How are you defining “reputable”? Fox?

Stupid me, Uyghurs and Mongolians are not as hip as the the Dalai Lama…

All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.

I have little sympathy for these people. Sure, there’s nothing wrong with protest. But Tibet is a bit of a fashionable issue where the protesters have little idea of what’s going on or the history of the region.

I quite agree with Willie McBride. Whither the “Free Turkestan” banners?

I’ll withold my applause until they head on down to Cuba to protest what’s going on in Gitmo.

That said, they either have a lot of balls or very little sense of how the government works in china.

@5: being sent to prison for doing something illegal is not a human rights violation.

then when you’re all barefoot and communicating via semaphore (those of you that really mean what you say), you might find your fragrant soles on steadier ground.

‘but LED’s made in the US are, like, sooo expensive.’

I fail to see you spouting up much history about this region yourself. Furthermore, listing the numerous other human rights violations throughout the world isn’t exactly justification for ignoring the plight of the people of Tibet.

You pick your battles, and they picked theirs. Isn’t that fair enough?

- Helen Zia
Democracy Now! August 12

I agree. Fewer stunts and more strategic planning needs to be the way of the future if you actually care about justice in Tibet.

I bet these people are going to make so many friends at all their lame, hippy parties. The funny thing to me is that they went to China with closed minds and so instead of learning anything about a fantastic country with fantastic people, they made fools of themselves, made the US look bad (the Chinese have an incredibly comprehensive list of US human rights abuses, so every time this happens we just look like hypocrites), and got themselves thrown in prison. Lulz.

Of course they can protest anything they want. Just like I’m criticising their protesting someone else’s abuse while a big fat abuse is sitting right at home.

Elvis Pelt:

You’re entitled to your opinion, but I wasn’t confusing the american govt and the american people. It’s just this: protest the human rights abuses in your own backyard before you protesting someone else’s abuse.

…. surprise.

http://www.mchlprnt.rg/Tbt.html

So being executed for being gay in Iran is not a human rights violation? How about being caned for not wearing your veil in Saudi Arabia? Your argument is without value or worth.

Yup. And if America does it, well, that justifies everyone else, too, doesn’t it?

I bet these people are going to make so many friends at all their lame, hippy parties.

It’s HIPPIE, not ”hippy.”

A very good book regarding the Tibetan situation is “The Dragon in the Land of Snows” by Tsering Shakya. It gives a very even-handed account of Tibet’s history, including the failures on both sides that have led to the current situation. Tibet was not the Garden of Eden that some people make it out to be, but does that justify the continued torture that is being inflicted on Tibetans by the Chinese government?

First, the US government is not its citizens. Even if you feel like assigning blame to the citizens indirectly because they voted for the government, I am probably not going out on a limb when I say that these guys are probably not Bush or Gitmo fans either. These people probably still feel right of center when they voted for Nadar instead of that right wing Nazi fascist Kerry.

Second, just because the US does something, doesn’t mean that from now until the end of time that thing is now a-okay. The US had slaves, slaughtered the natives, nuked/carpet/fire bombed cities, had an apartheid government, and has committed nearly every single nasty act that a big old super power with a pragmatic side to its ideological talk can do. Despite this, the US hypocritically beat on South Africa for running an apartheid government, spoke out against genocides, and in general likes to rise a stink when nations don’t live to its standards and it isn’t going to cause some political inconvenience. This is okay. Sure, in a perfect world the US would be a perfect model super power, but failing a utopic world, a super power that talks the talk and occasional walks the walk is better than the alternative proposed by say the Soviet Union.

Hypocrisy exists. Deal with it. If we become paralyzed from making moral judgment the second it might be viewed as hypocritical, well, we might as well give up making moral judgments and nod and smile no matter what horrific acts are committed.

Third, get a fucking sense of scale people. Yes, the US holds people in Gitmo. Putting this on the same scale as China making thousands of people vanish each year without record or report for political crimes doesn’t even begin to belong on the same scale. It is like equating petty theft to murder. If the US arrests some protesters for blocking traffic and gives them a day in jail, it isn’t suddenly a moral green light for another country to use nerve gas on protesters, ’cause like the US disrupts protests too.

Finally, stop obsessing over the US. Yes, the US is big, it has a lot of money, and it gets a little preachy, but seriously, it isn’t the only frigging nation in the world. There are actually other nations in the world that do some things better and some things worse. Someone brings up ANYTHING happening anywhere in the world where some moral judgment is made, and without fail someone drags in the US like it is some global barometer on morality where you just need to possibily appear to score higher and whatever it is your are doing (eating babies, mass genocide, j-walking) is suddenly morally okay.

The US is not your big brother. Just because the US is doing it doesn’t make it cool. If you US has a beer with dinner, it doesn’t mean that you can righteously declare that it is okay if you drink a keg by yourself.

Yup. And if America does it, well, that justifies everyone else, too, doesn’t it?

It does mean though, that the US has no moral high ground to protest these things. It’s all about the sinless one casting the first stone, etc. Not that Tibet doesn’t deserve freedom, or that I think China is right, but I find the protesters’ actions both laughable and hypocritical.

Is this the cyber-version of culture revolution? using groups of young and fast mind to attack?

In Tibet and Yunnan, I forced myself to speak English to my own Han people, because politically, those one-national Han people who forced me to admit Taiwan is part of People Republic of China. So, its better i don’t speak their language.

And, I felt freely in speaking both Mandarin and English to lovely Tibetan people.

…

does it give you more street cred when you get arrested as an activist? does it put a bit more strut in your junk when you go to parties?

if so, James Powderly is gonna score so much patchouli poontang when he gets back to the states.

…jealous…

The US government has lost a lot of moral standing in the world, but that doesn’t mean individuals can’t protest whatever they want.

During the Olympics, the Chinese leadership was shamed into setting up “protest zones” in Beijing. Predictably, the reality was Kafka-esque.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/19/sports/olympics/19protest.html

You say that Tibetan protestors are losing Chinese. They’ve been lost the last 50 years when the state controlled education system and media taught Han chinese that Tibetans are lazy, ungrateful trouble makers. Like american kids being taught that Native Americans are just savage alcoholics.

But to say what “Chinese people” want is a fool’s game. As more chinese citizens get a taste of comfort, it’ll be interesting to see how much oppression they are willing to keep putting up with.

China watchers all know that the Chinese government won’t engage Tibet in any kind of talks on autonomy because then ethnic chinese will then want self-determination as well.

So the Tibet protests during the Olympics are just a way of keeping the Tibetan freedom alive during a time when China is pushing its “One World, One Dream” propaganda with the blessing of the International Olympic Committee.

No worries.