In my earlier post, I had liberally invoked Gandhi and his philosophy to justify the Tibetan struggle for Independence and the changing forms of protest as Tibetans get more aggressive though not violent. I also beseeched that Tibetans be freed from the burden of their religion. Tibetans should not be asked to ignore the injustice done to them and remain passive under the guise of their Buddhist religion.
What I did not expect, was for the opposite side to do the same.
I chanced upon Miss Anne Wu’s article today titled “
Keep Tibet Away from the Games”. This post is a rebuttal to her article, among other things. She starts off innocently with positive strokes, introducing herself “
as a native of China with great affection for Tibetan culture” who was “
saddened by the violence that erupted in Tibet in March”. “Now finally here’s a Chinese who’s sympathetic to the Tibetan cause”, I thought. Going by the title of the article, I assumed she would be one of those who strongly believed in separating politics from sports, while not oblivious (read blind) to China’s faults. I was wrong. And how!
I read with increasing dismay as Miss Wu went on to justify China’s actions and what worried me was her personal reaction to the Tibet crisis. We all know the position of the Government of China on Tibet, but I had naively hoped that the ordinary Chinese person on the street would be different. Surely the Chinese citizens would feel differently. Many of them have suffered as much as the Tibetans due to China’s policies. Without delving too deep into history, earlier this month
Hu Jia, a Beijing based Human Rights activist, was
sentenced to three and a half years in jail for “"inciting subversion of state power”. And what about the Tiananmen Square Massacre? Have they forgotten it completely? Or did the PLA go about administering memory charms.
Wu cites that she learnt Tibetan folk dancing in Beijing and we are to understand from this that “
Tibetan culture is well respected among China's majority Han population”. Miss Wu is a text book example of a Chinese influenced by the PLA propaganda and media war against the Dalai Lama and Tibetans. China is trying to bring about this renewed sense of nationalism in China through its State controlled print and other forms of media. Chinese news channels repeatedly show scenes of Tibetans in Lhasa beating a Han Chinese man; stories of how a group of Chinese girls were burnt alive in a Lhasa store flood the papers; the Dalai Lama is projected as a “separatist” and a “spilttist”, bent on threatening the “sovereignty” of China. I am not condoning the violence in Lhasa. Prayers are held by Tibetans the world over for the victims of those riots, whether Tibetan or Chinese. Violence does not come easily to Tibetans. Those who did resort to violence clearly acted against their faith – out of sheer desperation.
Miss Wu then goes on to state that her feelings for Tibet were “
rekindled” when she saw an interview of “
an ordinary Tibetan woman who emotionally pointed out that the good life of the Tibetan people had been disrupted by violence committed by a few Tibetan mobs”.
What feelings were rekindled, I wonder. Feelings of superiority over the Tibetans as “rulers”. And “the good life” of Tibetans? Did I read right? One would surely have to be living in a cave if they thought that Tibetans were living it up in ‘China-occupied Tibet’. If this was true, why would thousands of Tibetans cross the border into India every year? If this was indeed true, why would the riots have happened in the first place? The “
ordinary Tibetan woman” who gave the “emotional interview” is obviously a ‘plant’. Another glowing example of China manufactured propaganda against the Tibetan Freedom Movement. Like the many others that China has engineered over the past few weeks.
Wu’s argument is that China should not be deprived of the dream to host the Olympics. I would like to inform her that China is definitely going to host the Olympics. No one will or can stop that from happening. Athletes will participate in the “most important global athletic competition”. But what China did not account for or anticipate, while planning their coming out party, was that it would have so many gate-crashers. Protestors against China's human rights abuses, violations and tyranny will be there in full strength. In spirit if not in physical presence. Voices will be raised in protest, and China cannot stop that.
Miss Wu goes on to say “It would be wrong to assume that the Chinese do not have free minds and that the government orchestrates everything. It's not surprising that blogs in China have exploded with anti-splittist and anti-West comments of the "Fen Qing" (furious young surfers), expressing anger over the violence and the Western media's one-sided, twisted reports. Overseas Chinese have also been energized. A video on YouTube, "Tibet was, is, and always will be a part of China," produced by a Canadian Chinese student, was clicked 1.2 million times and received 72,000 comments in three days. Patriotism and nationalism are strong among the Chinese. The power of the people's voice should not be underestimated.”
I am with you on this Miss Wu. Patriotism and nationalism are strong not only among the Chinese but also among the Tibetans. The power of the people’s voices should definitely not be underestimated. And you will realize this when the voices of Tibetans and those who support Tibet ring clear and loud, “FREE TIBET”.
Now here comes the fun part. Get this. Wu goes on to offer some advice to Tibetans using the cloak of Buddhism. She urges Tibetans to “let go” of “historical burdens”. “Buddhism's art of meditation offers wisdom: Let go, develop a refined awareness of the present moment, and reach a clarity of mind”, she writes. I want to laugh out loud. Does she really expect to lull Tibetans into inaction with these words. It somehow reminded me of what Desmond Tutu once said, “When the missionaries came to Africa, they had the Bible and we had the land. They said ‘let us close our eyes and pray’. When we opened them, we had the Bible, and they had the land”. Now Wu is invoking our religion to coax us to stay calm and “let go”, while China continues to ravage our land. Such a brilliant argument I say. Sparkling!
And here is the final blow. She ends her diatribe with Gandhiji’s words. “God ultimately saves him whose motive is pure”. This is supreme irony. Wu borrowing words from the greatest apostle of non-violence to justify and defend the actions of China, who could probably be called the biggest violator of all values sacred to a human being. It is jarring and one tends to think that Wu was merely trying to sound more eloquent, using words utterly out of context.
The Dalai Lama has always asked his people not to hate the Chinese. He says he prays for them too. But it is getting increasingly difficult to conjure up any amount of compassion for those who harbor such strong feelings of hate against us. Over the past few weeks, the antagonism of the ordinary Chinese citizen against Tibetans has been growing stronger by the day. One would condone the Chinese inside China, given that they are misled by the Government propaganda against Tibet. But what about the Overseas Chinese and Chinese students studying in foreign universities. They have free access to the news and would be aware of their country’s abysmal human rights record. They are living, working and studying in secular countries which are democracies. They enjoy various freedoms of speech and expression (which they do not have back in China. Err, aren’t these the reasons they emigrated in the first place?) One would expect them to atleast be sane about the current situation, and not launch headlong into an offensive campaign against Tibetans.
We have pro-China supporters attacking Tibetan supporters in San Francisco. The pr-China crowd even started beating a Chinese man who stood by the Tibetans, till some of the Americans standing by shouted “This is not China, Stop!”. Chinese students at Duke University interrupted a planned candlelight vigil supporting freedom in Tibet on the campus. Isn’t it shocking? And now there is
mounting evidence that the “Tibetan” protestor who “attacked” a wheelchair bound torch bearer in Paris is actually a Chinese living in Japan. To what depths will China sink to next?
Well Miss Wu, you have taken Buddha and Gandhi from me. So allow me to pull in Shakespeare. I say to the Chinese:
“If you prick us, do we not bleed?
If you tickle us, do we not laugh?
If you poison us, do we not die?
And if you wrong us, shall we not revenge?”
Will it come to this?
Bod Gyalo!
