Tibetan Terrorists and American Hypocrisy
// March 18th, 2008 // World for the Week
Free Quebec! Free Texas! Actually just give the whole lot back to the natives! What? That’s a little extreme you say? How can Canada remain Canada without a huge chunk of Quebec? What happened to all the history they shared together? If the public and the media continue to condemn the Chinese government and side with those bloody Free-Tibet protesters, I say our next step is to release Quebec from the evil grasp of the Canadian government and return USA soil to the Amerindians who got there first.
UPDATE: titled changed, yay.
For those who don’t think this is exactly headline news, here’s to quickly fill you in.
Free-Tibet Supporters: Free Tibet! Human rights abuse! Let Dalai Lama go back! No Olympics!
Tibetans: *burn stores* *harrass citizens* *threaten police*
Chinese government: LIES! ALL LIES! I’m giving you a deadline to stop burning things.
North American human rights groups: The Tibetans are suffering! Free Tibet! Shame on the Chinese government!
CNN: HEINOUS ACTS HAVE BEEN COMMITTED IN TIBET, PEOPLE DIED, SENSATIONAL STORIES, OMFGZ!!
WESTERN ATTENTION: America’s history of intervention
Now that we’re all on the same page, let’s browse around CNN and see what we can find.
The United States is urging Chinese restraint after days of violent protests in Tibet, even as a deadline passed for anti-Chinese protesters to surrender. U.S. State Department deputy spokesman Tom Casey said the United States is very concerned about the Chinese crackdown on Tibetan protesters. “We continue to urge restraint on the part of the Chinese government in terms of how it responds to these protesters.” (Source)
The issue of the U.S.’s tendency to intrude upon other nation’s sovereignty in the name of democracy aside (see also: Uncalled invasion of Russia during its Red-White civil war 1918, attack upon Canada for Manifest Destiny 1812, the irony of Woodrow Wilson’s 14 Points 1919, Truman’s doctrine in Greece and Turkey 1947, the fiasco in Korea 1950, the fiasco in Vietnam 1959, the badly-disguised raids for oil in the Persian Gulf 1990, the badly-disguised raids for oil weapons of mass destruction in Iraq 2003) … oops got carried away. Not my fault Uncle Sam has such a bad rap sheet. So the issue of U.S.’s tendency to storm into other people’s business to bring “justice and democracy” aside, isn’t it ironic the nation that prides itself on safety and security is recommending to a foreign superpower to use “restraint”?! Can’t you see what these so-called Tibetan protesters are doing? They’re hurting hundreds of innocent civilian. They’re bombing buildings. They’re burning schools and stores. They’re dosing FELLOW CITIZENS IN GASOLINE AND SETTING THEM ON FIRE.
Thirteen innocent civilians were burned or stabbed to death, [Tibet chairman] said, adding that calm had returned to Lhasa. On Friday, violence involving physical assault, destruction of property, looting and arson broke out in urban Lhasa. Rioters set fires at more than 300 locations, including 214 homes and shops, and smashed and burned 56 vehicles. In one case, a civilian was doused with gasoline and burned to death by rioters. Sixty-one members of the armed police were injured, including six critically. Rioters beat a police officer into a coma and cut a fist-size piece of flesh out of his buttock, he said. (Source, Notice how differently CNN and China Daily report the news? Not saying either side is right.)
TERRORISM: Called different names in different places
In the United States of America, you know what these “protesters” are called? They’re called TERRORISTS. Here, millions of tax dollars are put into tailing these people, bugging their homes, throwing them in jails, and DECLARING WARS ON THEIR COUNTRIES TO FIND THEIR CRIMINAL MASTERMIND IN CAVES IN AFGHANISTAN. Did you see the Chinese government telling Bush to NEGOTIATE with Osama Bin Laden?! Did you see Chinese Premier Hu raise international fervor when Iraq ignored the U.S.’s Ultimatum and the United States declared WAR?! So far the protesters ignored the Chinese deadline, and what. bloody. business does the U.S. State Department and Condoleeza Rice recommend “restraint” when they themselves went on to an invasion of a foreign country without the approval of the United Nations?!
When a region is under civil unrest, the government’s’ responsibilities are to ensure the safety and well-being of her citizens and STOP the violence through force, if needed. Dear Condi and Georgie, the next time Bin Laden bombs the shit out of your ranch and offices, sit down, breath, call a meeting, serve some cupcakes, and sort it all out like normal, responsible, statesmen because that way 1) no human right abuses occur 2) it really builds up American morale! Oh what irony!
MEDIA TRANSPARENCY: A total hypocritic farce
The next piece of article making news its rounds on CNN is that of a film crew who were evacuated from a hotel near Llosa due to the protest, or in the words of western media “banned access to the location” (you’d think that the press has more things to worry about when a recession the size of an army of giant mammoths is hitting their country).
As the [American film crew] were being driven away from the Xiahe area, [crew member Spence] Palermo said, they encountered a convoy of 20 Chinese military trucks headed toward Xiahe. “Most of them were loaded with Chinese soldiers, but … about half of the trucks were empty,” he said. “All I could think of was that they would soon be filled with the amazing, wonderful, kind and happy [Labrang Monastery] monks who would most likely be taken away to who knows where.” (Source)
My god Mr. Palmero, if you used more adjectives in addition to your “amazing, wonderful, kind, and happy” monks we’d have to buy you Baby’s First Dictionary, Volume II. What’s the point he’s trying to make here? That the Western media is transparent and people-powered while Chinese newspapers are heavily censored and state-controlled? I beg to differ. From what we’ve seen of the sensational Western press, stories are formed in such a way to sway public opinion and complement the photos taken for it. Take the picture below for example. The version CNN run is actually edited to remove the Tibetan protesters throwing rocks and jeering at the truck. What, are they trying to create another Tiananmen Square international outrage?
THE BANDWAGON: Think before you jump
To all these Free-Tibet groups springing up in North America, do they check their sources? Are many of their members from China? Have they been to China? Or are they so narrow-minded and short-sighted that you will fight for this through whatever means necessary? Kill the soldiers. Torture the civilians. Is this how they think the Chinese government will accommodate to your needs? The Dalai Lama calls this a “cultural genocide”. No, it absolutely isn’t. China is just as multicultural as Canada (56 different ethnicities FYI, I highly recommend this video which will give you a great awakening accompanied by awesome music, props to Momo for finding it!) Look at the temple pictured below. Does that look like religious and cultural prosecution? The government 
spends billions of dollar in bringing modern living to Tibet because it … just wants to put on a show for the West? Seems unlikely. The language is promoted. The culture is respected. The religion is allowed. So which part of this is “genocide”? Oh I’m sorry, the part about chasing terrorists out of the country? Gee I wonder why. I don’t deny that China has made mistakes in the past, but please, figure out the truth about Tibet before shouting at the top of your lungs.
HIDDEN AGENDA: CIA’s Shady Motive
On a side note, to back up the Video’s claim that Tibetan independence is funded by the CIA, consult the following excerpt from Rediff
The Central Intelligence Agency has stoutly refused to discuss its involvement in the Tibetan struggle but the story in Tuesday’s [Sept 1998] Los Angeles Times blows the lid off the Tibetan operation. The declassified historical documents provide the first inside details of the CIA’s decade-long covert programme to support the Tibetan independence movement. Part of the efforts was enlisting prestigious universities as Cornell in creating Tibetan study programmes. (Source)
Erm, does this sound like brain-washing to anyone? Quick history lesson: in the1940s-50s, the few men in charge of American foreign policy - US Ambassadors to Moscow W. Averell Harriman, George F. Kennan, and Charles E. Bohlen - all became “professionally-trained Russian experts” at an institution called Riga in Latvia. Some historians have claimed that this is one of the forces that broke diplomatic ties between the US and the USSR for these people were exposed to anti-Stalinist and anti-Communist doctrines at Riga. As history so clearly tells us, what do “specialized study programmes” on another cultural become? PROPAGANDA. And what does propaganda lead to? The Cold War - where two nuclear powers come within a hair’s length of unleashing destruction upon the entire civilized world.
I digress. According to the source above, “for much of the 1960s, the CIA provided the Tibetan exile movement with $ 1.7 million a year for operations against China, including an annual subsidy of $ 180,000 for the Dalai Lama.” Oh Uncle Sam, when will you ever learn that foreign powers don’t respond well when you march in your army of GI Joes and story-hungry news reporters on their soil? So yes, back to MY initiative of freeing Quebec, Texas, then returning the rest of our land to the Natives/Aboriginals! WOOT!
Sources I consulted/recommend
- Tibet Chairman: Police exercised great restraint from China Daily
- China Vows to Protect Territory from CBC
- American film crew kept from China protests from CNN
- In pictures: Lhasa street tense from BBC
- In the Field: Tibet in Turmoil from CNN
- Laughable - McCain’s Speech from SFFT
- Tibet Protest Photos
- Thank you Momo for bringing the video to my attention!
- Digg this - much appreciated.
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I have to thank you back for providing a much better and convincing post.
A lot of this is about America’s double standard… and activists, most of them probably cannot point where tibet is on the world map, being ignorant or oblivious to the actual situation in Tibet.
I don’t know if you read chinese but:
http://powerapple.com/modules.php?name=forum&file=viewtopic&forum=29&folder=a&topic=104963
Difference is, Tibet is a seperate Race from the Han Chinese fighting to keep their own identity, which the Beijing government is trying to destroy. China is a totalitarian country, so any comparison with the US is invalid. Thanks for playing, though. :biggrin:
@ Momo - Yes I do, thanks for the link
@ Anonymous Guy - Difference is, I can tell when people bother reading the heart of an article. The issue lies with Western media and government agendas. Thanks for commenting, though.
[...] Continue Reading [...]
Anonymous Guy: 55% of Tibetan population consists of Han. When I was in Tibet, I can feel the uniqueness of Tibet, it’s culture and religion, not a single part of it has been destroyed/replaced. And you can’t even find a single plastic bag in Tibet because the government prohibits it…
lol sry Crystal I’m feel like ‘i’m spamming’ your comments..
@ Momo - I LOVE having someone standing by me for this issue. You’re free to spam as much as you like!
@ Anonymous Guy: So people of different races can’t live peacefully in the same country? Damn, guess we’re gonna have to break up the United States then.
I just love how the US jumps on the “Free Tibet” bandwagon to protest against the genocide of a culture, when we’ve massacred our own fair share of cultures. And yes, we’re also hypocritical bastards. If Bush had been president during the LA Riots, I bet he would’ve unfavourably compared the rioters to terrorists.
The US media has a massive influence on Americans, which can either be a bad thing or a good thing. Americans are quick to criticise China or automatically show distrust of countries that have been painted by the US media as backwards or something menacing…or depict other nations’ media as biased (without looking at their own sensationalism).
What disturbs me is how uninformed an American media broadcast is at times. Take, for example, this News report on the Emo trend. Do these reporters not realise that those sites and such they refer to are satirical?
I get your point, and I agree with it; the US media is…let’s just say, in need of improvement. :dead:
Before someone comes on to comment that “at least the US media isn’t controlled by the government!” well…that may or may not be true, but really, have you seen how US media portrays issues pertaining to Big Pharma products? It’s insane. The US media automatically attributes an illness like depression, say, with a chemical imbalance when they have no proof of such/knowledge of such.
Either that or they portray a certain charismatic/attractive 2008 Presidential Candidate in such a good light that people love him.
As a formal IB student and Chinese Canadian, I applaud efforts. It’s very well writing for a blog.
At first, I thought I opened the wrong link to this page because of the the title. Was a little confusing, but ok. Might have been better off going straight to the point with the title, imo. Then again, my opinion means nothing for an aspiring dictator.
Keep in mind most of the audience here will be the ones you want to persuade. IE. I don’t know how open minded I’ll be reading this article if I didn’t know anything about Chinese.
As a Chinese Canadian, I can see validity in all of your arguments.
Anyways, good job. Good luck in Univ, btw. Looking forward to see you make a difference one day.
Okay, I see. Let’s ignore this, ignore ourselves and just keep things as they are because that’s the way it is. I am agnostic. I will go burn myself at the stake now. Thank you.
wow. i really enjoyed reading your post. it provided a lot of information about how we in America read filtered news rather then the raw news.
[...] headline news recently except the Tibet fiasco, so haven’t really got around to [...]
This issue will never end will it?
lovely blog xox
Wow, that is something to think about. Thanks for a great post.
There is always a group of “sympathetic americans” who will fight for the “rights” of any special interest group, even if they don’t fully understand what that group is really doing (or even worse, don’t even care). Sad
@Anonymous Guy. China has 56 races. By your logic, are you saying they all should break the country up? Quebec is facing exactly the same problem by being a niche of francophones in a continent of anglophones. They don’t have the same religion, culture nor background as the rest of Canada either. But does this condone their autonomy? I don’t think so. Besides, the Quebecois are doing a good job in preserving their identity. Ones culture and identity cannot be so easily relinquished through government policy. If they are, they would have no one to blame but themselves for believing in and practicing their own culture.
The Western world has already made a mistake with the Serbian-Kosovo split. Let it not happen again.
Oops, I mean for NOT believing in and practicing their own culture.
Very good post. learned lot, thanks. :biggrin:
very clear and reasonable post, thanks a bunch!
CNN and the like are set up for the stupid who can’t think of themselves
Hey! Just wanted to say I like your blog and your writing style. I think your blog is really well-written (which is unfortunately more than I can say for most people’s blogs) as well as really witty! In particular, I liked this post.
If you don’t mind, I’d like to recommend you submit it to yearblook.com. It’s a new sites determined to find the best blog posts and, at the end of the year, publish them in a book. I think you could be a strong contender.
Let me know if you have questions. Hope you check out the site!
Erica
I agree with you about the hypocrisy of the media when it comes to reporting stories on certain governments. When Western Tibetan independence supporters speak of cultural genocide I wonder if they ever consider why Tibet gets preferential treatment. There are many sovereignty movements that get little or no attention at all:
American Indians - Indian reservations continue to be undeveloped areas from what I have observed. Ceremonies are often merely entertainment for tourists. The culture is currently closely associated with Indian gaming and casinos, of which I am pretty sure there were none when the first Europeans arrived on the continent.
Canadian Indians - they suffered the indignities of the Canadian residential school system and the Gradual Civilization Act.
Native Hawaiians - Ceremonies have pretty much devolved to entertainment for tourists.
Okinawa - Indoctrinated to be “loyal Japanese” and offered up to the Americans as a sample of what the invasion of the Japanese mainland would be near the end of WWII. A third of the population was wiped out in the process. I believe it is still the poorest and least developed region of Japan.
The Seven Sister States - controlled by India. Some regions are probably under tighter control than Tibet under China.
Taiwan aboriginese, Maori of New Zealand, Australia aboriginese, the list goes on…
But then as an apathetic gen-xer my response is often, well yeah, whatever.
CHINESE LEAVE CANADA AND GO … yada yada yada, comment censored due to lack of intelligence …THREATS… blah blah blah.
See the above posters like John?! These are the Free Tibet protestors! True colours and all! Bet you he is a midget with no friends who wouldn’t even stand up to a fight with my granny!
The USA has been far more effective at destroying Hawaiian culture than China has been destroying Tibetan culture.
Only about 0.1% of the population of Hawaii are native Hawaiian speakers, and until recently Hawaiian was not even allowed to be taught in public schools. For several decades, teachers used to routinely beat children caught speaking Hawaiian. In contrast, Tibetan has always been the primary language of instruction in schools within Tibet. Although Tibetans are encouraged to learn Mandarin, it is possible for Tibetans to go all the way through college using only Tibetan. Of course, when the Dalai Lama ruled Tibet, peasants were not allowed to learn to read, and the literacy rate was a fraction of what it is today.
The Dalai Lama was a slave owner and cruel dictator, and all the Western propaganda doesn’t change that fact. While he might claim that he has no desire to reestablish serfdom in Tibet, the actions of his government in exile clearly indicate otherwise. Where is the Dalai Lama’s apology for the crimes against humanity he committed against his own people?
Although many in the Free Tibet crowd are well-intentioned idealists, they are ultimately fighting to restore serfdom and slavery in Tibet. Make no mistake, the former aristocrats and lamas want their land and slaves back. They want to reestablish the strict caste system and abolish land ownership by peasants. The exiled lamas and monks probably actually believe that a theocratic serfdom is the ideal form of government, but the aristocrats just want to return to a time when they owned everything.
I find it odd that people from a country that claims to value freedom and a seperation of church and state seek to reestablish a theocratic dictatorship based on serfdom and slavery. Make no mistake, when the Dalai Lama talks of “cultural genocide” he is mourning the death of a brutal slave society.
John…lol its the Chinese nationalist practice of censorship again, don’t worry about it, its poorly done research anyway, looks at one side of an argument, failing to understand …and possibly even look at the other side. Well done student nationalist!
Btw IB …really? oh wait you must be just in sciences and math only. I get it =)
The Buddhist clergy of Tibet were all slave owners. They supported “independence” because the Chinese government, being a “republic” had to at least pretend to be eliminating slavery.
If you want to see what sort of people those saintly buddhist clergymen were back in Tibet in the day I would suggest you take a look at the buddhist clergy in Thailand where their “Lama” declared drug addicts to have no souls, thus allowing the Thai monarchy free moral reign to literally butcher those they were calling “drug addicts” in the street and on television. In the west we think Buddhism is so peaceful.
The first Tibetan Dalai Lama was appointed by the Chinese Emperor. Tibet has for many centuries been a part of China or under control of China. There was never an “independent” Tibet.
Separatists of any stripe deserve no sympathy. Separatists always claim some sort of “unique” national oppression. In China this is pure BS as living under a Stalinist/Maoist/”Market Socialist” regime, everyone who isn’t a party boss is oppressed, and to claim some unique national oppression is narcissistic nationalist crap.
This is wonderful, keep it up! Free Tibeters are racist hate mongering hypocrites. Recently all over www I have witnessed these graceful people slandering NGO volunteers, tourists, Indigenous Tibetans, westerners that research and study in Tibet; labeling these people as conspirators that are effectively support a brutal regime. Most Free Tibeters have no shame!