Off Topic — HabitableZone

Off Topic » in reply to "The Secret" is back in the news

Shakabuku
Fox — (archived)

A number of us are old enough to remember the early-to-mid '70s. My guess is, some of us lived in urban areas in those days and can recall, however vaguely, a bunch of street-corner hawkers who claimed to be "Buddhists" and promulgated the idea that chanting one particular mantra, nam yoko renge kyo, would bring anything the supplicant desired.

"Come to a meeting -- free food!"

Mind you, the urban streets were full of such charlatans back then: Krishnas, Moonies, LaRouchies, Jesus freaks... the chanters may have gotten lost in the sauce, so to speak. But I recall an article in the Philadelphia City Paper from the time, which investigated the group. Shakabuku is the term given by the group to their recruiting style. It's probably Japanese, and I have no idea of its literal translation, but loosely it means "a sucker is born every minute." The word has stuck with me over 35 years, to signify the general aim of spiritual predators: those who feed on people's desire to satisfy unfulfilled yearnings with as little effort as possible.

How different is this so-called "Secret" from what some serious believers refer to as "the power of prayer"? Or from that ancient (1952) chestnut by Norman Vincent Peale, The Power of Positive Thinking? How different, for that matter, fromsolipsism?

In short: They may not handing you a flower, but they're no different, or better, than the people who caused businesses and transportation terminals to post "No Soliciting" signs on their doors, beginning around 1975.

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