I’m on the road this week, calling from Sebastian, Florida, on the Atlantic coast. I’m here with the Ruckus Society at a training camp for Free Tibet activists. Half of the students at the camp are Tibetan exiles, the other half are college students on break.
The students learn to plan direct actions, strategic campaigning, banner making, how to blockade a doorway or a city street. There are workshops on dealing with the media and climbing.
The Tibetans, in exile from the Himalayas, seem out of place in Florida among the palmettos and the Spanish moss. The woolen robes of Buddhist monks have been replaced with lightweight cotton. I suppose that’s appropriate. They are a people without a country. Wherever they go, they are out of place.
The Tibetan people have been without a home since the People’s Republic of China invaded Tibet 50 years ago; the diaspora began in earnest in 1959 when the Dalai Lama fled to India. Forty years of exile have taken their toll, many of the original refugees have died, many of the Tibetans here at camp have never seen their homeland. Things are no better in Tibet. The Chinese government has destroyed 6,000 monasteries, monks, nuns and political dissidents have been tortured and killed.
Tibetans believe in reincarnation; when their religious leaders die, they look forward to their rebirth. The Panchen Lama, Tibet’s second-highest lama, is an 11-year-old boy. He has been a prisoner of the Chinese government for the last five years.
Hoping to avoid a similar fate, the 17th Karmapa, who is 14, last week fled from Tibet to India, on foot. That’s right, a 14-year-old boy and a few followers walked out of the Himalayas to freedom. Although everyone here at the camp was thrilled to hear of the Karmapa’s escape, some wonder where it will all end.
Tibetans here are worried that they too, will die in exile and worry even more that the current Dalai Lama will die in exile and his successor will be born into an occupied land.
Clearly, these thoughts have been in the mind of His Holiness the Dalai Lama as well. His government in exile has been extending proposals – probing the Chinese government to find if there is a way for the Tibetan and Chinese peoples to live together in peace.
Among the exercises we engaged in this week was a session in which we tried to think like the Chinese government. Why do they want to occupy Tibet and what will it take to create an environment to which the exiles can safely return?
For one thing, the Chinese government uses occupied Tibet as a buffer state between China and nations such as Nepal and India. The Dalai Lama has tried to address the Chinese concern for security by calling for the establishment of Tibet as an international zone of peace, from which all weapons would be excluded.
While that potentially solves one major issue, an even more difficult issue remains. The Dalai Lama cannot compromise on the need for religious freedom in Tibet. Tibet has always been a Buddhist nation. China, until the Communist revolution, was a Buddhist nation. Reports from China say Buddhism there, although officially discouraged, is growing rapidly. China is home to 40 million Protestants and five million Catholics. Last week, China installed five Catholic bishops who are more loyal to Beijing than Rome and the government is actively suppressing the Falun Gong spiritual movement.
After a week of talking Tibetan politics, it is clear that weapons can be negotiated, commerce can be negotiated, autonomy can be negotiated but ideas – especially ideas about religion and freedom – no oppressor can negotiate ideas. They’re just too powerful.
Free Tibet
I’m on the road this week, calling from Sebastian, Florida, on the Atlantic coast. I’m here with the Ruckus Society at a training camp for Free Tibet activists. Half of the students at the camp are Tibetan exiles, the other half are college students on break.
The students learn to plan direct actions, strategic campaigning, banner making, how to blockade a doorway or a city street. There are workshops on dealing with the media and climbing.
The Tibetans, in exile from the Himalayas, seem out of place in Florida among the palmettos and the Spanish moss. The woolen robes of Buddhist monks have been replaced with lightweight cotton. I suppose that’s appropriate. They are a people without a country. Wherever they go, they are out of place.
The Tibetan people have been without a home since the People’s Republic of China invaded Tibet 50 years ago; the diaspora began in earnest in 1959 when the Dalai Lama fled to India. Forty years of exile have taken their toll, many of the original refugees have died, many of the Tibetans here at camp have never seen their homeland. Things are no better in Tibet. The Chinese government has destroyed 6,000 monasteries, monks, nuns and political dissidents have been tortured and killed.
Tibetans believe in reincarnation; when their religious leaders die, they look forward to their rebirth. The Panchen Lama, Tibet’s second-highest lama, is an 11-year-old boy. He has been a prisoner of the Chinese government for the last five years.
Hoping to avoid a similar fate, the 17th Karmapa, who is 14, last week fled from Tibet to India, on foot. That’s right, a 14-year-old boy and a few followers walked out of the Himalayas to freedom. Although everyone here at the camp was thrilled to hear of the Karmapa’s escape, some wonder where it will all end.
Tibetans here are worried that they too, will die in exile and worry even more that the current Dalai Lama will die in exile and his successor will be born into an occupied land.
Clearly, these thoughts have been in the mind of His Holiness the Dalai Lama as well. His government in exile has been extending proposals – probing the Chinese government to find if there is a way for the Tibetan and Chinese peoples to live together in peace.
Among the exercises we engaged in this week was a session in which we tried to think like the Chinese government. Why do they want to occupy Tibet and what will it take to create an environment to which the exiles can safely return?
For one thing, the Chinese government uses occupied Tibet as a buffer state between China and nations such as Nepal and India. The Dalai Lama has tried to address the Chinese concern for security by calling for the establishment of Tibet as an international zone of peace, from which all weapons would be excluded.
While that potentially solves one major issue, an even more difficult issue remains. The Dalai Lama cannot compromise on the need for religious freedom in Tibet. Tibet has always been a Buddhist nation. China, until the Communist revolution, was a Buddhist nation. Reports from China say Buddhism there, although officially discouraged, is growing rapidly. China is home to 40 million Protestants and five million Catholics. Last week, China installed five Catholic bishops who are more loyal to Beijing than Rome and the government is actively suppressing the Falun Gong spiritual movement.
After a week of talking Tibetan politics, it is clear that weapons can be negotiated, commerce can be negotiated, autonomy can be negotiated but ideas – especially ideas about religion and freedom – no oppressor can negotiate ideas. They’re just too powerful.
(C) Mark Floegel, 2000