Black Americans and Tibetans - Bhuchung K. Tsering (July 1999)

Black Americans and Tibetans
Article by Bhuchung K. Tsering (issue July 1999) 

If you look at the Tibet movement in the United States, or, for that matter, throughout the world, one of the glaring points is the absence of a major support base among the Black community. President Nelson Mandela of South Africa is the only African political leader showing an interest in Tibet. Among spiritual leaders we again have to turn to Archbishop Desmond Tutu of South Africa.

Within the United States, almost all Tibet support groups are composed of non-black Americans. The only black American actively involved in Tibetan affairs could be the monk who studied in Sera Monastery in South India. He is now ensconced somewhere in New England and seem to have been so Tibetanised that the last time His Holiness the Dalai Lama visited Boston in 1998, I saw this monk being included in the "Tibetans only" audience.

Why has the Tibet movement failed to attract the Black community and how can we change the situation? The Tibetan Government in Dharamsala has been studying this issue and has even started an office in South Africa. We Tibetans need to ponder more on this issue at our individual level and even have a public debate.

It is not that Black Americans totally ignore Tibet. This was brought clear to me during the ceremony to commemorate the tenth anniversary of the Tiananmen Movement held in Harvard University on June 2, 1999. Mrs Coretta Scott King, widow of American civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr, was the main speaker. In her speech to the predominantly Chinese audience that evening, Mrs King dwelt at length on the vision of His Holiness the Dalai Lama for the future of Tibet. She even went to the extent of appealing to the Chinese community to support His Holiness on his endeavour.

I am interested in ideas that our readers may have on how we can maximise our support among the Black community. 

Bhuchung K. Tsering is a commentator based in Washinton, DC. He currently works with the International Campaign for Tibet.

Editorial: Pema Thinley - A mere question of form (July 1999)

A mere question of form
Editorial by Mr. Pema Thinley (released July 1999)

Even as the exile Tibetan leader, the Dalai Lama, walks hale and hearty at a sprightly 64 years of age and expresses confidence to live well beyond the ripe old age of 80 years—in fact up to 113 years—Beijing has redoubled its efforts to prepare for a communist Chinese reincarnate for him. We are being told that it has set up a special task force "to study the issue and map out a strategy." It has brought over to Tibet its very own nine-year-old so-called Panchen Lama to obviously play a proxy Chinese role in this murky business. Yes, I am talking about the one named Gyaincain Norbu whom China has to use force and intimidation to get the Tibetan people to betray an appearance of acceptance while the real Panchen Lama, the youngest political prisoner in the world and whom the Tibetan people have no problem at all in accepting as their very own, remains incarcerated at an unknown location and under god-knows-what conditions, with his family.

Beijing dictates that the present Dalai Lama’s reincarnate shall not be a foreigner, that he shall be a Tibetan born in Chinese territory, and that he must be patriotic and have no intention to split the country. Similar conditions were spelled out after the 10th Panchen Lama died in 1989. While the requirement that the reincarnate be a Tibetan born in Chinese territory is objective, how does one determine the patriotic credential of an undiscerning toddler? It appears that this requirement is fulfilled vicariously by parental records. We understand that both the parents of Gyaincain Norbu were patriotic China cadres. Perhaps by spelling out such conditions China wants the Dalai Lama to know where he should be born and in what kind of a family. If he chooses to be born a foreigner, "Beijing would have to identify another soul boy just like the way Beijing picked the 11th Panchen Lama," China’s Tibet policy adviser Tao Changsong was quoted as saying in a recent newspaper report. Of course, this sounds very much like an admission that Gyaincain Norbu’s was a deliberate fake "appointment" to punish the Dalai Lama rather than a solemn "recognition" according to strict religious tradition of the real Panchen Lama.

Beijing seems to be at least in part responding to the fact that the Dalai Lama made it clear in May 1997 that so long as the Sino-Tibetan impasse remained, his reincarnate would "definitely" be born outside the Chinese controlled territories.

And why does China create so much fuss about recognising the reincarnation of a person who it says is no longer a religious leader but a splittist, who may not even get a Golden Stupa Tomb at the Potala Palace?

Having the power of the state machinery in its hands, to use it as it pleases, Beijing does not care, of course, that it has got the entire reincarnation issue totally wrong: that a reincarnate is no other person than the one who had preceded him. That means the 15th Dalai Lama would be no other person than the 14th who Beijing say is no longer a religious leader and with whom it does not want to have any dealing. Besides, it is the lama, believed by Tibetan Buddhists to be an enlightened being, not those who seek to locate his reincarnate, who determines whether at all he shall be reborn, and if "yes," where and when. Those entrusted to locate the lama’s reincarnate have to seek divine guidance and interpret religiously auspicious symbols—all anathema, in fact, downright nauseating to the communist Chinese creed — to fulfill their sacred mission. Nothing could be therefore more contemptuous of this solemn Tibetan religious tradition than relegating to alien atheists the final decision on any aspects of this entirely religious matter.

Beijing’s undue preparations for the coming of the 15th Dalai Lama is very disconcerting. In the Tibetan tradition, it is the height of religious discourtesy amounting to blasphemy for anyone to talk about the impending passing away of a living Lama. Besides, what makes Beijing so sure that the time for recognizing the reincarnation of the present Dalai Lama approaches nigh? Do the newspaper reports in recent times about the arrest of alleged Chinese spies said to be found stalking the Dalai Lama’s residence in Dharamsala deserve to be taken much more serious note of than seems to have been the case so far? Has communist China decided that the 14th Dalai Lama’s time is up and that the time for a fake but pliable communist Chinese 15th is due? After all, Tibetans need no lessons about China’s capacity for perfidy.

There is another aspect to this issue that Tibetans need to take note of. All questions about the likelihood of a Sino-Tibetan negotiation taking place under the communist Chinese dispensation appears to be totally ruled out. Short of an explicit statement from Beijing, there cannot be a more conclusive evidence of this than the Chinese government’s Cultural Revolution-style repression in Tibet and the use of abusive languages to denigrate the Dalai Lama, on top of talking about preparations being underway for the appointment of an impending Chinese reincarnation of him. It does not yet seem to have occurred to China to appoint a Dalai Lama of its own even as the one in exile still lives. But by declaring the present Dalai Lama to be no longer a religious leader but a "splittist", Beijing has come pretty close to doing just that. Only problem is there is no known method or tradition for going beyond that, for after all Beijing is still concerned with maintaining a "form" of respecting Tibetan religious tradition, though tragically not the profound spiritual "substance" underlying it. 

Bhuchung K. Tsering: Promoting healthy competition among Tibetans (July 1999)

Promoting healthy competition among Tibetans
Article by Bhuchung K. Tsering (issue July 1999)

Between July and September (I think) Dharamsala will be announcing the best civil servant of the year. This award was instituted some years back. Also, those who graduated from Central Schools for Tibetans since the late seventies would remember that the Tibetan Department of Education also presents the Bum-kyon-sum-del ("Vase Devoid of Three Defects") award to the best student in each school every year. I am sure the awards are still being presented today. These, as also other awards like the Tibetan Youth Congress' Rangzen Award (for social works, etc), I believe, are well intentioned to generate a healthy competition among the Tibetan people. Competition of the right kind, as we know, is an incentive to do better. The awards, thus, were established to recognise the achievement of certain individuals and thereby be an incentive for others to follow that path.

So how have these awards fared? Let us take the case of the Bum-kyon-sum-del laureates, if you will. Except for the 15 minutes of fame the students may have received on the day of the announcement of the awards, they seem to be non-entities thereafter. The medal that symbolises their award does not seem to have any value once the students leave the schools. In fact, my educated guess would be that very few among the officials in Gangchen Kyishong, leave alone the average Tibetan refugee, would be able to identify some of these Bum-kyon-sum-del laureates. There is thus no recognition of the individual within the community, which in turn is not any encouragement for others to aspire to reach that position.

As for the best civil servant award, it has been mired in unwanted controversy from the very beginning, thus negating the very purpose of its institution. Although it has been some years since its inception, this award has failed to find a place for itself in the psyche of the civil servants. One reason for this is that except for the monetary reward (5,000 Indian rupees to be exact), the award recipients do not have any other practical gain.

How about changing the system and making these awards fulfil the objectives for which they were established? In order to achieve this, we Tibetans need to learn the art of effective management: You should not only perform an action well, but should be seen doing so. In other words, presentation is important (I am not advocating here symbolism without substance). To give a culinary example, we Tibetans do prepare delicious dishes, but do we present them well? We know the answer.

Give these awards a little bit of high profile. Currently, the best civil servant award is announced in conjunction with some other ceremony. Oftentimes, it may be that the award recipient himself or herself is stationed outside of Dharamsala and so is not present when he or she is being honoured. Why not make the award ceremony an important annual event in itself and arrange it so that the recipient is present. Make the recipient share his/her experience to the rest of the civil servants. Project the awardees in the publications so that others get to know about them. Consider the award as a positive factor for promoting the recipient to the next grade. Similarly, currently, the best student medal is just that, just a medal. It does not seem to have any further significance. How about taking into consideration the medals when providing scholarships or jobs, or even promotions. In short, do whatever it takes to make people want these awards.