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China issues demolition order on world’s largest religious town in Tibet

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Re: China issues demolition order on world’s largest religious town in Tibet

#71

Post by garyrob »

kweks wrote: post #29

I was there literally three days ago. The place is nothing short of breathtaking. Nestled at 4200km, it was a three day motorbike ride from Chengdu. Even at its foothills, you have no concept of the scale of the town hiding in the hills. This will truly be a tragic loss - the town is much more than the 'slum' it is represented as - it's arguably the most important Buddhist learning institution in the world.. Photos f…

Thanks so much for posting those pictures. Amazing place! Tragic that they'll be tearing much of it down.

Re: China issues demolition order on world’s largest religious town in Tibet

#73

Post by toyg »

golergka wrote: post #44
toyg wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do your human rights diminish if you fight back in the "wrong" way?

If it's a choice between your human rights and someone else's life — obviously. Also, "fight back in a wrong way" is a very curious way to label brutal attacks targeting civilians that go on non-stop for the last hundred years — long before any of alleged grievances that you would be "fighting back" against even began.

> If it's a choice between your human rights and someone else's life — obviously.

So if I unjustly imprison you, and the only way for you to escape is by killing me, will you willingly stay imprisoned forever? It's an... admirable stance, although so unpopular that you'll likely find not even Gandhi on your side.

(honestly, historical trivia is relatively irrelevant to the whole Israel/Palestine debate, which has great moral issues to argue -- if your people suffered apartheid and holocaust, are you justified in doing the same to others "in self-defence"? How long does it take for populations to forego ethnic grievances and land claims? Will nations ever renounce ultimate sovereignty to the UN? etc etc)

Re: China issues demolition order on world’s largest religious town in Tibet

#74

Post by biswaroop »

kweks wrote: post #29

I was there literally three days ago. The place is nothing short of breathtaking. Nestled at 4200km, it was a three day motorbike ride from Chengdu. Even at its foothills, you have no concept of the scale of the town hiding in the hills. This will truly be a tragic loss - the town is much more than the 'slum' it is represented as - it's arguably the most important Buddhist learning institution in the world.. Photos f…

Wow incredible pictures. Also, 4200km is in the exosphere: I think you mean 4200m :)

Re: China issues demolition order on world’s largest religious town in Tibet

#75

Post by humanrebar »

bhouston wrote: post #23
abpavel wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or friends of any of those. Which in essence renders the whole UN useless.

The UN isn't useless when dealing with countries that do not have many friends, like Iran or Somalia, etc. But yeah, the UN is useless when it comes to major powers and those protected by the major powers.

The UN is not stopping nuclear proliferation in friendless countries, which really undermines the entire purpose of the UN.

Re: China issues demolition order on world’s largest religious town in Tibet

#76

Post by bhouston »

yompers888 wrote: post #45
bhouston wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

China : Tibet :: Israel : Palestine, they are analogous in many ways. The human rights groups talk about the problems, we recognize it is bad, the weaker ethnic community suffers and is oppressed, the more powerful ethnic group makes slow but steady progress in exerting its wishes, and no real changes are effected by the international community.

Doesn't Tibet lack a certain penchant for poorly aimed rockets and human shields in a way that detracts from this analogy?

yompers888 wrote:

> Doesn't Tibet lack a certain penchant for poorly aimed rockets and human shields in a way that detracts from this analogy?

Tibetians have tried various tactics, including violence, to oppose Chinese rule but none of them have been effective:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protests_and_uprisings_in_Tibe...

This gets back to what I say in my original post, slow and steady achievement of the stronger ethnic groups goals over a period of decades in the face of ineffective resistance by the weaker ethnic group.

Re: China issues demolition order on world’s largest religious town in Tibet

#77

Post by coldtea »

tim333 wrote: post #64
oi5zkc wrote: post #43

I visited Yaqing/Yachen mentioned at the bottom of the article about a month ago. The experience was surreal. In the middle of nowhere, 4 hours from the nearest city, the monastery is a sprawling complex of huts around the bend in a river in the tibetan tundra. Here are some pictures: http://imgur.com/a/v4gYI The hygienic conditions are very poor - people doing their business squatting on the streets, no toilets, rub…

>iPhone 6s It's a funny thing with monks. Quite a few are former businessman who want to try something more spiritual for a change but still are wealthy. I walked a bit with a young monk on the way to Tengboche Monastery and his main interest as we talked seemed to be designer sunglasses and which brand would be good to get.

>It's a funny thing with monks. Quite a few are former businessman who want to try something more spiritual for a change but still are wealthy.

So mostly phonies being tourists in spiritual-land?

Re: China issues demolition order on world’s largest religious town in Tibet

#78

Post by Eerie »

toyg wrote: post #73
golergka wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it's a choice between your human rights and someone else's life — obviously. Also, "fight back in a wrong way" is a very curious way to label brutal attacks targeting civilians that go on non-stop for the last hundred years — long before any of alleged grievances that you would be "fighting back" against even began.

> If it's a choice between your human rights and someone else's life — obviously. So if I unjustly imprison you, and the only way for you to escape is by killing me, will you willingly stay imprisoned forever? It's an... admirable stance, although so unpopular that you'll likely find not even Gandhi on your side. (honestly, historical trivia is relatively irrelevant to the whole Israel/Palestine debate, which has gre…

>So if I unjustly imprison you, and the only way for you to escape is by killing me

Completely wrong analogy. The killing doesn't help you escape at all, it just angers the jailer (who you can't touch anyway).

Re: China issues demolition order on world’s largest religious town in Tibet

#79

Post by coldtea »

douche wrote: post #55
dave2000 wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, it's perfectly meaningful to talk about Israel/Palestine - and by extension the US - when criticizing actions by China. Otherwise you end up with the same narrative you get in pretty much every media outlet in the world; whatever the US does is good, no terrorism or support for murderous dictators there (cough south america..cuba...saudi arabia..iran...iraq...indonesia etc etc etc ), and whatever China does is ba…

China and Tibet is more like what would have happened if the Arab Legion and the other Arab powers weren't so blindingly incompetent in 1947. There's a long, long history of China controlling Tibet, back at least to the Tang dynasty. The ChiComs are nastier about it than most of the previous Chinese governments, but that's what you get when you refute the old mandate of heaven/chakravartin mashup of political legitim…

The same legitimacy every other large government has. At least they only piss in their own pool -- not mess with peoples all around the world.

Re: China issues demolition order on world’s largest religious town in Tibet

#80

Post by bhouston »

golergka wrote: post #37
bhouston wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

China : Tibet :: Israel : Palestine, they are analogous in many ways. The human rights groups talk about the problems, we recognize it is bad, the weaker ethnic community suffers and is oppressed, the more powerful ethnic group makes slow but steady progress in exerting its wishes, and no real changes are effected by the international community.

How many terror acts do tibetian supporters commit on an average month in China?

You are advocating non-violent means, I think that is great. The main way to channel your energies into non-violent means of ending the situation in Israel-Palestine is to support the BDS movement. You can find out more here: https://bdsmovement.net/ It is based on the similar non-violent campaign against South Africa apartheid: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disinvestment_from_South_Afric...

Be warned those that the BDS movement is under attack though because it is viewed as a bigger threat to Israel's occupation than terrorism. Israel actually bars the top non-violent pro-Palestinian activist from leaving Israel recently as the BDS movement has had too much success.

Great interview by Glenn Greenwald:

https://theintercept.com/2016/05/13/interview-with-bds-advoc...

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