More on "Cultural Genocide" in Tibet
A number of people have asked me for more details about the situation in Tibet. I’ve realized that I have a tendency to excoriate the hypocrisy in the press without necessarily offering much additional in the way of compensatory education. So I’d like to remedy things by explaining the facts in more detail.
First, read this excellent paper from UCLA: "How Repressive is the Chinese Government in Tibet?". I find the analysis to still be relatively biased toward a western viewpoint, but far more factual than the typical newspaper report. You should definitely read it, but I’ll highlight some of the key facts:
- Population of ethnic Tibetans has grown dramatically during the period of time when they were supposedly being swamped by Han Chinese.
- Chinese government allows Tibetans to have 4+ children, while Han Chinese are permitted only 1 child.
- Han population live almost entirely in the cities, working reconstruction contracts, and tend to get the hell out of town as soon as they can.
- While Han Chinese culture may be influencing Tibetan youngsters to abandon their traditions (which are not that old or traditional, BTW); western culture is influencing them more.
The paper concludes that Tibetans may be suffering from "social and economic marginalization", but there is no concerted effort to commit cultural or ethnic genocide, and in fact the Chinese government is engaged in what amounts to an affirmative action program to attempt to offset some of this marginalization.
I largely agree with this conclusion. When you have a nation with 1 billion Han Chinese and 6 million Tibetans, it’s going to be very difficult for Tibetans to gain an economic or cultural edge. Han Chinese culture is chauvinistic. Nothing malicious about it; that’s just the way it is.
Furthermore, the efforts of the Chinese government to lift Tibetans seem to me to be more honest and consistent than the efforts of U.S. in affirmative action. A far larger percentage of black and latino men in America are in prison today than are Tibetan men in prison in China. The rabble-rousers would like you to believe that Tibetans in China are treated like Rodney King, but the media were only able to capture footage of Tibetans massacring innocent Chinese women and children.
The "religious freedom" arguments are also hollow. One thing people don’t realize is that there is no right of free assembly in China, and religions are strictly regulated by the government. Trust me; these restrictions are strongly supported by the Han Chinese, and they would vote the restrictions back in if they were relaxed. That’s just the way it is.
Take the Christian Church in China, for example. The government stuffed the church with Cardinals selected by the communist party. The pope excommunicated the Cardinals. The Cardinals happily continue to serve as heads of the church. This is how religions work in China. But this is normal. The Tibetan monks have more autonomy than any other religious group in China.
It’s interesting, isn’t it? George Bush ignores the situation of black and latino people in America, while claiming that the less-severe marginalization of Tibetans is a "human rights" issue. He doesn’t say a word about the Christian church in China being controlled by the government, but demands that the religious dictator head of a buddhist death cult be given sovereignty over the central government. And he argues that the Tibetans are being too heavily influenced by Chinese culture, while the Tibetan exile government has become essentially a puppet and mouthpiece of the western "cult of liberty" and a pawn for the neocons C.I.A.
April 5th, 2008 at 12:44 pm
It is an interesting post, worth reading.
Just one question: you always call the tibetian buddhism a death cult.
Any source that supports this point?
April 7th, 2008 at 6:13 am
Sure. Westerners love to portray the dalai lama as a modern-day Gandhi, and this idea of peaceful affable buddhism is perpetrated mainly by ignorant and idealistic college kids. A perfect example of this western sanctimonious ignorance is Larry King — you should check out Larry King’s interview at y2k with dalai lama. In it, Larry King repeatedly talks about how compassionate and peaceful the dalai lama is, yet calls the dalai lama a “muslim” 3 times. I encourage you to watch it, since Larry King is exactly as educated about tibetan buddhism as the average person sporting a “free tibet” bumper sticker.
For that matter, most western students of buddhism are pretty ignorant of buddhism as well. But even the average college kid can watch the pro-dalai movie “Kundun” and see that Tibetan buddhism is a lot different from what most people call buddhism. For most people, buddhism is essentially a cult of sophism and detatchment — proverbs, wisdom, and philosophy. But the tibetan manifestation is full of twisted cosmology and ghoulish rituals. And not long after it’s birth, Tibetan buddhism was essentially turned into a puppet for British imperial aims, and was never really peaceful.
The religion was basically created in 1300, with the “discovery” by Karma Lingpa of a document claimed to have been left on a mountain in 800 by Padmasambhava. The veracity of Karma Lingpa’s claims to me seems just as solid as Isaac Luria’s, Joseph Smith’s, or even John Dee’s. I use the word “cult” freely, but nowhere more freely than with groups who claim magical documents revealed during modern times, and supporting new and bizarre rituals.
But don’t take my word for it. Attend some lectures by your local rinpoche, read about the liturgical and cosmological details, and use your brain to compare with what you know about buddhism in general; or more mature religions.
April 12th, 2008 at 1:10 am
Thanks.
I know there is a difference, and that what westerners call buddhism is most of the times chan or zen buddhism - which is not accepted as real buddhism by the tibetians.
Chan budhism had been influenced by taoism a lot, it is more “lazy” and slow, and “chinese”.
I am not a “bumper sticker” kid - actually, I have to admit, that I think that I should not give advice on stuff I don’t really understand, like how asian people or middle eastern people should behave and live their life - just got curious, becaue it is a recurring thread in your posts.
I will try to find “Kundun”, and watch it.
Also by more mature religions you mean like…
Hmm… Hinduism, shinto, shamanism?
And thank you for the answer.
April 12th, 2008 at 9:48 am
Yeah, by “more mature religions”, I mean religions which have a tradition of reasoned debate, textual criticism, and documenting their beliefs and allowing the provenance of their holy scriptures to be tested with scientific means. Even the vedas have been exposed to some degree of textual analysis and criticsim. Islam has gone through purges where the the questionable elements were removed in favor of witness (”companions”) accounts observed by multiple people; and was open to reasoned debate internally and strengthened. They resist this to some extent today, but even today there are new publications of textual analysis of koran.
I am certainly not endorsing hinduism or Islam, but pointing out that these religions have *vastly* more integrity in scholarship than modern buddhism; which was invented later. Buddhism is different in every geography, because it’s just a random collection of wise saying that have evolved in each region. Textual criticism shows that wide swaths have been stolen wholesale from other great teachers and attributed to “buddha”, who is essentially a fictional character. The Sufis have vastly more integrity than this; and Islamic scholars yet more integrity.
I have no problem with people running around reciting wise proverbs and mystical statements meant to increase their detatchment — but until they put some rigorous scholarship behind it, I’m not going to grant them any more dignity than any other platitudes that Oprah or others utter to convince themselves of this or that.
Shamanism is pretty muddled as well; good comparison to tibetan buddhism. The wonderful thing about shamanic religions is that they can vary wildly from generation to generation, yet the proponents insist they are ancient and wise.
April 27th, 2008 at 1:56 am
You know that in Buddhism there were debates, until they arrived on a consensus of which of the scripts are acceptable and which are to be thrown out?
And that buddhism is not the wise proverb and mystical statements as we see it today.
That is mainly the chan Buddhism.
Plus, Buddhism was invented before Islam which was invented later than Christianity. Chan Buddhism was invented later, influenced by Chinese Taoism, but then, that is not Tibetian Buddhism, it is actually was declared by one of the lamas that Chan Buddhism is not real Buddhism - mainly because they don’t accept the scripts, work with a lot of wise sayings, and for all the things you say Buddhism is not a religion.
‘Master, what is the difference between a humanistic, monastic system of belief in which wisdom is sought by means of an apparently nonsensical system of questions and answers, and a lot of mystic gibberish made up on the spur of the moment?’
Wen considered this for some time, then at last said: ‘A fish!’
- Terry Pratchett, Thief of Time
As for Islam and Christianity as
“have a tradition of reasoned debate, textual criticism, and documenting their beliefs and allowing the provenance of their holy scriptures to be tested with scientific means.” that was funny to read.
I mean, if you take a look around, that is the last thing either of them allows.
Oh yes, debating inside the church, sure, and then the winning party excommunicates - and sometimes kills - the losing party, all in the name of “the real truth”, but testing with scientific means?
And again, Buddhism has documented it’s beliefs , that’s why in 629, a Chinese monk traveled to India to read the Holy Scripts in original, and after 16 years returned home, with more than 600 Buddhist scripts.
And even Chan Buddhists, say you have to learn the scripts before throwing them away and actually using your own head - again, Taoist influence -, so there you go again.
That Buddha - Siddharta - was a fictional character maybe true, but then so was Jesus and Mohammed, and all the prophets - at least in a sense.
On shamanism.
Modern shamanic religions can vary from generation from generation, original ones, not really - I think the modern “shamans” has as much in common with the original ones as the Wiccans with some ancient religion, or the “buddhist” who saw a Shaolin Kung-fu movie, bought a Feng-Shui book and found the “zen” to Buddhism.
Of course, not many real shamans are around here so we can’t ask their opinion, however Hungarian folklore and history shows that they had a rather complex and clear world view, and it did not change from Monday to Tuesday like you imply it.
That of course does not mean that people don’t muck it up all. Like everything. Forgetting the original meanings and inventing new ones.
And when a western guy, who knows nothing about the original Buddhism just saw some Shaolin Monks and says “wow it’s cool” starts to call himself buddhist, then is that the fault of the original beliefs or the guy?
It got pretty long, and this small window is not really comfortable, but I think you get why I don’t really agree with you on everything.
I think you don’t talk about Buddhism, you talk about zenism.
April 29th, 2008 at 2:30 pm
Hi Roland,
I am quite familiar with the history of Buddhism. You can argue that Theravada has a history of some scholarship, but the idea that the whole Pali Canon was actually faithful representation of Gautama’s words is just laughable. And furthermore, the dominant form of Buddhism is Mahayana, which threw out scholarship with the bathwater long ago. Tibetan, Chan, and Zen are all forms of Mahayana — they have no Canon, no tradition of reasoned debate and textual criticism. In fact, they deliberately fled the rigors initially imposed by the (early) Theravada monks.
I will refrain from being too judgmental or making comparisons to snake-oil salesmen — but when one has the example of Theravada, I cannot see how one can with a straight face attribute the Mahayana with scholarship.
Again, I would not intend to glorify reason, but I would point out that it was Islamic scholars like Al-Ghazali and Christian scholars like Augustine who have preserved the legacies of Plato and Aristotle. Science and the scientific method were invented by scholars within these two world religions. Their doctrines are still documented with stunning clarity for all to see today.
You argues that the wild variance in Buddhist belief is caused by westerners who watched a shaolin movie and who “got it wrong”. The problem with that argument is that you have no higher authority to appeal to. You can assert to yourself that *you* understand Buddhism and that all those other don’t, and you will just be making the problem worse. This is because Buddhism has no canon, no authority upon which to adjudicate disputes. In fact, since Mahayana revolted, Buddhism has actively opposed any attempt to constrain the system within the bounds of scholarship or reason. So everyone can make up his own version while claiming that all of the other “buddhists” don’t get it. It has become hardly different than paganism. I am 100% certain that Gautama never would have wanted that.
You are correct that there is a common ground amongst all versions of buddhism today — that common ground is a preoccupation with sophistry and a desire for detatchment. But that is hardly a religion — sophists and ascetes existed long before Gautama.
May 3rd, 2008 at 11:47 pm
“but the idea that the whole Pali Canon was actually faithful representation of Gautama’s words is just laughable”
That’s clear, the teachings were mostly oral originally, written down later, and we know what it means.
All I say that there was a start to it, with scholarship.
“Again, I would not intend to glorify reason, but I would point out that it was Islamic scholars like Al-Ghazali and Christian scholars like Augustine who have preserved the legacies of Plato and Aristotle. Science and the scientific method were invented by scholars within these two world religions. Their doctrines are still documented with stunning clarity for all to see today.”
Ok, I admit I was not thinking and talking of scholars, but strictly of religion and church.
And yes, true, science and scientific method as we in the western world understand it was invented by the greeks, and preserved by the Christian and Islam world.
I think that the cultural differences made it possible, if you have something like a Confucian culture, where you do NOT argue with your father, your mother or anyone who is older than you or above you, it is pretty hard to invent the art of debating.
And when you have a culture and tradition of debate and oratory, then your religions will be shaped by it.
And when you lose that tradition your religion will change too, like with modern fundamentalists, where the main argument is “it’s written, so it’s true”.
“You argues that the wild variance in Buddhist belief is caused by westerners who watched a shaolin movie and who “got it wrong”.”
No, no. What I tried to say there is that people who are not buddhists call themselves buddhists.
If I see people dancing waltz on the TV, then I start to walk around bobbing up and down and turn around slowly, without knowing what I should do, what the steps are, and so on, will I really dance wiener waltz? Nope. I can call it waltz, but I won’t be that.
“You can assert to yourself that *you* understand Buddhism and that all those other don’t, and you will just be making the problem worse.”
Exactly. I don’t understand Buddhism, I don’t claim I understand Buddhism, and I don’t call myself a Buddhist.
“I am 100% certain that Gautama never would have wanted that.”
The “founders” never wanted the actual result.
I doubt that Jesus was clapping happily at the Inquisition, or is really content with the current churches.
“It has become hardly different than paganism.”
Well, the Maya and the Inca were pagans, and they had religions probably with scriptures and all. Of course we don’t know, for every writing was destroyed, but they had advanced mathematics and astronomy, so probably they were scientific in their religious worldview too.
On whether Buddhism can be called a religion, that is a good question.
According to the Merriam-Webster, religion is:
1 a: the state of a religious
b (1): the service and worship of God or the supernatural (2): commitment or devotion to religious faith or observance
2: a personal set or institutionalized system of religious attitudes, beliefs, and practices
3archaic : scrupulous conformity : conscientiousness
4: a cause, principle, or system of beliefs held to with ardor and faith
If you look at 1) it is not a religion, if you look at 2 and 4 it is - especially with the meaning of 2.
It certainly is not a strict, organized, central, rigid structure like the Catholic church.
It is a “a personal set of beliefs and practices”. Maybe you could call it that and skip the religion thing.
May 8th, 2008 at 10:05 am
OK; I think we are mostly in agreement. Thanks much for all of your thoughtful comments!