Tibet: Who's for feudalism?

from the Guardian:

Easily the most popular cause at present for film stars, pop stars and what Greg Barns in the Hobart Mercury calls "celebrity politicians" is freedom for Tibet. The "freedom" they want would return Tibet to feudalism, to the system that prevailed before 1951.

The country would once again be ruled by the Dalai Lama, a prospect that the incumbents in both the White House and Downing Street would clearly welcome. And why not? For all their noise about fostering democracy, the leaders of the US and Britain have no difficulty cosying up to feudal autocrats in the Middle East or Asia or anywhere else such relics can be found.

Britain has been actively interfering in Tibet (and also in Afghanistan) since the 19th century, but stepped up its activities after the victory of the Revolution and the Chinese Red Army in 1949. Together with the US, Britain helped to provoke the flight of the Dalai Lama to India....

"In short, the CIA/NED directly bankrolls the apparatus that runs the Dalai Lama’s international campaign for a non-violent revolution in Tibet to overthrow the Chinese."

The brutal way the Dalai Lama’s supporters hacked to death ordinary workers — shop assistants and others — during their "revolutionary" riots suggests that their leader’s appeals for non-violence were a sop to the Western media.

For the Dalai Lama is not after democracy or indeed any form of popular rule. He wants to be restored to power, and images of benign monks exuding love and kindness simply aren’t supported by the historical facts.

Barns has him pegged to rights: "The Dalai Lama leads an elite of families and religious figures that once ruled Tibet. And the Tibet they ruled was one of the most backward and inhumane societies in the world.

"Almost 90 percent of Tibetans were slaves before the Chinese invaded the country".

read full article here