ความคิดเห็นที่ 77
You asked me to provide you with evidence of journalists having met Tibetans in Tibet who have expressed the view that the positives of Chinese rule outweigh the negatives.
Let us take attitudes towards the Beijing to Lhasa railway for starters. In the lead-up to the opening of that railway, the Dalai Lama expressed fears that the railway was going to aid in the Sinocisation of Tibet, and this was quickly seized on by Tibetans in exile support groups throughout the Western world as a development that would aid in Beijings alleged policy of genocide. Such claims of course, excited the imaginations of many ordinary Tibetans, many of who not surprisingly then expressed suspicions about what the new train line would bring them. But as many tourists and journalists to Tibet soon discovered, many urban ethnic Tibetans felt as though the positives would outweigh the negatives, and this is because an increasing number of Tibetans now have a very real material stake in the new economy. Their living standards are improving, and although Han retailers and small businesses stand to benefit more from increases in tourism and trade, the fact is that this will likely change as more and more Tibetans accumulate sufficient enough capital to start up enterprises of their own. And many Tibetans know this. Jonathon Watts, of The Guardian newspaper, reported that Among the four or five unscheduled meetings I had with Tibetans, most were looking forward to the economic benefits the line is expected to bring: 2.5m tonnes of cargo and 1m tourists and business people.
Indeed, Tibetans are divided on the issue of whether or not the benefits of being a part of China outweigh the negatives. Tibetans are divided, noted Jonathon Watts. There are those independence activists who expressed disapproval of the railway because they are against being a part of China, and who therefore regard the new line as evidence that Beijing is out to further entrench their rule, while others acknowledged the good that the trains might bring. I was surprised to find a living Buddha make one of the strongest arguments in favour of the railway, wrote Watts. "We've been too backward, too isolated for too long, said the lama, who asked that his name not be used. The rest of the world is in the 21st century. We are still in the middle ages. A more predictable advocate was the governor of the Tibetan Autonomous Region, Jampa Pahtsok. "It is unimaginable to have a high growth rate without a railroad. (see The Guardian, Sep.20, 2005)
And life is improving for many Tibetan farmers also, as Goldstein and Bealls research (mentioned earlier) shows. When Dexter Roberts came across villagers in Northern Tibets Nagqu Prefecture, he discovered that most of the villagers (barley farmers and herdsmen) were quite content. Life isnt bad at all, he quoted one villager as saying. (see "Tibet: Caught in Chinas Two Hands", Business Week Online, Sep.19, 2003).
Tony, I have never argued that most Tibetans dont want some ???? of self-government. I simply said that I think it is presumptuous to say that the majority of Tibetans want independence. I stand by that. Maybe they do? But to assert with confidence that most want independence without supporting such a claim with any empirically verifiable evidence of a quantitative nature is questionable, especially when there is a growing amount of qualitative evidence to show that Tibetans are divided on such issues. Even the Dalai Lama himself says that he no longer wants total independence from China, but instead, some ???? of self-government.
Take a closer, more objective look at Tibet today. The mass protests have stopped. As Robert Barnett has noted in his book, Lhasa: Streets with Memories, published by Columbia University Press, Tibet has become a dispute in which the main weapons are ????s of economic change that have benefits and drawbacks: the market, the leisure industry, mass tourism, population shift, uneven wealth, and consumerism.
It wont be all that much longer Tony, before Lhasas main thoroughfares find themselves hosting McDonalds, KFC, and Pizza Hut fast food outlets, along with Starbucks and other such global enterprises. And dont be too surprised if some of the license holders turn out to be ethnic Tibetans.
Tony, you argue that Tibet and Tibetans might [have] been very different had China not invaded, but for sure they would be sovereign masters of their own destiny.
Bollocks! How many ordinary Tibetans were ever the masters of their own destinies? Im not justifying Chinas invasion and occupation of Tibet, which was carried out for geopolitical reasons, and largely in response to continual incursions by Britain and Russia, and which therefore needs to be viewed in the context of the Cold War. The Kuomintang of course consistently made it clear that they intended on invading and occupying Tibet, and had they defeated the PLA, they probably would have gone on to do just that. Had that been the case, I bet the the U.S. State Department wouldn't have objected.
But let us not romanticise the life of Tibetans prior to the invasion either. As Michael Parenti (and many others like Leigh Feigon, in his book Demystifying Tibet) has documented, Tibet was a retrograde theocracy of serfdom and poverty, where a favoured few lived high and mighty off the blood, sweat, and tears of the many. It was a long way from Shangri-La.
And whatever wrongs and new oppressions introduced by the Chinese in Tibet, after 1959 they did abolish slavery and the serfdom system of unpaid labour, and put an end to floggings, mutilations, and amputations as a ???? of criminal punishment. They eliminated the many crushing taxes, started work projects, and greatly reduced unemployment and beggary. They established secular education, thereby breaking the educational monopoly of the monasteries. And they constructed running water and electrical systems in Lhasa.
Finally, we shouldnt lose sight of the fact that the Tibetans in exile and their supporters have consistently exaggerated the human rights abuses that have taken place in Tibet, as Barry Sautman and others have convincingly demonstrated. Such exaggerations from the Tibetan community in exile come as no surprise though. As Michael Parenti says:
For the rich lamas and lords, the Communist intervention was a calamity. Most of them fled abroad, as did the Dalai Lama himself, who was assisted in his flight by the CIA
throughout the 1960s, the Tibetan exile community was secretly pocketing $1.7 million a year from the CIA, according to documents released by the State Department in 1998. Once this fact was publicised, the Dalai Lama's organisation itself issued a statement admitting that it had received millions of dollars from the CIA during the 1960s to send armed squads of exiles into Tibet to undermine the Maoist revolution. The Dalai Lama's annual payment from the CIA was $186,000. Indian intelligence also financed both him and other Tibetan exiles. He has refused to say whether he or his brothers worked for the CIA. The agency has also declined to comment
.Today, mostly through the National Endowment for Democracy and other conduits that are more respectable-sounding than the CIA, the US Congress continues to allocate an annual $2 million to Tibetans in India, with additional millions for democracy activities within the Tibetan exile community.
The Tibetan issue is by no means clear-cut. It is complex, and in constant states of flux. Even Tibetan specialists find it difficult to fit together images and realities, and so one might imagine how much more difficult it is for the great majority who make no pretence to knowledge about Tibet and who, if interested, seek guidance in the ????ulation of their own images. Those who seek such guidance from the plethora of publications produced by the numerous existing Tibetan support groups should therefore read them with some considerable caution, given their obvious bias.
I am not a Tibetan specialist, by any means, but I have more confidence in the findings of independent academic researchers (who present more objective, more soberly balanced views that are based on empirically verifiable research data of both a quantitative and qualitative nature) than I do in both the claims of official Chinese sources and of the various Tibetans in exile support groups.
Oh, and by the way Tony, your puerile attempt to discredit me by dismissing me as an employee of the Chinese government really is pathetic, and only serves to further demonstrate the height of your ignorance. I have been in China now for five years, not four, and I am not, and never have been, employed by the Chinese government. I teach a university preparation program at a Chinese private university in Hangzhou for a Sydney-based college, and I am paid an Australian salary, in Australian dollars, by my employer of over 15 years, the N.S.W. Department of Education and Training. There is absolutely no pressure on me to two the Partly line in fact, nobody here has ever interfered with my teaching.
I suggest, Tony Martin, that you take a sedative and calm down. A few laxatives will no doubt help!
M.A.Jones
Hangzhou
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