Dr. Fuller's Ludicrous Theory about ethnocentric Buddhism

By Dr. Habib Siddiqui

RB Opinion

April 6, 2014

My attention has been drawn to Dr. Paul Fuller's article which has appeared in the DVB. Here below I share my observations.

Throughout history there have always been people, even those who appear to be intellectuals, who justified the crimes of despots and ruthless murderers under certain pretexts. There were no shortages of German, Austrian and Italian fascist intellectuals who were not only supporters of the Nazi Fascism of the Hitler era but greatly promoted the evil cause. One would have thought that Nuremberg Trials and the wholesale condemnation of the evil ideology in the subsequent years and decades had put that dark chapter behind us, and no one and surely not the so-called educated intellectuals who teach at the college and university levels would be a devil's advocate. But our expectations have always been unrealistic. There are still evil geniuses around our world who are willing to act as intellectual whores and pimps selling their credentials to the highest bidder.

So, while it is sad to read Dr. Paul Fuller's article below, I am not too surprised with such absurd, ludicrous interpretation of what is going wrong in Burma. He has apparently tied his knot with the devil. He calls the current genocidal campaign against the non-Buddhist minorities, esp. the Rohingya and other Muslims in Myanmar as ethno-centric Buddhism. How wonderful! One has to really take pity on such an interpretation of reality inside Burma!

Where did Paul Fuller get his PhD from, I need not know, and how much did his students got out of his teaching in Australia where he claims to have been teaching religious studies, I don't care to know. But if his latest article is any indicator to judge his intellectual caliber, surely, he has done a terrible job, and has proven beyond doubt that he is not someone who can be trusted or respected on matters dealing with human rights and abuses.

When a country has sizable minority communities of various religions, ethnicities and races, and then minorities are targeted for extermination simply because of their distinct religion, race and ethnicity, social customs and mores, and when they are denied counting in the census simply because of such distinctions, and the entire population from top to bottom, including monks, are behind the eleminationist policy - what do we call such acts? Is it anything but genocide? Was Hitler's extermination campaign of Jews in Germany ethno-centric Christianity? 

Who is Paul Fuller trying to fool?

Shame on him! People like him are a disgrace to humanity and should be shun.

Dr. Paul Fuller's article can be read here.