Talk:Tibet

For older discussion, see Archive 1, Archive 2

The Immigration Issue

All too often, I hear this sort of rhetoric from Free Tibet supporters:

"All these Chinese people coming in, exploiting the economic growth, monopolizing all the benefits, etc. etc. Soon... we'll be a minority in our own land, blah blah blah... we don't want their kind here, blah blah blah..."

Doesn't that sound eerily familar to those anti-immigrant/white supremacist bigots you hear in the US? "We don't want so many of them coming here, taking all our jobs, milking the system, breeding here to get citizenship, 'mudding up' our race, etc...."

This sentiment (I might say even racist) is evident under certain sections in this article as well. I am not saying it should be removed or even edited (as it is only one POV), but I think there needs to be ANOTHER POV to this particular issue from the Chinese side. PRC citizens are human beings and have the moral right to travel within their OWN country when seeking opportunities like you and I. They are not simply leeches as Tibetan separatists writing in this article are trying to portray them.--Lssah 88 16:25, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

Well, I have certainly thought of the parallels between these issues, but I don't really remember seeing it mentioned anywhere, which implies that perhaps not so many people have thought about it. However, I don't really see the point of bringing U.S. immigration policy, white supremacism, etc. into the discussion. The fact of the matter is that just about every single country in the world restricts immigration, most more stringently than the United States. And they certainly would all try to restrict immigration if there was a possibility that a group of outsiders equal to or greater than the current population was going to move in and change the political system; this is precisely the situation that Tibet is facing. Can you imagine what would happen if, for example, several hundred million people from India started moving into China and seemed interested in affecting the political process? There would be an approximately 0% chance that the PRC government would fail to at least try to stop them. (Personally, I have rather unusual views on the immigration question, but, of course, my personal views are not relevant to this article at all. It just seems disingenuous to criticise Tibet for wanting to do what literally any other country on Earth would try to do in the same position).

You say, "PRC citizens have the right to travel where ever they want in their OWN country...", but here you simply assume the answer to the question, "Is Tibet part of China?", which is, in fact, the subject of vigorous debate.—Nat Krause^(Talk!) 16:37, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

The assumptions I am making is that the PRC currently exerts sovereignty over Tibet and this is legally recognized internationally including the UN and major relevant countries which had initially refused recognition (India and US namely). One can simply grab an atlas from the library to see that Tibet is shown nominally as part of the PRC and not as "territory under illegal occupation" or something similar. Regardless, the question of whether Tibet is part of China can be debated based on a moral and political standpoint, I am debating on the latter. Given that framework, any person born within the PRC naturally have the right to travel within PRC borders. By saying PRC citizens (Han and non-Han likewise) shouldn't be able to travel to autonomous regions because it might threaten the culture of that region, it's tantamount to suppressing freedom of travel. The rights of Tibetans and Han Chinese goes both ways. --Lssah 88 20:16, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

It is true and provable that the PRC exerts sovereignty over Tibet and that its sovereignty is recognised by the UN, the United States, and India. This has everything to do with the fact that they are in effective control there. However, when you start talking about people's right to freedom of travel, you are now addressing the question of what is right, which is something else entirely. I agree that preventing PRC citizens from living in Tibet limits their freedom of travel, but, as I've said, every country on Earth would limit the freedom of travel under these circumstances, and there's no obvious reason why Tibet should be an exception.—Nat Krause^(Talk!) 20:22, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

The obvious reason is, Tibet is not a country on earth. It's currently a part of PRC according to the facts you just said you had "recognized". --Callofktulu 03:10, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

No, what I just said is that a bunch of politicians have said that Tibet is part of China. That doesn't make it true. It seems to me that you are confusing two different things here. On the one hand, it's true that the Chinese government is in control of Tibet. This is a statement of what is, and anything that follows from it is a matter of who can do what. As for the question of whether Han people can move to Tibet, the answer is that they can move to Tibet if the PRC government says they can, and they cannot move there if the government says they can't. Period. That's because the government controls the country. On the other hand, if you want to talk about somebody's rights, then you are now talking about the way things should be. And, when you come down to it, Tibet should be controlled by Tibetans, which, in the opinion of almost everyone in the world, means that they should be able to control who comes into their own country and who doesn't.—Nat Krause^(Talk!) 20:22, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

Well, whether Han migration to Tibet is 'right' or not is entirely subjective. If I was raised in the PRC and have been taught my whole life that Tibet is part of the motherland, and now I am told I can't live there because my government succumbed to international pressure forbidding Hans from moving there, I would feel pretty pissed.--Lssah 88 22:07, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

In my opinion, since the Chinese government controls and exerts sovereignty over Tibet (or more accurately "Xizang"), Tibet is a part of China. I think what Nat Krause should have questioned instead is whether Tibet should have been a part of China (possibly in legal terms), which is of course open to debate. Heilme 23:01, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

---

The key is, Dalai and his followers are only a small group of people, who are not living in Tibet, could barely speak in the Tibetan language, and know little about what's going on in today's Tibet. They don't know what people living there are currently thinking. They don't care about their opportunities of development and prosperity. They just want to resume their past previlege and noble status in Tibet (as serf masters), and they have been detached from Tibet for years. So I don't understand why Western people think of their unrepresentative, bias, and sometimes absurd views (e.g. the view regarding Western development policy and the railway) as important ones?

Most of the pro-Tibet opinions in the article are from "Tibetans in-exile", I very much doubt the opinions of Tibetans currently living in Tibet are adequately represented in this article, specifically the younger generation that were born and raised in the post-Mao era. I suspect their views on Chinese rule would differ from those who experienced the worst of it during the earlier phases. Maybe there should be a another POV section dedicated to their views? BTW, the above statement is written by someone with an emotional outburst and neglected to sign his post, it was NOT written by me!--Lssah 88 22:19, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

I agree that the Dalai Lama and his followers are a smaller group of people than Tibetans in China, but that doesn't mean anything about any assertions or claims they may make, which have to be judged on their truthfulness and accuracy and not how many followers they have in comparison to other groups. Also the contention that they can "barely speak in the Tibetan language" is incorrect. The Dalai Lama speaks fluent Tibetan as do most of the exile CTA (Central Tibet Administration) officials. As to whether they know what is happening in Tibet istelf, they have tried to organize fact finding missions a few times, but it seems these were rebuffed by the PRC. Perhaps it would be best if third parties could be allowed to find out what is really going on. --Aishwarya888 20:39, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

Let me ask you a question, if Dalai Lama's "fact finding missions" never landed in Tibet for whatever reasons, how can he and his followers stated any "truth" regarding contemporary Tibet? Where do their "truthfullness and accuracy" come from? BBC? VOA? LOL... --Callofktulu 03:10, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

Well, I don't know, Mr. Ktulu. Perhaps from the thousands of refugees who have fled. Perhaps someone bribed some Chinese military to smuggle media in and out. Perhaps certain journalists whether Chinese or not, have uncovered things. Who knows, right? There does seem to be an amazing proponderence of evidence in support of at least many of the CTA and Tibetan exiles' claims. I also know that EU officials visited Tibet a while ago and were not happy with what they saw. I have looked at some of what the PRC has put out about "progress" in Tibet and all I can say is that no where on earth has such paradisical "progress" ever been achieved...so that PRC info is suspect, to say the least. --Aishwarya888 20:45, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

I'd love to have a section describing the views of Tibetan people in Tibet. However, as I assume you're aware, Tibet is a police state, and, therefore, its people cannot freely express their views under penalty of being tortured in prison. How do you propose to write such a section, then?—Nat Krause^(Talk!) 20:22, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

I don't think that possible -- Not because Tibet is a "police" state, but due to the weird logic here in Westerner's mind that would pre-assume anything positive to be PRC propaganda. Your bias created this paradox: only people jailed by PRC (therefore cannot write here) can tell truth. Personally, I do NOT think myself has the authority to tell what the current Tibeten people REALLY think, but I can add some of my personal observations. According to my experience, neigther those pro-PRC nor pro-Dalai claims are true. People living in Tibet generally don't have much love in CCP, but don't have much hate in them, either. As to Dalai, they think he is still the highest religious leader (you will NOT get jailed if you expressed so), but not many of them want him back as the political leader (yes, this one will put you in jail), because there is just no reason for them to do so. Remember most Tibetans are former serfs or descendents of serfs while Dalai and his followers were serf masters, and it is TRUE that when CCP launched massive land reform in late 50s, many Tibetan serfs supported them. That's why Dalai lost the battle so quickly. So if you have time the best way is to go there and see it yourself. The other thing I heard when I was there, was that during some time in late 70s or 80s there were several rebells in Tibet. Maybe someone can add something about it? --Callofktulu 03:10, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

I very much agree with you though I myself am not a Tibetan. The revolt of Tibetan serfs are one reason why the Dalai Lama lost quickly to the Chinese armies. And in the 70s or 80s, there are armed conflicts involving Tibetan separatists (I am not too clear on the detail) and they attack a Chinese military base there. But since then, the Dalai Lama has encouraged peaceful movement (which won him the 1989 Nobel Prize), and there hasn't been much conflict since. Heilme 23:24, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

Immigration to Tibet is not about ethnic Chinese "seeking opportunities." I used to teach at a college in China. I know how the system works. The government sends recruiters to the campuses they tell the students that it's their patriotic duty to work in Tibet and they'll get priority when they apply for housing in major city later. I don't know if what the recruiters say is really true, but the students seem to believe them. Every ethnic Chinese ultimately wants to live in a major city and considers living in Tibet a sacrifice. I asked if the students if they wanted to learn about Buddhism and they seemed to be a bit surprised to learn that Tibetans are Buddhists.

So is there really a massive wave of Han migration to Tibet or not? You seem to be implying that those workers travel reluctantly to Tibet for a temp job so they can find better housing in a major city in China Proper later, and NOT settling down in Tibet right after. I would hardly call Lhasa a major city.--Lssah 88 02:57, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Chinese do not have the right where they like in their own country. There is a housing registration (houkou) system. (The police followed me home once, so even I had register.) If you look at Chinese personal ads, women write things like, "I want to meet a man who has houkou for such and such a section of Beijing."

There is indeed a regulation over inter-provincial migration (such as rural workers moving into cities). This is because urban people usually get privilege such as health/education from the city-governments and these city officials don't want to pay extra money for rural immigrants. As a result, it's very hard for rural immigrants to get resident status in the city. But as of last year, the Chinese government has abolished such restriction in many big eastern cities so rural immigrants can enjoy benefit given by the city governments too (not yet Shanghai I think). All in all, I think your statement is misleading. Chinese do have the right to live wherever they please within China. But not necessarily able to easily change their resident status (such as changing from a Anhui resident status into a Shanghai resident status). Heilme 23:18, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

There was no agitation about the condition of the serfs prior to 1951 and no reason to think they welcomed the Chinese Communists. This issue is something the communists created after the fact.

This is just naive. The success of any governance has its deep social roots and reasons. "There was no agitation about the condition of the serfs prior" is also untrue. CCP might be evils, but they were not idiots. They were very smart in mobolizing people and getting support from the mass. There's no reason denying it.

The reason to deny it is because it's not true. There no Tibetan communist movement before Chinese troops. In the 1950s, the entire politburo of the Communist Party in Tibet was ethnic Chinese. The party took away the peasants' property, herded them into communes, made them slaves, and create a famine (which Tibet never had when it was independent). Even the Panchen Lama, the CCP favorite Tibetan, denounced the policies. The revolt in 1959 had support from all segments of Tibetan society.Kauffner 02:07, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

On the issue of why Tibet fell so easily to the communists: The monastaries wanted Tibet to be a nation dedicated exclusively to religion. To them, the army represented secular and British influence. It was therefore starved for funds.

As far as what Tibetans really think, there's a simple way to find out. Have a multi-party election.Kauffner 11:57, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

Propaganda

This is one of the most shocking articles I have read on Wikipedia and it goes to show how far American based websites will go to please the Chinese government.

There has been a near destruction of a people with an entirely separate and identifiable cultural history and identity under the actions of the People's Republic of China. Lhasa has had its cultural and ethnic soul ripped out, the people live in terror of being accused of pro-Independence political views.

The mass murder of monks and nuns alone demonstrates Chinese attitude to freedom of expression. Children were forced to shoot their own parents. Nuns and monks were forced to have sexual intercourse in the streets before being crucified and/or buried alive. Modest estimates alone put the total number of civilians murdered at 300,000

This entire article is a sham and the perpetrators know it. The abuses against the Tibetans were laid open very clearly by secret footage smuggled out of Tibet by the BBC and several other European television networks.

More fool you lot for putting up with this shambolic whitewashing.--Iamlondon 01:17, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

"This entire article is a sham and the perpetrators know it" is a personal attack on the editors of this article. Either prove your accusations, or apologise, or else I will remove these comments from the talk page.—Nat Krause^(Talk!) 01:19, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

Firstly, it was a direct attack on certain contributors. Secondly, with all due respect, the inclusion of PRC quotations and statistical estimates regarding the genocide which took place in Tibet from 1959 onward is, frankly, ridiculous. If you feel the need to remove my objection then I question the efficacy of any 'editing'. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M92HetGpkUM&search=tibet - Perhaps you would like to watch this video.--Iamlondon 01:41, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

Please do not vandalize this article into a Free Tibet site, it needs to be as balanced and neutral as possible. Also, showing that video from an obvious source is bad taste when one can easily find pictures of lamas talking on cellphones from Chinese sources trying to purport the economic prosperity they are bringing to Tibet. Also, you still haven't provided sources to your claims of: "The mass murder of monks and nuns alone demonstrates Chinese attitude to freedom of expression. Children were forced to shoot their own parents. Nuns and monks were forced to have sexual intercourse in the streets before being crucified and/or buried alive. Modest estimates alone put the total number of civilians murdered at 300,000" Please bear in mind that any citations you provide to these accusations must be independently verfied by neutral sources.--Lssah 88 15:42, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

I would like to see such claims' sources. Or cite them somewhere if you please. While I may personally think that some horrific things have happened in Tibet, I also realize that if anyone makes specific assertions, as opposed to generalized opinions, it would be nice if you can provide sources as I am certain some of us wish to check them on our own and draw our own conclusions. This is the only way what is the truth can be discovered in this medium. Likewise, since the exile CTA's info needs to be verifiable and supported by facts, I wish to see more sources or citations about improvements or benefits to Tibet that don't just rely on what the PRC gov't has to say, as all of us human beings know that gov'ts have their own interests at heart when they present info. That info must still be verifiable and supported by facts. --Aishwarya888 20:46, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

Regardless of whether it is information from the PRC govt or the CTA in exile, information has to be verifiable and backed up by sources where necessary. Iamlondon and others like him/her do not appreciate their own biases. --Sumple (Talk) 00:45, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

By the way, Iamlondon, I watched the movie you linked to, and, overall, I thought it was quite good, and not terribly propagandistic. I would recommend it to anyone who understands English. Anyway, I'd like to know what specific changes you want to make it the article, so we can discuss them. Or, just go ahead and make changes as you see fit, and other users will change them back if they disagree, at which point we can discuss if necessary. Of course, anything you add should be verified from neutral sources, unless it is added in the context of describing someone's opinion.

I'm a bit confused by your statement, "the inclusion of PRC quotations and statistical estimates regarding the genocide which took place in Tibet from 1959 onward is, frankly, ridiculous". Even the documentary you linked to includes some statements from Chinese officials. The people in the PRC are humans just like you and me and they deserve to have their statements considered.—Nat Krause^(Talk!) 03:46, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for your comments. My first point is to say that I am not a vandaliser, so no fear there - were I such I wouldn't be having this discussion. Neither am I a 'Free Tibet Nut'. I'm actually nothing more important than a Roman Catholic passionate about the fate of forgotten peoples. Quoting the PRC on statistics referring to Tibet is dangerous because it plays into the hands of a nation with one of the most horrendous human rights records in the current age. There is some shameful financial B___ Kissing going on between several western nations and a nation which has utterly rejected the principles of freedom that the west itself holds dear...or claims to. I find it remarkable that in the face of unlimited eyewitness testimony, secret footage and countless news programmes concerning Tibet that anyone would question that the state of affairs in Tibet is anything other than deplorable. In Lhasa alone (a city whose beauty has been eradicated by the destruction of ancient structures of world heritage status) Tibetans face terribly high unemployment and poverty rates because they will not conform with their Chinese neighbours. Recent propaganda concerning further transport route incursion into Tibet revolves around the notion of a backward little corner of 'Greater China' in need of fatherly development from Peking. This article achieves the job set out by the Chinese Government - to convince outsiders that although there has been trouble in Tibet things are actually not so bad. One might tell that to the several thousand Tibetans who have endured prison in Chinese gaols for no greater crime than asking for their political freedoms as Tibetans - a sovereign nation with a history of foreign diplomatic relations, its own armed forces, its own language, currency, racial identity and literary/artistic traditions utterly separate from the Chinese. Information should not have a political father, I quite agree - which is why this article is pretty redundant - it presents an image of Tibet far different from the current and past history of Chinese involvement in that country, an image that says, "Yes, things aren't great...they're 'so so'" when in fact things are atrociously bad for Tibetans and wonderfully promising for dollar-driven Chinese immigrants. 'Balance' in this article has resulted in 'Bias' by default. And I am terribly saddened that so many will read this article and come away relatively unconcerned for a people who continue to flee their homeland by the thousands each and every year. Reducing the truth of conditions in Tibet to a series of external links just isn't good editing at all.--Iamlondon 20:16, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

Man, your argument only leads to one reasonable conclusion: "Free China". Why Tibet is so special here? Dollar-driven Chinese immigrants? Is it your habit to use racist words? Most people in this world are dollor-driven. Americans, Britishers, you name it. Money talks! I really doubt your capability of making neutral judgement. --Klim2000 23:50, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

With regards to the Wylie system and transliteration of Tibetan names into English:

Many scholars using Wylie solve the problem of which letter to capitalize by not capitalizing any letter. This appears to be a fruitful choice since Tibetan writing has no such capitalization. I recommend this approach be used. Capitalize the letter when using a more phonetic transliteration but leave the Wylie version uncapitalized.

For example... Shigatse "gzhis-ka-rtse". This looks a lot better and is more accurate then using "Gzhis-ka-rtse." (Of course, if you can get written-Tibetan versions, so much the better.)

I should also mention that some translators who do capitalize letters have modified Wylie a bit and capitalize the first letter that is actually pronounced. Thus, our example above would be... "gZhis-ka-rtse." I can see why some people would use this style as a word like Gelug looks better as "dGe-lugs" than "Dge-lugs." (Similarly for Lama as "bLa-ma" as opposed to "Bla-ma.") It is just a pedantic choice though as I have said Tibetan writing has nothing comparable to capitalization. I do note that the this style is followed in the Geography section of the Tibet Article. (A-mdo, Khams, dBus-gTsang, and mNga-ris are used.) This style is not used in the Cities section. So whatever choice of Wylie style is made, it would be nice to see it consistently used throughout the article.

The Wylie system is only used to adhere to accuracy and so that researchers can accurately reference any cited Tibetan texts. Owing to the complexity of Tibetan writing, mere phonetic transliterations would lead to confusion for researchers since spoken and written Tibetan vary widely, as anyone familiar with Tibetan can testify. Thus if you are reading a work in English on some Tibetan Buddhist text and wish to look up the original, you would rather have the Wylie spelling so you can reference the Tibetan work more easily then trying to search out all the possible Tibetan orthographic spellings that would give rise to a phonetic spelling.

I hope this has been helpful. I could go into more detail as to why Wylie is necessary both for researchers and for Western students of Tibetan Buddhism - all of the issues related to actual Tibetan pronunciation as opposed to the way Tibetan is written - but this would entail an article in and of itself. And as I am only a casual reader whose knowledge of written Tibetan is second hand, I leave that for more qualified people.

--Aishwarya888 20:13, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

Aishwarya, thanks for your input on this. I agree that we need to have Wylie spelling (either that, or Tibetan characters, or both) available for names. However, I think if there is separate article for the subject, then we don't have to give the Wylie spelling here (that's the way we generally do it for Chinese words).

Unfortunately, I don't quite agree with you about capitalisation, although this is essentially an issue of style, so it's hard to argue over. I prefer to capitalise all Romanised words as they would be in English. I figure, English has fairly simple capitalisation rules, so we might as well apply them across the board. I've been doing a bit of Wylie input here and there lately, so Wikipedia is gradually tending more to this style: Bstan-'dzin Rgya-mtsho (whereas some writers would make it bsTan-'dzin rGya-mTsho bstan-'dzin rgya-mtsho, or bstan 'dzin rgya mtsho). This is the style that was apparently recommended by Wylie in his original paper laying out his system, and it was also recommended to me by Wikipedia's Nathan hill, who knows more about this stuff than I do.—Nat Krause^(Talk!) 04:57, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Ethnicity and Statistical Variance (Han, Tibetan, and Other?)

With regard to official PRC statistics on population and population groups in historical Tibetan areas, I want to ask for some clarity, if possible, on the "Other" category. This is important as some of the ethnic minorities categorized by the PRC as "Other" in terms of the "Major Ethnic Groups In Greater Tibet by Region, 2000 Census" chart on the Tibet Article, may be considered by Tibetans as Tibetan groups.

There is some variance that may appear as groups like Sherpas, Monpas, Jongpos, Lhopas and others which are culturally and historically Tibetan groups are not to my knowledge recognized as such by the PRC. With regard to Sherpas themselves, I am aware that they reside more in central Tibetan areas and also in Nepal (where they are considered a distinct ethnic group of Tibetan ancestry). I am unaware of any of the other groups, but some exiled Tibetans have made some reference to these groups in the past.

I wonder if anyone has any more info on these groups particularly as they relate to this issue and the Tibet Article, as well as the various views by the PRC, the Tibetan Gov't in exile, and any opinions by any people from any of these ethnic groups themselves as to their status and categorization. Summaries of this info could be included in the Demographics section of the article so that readers could gain a more accurate or balanced idea of cultural and historical Tibet. More detailed presentations of this info could better help any specific Wikipedia articles on the groups themselves.

It's just a idea and a question.

Thank you for any help you can provide me with on this. --Aishwarya888 20:49, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

Wiki Project China

I do not think that this article should be part of wiki project china (ie not be related ro china relanted articles, but rather tibet related ones) It is a very politically contencious issue; Tibet, its occupation is illegal under international law and China has committed human rights abuses in Tibet. Who agrees with me?--Segafreak2 11:07, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

It's fine where it belongs. Tibet's status is as much of a concern to the CCP as it is to Tibetan separatists.--Lssah 88 22:13, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

A majority of the territory of what is known as "historical Tibet" is now part of China. So the current setting is okay. "Legal" or "illegal", international viewpoint is not always neutral. Heilme 22:52, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

Historical Tibet and historical China overlap. For long periods both governments performed some governmental functions in the same territory with respect to the Tibetan and Chinese populations. Fred Bauder 17:42, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

I agree that the China project template should stay, but, in order to assuge any hard feelings, I have moved the Central Asia project template so that it appears first.—Nat Krause^(Talk!) 18:14, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Will Tibet ever be indefinitely free?

It just occurred to me that the Republic of China also claims Tibet to be a part of China. So say history is reversed and the communists fled to Taiwan with the ROC remaining in control of the mainland. Chiang Kai-Shek would still have gone after Tibet and forcibly re-integrate it with China. So it seems like no matter what happens, and regardless of what the ruling government, Tibet will always be a part of China at various points in her history. It might become temporarily detached from China when she succumbs to internal turmoil and division (god forbid it ever happens again), but it will always be re-integrated back with China by a strong unifier, ala Mao Zedong/Qin Shi-huang type. The region is too strategically important for any sane Chinese leader to ignore.--Lssah 88 03:23, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Finally somebody understood it! Yes, so it is almost equally insane to argue with average Chinese that Tibet should be freed. I am a proud Chinese. Freeing Tibet sounds like cutting Chinese legs to me. I am ready to fight again any attempt of freeing Tibet! Really! --Klim2000 23:57, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, well Poland used to be part of Germany, and part of Russia. That's no reason why it should be so now.Skookum1 17:19, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

It is possbile

Whoever wants to separate Tibet has to demolish China first. That is simply the fact. And mostly, only the (potential) enemies of China want to do so and therefore they constantly make propaganda to advocate "free Tibet" compaign, which is "weakening China" essentially. For general western public, think twice before response such advocates with any personal energy. Like think twice when somebody claimed there was weapons of massive destruction in Iraq. --Klim2000 23:40, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

Evaluation by the Tibetan exile community

After reading through this section, I can't help but notice the latter part of it are either full of self-contradictory statements or purely plain PRC bashing. It speaks of the need to improve educational/healthcare access to Tibetans & the ability to compete in the economy, yet rails against the logistical basis on which it must be achieved. How could access to better education come about when people have no ability to migrate and settle in Tibet? How can Tibetans be competitive if they are perpetually kept in the nomadic lifestyles of feudal times? How can Tibetans benefit economically when they remain isolated and have no knowledge of or exposure to people beyond the next hill or mountain? How can the economy improve without the logistical infrastructure to channel in technology, capital, entrepreneurs, and skilled labor? It may be true that Tibetans are by and large unable to compete economically in the status quo. However, by NOT embarking on projects like the railway, they will only remain impoverished, and the socio-economic gap between Tibetans & Hans will be even greater. Have the exiles ever considered these matters?

Also their complaint about the government's efforts to rebuilding their monasteries is nonsensical. Maybe the CCP SHOULD NOT restore those destroyed monasteries, since Tibetans don't like it anyways and the saved expenses could surely be used to buy more guns and bullets for the PLA instead. Maybe they should also stop building schools, hospitals, sewers, water works, transportation, electricity, communications, and anything else that could be used to remind the Tibetans of 'Chinese taint' that once existed there while we are at it. --Lssah 88 15:00, 21 July 2006 (UTC)