Tibet Protests Turn Violent

The way I see it, the Chinese shouldn't even be there. This is like having fanatic muslim riot police in London.
http://edition.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/asiapcf/03/14/tibet.unrest/index.html#cnnSTCText

Is anyone evening keeping up with the events?
I wanna hear people's thoughts on the issue.

Personally I'm not up to date on the whole issue, but my current, only somewhat educated opinion is that China needs to but out of other regions that reject its control and start taking better care of its own people.

Sorry, I haven't really been following the issue. I guess this situation was to be expected, it's not like Tibetans are going to wake up one day and be happy with China occupying them.

Vaxillus said:

China needs to but out of other regions that reject its control and start taking better care of its own people.

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My thoughts exactly.

http://english.chosun.com/w21data/html/news/200803/200803170008.html

For those that haven't kept up on the issue, China has proven yet again that it is the shame of humanity. Censored media, deadly force against unarmed people, torture, the whole works. Seriously, if this keeps up we may as well de-evolve back to the stone age.


2008 olympics anyone? As an athlete I know I sure as hell wont be going to China.

Ramen4ever said:

My thoughts exactly.

http://english.chosun.com/w21data/html/news/200803/200803170008.html

For those that haven't kept up on the issue, China has proven yet again that it is the shame of humanity. Censored media, deadly force against unarmed people, torture, the whole works. Seriously, if this keeps up we may as well de-evolve back to the stone age.


2008 olympics anyone? As an athlete I know I sure as hell wont be going to China.

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I'm in China at the moment actually, I can tell you they definitely don't report anything that's happening in Tibet in the Chinese media. The internet censors are working overtime too to try and block access to anything talking about it and they've even blocked youtube again, which they last did when the Dali Lama met President Bush. I can tell you that even saying the idea of China leaving Tibet is small is a wild overstatement. There is literally no chance the Chinese will leave Tibet with the current government system they have, and there's no sign of that changing any time soon. Personally I was always amazed that they'd decided to hold the Olympics here, I don't understand what logic was behind that decision. For all its reforms China is still a police state that will ruthlessly crush any political opposition to the rule of the Communist Party. They still also claim that Taiwan and other lands and oceanic territories controlled by almost all their neighbours rightfully belong to them, and they openly say they do not rule out the use of military force to acquire them one day.

Sanguinius said:

I'm in China at the moment actually, I can tell you they definitely don't report anything that's happening in Tibet in the Chinese media. The internet censors are working overtime too to try and block access to anything talking about it and they've even blocked youtube again, which they last did when the Dali Lama met President Bush. I can tell you that even saying the idea of China leaving Tibet is small is a wild overstatement. There is literally no chance the Chinese will leave Tibet with the current government system they have, and there's no sign of that changing any time soon. Personally I was always amazed that they'd decided to hold the Olympics here, I don't understand what logic was behind that decision. For all its reforms China is still a police state that will ruthlessly crush any political opposition to the rule of the Communist Party. They still also claim that Taiwan and other lands and oceanic territories controlled by almost all their neighbours rightfully belong to them, and they openly say they do not rule out the use of military force to acquire them one day.

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Scary. (Understatement).

Religion is poison, and freedom is the real understatement. If you don't like it there, leave the country, it seems even if they censor stuff, (what government doesn't?) you can still access the information somehow.
Anyway i would rather live in a communist country than a capitalist one.

NightCrawler said:

Religion is poison, and freedom is the real understatement. If you don't like it there, leave the country, it seems even if they censor stuff, (what government doesn't?) you can still access the information somehow.
Anyway i would rather live in a communist country than a capitalist one.

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The ignorance in this statement saddens me. Communism is an utterly flawed system that usually leads to social collapse or poverty without practically brainwashing the people. There's no motivation to work when you get paid dirt just like the next guy, often for doing harder work. Starvation is the only motivation. Your government treats you as disposable, you're just coal to fuel the engine.

Leaving isn't that simple, it requires a lot more than money, which most people in such a bad position don't have anyways. I'm not sure about the way China treats emigration, but common sense says it's not easy or even possible for the average person. Even if it was, there would be a large outflux of Chinese labor into the surrounding area, causing job problems and bringing forth racism.

NightCrawler said:

If you don't like it there, leave the country,

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Do you know what National pride is?

Sanguinius said:

They still also claim that Taiwan and other lands and oceanic territories controlled by almost all their neighbours rightfully belong to them

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Tons of countries do that, though. Granted, China's more daring and vocal in its claims, but that goes along with its government.

NightCrawler said:

Religion is poison, and freedom is the real understatement. If you don't like it there, leave the country

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Honestly you're saying bullshit here. It's easy to talk like that for an European. Go see how people live there, and ask them how easy it is to move overseas. Not to mention that it has the largest population in the world. Would you like 5 million Chinese people to move to Portugal? That's less than 0.5% of their population.

Vaxillus said:

Communism is an utterly flawed system that usually leads to social collapse or poverty without practically brainwashing the people.

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I don't mean to offend, but I don't think pushing your own generalized and exacerbated view of what Communism is (partly a reflection of your country's educational system and national culture of antagonism towards it) will be helpful here. What it'll do at most is start a neverending political debate.

Vaxillus said:

Even if it was, there would be a large outflux of Chinese labor into the surrounding area, causing job problems and bringing forth racism.

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It's already the case. Chinese people are commonly regarded a lot less nicely in Asia than Mexicans are in the USA. People have such flowery sayings as "put a Chinese in a pigpen and the pigs will come out first".

NightCrawler said:

Religion is poison, and freedom is the real understatement. If you don't like it there, leave the country, it seems even if they censor stuff, (what government doesn't?) you can still access the information somehow.
Anyway i would rather live in a communist country than a capitalist one.

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Don't come to China then because it has a capatilist economic system. Communism exists only in the name of the party here, the government isn't communism it's an authorotarian nationalistic aristocracy, with a small amount of communist ideological baggage.

Aazealh said:

Tons of countries do that, though. Granted, China's more daring and vocal in its claims, but that goes along with its government.

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I don't think there're many countries in the world that actively state their militaristic desire to acquire disputed territories with other nations, especially among major nations of the world.

Aazealh said:

I don't mean to offend, but I don't think pushing your own generalized and exacerbated view of what Communism is (partly a reflection of your country's educational system and national culture of antagonism towards it) will be helpful here. What it'll do at most is start a neverending political debate.

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I guess the millions of Chinese; North Koreans; Ukrainians and Cambodians and people of many other countries who died from the failed economic policies of their respective communist governments were all lies told by evil capitalist regimes to tarnish the reputation of the glorious peoples revolution . Didn't this Communist vs Capitalist argument die among sane circles almost everywhere in the world some 15 years ago?

Sanguinius said:

I don't think there're many countries in the world that actively state their militaristic desire to acquire disputed territories with other nations, especially among major nations of the world.

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Honestly? Probably more than you think. For example, South Korea and Japan often go at it about disputed islands, and I know that France has had several incidents even in recent years about disputed territory. By "go at it" I mean having diplomatic incidents where ships will patrol too closely, the military be put in alert and such, and that echoes in the national papers and in people's minds. It's probably the same for a lot of other countries. Of course, it's very subdued compared to China's claims, but it's not that different in the end.

Sanguinius said:

I guess the millions of Chinese; North Koreans; Ukrainians and Cambodians and people of many other countries who died from the failed economic policies of their respective communist governments were all lies told by evil capitalist regimes to tarnish the reputation of the glorious peoples revolution . Didn't this Communist vs Capitalist argument die among sane circles almost everywhere in the world some 15 years ago?

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Here's my answer to you:

Sanguinius said:

Don't come to China then because it has a capatilist economic system. Communism exists only in the name of the party here, the government isn't communism it's an authorotarian nationalistic aristocracy, with a small amount of communist ideological baggage.

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You know very well what I mean, so don't try to start an argument with me here when you're saying the same thing with a different wording. Communism is a nice little utopia of an idealogy that's never really been put into application and never will. The word itself is used far too lightly to qualify any despotic regime that calls itself so. North Korea calls itself the "Democratic People's Republic of Korea" and it's none of these things. Stalinism is about as close to Communism as it was originally designed as the DPRK is to Democracy to me.

Sanguinius said:

I'm in China at the moment actually, I can tell you they definitely don't report anything that's happening in Tibet in the Chinese media. The internet censors are working overtime too to try and block access to anything talking about it ... For all its reforms China is still a police state ...

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Wow, you're talking from behind enemy lines in a foreign police state? How are you eluding the internet censor- Oh shit... did you hear that? My god, they're COMING THROUGH THE WALLS!!!!!!

Vaxillus said:

There's no motivation to work

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Except the part that you're helping the government and that there's actual reciprocity in that equation. But i guess you prefer private entities ruling everywhere where the only motivation they know is greed.

Your government treats you as disposable, you're just coal to fuel the engine.

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Lawl, and what are you now? Special? Do you feel it when you get flooded with publicity everywhere? That if you buy that new shit you'll be the better man, or that you, yes you, can conquer all your dreams, cause we're all different and special sons of God!

Oh, and if the engine you fuel gives you free health/educational systems, why not?

Aazealh said:

Communism is a nice little utopia of an idealogy that's never really been put into application and never will. The word itself is used far too lightly to qualify any despotic regime that calls itself so. North Korea calls itself the "Democratic People's Republic of Korea" and it's none of these things. Stalinism is about as close to Communism as it was originally designed as the DPRK is to Democracy to me.

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True.
And just look at Cuba, even them that acomplished what they did, know how hard is to survive with all the *cough* international pressure *cough*.

Sanguinius said:

I guess the millions of Chinese; North Koreans; Ukrainians and Cambodians and people of many other countries who died...

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I guess that "cleaning" of all the rebelous bourgeois, aristocrats who own stuff just because they were born with them, or lost their lands to the ones who worked in them, doesn't give me much pitty.

NightCrawler said:

I guess that "cleaning" of all the rebelous bourgeois, aristocrats who own stuff just because they were born with them, or lost their lands to the ones who worked in them, doesn't give me much pitty.

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I'm curious how you justify the other millions of dead? I know for a fact that when the countries in central and eastern europe were forced under a communist rule the first people to get murdered were always the intellectual layer of people, University professors, school teachers, scientists etc. along with the landowners, government representatives, social workers and any other individual who had a shred of decency.
Sure some bastard aristocrats got what they deserved but that doesn't justify ALL of the other good people that were killed. Those people that worked on the farmlands were killed just as brutally the moment they didn't give Everything to the government.

Also if your ancestors had a piece of farmland for over a thousand years and worked everyday on those farms so they could provide food for others to eat that doesn't justify them being murdered just because they were "born" with it.

NightCrawler said:

Except the part that you're helping the government and that there's actual reciprocity in that equation. But i guess you prefer private entities ruling everywhere where the only motivation they know is greed.

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First of all, if I understand what Aaz is saying about true communism being put into practice on a national level, than I agree completely. I assumed we were talking about the kind of 'communism' historically in practice in places like Russia and once upon a time in China. However, what we have in regimes like Russia is an utter failure demonstrated by the fact that it completely collapsed on itself. Working for the 'greater good' is great and all, but it's not a true motivator, especially with cases like Russia. Every major 'communist' regime has just been a tool for those running it, sooner or later the people running it realise that they're getting the short end of the stick and guess what? It explodes. China's avoided this by moving away from this sort of system, thus this argument shouldn't even be taking place in this thread.

So far as capitalism goes, I was never defending it. It has flaws like any other system. But please don't try and argue that life during the rise and subsequent ruling of Mao Zedong was better than life in America or most of Europe at the time. We have published first hand accounts of all the social atrocities committed during this period. While the government has changed since then, it's not much better.

NightCrawler said:

Lawl, and what are you now? Special? Do you feel it when you get flooded with publicity everywhere? That if you buy that new shit you'll be the better man, or that you, yes you, can conquer all your dreams, cause we're all different and special sons of God!

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You're a fuckin' genius. Honestly, you're assuming I possess a narrowminded, religion obsessed view just because I'm supposedly capitalist? You don't even know if I am. I'll enlighten you and let you know I'm not even religious, let alone some sort of self obsessed, materialistic attention whore. I'll argue your other points, you have something to say even if I believe it totally unfounded, but on this I just have two words: Fuck You. I have patience for everything but this sort of stereotyping. God knows I've joked about it in the past, but if you honestly mean this, please, do us a favor and go drown yourself. "LAWL"

NightCrawler said:

Oh, and if the engine you fuel gives you free health/educational systems, why not?

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Free healthcare and education are kinda useless when you're starving. Let's not forget all the people in China who've gotten screwed out of their homes by the Chinese government in order to build a new freeway for the Olympics FOR THE GREATER GOOD. Yeah, I'd trade my only shelter for free education and healthcare

Aazealh said:

Honestly? Probably more than you think. For example, South Korea and Japan often go at it about disputed islands, and I know that France has had several incidents even in recent years about disputed territory. By "go at it" I mean having diplomatic incidents where ships will patrol too closely, the military be put in alert and such, and that echoes in the national papers and in people's minds. It's probably the same for a lot of other countries. Of course, it's very subdued compared to China's claims, but it's not that different in the end.

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That's not what I meant, I specifically meant the militaristic card they leave on the table. I know lots of countries have terrotorial disputes but the big difference with China is that it openly has military invasion and acquisiton as among its first options. Other countries generally resolve these disputes through negotiation, especially when we talk about major countries in the world and not impoverished countries like say Ethopia and Eriteria.

Aazealh said:

Here's my answer to you:

You know very well what I mean, so don't try to start an argument with me here when you're saying the same thing with a different wording. Communism is a nice little utopia of an idealogy that's never really been put into application and never will. The word itself is used far too lightly to qualify any despotic regime that calls itself so. North Korea calls itself the "Democratic People's Republic of Korea" and it's none of these things. Stalinism is about as close to Communism as it was originally designed as the DPRK is to Democracy to me.

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Well if we're going in the strictest views of the meanings of terms then there has never been a Capatilist country either. If you're living in the real world however, China in the 50's; 60's and 70's was a real communist country (as real as any country gets to theoritical systems) and at that time it's policies left approx. 30 million dead largely from starvation during mao's "Great Leap Forward".

Just to clear things up (not that information helps lunatics like NightCrawler) China does not have a free education and health care system. Also even though I just mentioned it above, most people who die in communist systems whether the USSR the PRC or others are not rich aristocrats or anything like that they're the poorest in society. In the 60's people died of starvation in their millions in China because of their policy of collectivisation of agriculture and the disruption caused by the "Great Leap Forward". People resorted to canabilism and abducted and ate children off the streets! What more can I say to highlight how appaling it was? If you don't believe me look it up, its not hard.

Walter said:

Wow, you're talking from behind enemy lines in a foreign police state? How are you eluding the internet censor- Oh shit... did you hear that? My god, they're COMING THROUGH THE WALLS!!!!!!

"Raisehands and stoptalk, doubleplus ungood immigrant Goldsteinfriend scumspy!"

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Haha, well it's not quite like that, there're no thought police and they block undesirable sites online rather than try to monitor everyone who tries to get on them. They don't try and "cleanse" (to use NightCrawlers language) people who're not fanatically loyal to them, they only go after people who demonstrate and organise demonstartions and opposition to the government. If anything the government prefers people just to focus on their personal lives and leave matters of policy to "those who know what they're doing" keep in mind that the Governments' argument against democracy here is that it would merely cause confusion and disrupt the development of the country.

Vaxillus said:

First of all, if I understand what Aaz is saying about true communism being put into practice on a national level, than I agree completely.

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Yeah, it's just that I don't like how the ideology itself is systematically equated with the infamous regimes that reclaimed it for themselves, when in fact they never even began to apply it. And how could they have? Marx and Engels themselves never really defined how it could work in a modern society, instead concentrating on criticizing the failings of Capitalism. It's just like how the nazis weren't exactly socialists. I often feel that most arguments on the topic of communism come from the giant gap that exists between the original and highly ideological communism and the totalitarian regimes that labeled themselves so as a convenient excuse to reduce the life of their citizens to worthlessness. It's basically two people talking about two different things that share the same name.

Sanguinius said:

That's not what I meant, I specifically meant the militaristic card they leave on the table. I know lots of countries have terrotorial disputes but the big difference with China is that it openly has military invasion and acquisiton as among its first options. Other countries generally resolve these disputes through negotiation, especially when we talk about major countries in the world and not impoverished countries like say Ethopia and Eriteria.

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But many of those disputes have been going on for dozens of years and still aren't resolved. I get your point, but to me as long as China doesn't act on its threats then it's mostly bravado. I think that's also why they're desperately clinging to what land they already occupy, because they know if they let go then they'll never get them back. Could you see them invading Taiwan in this day and age? They'd get the whole world on their back.

Sanguinius said:

Well if we're going in the strictest views of the meanings of terms then there has never been a Capatilist country either. If you're living in the real world however, China in the 50's; 60's and 70's was a real communist country (as real as any country gets to theoritical systems) and at that time it's policies left approx. 30 million dead largely from starvation during mao's "Great Leap Forward".

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Well it's true that no theorical system can really be perfectly realized, so you have a point. However I'd argue that Capitalism has been and is being much more faithfully applied around the world than Communism ever was; they're on completely different levels. It comes down to Communism not being even applicable on large scales, and its core values being completely irrealistic when considering a whole nation. Like I said I originally just meant to warn Vaxillus about the oncoming argument that was looming, so I don't want to start arguing about how most communist and even socialist values were never approached other than in the vaguest sense by those countries. However you've got to admit that Maoism was largely based on Stalinism, which itself was one of the most authoritarian and coercive governments to have ever existed (so, not in accordance to communist values). It was justified as a short-term solution to bring about socialism, then one day communist, but in reality things never went very far. In that regard, the "Great Leap Forward" can be seen not as an application of Communism, but merely as a terribly misguided attempt to bring forth an instant industrialization. And then we've got to consider China's huge historical and traditional baggage to fully appreciate the context of Mao's reasoning and methods.

Anyway and because such arguments bore me, rest assured that I'll be the first to condemn any of the great "communist" regime you mentioned. They're no better than run-of-the-mill fascist regimes as far as I'm concerned.

Sanguinius said:

Just to clear things up (not that information helps lunatics like NightCrawler) China does not have a free education and health care system. Also even though I just mentioned it above, most people who die in communist systems whether the USSR the PRC or others are not rich aristocrats or anything like that they're the poorest in society. In the 60's people died of starvation in their millions in China because of their policy of collectivisation of agriculture and the disruption caused by the "Great Leap Forward". People resorted to canabilism and abducted and ate children off the streets!

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Hahahah, I hope you're not telling this to me specifically. Of course China doesn't have a free health care system. I mean who in the world would think they do?! And I could tell you about cannibalism in China for hours if you wanted. Not only during that era but in others as well, and in present times too. How people exchanged their newborns with neighboring villages so that at least they didn't eat their own children. I'm very well aware of the extremely dire state of China right now, in every regard. I can tell you about every sordid affair that's reported daily in neighboring countries but never in the West or in China itself, or accounts of people that know more of the country than just Shanghai and Beijing and who've seen how perillous it can be (where the police will help scam foreigners or let them be murdered). Not to mention the extreme poverty and dramatic sanitary conditions of some provinces that aren't better than the poorest African countries.

Now anyway, wasn't this originally about Tibet?

Aazealh said:

Hahahah, I hope you're not telling this to me specifically. Of course China doesn't have a free health care system. I mean who in the world would think they do?! And I could tell you about cannibalism in China for hours if you wanted. Not only during that era but in others as well, and in present times too. How people exchanged their newborns with neighboring villages so that at least they didn't eat their own children. I'm very well aware of the extremely dire state of China right now, in every regard. I can tell you about every sordid affair that's reported daily in neighboring countries but never in the West or in China itself, or accounts of people that know more of the country than just Shanghai and Beijing and who've seen how perillous it can be (where the police will help scam foreigners or let them be murdered). Not to mention the extreme poverty and dramatic sanitary conditions of some provinces that aren't better than the poorest African countries.

Now anyway, wasn't this originally about Tibet?

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No I wasn't addressing that to you, nightcrawler said that they have a free at the point of delivery health and education system in China and Vaxillus seemed to believe him. I just wanted him to know that that was just NightCrawlers ignorance talking again. The police thing applies to Tibet too though, the police generally don't do too much against the Tibetans (unless they're taking their land or something similar) unless they protest as was the case with the current violence. The Chinese government always steps up their armed presence in Lhasa around this time of year as it is the anniversary of the 1959 uprising which caused the Dalai Lama to flee to India, after the Chinese government took back the Capital in a very bloody put down of the Tibetans.

Edit: Some photos taken in Lhasa city.

http://www.economist.com/daily/chartgallery/displaystory.cfm?story_id=10869993

As always, It's great reading one of Aaz's little rants. I look forward to your book
Now on Tibet.
Why don't the Chinese just mine that uranium and get the hell out.. It's the only "real" reason they're really there in the first place. Tibet makes for quiet possibly the shittiest farmland imaginable, hard to excess the few places that do have good soil and every other place has more rock then dirt. Statistically speaking.

The thing I'm most curious about, is why are they transporting over 5000 Chinese people a day to Tibet ever since the railroad was completed (1980's)? Interesting, to say the least, I look at some of those pictures and I gotta tell you, it looks like all the shops are Chinese. Could it be the Tibetans don't like to have their jobs stolen? It's hard enough for major countries to compete with China economically, how are the shop owners in Tibet supposed to keep up?
Apart from being the anniversary of the 1959 uprising, I think there were more reasons for these riots. If you can think of any other issues the Tibetans are facing besides religious and ethnic suppressions please do share.

*Edit*

Bottom line for this whole issue is this. "People are being Forced against their will." No matter how China sugercoats it, that is the sad truth. If an entire population wishes to be left alone in isolation, people as human beings are morally obligated to comply. People are not animals and the Chinese Government needs to realize that fact.

So apparently China started (provoked) the violence. BBC just showed some interesting clips and photos.
A group of Tibetan monks were sitting on the street and a large chinese riot squad was right in front of them. One of the Chinese riot members did something (looked like a hit to the head) to one of the monks, then things got out of hand and the Chinese opened fire on unarmed monks.
I'm speculating that one of the monks tried to speak Tibetan which if I recall correctly is banned in China, the riot member must of tapped him on the head to remind him of that.

Well that isn't surprising. Nevertheless, it's regrettable that such oppression still exists in the world.