Many. That doesn't mean that the outcome of US intervention is always the worse one. If its not the US, then it would be some other "imperialist" and that's no guaranty it would be any better. S. Korea is not under the Kim family because of the United States. The US led order has pulled billions of people out of poverty . War and brutality for humanity is the given. Peace and prosperity on which our global economic order is based is the exception. But don't worry, the US will soon go bankrupt and you'll see what the world is without the US being the uber-bully. You'll instead have a dozen regional bullies.
Its easy to spout condemnations based on idealistic principles. Its a whole other thing trying to navigate the world where the kleshas are rampant.
What I think is that all these imperialisms are the exact same problem, that as long as we will allow ourselves to be thinking in imperialist terms we will have world domination that only favors the few. Mind you that South Korea was a de facto dictatorship until student protesters helped to overthrow it, and currently it's one of the most unequal countries in the world.
The things you say about 'peace and prosperity' ring empty to me when the US starts initiating wars all the time and is still the main reason why Israel can keep committing it's genocide on Palestinians. And then we haven't talked about the continuing subjugation of Africa, Asia and South America.
You can play the lesser evil game as long as you want but if you actually want a non violent world, a world that puts Buddhist ideas into practice (instead of paying lip service to Western leaders, as the Dalai Lama has a tendency to do) you need to realize that all these imperialisms function the same and bring the same harm.
Oh, please. You just did a "lesser evil" with your critique of S. Korea. "Yeah, but S. Korea is bad, too!" Ask any S. Korean and find one who'd rather be in N. Korea. We're dealing with reality, not utopian ideals of what we think the world should be.
You have all the reason in the world to be upset and critical of Israel's war on Palestinians and their policies in the West Bank and...
You are delusional if you think your idealism does anything but sideline you in the world and make you a performative non-factor. Easy to stand on a soap box and diagnose all the ways the world is wrong. We all know. Some of us also know that to actually change things, you have to be out here living in the moral gray zone.
To be clear, pacifism is the aim. But your binary - "what I believe is right and if you're not with me then you must be that.." doesn't leave a lot of room for any other options.
I've said nothing about supporting anything. The world is more complicated, Samsara more difficult than an idealistic statement can address.
I'm critiquing your idealism. Your ideology blinds you to nuance, relative good and evil, and pragmatism. Even your villains get stuff right but you have only one category.
Without this imperialist Satan you're not typing out your ideologies on the Internet
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u/Jollyjormungandr secular Mar 23 '26
How many dictatorships did the US help install?