Culturing Fear & Hatred In The Sinhalese Mind – An Open Letter To Sinhalese
Mass Usuf
My dear Sinhalese Brothers and Sisters,
You are all aware of the gradual corruption of a great teaching, by some rogue monks who pretend to protect Buddhism and the Sinhala race. Have you given some thought that it is time to make your voice heard and rise up to stop this menace. I am certain that you also understand well the opportunistic politicians who support such activities. They want to fool the average Sinhalese that they are pro-Sinhala Buddhist. The protection of Buddhism cannot be achieved through harvesting racism, hate and communal disharmony. And, not through nationalism. All of this is pure humbug. A true Sinhalese Buddhist would not want to be part of this.
Innocent Youth
You may wonder why a Muslim is worried about this. The answer is twofold. One, I believe that if true buddhism is practised there would be no other nation in the world to match Sri Lanka – metta (loving kindness) is one simple example. This may sound idealistic but it is the truth. Secondly, this nation and all of its people can prosper and live peacefully. We all yearn to live in such an environment along with our families.
The crass racist indoctrination by a set of asinine monks, correlating buddhism to add value to it, is crossing reasonable levels. Let me highlight and, do so in bold that it is not all of you who belong to this lot but, only a small portion. My point is that this small portion, by virtue of being led by the Sangha, may be a serious number to be reckoned with. More dangerously, the ensnared innocent youth becoming the cat’s paw in the hands of these dubious Mahatmas. The extent of spurious content dissemination in the social media indicates that they have taken leave of their intelligence and common sense. The youth is being systematically radicalised. It can be your own brother or sister, son or daughter.
The type of nonsense that is spread in the social media and the web portals sets a new benchmark for the level of foolishness of these youths. Albert Einstein said, “Logic will get you from A to B. Imagination will take you everywhere”.
Wonderful Lot
ISIS and Galagoda Atte Gnanasara make good comparison (See my article in Colombo Telegraph: 28 July 2015). Even though the Muslims are against ISIS, the global media wrongly accuses Muslims for the acts of ISIS. Similarly, the entire Sinhalese community will be accused of being racist people because of the aberrations of Gnanasara and a few others.
The Sinhalese people are a wonderful lot. Do not get me wrong. This is not an apologetic or a sheepish statement nor is it to curry favour but, a sincere one. Of course, like in all societies you get the bad people, too, among the Sinhalese. The racists are an example. These unsocial elements are of course, a minority but certainly bring shame upon you, who belong to the respectable rest.
However, I feel that if this errored course is not corrected on time even the moderate Sinhala majority may have to face problems. A time will come when fingers will be pointed accusing you of being unpatriotic, ‘un-Buddhistic’ or ‘un-Sinhalese’.
What Have You Done?
