If you’re like me — and if so, my condolences — you’ve managed to go several decades without paying much attention to the Dalai Lama. I know who he is, sort of, and I know a lot of people think he’s an enlightened, supernatural being of some sort. Good for him, and for them. I can’t think of anything he’s ever said that offended me, or triggered any other emotional reaction. He just seems like a cheerfully harmless fellow from a culture I could probably learn more about if I weren’t so lazy.
But that was then. This is now. It’s 2019, and the Dalai Lama is #cancelled.
The Dalai Lama said Donald Trump lacks “moral principle.” He suggested Europe should be kept for Europeans. And should a woman succeed him, he said, she’d have to be “more attractive.”
The spiritual leader of the Tibetan people made those comments in a wide-ranging interview with the BBC…
The Dalai Lama also commented on who might succeed him after his death. “If female Dalai Lama comes, then (she) should be more attractive,” he said with a laugh.
If the Dalai Lama got any #woke points for bashing Trump, they were wiped off the board by what he said next. Here’s the video.
This was perhaps the most surprising moment in the interview. I asked the Dalai Lama if he stood by his earlier comment that if his successor was female, she should be attractive.
He said he did. Watch here:#DalaiLama #BBCDalaiLama. pic.twitter.com/QAy0EFDZTT
— Rajini Vaidyanathan (@BBCRajiniV) June 27, 2019
Rajini Vaidyanathan: You once said that you would be open to a female successor. You also told one of my colleagues that that female must be attractive, otherwise it’s not much use. Can you see why that comment upset a lot of women?
Dalai Lama: [I’m not going to try to transcribe what he said, sorry if that’s racist]
RV: Can you see why a lot of women, though, found that quite offensive when you said it?
DL: [Something about women buying makeup? Sorry, no comprendo]
RV: A lot of women would say that’s objectifying women. And it’s about who you are inside, isn’t it?
DL: Yes, I think both. Real beauty is inner beauty, that’s true. But we human beings [unintelligible] appearance also important.
First things first: Whenever a journalist says something like, “A lot of people would say [X],” you can just replace that with, “I, personally, am saying [X].” Rajini Vaidyanathan is obviously upset and offended by his sexism. And that’s exactly what it is. It’s the very definition of sexism.
And… so what?
BREAKING: 84-YEAR-OLD MAN IS OLD-FASHIONED
So the Dalai Lama thinks a woman’s physical appearance matters more than a man’s. He may or may not even have the outdated belief that it’s the product of millions of years of evolution. Is your self-worth so fragile that it can be shattered by some religious leader, in some remote part of the world, saying something that doesn’t conform to whatever the current sociopolitical norm happens to be this week? Are you really so arrogant that you’re going to wokesplain gender politics to the Dalai freakin’ Lama?
Of course you are. It’s not as if you have anything better to do.
My Dalai Lama don’t want none unless you got buns, hon!
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