Activists jumped on stage during Dalai Lama’s talk
Dear friends around the world,
As we all know, His Holiness the Dalai Lama is a strong advocate of world peace and compassion. In all his teachings, he always stresses about respecting one another and to have compassion towards all sentient beings, this is also what made him one of the Nobel Peace Prize winners in 1989. I find it interesting that someone has jumped on stage demanding him to be more compassionate towards animals. This would surprise the crowd. Tibetans would dare not do this but in other countries, I guess they express their thoughts freely. I didn’t realize that save animal activists are asking His Holiness to speak out on animal cruelty and killing and to stop meat consumption. I hope His Holiness will support them more actively. Judging from the comments on the article I am posting here for your awareness, people are not happy with his choice of food and ‘lack of support’.
I have always respected His Holiness and I still do now. This article is shared for educational purposes, I hope His Holiness live long and continue to turn the wheel of dharma to all sentient beings.
Tsem Rinpoche
Animal activists dragged off stage during Dalai Lama lecture at CU Boulder
By Tiffany Ditto | Updated: June 24, 2016 at 2:05 pm | Published: June 23, 2016
Animal activists were dragged off stage Thursday as they interrupted the Dalai Lama’s lecture at the University of Colorado-Boulder.
The activists had climbed onto the back of the stage with a banner that said “meat is violence not compassion.” Direct Action Everywhere, a Berkeley, California-based activist group that is working to challenge speciesism throughout society, took responsibility for the protest, saying the Dalai Lama supports the consumption of animals.
BOULDER, CO – June 23: His Holiness the Dalai Lama duplicates sign language from an audience member expressing “I love you” during the Compassion in Action event at the Coors Events Center June 23, 2016. (Photo by Andy Cross/The Denver Post)
The group said the protest was “a vigil mourning the Dalai Lama’s lack of compassion for animals.”
Related:
Protesters gather outside circus show in Colorado Springs
Boulder police said officers and U.S. State Department officials dragged the activists off the stage as the Dalai Lama continued his lecture unfazed.
The protest follows an ABC “Nightline” story that aired Wednesday investigating dog farms that provide meat for the Yulin Dog Meat Festival in China – where the Dalai Lama is from. The activists said that conditions showed in footage of the dog farms is akin to what is found in U.S. farms where animals are bred for consumption.
“It is a standard business practice for every farm to kill animals for food, which is not justifiable,” activist Aidan Cook, who was removed from the stage, said in a statement. “The Dalai Lama should be supporting compassion for all beings, regardless of whether they are dogs, cows, pigs, chickens, or fish, by not only ending his own consumption of animals but by spreading a message to end the violence that is happening to animals every single day.”
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Source: http://coloradosprings.com/animal-activists-dragged-off-stage-during-dalai-lama-lecture-at-cu-boulder/article/1578886
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His Holiness the Dalai Lama is the emanation of Buddha Chenrezig, but very few came to know that he is not a vegetarian. It seem the Dalai Lama would only be vegetarian every other day . During one of his interview he did mention so. For many, it comes as a shock to learn that the Dalai Lama eats meat for medical reasons. He was advised by his doctors to resume consumption of meat to aid his recovery, We should respect him that is his choice.
During one of Dalai Lama’s lecture a activists had jumped on stage with a banner to challenge Dalai Lama of consuming meat and was arrested. As most of the people are aware of his compassion and harmony but many do not agree with him been not a vegetarian.
Thank you Rinpoche for this sharing.
I do think there is a stark difference between realized masters, buddhas and high level bodhisattvas partaking in meat compared to ordinary mundane beings partaking in meat.
The Buddha Shakyamuni did not have much of a choice, he took whatever people offered to him even if it was a boiled frog. I mention boiled frog as the monks of Northern Thailand those who go for alms sometimes found boiled frogs as part what they receive in their alms, the monks are practicing on attachment. I think when an enlightened master eats meat, they can bring benefit to the being who flesh is being partaken. On the other hand when mundane being eat flesh, they create causes that in the future their flesh can be consumed by others too.
I don’t think activist are wrong to make themselves heard, if they have so much compassion then it is heart wrenching to see more and more animals being gutted, slashed, boiled and killed on a continual basis.
Thank you Wai Meng for your message. I agree with you on this in that it is the motivation towards eating meat that makes the difference. When we mundane beings eat meat, we eat it for self-pleasure, because it tastes good, which reinforces our negative karma. For enlightened beings, it’s totally for the animal’s benefit and creates merit for both due to their supreme bodhichitta motivation. 😊
Thank you for sharing. Have you been to Kechara Forest Retreat?
Thank you. No I haven’t actually. I’m living overseas at the moment so would love to visit KFR when I travel one day!
I personally think what these people have stated is very true because as a person who always support peace and compassion, should not be eating meat or consuming dairy products at all unless if it is regarding his health. Either way, the Dalai Lama should speak up and tell us the reason why his holiness is still not a vegetarian despite giving all these speeches.
Although it is good that these are raising this issue but the way they did was very disrespectful in my opinion because we should never interrupt a person no matter who he/she is as a form of respect and by the way, he is the Dalai Lama. I am not stopping anyone from raising this issue but there is always a better place and time to do it.
I totally with what James LaFemina lll has written in the first picture. As long as we consume meat, we do not have the rights to state that we love all animals. Of course, you would love your pets but you only love your pet or the particular species of animal. That still does not make us an animal lover. Cause if we really do love them all, we would have stop eating them long ago because we know what kind of treatment and pain they received, and they either end up on our plates or become our the accessories we “own”. Loving them means not to support eating or wearing them, but to treat them with loving compassion.
Dear Rinpoche,
Thank you for sharing this article. His Holiness the Dalai Lama is the emanation of Buddha Chenrezig, i have no doubt this and i fully respect him. However, there are several actions of his that really baffles me.
The Dorje Shugden ban is one of them. This ban is totally uncalled for since Dorje Shugden had been practiced by many high lamas and sanghas for 400 years. There was no problem as everyone is at peace and the high lamas still reincarnated back to dharma. Then, suddnely out of the blue the Dalai Lama said Dorje Shugden is a demon and we should treat the practitioners badly. His Holiness the Dalai Lama always stressed respect among religion and even ask us to talk nicely to the terror group ISIS. Why he wont respect the Dorje Shugden practitioners and not to mention we are buddhist as well?
As Rinpoche said, the mind of highly attained beings do not degenerate. The Dalai Lama had been a highly attained incarnation line hence there must be a reason for all his controversial actions recently. Perhaps there is a bigger picture behind? we wouldn’t know because we are not up there yet.
Humbly,
Chris Chong
His Holiness the Dalai Lama is certainly in a dilemma. For all his teachings on compassion and love, being a holder of the Nobel Peace Prize, he had been very contradictory.
1. Eating meat as claimed by the activist from Direct Action Everywhere.
2. Advising the world to listen to ISIS and respecting them.
3. Advising the EU against permanent intake of the refugees from Syria and other war-torn countries.
4. Giving the sexist remark of him reincarnating as a “really attractive” female 15th Dalai Lama.
5. Illogically banning the practise of enlightened Protector Dorje Shugden which CTA and his followers had taken zealous harmful actions towards the practitioners (his own people) who would not give up this precious practise given by their Guru, thus causing so much damage and sufferings.
With due respect to His Holiness, maybe he need to be consistent in his actions to match his teachings.
As much as I love and respect His Holiness the Dalai Lama, I think some of His actions these days are really questionable. I believe His Holiness needs a whole new strategist and PR agent to please stop creating more bad rap news for His Holiness for it certainly is not doing Him any justice these days.
I see and hear the comments made by vegan activist and people and they have every right to question and speak up because as Buddhist it is our core practice to show compassion. And if we cannot do so from the simple meals we take daily then our message of love and compassion becomes pretty hypocritical, no matter what the justification may be. I think people are well educated enough these days and they will not simply by into another excuse just because that person is someone “popular” and “holy”. If anything it just brings down the entire spiritual sanctity we are involved. So I hope His Holiness would at least be more active in this area in showing compassion towards animals, perhaps get involve in saving animals, like the ones in this recent Yulin Festival? I am sure Marc Ching would appreciate a message from His Holiness, perhaps a tweet or two? https://www.tsemrinpoche.com/tsem-tulku-rinpoche/animals-vegetarianism/marc-ching-shows-us-the-way.html
This is a delicate matter to comment on.
On the one hand, I do not agree that anyone should bully another into submission of the former’s views, whatever it may be. On the other hand no life should be harmed just so that we can satisfy our appetite. When I learned how badly livestock and animals bred for their flesh are treated and then slaughtered, I felt that it would be very difficult for me to practice Dharma and daily create the reasons for more animals to be killed.
As for the Dalai Lama, it seems His Holiness keeps running into one controversy after another. The Dalai Lama’s comment re the world needing to listen to and respect ISIS caused a stir. As did His Holiness’s comment about women. And then, there is the Dorje Shugden ban. And now the Dalai Lama finds himself in the focus of animal activists.
I do find it strange that for all the CTA’s claims that Shugden worshippers pose a threat to the Dalai Lama, the security covering His Holiness’s events seems to be quite casual. May be there is no real threat after all.
In one of his books, H.H. explains that he is taking meat because he had jaundice and was advised by his doctors to include meat in his diet. He had indeed wanted to be a vegetarian.
It is a pretty well-known fact that HH Dalai Lama is neither a vegan nor a full-time vegetarian, because of advice given by his doctor.
Nevertheless he has in the past advocated being vegetarian.
What I’ll be curious to see is a response from HHDL on this matter of the Yulin dog eating festival. It has been many days but I’ve seen nothing of this sort in the news.
Well, what are you waiting for Your Holiness and thank you to the activist for forcing the issue.
After reading this article, it really dawn on me that HH Dalai Lama really did seldom talk about the animal welfare. I wonder why.
I learn from my Guru, Tsem Rinpoche, to respect HH Dalai Lama, and He treats HH Dalai Lama as the Buddha of compassion. So do I. Since He is highly accomplished, He is not bound by the expectation of the public. However, people like us who are not accomplished (at all), we better stick to the “no killing” vows.
I do agree with (only) some of the comments from the public, i.e. HH Dalai Lama should be more vocal about the animal welfare. There are millions of animals being killed everyday. There are so many negative karma created everyday just from the killing of another sentient being alone. Since HH Dalai Lama has such great influence, I feel He can put more effort in advocating animal welfare. I think that is these activists are trying to get at.
I pray for the long life of HH Dalai Lama, and pray that all animals do not need to suffer or be slaughtered just for the food for human consumption.
I do not support eating meat. But I do have gurus who are highly accomplished, who eat meat. One of them, my primary guru, makes it a point to eat ribs for supper. Their attendants and students, probably not so accomplished, also eat meat. Some turned to vegetarianism because their sponsors prefer it to be so. Let us keep our eyes only on our own mind.
I had a shock of my life when I read this news because it implies that the 14th Dalai Lama is a meat eater. So I tried to google about it. Lo and behold, I found images of him eating meat and articles trying to justify his moral gymnastic. Buddha prohibited killing of any kind. In His teachings, compassionate is key. Being compassionate means to be kind to all sentient beings, and killing another sentient beings for their meat when there are so many options is definitely not a compassionate action. It really sadden and puzzle me at the same time that the emanation of Kuan Yin (Avalokitshavara / Chenrezig) eats meat.
I hope one day, the 14th Dalai Lama will be a full vegetarian and promote vegetarianism.
Thank you Rinpoche for sharing this news.
Humbly, bowing down,
Stella Cheang