Dalai Lama joins green ink brigade

Has the Dalai Lama lost it? Never the most logical thinker or speaker, the gaffe-prone Tibetan leader, faced with bad publicity re:Tibetan rioters attacking Han and Muslim civilians, is now suggesting that China staged the uprising in Tibet. "Tibetans are non-violent people. We have heard about a few hundred Chinese soldiers received monks’ dress." Dalai Lama suggests China could be behind Tibet unrest , Press Trust of India March 28.

Let’s see if we have this straight. China, anxious to show a human face to the world in Olympic year stirs up trouble in Tibet in order to…well do what exactly?

So the Dalai Lama has joined the nightmare, back-to-front, green ink, conspiracy world of the crackpot ‘blogosphere’ and in particular its elite American division, the lunosphere.

One crazed scribbler has Hu Jintao/Dr Evil/Fu Manchu deliberately provoking riots in March to justify an early lock-down of Tibet so that the Olympic Torch makes it safely to the top of Mount Everest in May. Er, yes..that makes a lot of sense.

The Problem with Cultural Genocide

The first major problem is that cultural genocide is not genocide. It’s a dramatic and emotive way of talking about assimilation.

The British tried assimilation in Ireland for centuries with a great deal of success. Although they failed to wipe out Catholicism, they effectively eliminated the Irish language. (Of course they alternated between assimilation and good old-fashioned genocide – Cromwell, the famine etc.) But despite their success in converting the Irish to “civilised” dress and language, the English still had to get out when their time was up. Dalai Lama and assorted Tibetan nationalists please note.

The second problem with the cultural genocide slogan is that it is manifestly at odds with the reality on the ground. Everywhere you go in Tibetan regions you see temples being lovingly restored, not just as tourist attractions, but with the full and enthusiastic participation of the Tibetan people, who donate their money and labour. In many places it seems that half the male population are monks. There are pictures of the Dalai Lama everywhere and everyone asks foreigners have they met him. The impression is not of a culture on the verge of extinction as was the case during the Cultural Revolution but of a resurgent people, growing in confidence; with the confidence, precisely, to stage a revolt.

Of course there are the necessary compromises with the authorities, such as ritually expressing loyalty to the Chinese state, denouncing “splittists” and so on. The portraits of the Dalai Lama are taken down when bigwigs visit and immediately put back up when they leave. But the Irish paid this sort of lip-service for centuries without losing their identity.

The third and biggest problem with the Cultural Genocide slogan is that it directs the anger of the Tibetan people not against the Chinese government, but against minorities in Tibet such as the Han and Muslim traders who bore the brunt of the March 14 violence. The energies of the people are concentrated not on achieving political freedom in a modern state, but on recreating the fantasy-land of Shangrila. At a time when even Bhutan is opening up and adopting democracy, an independent Tibet can’t expect to hide behind a cloud curtain. It should be made clear to Hans and Muslims that they are welcome in Tibet.

The great Irish Rebellion of 1798 was led by Theobald Wolfe Tone, a radical Protestant inspired by the ideas of the French Revolution. The revolt was scuppered when the mass of Catholic peasants rose and massacred Protestant settlers, allowing the British to exploit Ireland’s ethnic division. The most famous peasant leader was the courageous but narrow minded priest Father Murphy.

Tibet has its share of Father Murphy’s. It is still waiting for its Wolfe Tone.

Five dead, nothing said

The brutal slaying of five young girls burnt to death when the shop they were working in was torched during the Lhasa riot went largely unreported in the western media.

It didn’t fit the western preconception that the Tibet uprising was all about Chinese troops firing on peacefully demonstrating monks.

Chinese TV showed convincing coverage of the outrage including interviews with distraught relatives but nearly two weeks later no western outlet had mentioned it. Finally, yesterday the New York Times carried an article which, while acknowledging the tragedy, so minced its words as to be insulting to the memory of the girls.

Let’s be honest, the western press operates under severe restrictions in China, but the restrictions are not new. Basically western journalists while denied access can write what they like. All the more shameful that they got this one wrong while the tightly controlled and censored Chinese press got it right.

The western media has not exactly covered itself with glory with its coverage of the Tibet crisis. On the contrary, it has scored a massive own goal by losing the trust of the middle class Chinese who in the past viewed it as an antidote to China’s laughable state-controlled media.

Echo of class struggle livens up China Congress

More than 30 years after the death of Chairman Mao the class struggle has again reared its head in Chinese politics but this time it’s the rich who are making the running.

At the recent Chinese People’s Political Consultative Congress, China’s richest woman, paper queen Zhang Yin, called for tax breaks for the rich and opposed moves to give workers the right to permanent contracts. Many delegates and commentators criticized her stance but other entrepreneurs supported her.

Zhang made her multi-billion dollar fortune importing waste from the USA to feed China’s insatiable demand for paper products. Her company, Nine Dragons Paper, is the largest paper manufacturer in China.

Zhang’s willingness to give open expression to apparent self-interest reflects the growing confidence of China’s wealthy. Cities are peppered with extravagant shopping malls stocking the glitziest western brands. The nouveaux riches increasingly enjoy flaunting their wealth in the form of flashy cars, designer clothes, jewellery, gated villas and uniformed servants. For the less well off, dozens of glossy magazines promote an in-flight fantasy world, and soap operas dramatizing the lives of the rich and famous are part of the daily diet on Chinese TV.

The Chinese leadership is only too aware of the widening gap between rich and poor. President Hu Jintao has made building a harmonious society the flagship policy of his term of office. He has abolished the centuries old agricultural tax and pumped money into poorer rural areas. But while Hu has pushed China in what observers describe as a more social democratic direction, he is treading a fine line; the last thing China’s leaders want is to kill the goose that lays the golden eggs.

Meanwhile the poor and middle income earners are increasingly concerned with the rising cost of living, as everyday items such as food, housing, education and health care go through the roof. They are unimpressed by the conspicuous consumption of the wealthy. A recent survey showed that 70 percent of the public, far from seeing the rich as glorious, regard them as self-serving and ungenerous. China’s rich have an image problem that commentators have advised them to address by following America’s wealthy down the road of large-scale philanthropy.

Trades unions, after decades of rubber-stamping management decisions under the planned economy are beginning to take a stronger line in defence of their members’ interests. Their initial targets have been foreign brands such as MacDonald’s and KFC, both recently investigated on suspicion of paying under the minimum wage, but some think it will not be long before some of China’s giant domestic corporations face challenges from organized labour.

The ruling Communist Party has welcomed the new rich into its ranks and hopes that “contradictions among the people” in Chairman Mao’s phrase, can be contained and resolved in one big happy family.

One thing that commentators on all sides have welcomed is that Zhang’s remarks have brought into the open the existence of different interest groups in society and initiated a debate about their competing claims. That, they argue, can only be a healthy development.