religions yet you practice meditation which is the cornerstone of Buddhism. That is just blatant blasphemy. Learn to swim.


Beliefs are dangerous. Beliefs allow the mind to stop functioning. A non-functioning mind is clinically dead. Believe in nothing.

That would be a belief

While I disagree, I like that you support you argument well. The arguement that Buddhism is a form of escapism is something I've thought about alot. But it doesn't just appeal to those who are weak, depressed, down etc. It appeals to the successful as well.

Perhaps I work out constantly, am in great shape, look good. Now as I age, my body will inevitably decline. This alone is a form of suffering. Does this somehow mean I am less now? One woman I know would say yes. She fights to remain young because shes connected to the idea. I know you understand this, but I'm reiterating that the definition of suffering according to Buddhism (specifically speaking of non-derived, exclude "nam myo renge kyo"-isms) is that which is dualistic. Having means suffering because it will be inevitably lost, and not having means suffering because it is wanted.

I think a great point was brought up by Libido about anger. Physiological responses do NOT occur, because the persons frame of reference has shifted. Even condescension can bring this about, so I don't think it to be a stretch to say meditation can too. I would probably get pretty angry if someone tried to spit on me. Now, if that person were a young child, I wouldn't be angry, but rather understanding of their ignorance. If I think of the majority of people as mental children, then can't I generalize this "understanding" to include some poor drunk bastard who's trying to spit on me because he doesn't have any other tools to deal with life?

My point is that while Buddhisms "truths" are just as questionable as Christianity, their is intentional ambiguity that demands people think and question. Let me take a guess here:

You have always been interested in philosophy etc., but until you went through the much more palatable "Buddhist" experience, never really studied it much.

Even if I'm wrong in this particular case, I have seen this many times. People get into Buddhism, start to think and question, and then leave behind the dogmatics. So perhaps one can think of it as a stepping stone towards critical thinking? All I know is that I'm semi-Buddhist, and can agree that you've outgrown it. How many Christians would profess that? Wouldn't a Christian feel it their "duty" to show you the error of their ways?

Suffering is of the forms of attachment. If you are addicted to your ego (thoughts, beliefs, ideas of victimization, fears, delusions, judgments, prejudices and superstitions of ignorance) and your need is wrapped up in how you perceive yourself, and maybe how you think others perceive you in surface appearances, you are already suffering in the anxieties and stress created pressures of maintaining the image and expectations.
Aging in itself is not suffering if you are not attached to your appearance or your mortal body.
When the ego identifies itself as a particular faith follower because of certain properties or ideals within the definitions of the faith this doesn't mean the person is of that faith. People invariably are going to call themselves something or nothing because of some personal preference.
When Buddha/Siddh�rtha/Gautama/Ś�kyamuni spoke of his knowledge of inner being he didn't call it Buddhism or that he learned it from a Buddhist but he spoke in the language of those who understood him in reference to enlightenment. In speaking of enlightenment he was considered a sammasambuddha or fully enlightened Buddha (One with God) and some say there are 9 types of Buddha or 29 names for a Buddha. Similarly Jesus never called himself a Christian as in a follower of Jesus the Christ, but he did speak of being Christ-ed or one with God, enlightened, "The Son of God".
Neither spoke of a God of wrath or of a single entity separate from all that lives making decisions for our welfare or destiny. They both spoke of moving the senses inward in contemplation/meditation to awaken the subtle senses of inner being and experiencing the One absolute transcendental, Ascended God, that is the foundation of every thought feeling and experience or reflection of that.
God, Christian, Buddha...are words used to give direction to suffering minds who believe they have no connection to anything and are victims to creation.

Symbolically the Buddha spoke of the way, and Jesus by example of miracles (as the ignorant saw them) was the way. Always the intellect precedes the experience. You don't recognize what is real in an experience if you haven't paved the way through the intellect. You can have an experience and not fully understand it but you can learn more and have the same experience and the experience is not the same as the first because there is now a connection of both heart and mind rather than a jumble of senses, associative ideas based on an accumulation of dissociative memories and projections or the attempts at fitting an unknown through the known holes. With understanding fear is removed. If the first reaction is fear then clear thinking is rarely engaged until fear is removed, and if knowledge is not present fear and doubt live as superstition and ignorance until the mind buries what it doesn't know or comes to some satisfaction in fitting the new experience in an old hole or actually comes to greater understanding and experience.

Buddha spoke of the middle way or clear discernment in separating past impressions with clear understanding based on intuitive properties that recognize the difference between belief and knowing or illusion and reality. Jesus spoke of the same when he said I do nothing of myself but of my Father, when speaking of uniting the senses and heart with the universal mind or God consciousness that is consciousness that is ascended beyond beliefs, and illusions of fear that are the ego. The immortal consciousness that exists both before and after the body, before birth and after death.
Buddha represented the intellect that precedes experience and Jesus by example lived the experience.
Both were Christ-ed (enlightened or sons of God) or Buddha's, both had their missions and they were meant to be combined in the teachings of human enlightenment rather than separated into dogma and religion.

The thing is, ignorance in a human is like the condition of an unripened fruit, there are certain foundational requirements in experiences of contrast that have to be achieved in the human as are their certain requirements in growth that take place in fruit.
Tho there are many branches with many fruit the fruit often experience themselves as separate from each other and not of the same tree or even the same root. In ignorance we see our branches in certain stages of development and vision as being different than the other branches. We may fear the intrusion of beliefs and ideas that exist on another branch even going to war to protect our branch. We try to water the branch rather than realizing the root system and watering the root of all life on all branches.
The fully enlightened take their awareness to the root and by giving it attention connect themselves through the sap to all branches and to all of the fruit. The more fruit that give attention to the root the more the branches and the fruit benefit.
A fully ripened fruit gives birth to its own tree and becomes as a God giving life to its own branches and its own fruit.
Ps 82:6 I have said, Ye are gods; and all of you are children of the most High.

But until then we separate ourselves into individuals through the ego, fearing the other fruit and their beliefs.
Deut 6:14 Ye shall not go after other gods, of the gods of the people which are round about you..

Suffering is of the ignorance of Ones True Self and of ones true nature.
Heaven is inner peace and awareness of Truth or Self realization, and Hell is life in ignorance or suffering in fear and superstition.

That is in essence a comparison and compilation (a Readers Digest version) of all True Teachings and Religions.

Life is not suffering. Suffering is the inability to realize and live life.