XPost: soc.culture.china, soc.culture.indian, soc.culture.nepal   
   XPost: soc.culture.usa, talk.politics.tibet, soc.culture.iraq   
   XPost: soc.culture.europe   
   From: acoustic@panix.com   
      
   In article <518c31f3.605891812@news.giganews.com>,   wrote:   
   >That is no excuse to take over their country and make them a minority   
   >as China is doing in Tibet , Xin Jiang and Inner Mongolia   
      
   But your statement indicates that you are very, very confused.   
      
   Given my subject line, your single sentence response begins with the   
   impression that you were talking about Tibet being taken over when you   
   talked about "their country".  But when you started talking about   
   making "them a minority", you are comparing them also with A, B, and   
   C, where A = Tibet, B = Xin Jiang, and C = Inner Mongolia.   
      
   So, it appears that you were comparing A with A and B and C.   
      
   While it may be logical admissible, it does not make sense to compare   
   A with A in a linguistic context where words are conveyed to mean   
   something for communication purposes.  It is especially true when A   
   does not compare well with B or C.   
      
   While A can vacuously compare with A itself, it contributes to no   
   information.   
      
   A does not compare well with B because ethnic Tibetans remain the   
   majority of the TAR while it is possible that ethnic Han Chinese are   
   getting to be comparable in numbers to the Uighurs.   
      
   A also does not compare well with C because there is not a comparable   
   ethnic struggle in Inner Mongolia.   
      
   Furthermore, the critical issue of political importance is that A and   
   B and C have all been a part of China long before the communists took   
   over.  Just compare the map of China in the Qing dynasty (for nearly   
   three hundred years of history) with the current one and compare the   
   map of the Republic of China (1911-1949) with the current Chinese map,   
   and you will see that the current map contains no more territory than   
   its two predecessors.  In fact, the ROC claimed Outer Mongolia as its   
   own, which is a large piece of land, just as its predecessor did but   
   China does not.  But all of them claim A, B, and C as part of its   
   territory.   
      
   So, there is no basis to talk about China "taking over" A, or B, or C,   
   regardless of the ethnic composition in those areas.   
      
   As to ethnic composition in any region in the world, it changes all   
   the time.  As long as sovereignty is not a question, there is no basis   
   for a complaint about ethnic composition, unless you do not believe in   
   the freedom of movement within a country.   
      
   In the US, ethnic composition has changed rapidly in recent years.   
   Only petty sour grapes types complain about the hispanic population   
   becoming the majority in such and such a state.   
      
   Of course, the US killed all the American Indians to become what it is   
   today.  China has not pursued such a policy.  There is no evidence   
   that China's policy in Tibet is meant to harm ethnic Tibetans.  It is   
   pure VOA, RFA type propaganda in collaboration with Da Lama and his   
   TGIE cohorts.   
      
   Now consider the fact that some Tibetans count the Mongols as their   
   forebears and thus lamented the loss of its past glory.  So, a legit   
   question is to ask how did they manage to lose that glory?   
      
   My guess is you can't blame the CCP for robbing it from the Mongols or   
   the Tibetan lamas.  While Mongols couldn't hold their far-flung empire   
   for more than some four score and x number of years, the Tibetan   
   lamas stayed alive only by agreeing to be somebody else's vassal or   
   tributory state.   
      
   Of course, the Chinese suffered their own humiliation before the whole   
   world when Imperial Japan and colonialists from the West entered China   
   at will and carved up its prime real estate along the coasts.  And   
   when a group of Chinese believed that with righteousness, they could   
   fight off the invaders with their own bare fists, they got shot dead   
   right away or if they got captured, their heads got chopped off with   
   the shiny swords the imperial Japanese soldiers wielded in full public   
   view.  One can relive such grusome moments by viewing photos from   
   history books.   
      
   At least the intellectuals among the Chinese people at the time knew   
   what was wrong.  They looked inside themselves.  And they fought their   
   way out.   
      
   But let's focus on these three groups that existed in China: the   
   Tibetans under the lamas, the Nationalist soldiers, and the communists   
   along with their peasant allies.  We know that the lives of the lamas   
   were extremely decadent while the masses were illiterate and   
   relentlessly exploited.  (In Heinrich Harrer's Seven Years in Tibet,   
   he recounted the first dinner he was invited to have dinner with the   
   "Holy Mother", i.e., the mother of Da Lama and the record-holder of   
   being the mother of the largest number of Incarnations, he counted 40   
   dishes at the banquet of many guests.  And this was happening among   
   the Tibetans in the "noble class" while the masses had to work from   
   morning to dark, panting and moaning at the hard work they had to do   
   to survive.  Tibet under the Lamas was clearly heading to trouble   
   because the system was so inequitable.)  And we also know that the   
   Nationalist under Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek was getting U.S.   
   military and economic aide to fight the communists.  But who was   
   supplying the communist guerrilla soldiers?  Hardly anyone, except   
   maybe the Soviet Union.  They might have given them so rifles,   
   grenades, and ammunition.  Mostly, on a one-on-one basis, they were   
   poorly equipped and could not have fought off the Nationalists, not to   
   defeat them.   
      
   The fact that the communists successfully took over China, with little   
   fighting, shows that they won by the force of logic - not by force of   
   luck.   
      
   So, of course, the Nationalists could afford only a token presence in   
   Tibet despite their assertion of sovereignty over it.  But the   
   decadence of the lamas shows through because they thought they had   
   nothing to worry about when the world was actually passing them by.   
      
   But everyone should be able to see that the complaints concerning the   
   way Tibet is governed today mostly come from the monks.  Of course,   
   they complain.  They have lost their past glory and the last vestige   
   of influence of the masses.   
      
   But there is no objective reason as to why the corrupt monk system   
   should not be replaced by an egalitarian one - which the communists   
   brought in and eventually imposed.   
      
   China's current position in Tibet did not arise from a vacuum.   
      
   It is particularly not a result of some evil doing on China's part,   
   despite western rhetoric.   
      
   China was able to go in because the lamas system had rotted to the   
   core.   
      
   If Tibet were a reasonable "country" and if it were a matter of brute   
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)