What was the Police charge ?? Whatever it was it should surely have been attempted murder. I don't understand why the Judge considered Religion or Race - there was no Hate Crime just some name calling which it appears was totally correct in it's application !!
If you really think those buddhists are peaceful you might have a bit to learn about the world... from the stories I've heard from friends who have lived and worked in buddhist countries, the image of tolerant westernised buddhism you see portrayed in the media/hollywood is very very different to the day to day poverty-and-fear reality of the normal people.
I think a big part of the issue is that (like many islamic countries) their religion has become mixed into a sense of nationalism so that the hardliners see anyone with different beliefs as rejecting the national identity and therefore 'not one of them' and not deserving any rights. The Burma/Myanmar situation is also a race issue, the Rohingya people being a different ethnic group that the others want to kick out because they're different (and the other neighbouring countries don't want them either and say they should stay where they are).
Basically its a bloody mess, you get assholes in every belief system (including the ones who believe they don't have any beliefs) and things are often not as simple as they appear. Some belief systems do seem to make being an asshole more of a systematic requirement than others though, we probably agree about that.
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