The current visit of the Dalai Lama to Canada is well underway. At the grandiose spiritual meetings with Hollywood style fan-fare, he spreads his message of peace and freedom. But now his political agenda has become clear. We should have seen this coming. This, after all, is what he always does ? no, I am just a monk, he insists. Yes, I will talk about politics if you want to.
The truth about Tibet history and reality has never been as simple as the Dalai Lama and his followers try to project to the global audience. For instance, “Tibet independence” and “increasing Tibet autonomy” are vague ideas that most Canadians are ill informed of. What is their vision for Tibet society? Democracy? Theocracy? Or Dictatorship by the elites from Dharamsala? Very few people in Canada realize the sufferings "bestowed" by the Tibetan feudal theocracy upon the Tibetan people before the so-called Chinese invasion. Very few people know that under the feudal theocracy of the old Tibet, there was institutionalized serfdom. A sizable number of Tibetans were in fact serfs owned by serf owners. How many Tibetan serfs were mutilated and tortured? Of the brutalities of the Tibet feudal serfdom, the theocratic establishment was an integral part.
The Dalai Lama has little hesitation in using the phrase "cultural genocide" to describe the current situation in Tibet, even though he has little first hand knowledge of the reality in Tibet. According to the year 2000 census, the population in Tibet has increased from 996,300 in 1950 to 2,616,300 in 2000; 92.2% (2,411,100) of the population is Tibetan in ethnic origin, 5.9% (155,300) Han Chinese, and 1.9% (49,000) other ethnic groups. The life expectancy for Tibetans is now 65, as compared with 36 in 1950 ("China's Tibet" By ZHONG, Zhang-wei, 2001). By spreading the myth of the “cultural genocide,” he is ignoring the history of the last two hundred year of the Americas. He must be in the belief that the presence of the Tibet exile population has little impact on the population and cultural make-up of Dharamsala and the surrounding areas. Since the 1950s, the Tibetan exile population in that mountainous city has steadily increased to more than 100,000 today. The presence of such a large foreign population has changed completely the local social and political landscape.
Nowadays the Dalai Lama claims that he has abandoned his Tibet separatist past. In the past, his extensive dealings with many organizations hostile to the new Chinese government were far from noble. Under the fuzzy pretence of fighting for "Tibet freedom." The purpose of those co-operations on the surface took the guise of freedom fighting, but the real design behind the co-operations was to fit the Tibet independence movement into the strategic blockade of China, which lasted for more than two decades. Those blockades caused tremendous economical hardship and aimed to deprive basic necessities for a nation and its citizens to survive. Combined with the internal disasters in China, those blockades caused untold sufferings of the Chinese people. Was the Dalai Lama thinking about peace and human rights when he supported and indirectly contributed to those blockades?
It is issues like these, and many others, that clearly demonstrate the dubious nature of the phrases of “cultural genocide” and “human right for Tibet”. For the Dalai Lama, we should not only hear what he preaches, but also examine what he did and does.
Fuhu Wang
The truth about Tibet history and reality has never been as simple as the Dalai Lama and his followers try to project to the global audience. For instance, “Tibet independence” and “increasing Tibet autonomy” are vague ideas that most Canadians are ill informed of. What is their vision for Tibet society? Democracy? Theocracy? Or Dictatorship by the elites from Dharamsala? Very few people in Canada realize the sufferings "bestowed" by the Tibetan feudal theocracy upon the Tibetan people before the so-called Chinese invasion. Very few people know that under the feudal theocracy of the old Tibet, there was institutionalized serfdom. A sizable number of Tibetans were in fact serfs owned by serf owners. How many Tibetan serfs were mutilated and tortured? Of the brutalities of the Tibet feudal serfdom, the theocratic establishment was an integral part.
The Dalai Lama has little hesitation in using the phrase "cultural genocide" to describe the current situation in Tibet, even though he has little first hand knowledge of the reality in Tibet. According to the year 2000 census, the population in Tibet has increased from 996,300 in 1950 to 2,616,300 in 2000; 92.2% (2,411,100) of the population is Tibetan in ethnic origin, 5.9% (155,300) Han Chinese, and 1.9% (49,000) other ethnic groups. The life expectancy for Tibetans is now 65, as compared with 36 in 1950 ("China's Tibet" By ZHONG, Zhang-wei, 2001). By spreading the myth of the “cultural genocide,” he is ignoring the history of the last two hundred year of the Americas. He must be in the belief that the presence of the Tibet exile population has little impact on the population and cultural make-up of Dharamsala and the surrounding areas. Since the 1950s, the Tibetan exile population in that mountainous city has steadily increased to more than 100,000 today. The presence of such a large foreign population has changed completely the local social and political landscape.
Nowadays the Dalai Lama claims that he has abandoned his Tibet separatist past. In the past, his extensive dealings with many organizations hostile to the new Chinese government were far from noble. Under the fuzzy pretence of fighting for "Tibet freedom." The purpose of those co-operations on the surface took the guise of freedom fighting, but the real design behind the co-operations was to fit the Tibet independence movement into the strategic blockade of China, which lasted for more than two decades. Those blockades caused tremendous economical hardship and aimed to deprive basic necessities for a nation and its citizens to survive. Combined with the internal disasters in China, those blockades caused untold sufferings of the Chinese people. Was the Dalai Lama thinking about peace and human rights when he supported and indirectly contributed to those blockades?
It is issues like these, and many others, that clearly demonstrate the dubious nature of the phrases of “cultural genocide” and “human right for Tibet”. For the Dalai Lama, we should not only hear what he preaches, but also examine what he did and does.
Fuhu Wang
