Because the Dalai Lama had very good PR in the 90s leading to Free Tibet slogans and the Dalai Lama being synonymous for ”great wise holy man” in the minds of Westerners.
this post was submitted on 22 Oct 2025
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I remember seeing his books everywhere about spirituality that corporate execs would buy.
jesus that's a grim indictment
Globally, that branch of Buddhism is on the relatively small side.
I always try to emphasize this to people. There are 4 Tibetan schools and he's the political (not even spiritual) figurehead of one of them. In the others, he's at most a respected teacher or not thought about at all.
This is technically correct, but in practice not really. From what I've seen, he's revered as a spiritual leader of immense importance by most Tibetans.
Seeing Tíbet as the seat of bhuddism and the dalai lama as its "pope" its like thinking the president of the mormon church is the leader of christianity
excuse me but I learned about buddhism from a Richard Gere movie so actually I'm the expert here
I'd be willing to believe that. I guess the catholics have more numbers but like so many of them are just culturally christian. Nobody is just culturally mormon I think. Also they got more cash.
Even if only 1% of Catholics are real practicing members of the religion, there would still be more of them than Mormons total.
Better CIA connections than the Vatican, too
To be fair you could argue that historically it's the other way around. The CIA managed to exist because it had Vatican links.
The Dalai Lama? Sure
Ah you mean the Mormons.
I know a communist who calls himself "culturally Mormon," but that's just his way of saying he doesn't consume caffeine.
no that counts it's not like the level to be culturally catholic is any higher
cultural catholic, observing lent but couldn't tell you how or why
In public, would he say "shit" or "shoot"?
He's not especially profane but I've never heard him use weird euphemisms like "shoot" or "fudge." Next time I'm in a meeting with him I'll drop a book on his foot and see what happens. If he passes the test I'll explain that it was for opsec.
if this thread from a few months ago is an indicator the usual hatchet job is incoming https://old.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1lp6wy5/why_is_chinas_annexation_of_tibet_not_considered/
I think we're way past the point where anybody cares what the west thinks though.
westerners asking other westerners 
they go on and on about tibet's self-determination, but nobody asks exactly which tibetans that involved. oh yeah, sure, let's let tibet's slaver aristocracy do self-determination against the will of the peasants, who cares what they think!
They do the same with the Soviet-Afghan war too
"So happy the evil commies lost" brother did you maybe consider that the 'evil commies' losing had something to do with the Taliban being in charge of the country when the US invaded it like 12 years later?
I'm not convinced these people think the Taliban is actually worse than the "evil commies"
It's cyclical. They didn't think it up until about the 2000s, then 2001 - 2025 they were, now they're not because its politically more convenient to work with the guys (and their syrian offshoot did pinky swear he ain't like that anymore). I expect to see a return to hating the taliban somewhere around 2040 when the the US starts some bullshit war it now instantly gets embarassed in and decides it's time to take it out on the Afghans, again.
Because the west got dementia. They change their opinions as soon as the mainstream media does.
Nobody talks about Tibet is crazy. I guess it has fallen a bit out of fashion.
no more milk in that cow for now, but the west never forgets a thing. they'd start agitating for constantinople the moment turkey weakens.
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i thought that when the average westerner considers buddhism, they either think about orange-clad beggar monks in southeast asia, or wise old monks in east asia, or wacky-yet-serious zen masters. tibetan buddhism was always the weird branch of the tree wasn't it?
when westerners decide to "go buddhist" they often choose some weird westernized atheist sterilized version, or some local zen temple in california or whatever. but this reminds me of 1: Richard Gere (an 80-year-old man with a 30-something wife and a kid in primary school) who was just at the Dalai Lama's birthday ceremony and 2: there's some norwegian or danish Lama who's apparently big in the west and uses his Great Wisdom to be racist and islamophobic
uses his Great Wisdom to be racist and islamophobic
Just like the Dalai Lama, then!
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-48772175
In a speech last year he said that refugees to the European Union should ultimately return home, adding that "Europe is for Europeans", a statement he stood by when I challenged him on it.
"A limited number is OK, but the whole of Europe [will] eventually become Muslim country, African country - impossible," he said.
I swear he's propped up as the buddhist pope just so you don't go and learn about cooler Buddhists
(I don't think he was explicitly Buddhist but there were cool ones in Vietnam, I just enjoy the image)
The guy in the famous anti us self immolation picture was a Vietnamese Buddhist
The Chuddha
Zenz Buddhism
He’s almost got it
Sam and Dave Sieze The Means
My position is that I dislike kings or any equivalent monarchical derived authority.