Stories about fairness
4 Buddhist wisdom stories about fairness from Buddhist teachers, each linked to the original talk.
- Anger's trial with no defenceAnalogy · Ajahn Brahm
In brief: Simile from his own anger at a fellow monk: listing everything he didn't do, Ajahn Brahm sees he is justifying his anger like a court case where only the prosecutor may speak, no…
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And so an other way of managing anger is to have what we call a fair trial. A lot of times you get angry at somebody, it is like a trial where you only have a prosecutor and no defense. Say these, you know, say it is your boss. They've got no right to speak like that to me. And you try and justify it. That are boss speak like that, they are just really cruel, don't they know how much I've worked hard for this. You always try and get more evidence to justify why you should be angry to that person. How about having a defence attorney in that trial? In other word, oh that poor boss, he must be very tied, he had a very busy day today. Maybe he had an argument with his wife this morning, maybe he's got a migraine. See if you can deliberately when you're about to getting angry at your husband say. Try to find some mitigating factors. He must be crazy. He's mad. He must be going through the male equivalent of menopause. Whatever it is? Try and find some mitigating evidence, so you can not just judge just him one-sidedly.
- “But there were so many other robberies I got away with”Story · Ajahn Brahm
In brief: After the class an old prisoner earnestly tells Ajahn Brahm he's in jail for a robbery he didn't do — he was set up. Fired with a sense of justice, Ajahn Brahm is mentally…
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fellow who was in prison for something he didn't do. Imagine being put in jail for a crime you don't commit. And this poor gentleman he was over at Karnet prison farm and I used to go and see him. And he he came up to me one evening and he said, you know when I was visiting there. And he said: look Ajahn Brahm, I respect you. And you know I’m trying to change my life, trying to be a good person, keeping my precepts. So I won't lie to you. He said: I won't lie. I know other prisoners will all say they're innocent, they didn't do it. But I didn't do that crime. I didn't do that robbery. I’ve been put in jail for something I never did. And I’ve got a social conscience you know. You can't just let that happen to a poor person put in jail for a few years for a crime he didn't commit. And I also know that you know your ability to get a lawyer or just to call for help is so limited inside prison. So I thought I know people maybe I can take that cause up. Maybe I can sort of fight for his release from jail for a crime he never committed. But as I was thinking like that the this this scallywag of a prisoner he looked at me and he broke into this you know almost like a few teeth missing smile. And he said he said: But Ajahn Brahm, it's true I honestly I never did that crime. I never did that robbery. But he said since I listened to you
- The birds queued — and punished the queue-jumperStory · Ajahn Brahm
In brief: Near the Burmese border in hot season he put out a water bowl by a knothole. Birds of different sizes lined up in a queue; when one jumped the queue the others piled on, pecked…
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to see all these birds of different sizes and species line up in a queue. Have you ever seen birds queuing? I have. And it was true. That's what they did. There are maybe eight or nine birds, maybe a dozen at the best, you know, and they were big ones, small ones, and they were sitting there just waiting until the one in front finished and then the next one would actually come in. And of course, it is fascinating. And then there was always every afternoon one bird would come in and would actually jump the queue and try and get in there first. Couldn't wait to have a bath or have a drink. Weird. But you know what the other birds would do? They would all get out of queue, jump on that Q jumper, [laughter] pick him and beat him and whatever. And that Q jumper would fly away. And then all those birds would queue up in exactly the order they were before. [laughter] It's unbelievable. Absolutely true. And so what that really did was, you know, increase your respect
- The fourth cookie always went to the supervisorStory · Ajahn Brahm
In brief: A psychology experiment split volunteers into threes: two wrote a report, one checked it. When five cookies arrived for three people (Western etiquette leaves the last), the…
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It was a cookie experiment. If those of you who know the cookie experiment it was actually quite revealing about the nature of human beings and what happens when they get into positions of authority. As you all know, a lot of troublesome people are those in positions of authority who boss you around and bully you. And of course, psychology experiments are very revealing because they take ordinary people and see what they do in in special situations and ordinary situations which reveal some of the nature of the human being. Not just special human beings, not uh failed human beings, but ordinary human beings. Because what they did, they had u these volunteers and they split them into groups of three. And they gave each of these little teams sort of a little job and a report to to write out. And two of the three were tasked with writing the report out and the third was supposed to check them. That's all just to check to make sure they wrote the report properly. So that third person was tacitly in a position of authority. And the main part of the experiment was when they brought a plate of cookies and some coffee in because it was hard work. They didn't realize that this was actually the main part of the experiment. It wasn't just a treat because they brought like was it five cookies in and there's only three people there. And apparently western psychology means that no one ever takes the last cookie. That's a no no. But it was the fourth cookie which was the interesting one. Who would take the fourth cookie? And that would always be the person who was checking everybody else. The supervisor, the one in authority, they would always think that they deserved that fourth cookie. And the other interesting thing was when they ate those two cookies, well, everyone else ate one, they would they would uh uh spill all sorts of cookie chips all over the place. They would have no proper sort of etiquette and eating because it was realized that for them in positions of authority, rules did not apply to them and they deserved more than anybody else