Sharon Stone's Bad Karma About Bad Karma
Nick Gillespie | May 29, 2008, 7:22am
Luxury retailer Christian Dior has pulled advertisements featuring Sharon Stone from stores across China after the actress suggested the country's earthquake was "bad karma" for Beijing's policies in Tibet.
At least 68,000 people died in the May 12 quake in southwest China, which came months after unrest in Tibet that sparked an international outcry over Beijing's handling of the predominantly Buddhist region, which Communist troops entered in 1950.
"Due to some customer reaction we have decided to pull her image from all of the department stores and from all of China," Christian Dior China said in a statement.
More here.
Questions: Does this demonstrate the endless vapidity of Hollywood stars who rule the world like the dinosaurs once did? Or Sharon Stone's firm grasp of karmic understanding? The power of the market responding to new signals by punishing those who disappoint or dismay consumers? The power of a government that oversees the people who produce a ton of luxury goods sold in the West? Do Buddhists simply get what they deserve in every situation? Why was Buddhism so popular for a while among Westerners (Zen Archery, Hesse's Siddartha, Gary Snyder, "Karma Chameleon," and all that)? Do Theravada Buddhists emit less karma than than Mahayana believers (actual mileage may vary)?
Sharon Stone at Wikipedia here.
Adam Smith on Chinese earthquakes here.
reason's Kerry Howley on luxury fever here.
imp | May 29, 2008, 2:50pm | #
Collective reward/punishment is a key element in Western thought.
Adam eats the apple (big crime there!) and the entire human race suffers. Pharoah won't let the Israelites go, so every first born in Egypt must be killed. Because the Babylonians conquered the Jews, Psalm 137 blesses anyone who smashes a Babylonian toddler against the rocks.
The biblical prophets seldom curse kings by name, but instead curse entire nations, as if even the women and children must be punished for the transgressions of the ruling elite.
Anti-semetics may condemn ancient Jewish thought, but do so only in terms of repeating the same error, by holding Jews alive today guilty for an alleged crime on the part of a handful of leaders that supposedly occured two thousand years ago. Hello, can you get more abstract in your collectivism than that?
Then along came Communists, who eschewed the Bible entirely -- and proceeded to judge individuals on the basis of the alleged sins of their economic class.
Anyone who thinks that the Western Mind is drawn toward individualism and away from collectivism should pay special attention to the moralizing statements of US Civil War leaders.
Affirmative action, reparations for slavery, reparations for the Holocaust, Hillary Clinton's declaration that Iran will be 'obliterated' if it attacks Israel -- we're always looking for some way to judge and punish people collectively rather than individually.
Sharon Stone's outlook is simply a product of our society's infatuation with collective judgment. That she dresses it up with reference to 'karma' -- a term relating to individual reward and punishment -- shows that like much of trendy Hollywood, she is eager to pretend that she has attained to Eastern Enlightenment. But underneath is still the fundamentalist biblical worldview of Us vs. Them.
