Pema Tseden's Film Freezes Out The Facts

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There is no untainted cinematic insight into the suppression and abuses inside Tibet, no full exposure of the harrowing realities of forced sterilizations, the destruction of a nomadic culture through a policy of re-settlement, nor any detailed documentary recording the environmental pillage which is transforming once verdant pastures and forests into a lunar-like landscape, with convoys of trucks heading back to communist China with their booty of timber and minerals. The transformation of Tibetan towns into yet another Chinese concrete facsimile, complete with gaudy excess and a range of previously unknown erosive social problems, continues apace, un-documented. No genuine independent film-making is of course possible under such a repressive totalitarian regime, one desperate to convince the world that Tibet is undergoing positive change, thanks, we are asked to accept, to the seemingly compassionate rule of communist China.

Unfortunately we are denied any unbiased evidence which would reveal the progress claimed by the communist regime, only the testimony of some supposedly impartial western academics and politicians, who appear to specialise in an uncritical acceptance of any official propaganda that Beijing presents them. We then have seemingly unlimited amounts of Chinese films on Tibet, mostly designed for television broadcast, with sickly images of Tibetans dancing and singing in praise of yet another bumper-harvest, due no doubt to China’s enlightened agricultural policies. These are transparent disinformation with actors supposedly dressed in traditional Tibetan costumes, that are color coded to match the red and yellow colors of the communist Chinese flag! Barely able to move due to the overly abundant costume jewellery and obligatory fixed smile, set against images of modernity Chinese-style, like a crude layer of make-up they conceal a more disturbing reality.

More recently a more subtle form of propaganda has emerged, more cinematic, carefully crafted to present some illusion of balance and independence, yet the underlying message remains the same, albeit diluted and sophisticated. A good example is the latest offering by Tibetan Director, Pema Tseden , of course being an obedient and loyal citizen of communist China he also has a Chinese name too, Wanma Caidan. His latest offering, Old Dog is a tale based upon the fortunes of an elderly Tibetan Mastiff, which has generated tensions between a father and son.The animal is sold off by the boy, only to be rescued by his father who releases it in the mountains, only to discover the dog back in the hands of the dog-seller, a development which requires drastic intervention, if the family pet is to be finally liberated.

A slick production filmed inside Tibet, it presents an allegory of the loss and change experienced by Tibetan culture, the conflicting social realities of generations, one looking to a past and freedom, another seemingly more pragmatic and accepting of present conditions.This theme, was reflected in Pema Tseden’s previous film, which centered upon a quest to find Tibetans able to perform traditional Tibetan opera, with none available,we were left to conclude that the old ways in Tibet are undergoing change, life is moving on, with the underlying implication that this is a good thing. While aesthetically these films have charm and nuance what they both choose to avoid is the fact that such change has been forced upon ordinary Tibetans, and that such cultural erosion is a direct result of China’s imperialistic aggression which has deliberately targeted Tibetan culture for over five decades.

It is reality which the Director surely knows dare not speak its name.

Video Extract ‘Undercover in Tibet’ Courtesy of Bho Gyalo

We invite Ms Mary Beth Markey of the International Campaign for Tibet (ICT) to comment if she regards the testimony offered by the Tibetan woman featured in the interview above, as exaggerated, or untruthful? Furthermore, does she consider such atrocities are not inflicted upon Tibetan women? If so on what basis does she reach such a conclusion?

As predicted by one of our friends on Facebook last week, the report on Tibet published April 25 by the International Campaign for Tibet contains not a word of concern regarding China’s forced sterilizations of Tibetan women. Let’s allow that to sink in…a leading organization on the issue of Tibet has released a highly detailed appraisal of China’s genocidal policies in occupied Tibet and has chosen to ignore and exclude any critical reference or examination, of what is a major human rights violation against women! Indeed the solitary mention of family planning within its 148 pages actually endorses China’s propaganda claims that Tibetans are exempt from such coercive population control measures “The Chinese state’s positive discrimination’ policies—both those to assist individual Tibetans,such as educational admissions preferences and family planning exceptions” (page 5) How singularly curious that while highly critical in exposing a range of China’s distortions and violations concerning Tibet, the ICT on this issue is so charmingly credulous in not only accepting China’s propaganda on this troubling subject, but has felt it important to assert that claim as fact!

The foreword by ICT President Mary Beth Markey welcomes “a constructive examination of the concepts put forward in this report by international law and country studies experts, human rights advocates, policy makers, peoples whose cultural rights have been abused by the state and others who have a stake in understanding the kind of cultural and human rights violations that have characterized the situation in Tibet.”

In that spirit of positive investigation perhaps Ms Markey would care to explain why it was that her organization has once again decided to ignore entirely atrocities suffered by Tibetan women, which have been carefully documented and reported over the years, with a wealth of detailed testimony and reports, all of which demonstrate that while China may well assert a relaxation of its notorious one child policy in occupied lands such as Tibet, the reality is that Tibetan women are being forcibly sterilized, and subject to a range of human rights abuses associated with the implementation of what remains a coercive population control program. The nature and extent of such violations is deeply disturbing and has been documented since at least 1979, yet the existence of what is a compelling body of evidence, eye-witness reports, personal testimony and other accounts,some from Chinese sources, is consistently ignored by the ICT.

We can only presume that in its eagerness to accept the official assertions of China’s regime that Tibetans are exempt from the odious excesses of coercive birth control, it considers such accounts as unreliable and insufficiently convincing, the traumatized experiences of Tibetan women, whose lives are forever scarred by the horror of being forcibly sterilized, are it would appear, greeted with a mercilessly skeptical response by Ms Markey and her ICT colleagues. Interesting that such skepticism is reserved only for this issue, while reports detailing other areas of human rights abuses are widely reported and opposed by the ICT, we wonder why the testimony of Tibetan monks is invested with unquestioned credibility, yet accounts of Tibetan women who suffer China’s forced sterilizations are placed under the microscope and then dismissed as unreliable, not verifiable or uncorroborated?

The fact is that such reports are as equally credible and disturbing as any other instance of human rights atrocity in occupied Tibet and surely demand the attention and action of organizations dedicated to exposing China’s violent oppression of Tibet and its culture. As reflected by the statement of a United Nations Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women,

“Women in Tibet continue to undergo hardship and are also subjected to gender-specific crimes, including reproductive rights violations such as forced sterilization, forced abortion, coercive birth control policies and the monitoring of menstrual cycles. There have been many reports of Tibetan women prisoners facing brutality and torture in custody” (UN Commission on Human Rights-Report of the Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and consequences, Ms. Radhika Coomaraswamy, 27th February 2003)

Unfortunately the agonizing suffering that China’s population control program inflicts upon women in Tibet is callously rejected by the International Campaign for Tibet, which clearly regards China’s claims on the subject as more truthful and credible than the testimony of Tibetan women. Why is it that a hugely resourced, informed and specialist organization is so unwilling or unable to see the disturbing truth that Tibetan women are subject to such atrocities? Instead preferring to peddle China’s disinformation, which was exposed as such in 2008 by Jezza Neumann, British television producer whose film ‘Undercover in Tibet’ reported on the subject:

“China maintains that it doesn’t implement its one-child policy in minority regions such as Tibet, but we discovered that this wasn’t true. One woman told us how she’d been subjected to a forced sterilisation. The secret police broke into her house and said they would take all of her belongings if she didn’t go with them. Aspirin was the only anaesthetic she was given before they cut her open.“ (The Independent March 31, 2008)

Such gross violations are either being denied by the International Campaign for Tibet, or regarded as being of insufficient concern as to merit a word of concern, Tibetan women terrorized by China’s population control officials have little indeed to be grateful for to Ms Mary Beth Markey, or her organization’s latest report.

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Some years ago a westerner traveled to a small  and somewhat deprived Tibetan settlement in Northern India, in her rucksack was a video, one  that she had been told would be greatly appreciated by the local Tibetan community. So after a trail of recommendations and discussions a video player and television magically appeared from the cold mountain air and was  set up in small hall. By the night of the screening word had spread and the place was packed, a sea of excited and curious eyes, with the help of a translator, she offered a brief introduction and apologized that the dialogue was not in Tibetan but hoped that the story would be understood and appreciated. The barely functioning solitary light-bulb was switched off, replaced by the flickering glow of the opening title illuminated the faces in the gloom, Jason and The Argonauts had traveled from the turquoise Mediterranean skies to the border of Tibet. This heroic tale, with its monsters, magick, gods and goddesses enchanted the audience, after all it was not entirely removed from the traditions, beliefs and mythologies of the Tibetans gathered there.

Thinking of that event brings to mind another, less celebrated Greek figure, Sisyphus, who was punished by Zeus and made to roll a huge boulder up a steep hill. Before reaching the top however, the rock would always roll back down, forcing him to restart his task. It was a punishment given to King Sisyphus for his arrogance in regarding himself cleverer than Zeus, Father of the Gods. So it was that  Sisyphus was consigned to an eternity of futility and ceaseless frustration.

It serves as a very apt metaphor for the current efforts of the exiled Central Tibetan Administration (CTA)  to secure a form of autonomy for Tibetans from the Chinese Regime, although the punishment in this case has been imposed, not by an all powerful deity, but a collective desperation and myopia that has witnessed unending failure and disappointment, as China rejects each compromise offered by the CTA, forcing them to retreat, only to make another arduous and vacuous attempt at progress. What makes this particular masochism, truly painful (as it is absent of any pleasure whatsoever) is the fact that the architect of the strategy, that abandons Tibetan nationhood in favor of an autonomous Tibet, the Dalai Lama, in 2009 publicly acknowledged his Middle Way proposals had failed

Image: chiasandro/museumofmodernart/newyork

Yet despite that acknowledgement, and the direct experience of repeated failure in realizing progress, his representatives within the Central Tibetan Administration continue to press China for negotiations. This pointless action is truly Sisyphean, although the comparison does need some adjustment, a more fitting analogy would perhaps involve Tibetans having bought a used car, the engine of which is beyond repair,  dutifully pushing it across the Himalayas, in the hope of selling it to a Mercedes showroom in Beijing!

“Almost around 300 local Tibetans joined this March 10th 2012. One the most successful rallies here in Madison so far. We got the proclamation by Governor of WI Scott Walker. that this date be held as ‘Tibet Day’ here in Wisconsin. Our program started at 10:30. Tibet’s flag was raised by Madison Dane County Executive Joe Parisi, a great supporter of the Tibetan cause, who presented a strong speech on the oppression by the Chinese government.

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Following other supportive speeches we marched towards the Madison capital square. There were more than three thousand local protesters, and we took this great opportunity to share information on the Tibetan Uprising Commemoration among them. We chanted Long Live His Holiness The Dalai Lama, China Out Of Tibet Now, Free Tibet Now, UN Sleeping Tibetans Are Dying, and Boycott Made In China. and handed out thousands of fliers to the public, it was a great turnout and positive day for Tibet!”

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Report courtesy of: Kunchok Gonpo. RTYC-WI President

This declaration has been released to Tibetan organizations world-wide in recognition of the many thousands of Tibetans who lost their lives fighting for Tibetan independence and in solidarity with the people of Tibet, who continue their rightful struggle for nationhood, justice and freedom.

As His Eminence 11 Shingza Rinpoche, Mr Dorjee Gyalpo and Mr Yeshi Tenzin approach the third week of their hunger-strike outside the steel and glass indifference of the United Nations Headquarters, in occupied Tibet the resistance to China’s violent and illegal occupation continues, undiminished by the genocidal efforts to erase Tibet’s national identity. Despite placing Tibet under military siege, shooting, torturing and jailing Tibetans, protests for Tibetan independence continue across that blighted land.

Meanwhile, armed with a recently selected Prime Minister, who sings a remarkably similar song of compromise to the previous incumbent, the body formerly known as the Tibetan Government in Exile (promoting itself as the Central Tibetan Administration [CTA] a less politically emphatic title aimed to mollify China’s sensitivities) maintains efforts to appease communist China, in the hope of securing so-called ‘meaningful autonomy’ for Tibetans. In surrendering the objective of a separate political or territorial identity for its people, the CTA now sees resolution in submitting to Chinese rule and extending trust towards the theoretical protections within Communist China’s law on Regional Ethnic Autonomy.

Evidence for such breathtaking compromise may be found within the troubling pages of the ‘Memorandum on Genuine Autonomy for the Tibetan People’ (released on 16th November 2008 by the CTA). A document that contemptuously ignores and abandons the rightful political aspirations of the Tibetans inside occupied Tibet, it is in essence a capitulation towards China’s demands. Illustrated by this extract:

 “To a very considerable extent Tibetan needs can be met within the constitutional principles on autonomy“. Investing significant faith in China’s law on regional and ethnic autonomy it goes on to claim that discretionary powers within the regional framework “can be exercised to facilitate genuine autonomy for Tibetans” and concludes by describing Tibetans as an ‘ethnic minority’.

Such betrayal, and that is precisely what is going on here, is difficult to stomach, more so as the architects and supporters of this surrender will be flying Tibet’s national  flag this March 10 and offering fine words on the sacrifices of Tibetans, while behind closed doors they  are pressing for a ‘solution’ diametrically opposed to the very cause being waged by their compatriots inside occupied Tibet.

A struggle, even Tibet’s oppressors acknowledge, that has the objective of national independence, on Wednesday March 7 Tibetan traitor, carrying the Sinocized name of ‘Wu Zegang’, China’s puppet ‘governor’ in the region of Ngaba, Amdo, speaking on recent self-immolations declared that “Tibetans demanded: “independence for Tibet..”

Unsupportive of that aspiration, the strategists of the CTA, while aware of the decades of tyranny China has forced upon Tibetans, in a staggering example of misplaced optimism triumphing over fact, believe prosperity, self-rule and freedom attainable under communist China’s constitution.  The thinking and denial that accommodates such delusion would no doubt have counseled that equality and justice was possible for Black people under South Africa’s Apartheid Regime!

In rushing to address China’s increasing demands on talks relating to Tibet the CTA appears to be blind to the fact that  securing ‘genuine autonomy’ itself presents hazardous political risks and offers no protection whatsoever in maintaining a distinct Tibetan national, cultural or territorial identity. Tragically, such considerations do not trouble the thinking of those responsible for progressing negotiations with Beijing, including Lobsang Sangay.

Meanwhile, the selfless sacrifice of the Hunger Strikers outside the United Nations, or demands of the Tibetan martyrs who have self-immolated, and countless individual and mass protests for Tibetan independence across Tibet, has not agitated the conscience of the CTA, which remains contemptuously dismissive towards any dissenting voice, preferring to stumble, with eyes wide-open towards the abyss. What a disconnect between a people and its leadership, instead of unity we have an Administration willing to extinguish Tibetan nationhood and trampling over the common political aspiration of Tibetans inside occupied Tibet. Thankfully however opposition towards this inane strategy is increasing, particularly from younger Tibetans, and those communities far removed from the deferential conventions which stifle dissent within Tibetan communities in India. Evidence for such resistance may be observed across the Internet, the call to end the CTA’s  vacuous and fruitless policy of appeasement is gaining ground.

March 10 is a date of immense resonance for Tibetans inside, and beyond Tibet, this year against ongoing repression in occupied Tibet and with self-immolations reminding the world of Tibet’s true cause for independence, it is hoped that the Central Tibetan Administration will not only hear the voices of its people, but decide to act upon them by actively supporting the national liberation of Tibet.

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Image: courtesy of shingzarinpoche

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Photo Diary Of Day Ten Courtesy Of Tsewang Rangzen/Tibetan Youth Congress