Is Buddhism Losing Its Cool?

And why it matters.

In the days following the re-election of Donald Trump, well-known Buddhist teachers have issued statements about the election. Lion’s Roar has published a compilation of them. The article starts,

It is now time to ask ourselves, “What would a bodhisattva do?,” and let that be our guide and inspiration. Lion’s Roar offers us the wisdom of leading Buddhist teachers, leaders, and activists as we contemplate how to meet a dark time with the compassion, courage, and skill of bodhisattvas dedicated to the welfare of all beings.

Here are samples of things said about this “dark time.”

…what do we do when we did the work on personal change, campaign hard for our candidate, yet the world we wanted to see change in the direction we wanted it to change doesn’t?

I completely empathize with people who are in shock and grief, but although I share the grief, I am not in shock. The political organizing and base building that brought the U.S. to this point in our election history has been going on in plain sight.

Let us give ourselves and those around us time to grieve and mourn. Let us reach out and care for the most vulnerable among us.

Walking home from morning meditation, the streets shrouded in mist, I touch my sadness, anger, and fear, open to the anguish of the world.

On a day like today, there is often an instinct to run off – to flee to Canada or India, to hide out in some remote hermitage or temple, to remove ourselves from a situation here and now that is so hard to accept.

This is a tough day for many of us. The winds blowing across the golden West Coast of these United States bring a change that many of us did not choose. And yet, here it is. Let the tears fall, if they may. Let the heartbreak be acknowledged and felt, if you feel it. I am here with you, feeling the whole range. Let’s wrap our arms around our hearts, and feel what we feel. Sadness. Anxiety. Fear. And disappointment.

i refuse to be defeated by ignorance / we can call out the multiple causes and conditions / there are so many / and right now, we have to come alongside a lot of anger and anguish / and then foster healthy solidarity to do what we can to mitigate the suffering that so many are facing and will face

The overall impression is that Buddhists nationwide are not only having a pity party, but that US Buddhism is a political monoculture - not an inclusive space for Trump voters, i.e., over half the country. This would not seem to be a good starting place for saving all sentient beings. 

Perhaps worse than that is that this pity party makes it look like Buddhism is losing its cool. 

“Cool” has various meanings. One is about equanimity and composure, and another is about charisma. I mean both of these. Pity parties are the opposite of cool. 

Although people look for different things in spiritual practices, one of the most common things they look for is equanimity. If Buddhism demonstrates that it cannot deliver equanimity about a Cheeto-colored entertainer becoming president again, it sure makes it look like Buddhism not only cannot deliver equanimity about difficult things in life but that Buddhism may actually make one mentally and emotionally fragile. That’s not cool - in either sense.

Back in the 1950s, Zen got a reputation for being cool. There was Jack Kerouac and the Dharma Bums. Buddhism got cooler in the 1960s, with several Asian teachers coming to the US, filling sanghas with American converts. In 1974, the best-selling book was Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

I first became interested in Buddhism in my late teens - the late 1970s. I started practicing Zen in 1991. Perhaps my experience was idiosyncratic, or my memory is distorted, but I recall lots of emphasis on stories that conveyed mental toughness. Years staring at walls, cutting off one’s arm to convince a teacher to teach, taunting a samurai who could behead you. When I was at Tofuku-ji, a Rinzai monastery in Kyoto, one of the monks complimented me, impressed that such an old man (I was 37) could do the hard practice they did. The monks were all in their early 20s. And, yes, it was very hard. 

No wonder the cool thing today is Stoicism. While several prominent Stoics such as Ryan Holiday, Massimo Piglucci, and Donald Robertson made it clear that they thought one of the candidates was particularly lacking in virtue, post-election, I’ve not seen any signs of Stoic pity parties. They’re all, like, being stoic about it. 

Suppose you’re some young guy looking for a spiritual practice. Which looks cooler? 

Now ask yourself that question again, this time taking note that Trump was the most popular candidate among young men.

Now, do some searching on Substack to compare how many people are subscribing to Substacks on Stoicism with those subscribing to Substacks on Buddhism. Compare the number of subscribers. The difference is huge. 

Stoicism

Buddhism

Admittedly, this comparison isn’t quite fair because of the way keyword search works on Substack, but Buddhism had a good half-century head start over Stoicism on being a “thing” in the US. It institutionally outclasses Stoicism in every way, except, it seems, by what people now want to read about. 

Compare also what Amazon lists as top-selling Buddhist books with their top-selling Stoic books. You’ll see the same trend.

James Ford Roshi and I once had a conversation about whether Amercia had reached peak Zen - defined in terms of how many active Zen teachers there were, both currently and in the training pipeline, and taking into consideration their ages. According to his calculations, the number of Zen teachers in America is going to start falling as the Boomer generation of Zen teachers dies off. As past president of the American Zen Teachers Association, he’s in a position to know these things. I’m just a guy trying to pay attention to what’s going on, but - perhaps just speculatively - I think some dots can be connected here. 

I’ll take up Lion’s Roar’s question, “what would a bodhisattva do?”  While nobody ever authorized me to be a Buddhist teacher, as a retired Chief Marketing Officer of a publicly traded company, I know a thing or two about marketing. And as someone who has taken the bodhisattva vows, I’ll do here as Lion’s Roar requests. I will meet this “dark time with the compassion, courage, and skill” to report a problem: Buddhism USA’s current branding looks uncool. 

The process of saving all sentient beings involves selling them on the idea of being saved. Marketing is a skillful means. 

Like it or not, Donald Trump has been doing good marketing. There’s something to learn here. 

Make Buddhism Cool Again.