> I stopped reading upon seeing at the very stop this “ Silicon Valley is the latest player in a history of Western appropriation of Buddhism”

I think you jumped the gun. The extended interview with the book author showed that her position is aligned, or even the same as yours (your comment is naturally too brief to tell whether I should have used only “aligned” or “same”).

And indeed it’s Buddhism we’re talking about: a belief system appropriated by other cultures to the point where its origin in India was forgotten for centuries.