Honestly, guys this seems really silly to me, that it's causing such a firestorm. It shouldn't be, its almost like how Quebec wanted to seperate. The only reason why its this big, is because the dalai lama is involved and he has a good image in the world. I suppose the media is to be blamed to, with the inaccurate presentation of this event. It's ridiculous and jeopardizing the Olympics, which I think is a great thing to bring understanding between the east and the west. And for all those silly supports, you seriously don't get the geopolicitics of that region. You can not just suppose that you can change things to way it is like exactly like your country. Somethings are easy to do in your country but not so in others, in many cases it might even be impossible, and vice-versa.
Because Tibetans don't want to be under the rule of a repressive Communist regime that carries out public executions?
Want to tell me when was this public execution of yours? This might not just happen to be 1989 is it? During the same time as the massacre of Tienanmen square. Those were horrible times my friend. But if you haven't notice China changed dramatically since then and people now have a lot more personal freedoms than before. Just look at how the recent protest was handled. I don't think there was any public executions.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/1425570.stm (2001) http://www.hrw.org/reports/1994/china1/china_948.htm (1994) http://hrw.org/press/2003/01/tibet012803.htm (2003) http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2006-06-14-death-van_x.htm (2006) The last article notes that China is slowly phasing out its public executions. About time!
China do have lots of excutions and lots of them being innocent people not given a fair trial. But you have understand the politics behind it. It's not because the central government is saying go kill them all. It's the government level at the provincial level. There are a lot of corrupt officials in china right now. If you got money and you got power which lots of officials do, you can do a lot of things and get away with it. One of the root of the problems of this is because the people who work in the government get paid pennies why they have lots of control. You have to understand that it's not the policy that is bad, its that right now they can't enforce it well. If you look at China's laws and policies they are pretty good. In Canada where I live, I suppose you live in a developed country too. Our government is pretty structured with little room to move and bend around. This is not the same for China, and if you tried to rat anyone out, you'd be in trouble because no one likes a trouble maker. There are issues in china right now, no one is denying it. I'm sure if you ask people in China what they feel about youtube censorship and stuff like that they are not happy with it. But This should be a seperate issue from the separation of Tibet. Why aren't the rest of China trying seperate off if it's really that bad? Why I feel so strongly about this is that many of the people I agree with on basically all majority of issues do not agree with me on this one. Which to me seems like they are all completely stupid, but at the same time I can't blame them because I would think the same as them if I didn't know how different China's system with the Western world is. China still needs time to slowly structure everything out, and they are moving in the right direction. There doesn't need to be anymore tension between the East and West right now, those separatist are just troublemakers.
It's not that I don't know about China's problems with local governments. It's that Tibet has different people who want to live differently under their own sovereign state. They broke away from China, and China took them back over. The separatist movement may or may not constitute a roadblock in U.S.-China relations, but it is a legitimate cause that the separatists can now push via the Olympics. I agree with you that the system of government in China has some improvements that can be made. Sure, China has made some strides by going semi-quasi-psuedo-capitalistic. They'll have to do more of that to see big results.
Another reason why they can't always move as fast as Westerns people always want to see is because of the rural area where they are still very old style and love communist and see mao as a god. The Urban Cities are ready already. But realistically if China were to change dramatically in one day like the western world keeps screaming for it would have to be a violent one, but they don't understand that. You say tibet has different people and different culture and want to live a alone. Let me tell you something. Most people in tibet don't want to seperate believe it or not. Even 2/3 are of han ethic and 1/3 tibetan. Not even the majority of tibetan wants to seperate. With that said different culture and different people. Are you aware though, china is comprised of 56 different ethic groups with differen cultures. Near korea you got the chinese-koreans, you got the inner mongolians you got extremely dark asians near vietnam, by yugoslavia, those chinese there don't even look asian. If they told you they were chinese you won't even believe it them, but they call themselves chinese. So why aren't they all trying to seperate. Tibet declared independence with the help of foreign powers which are always trying to seperate countries. They colonize it, and if they lose it they seperate it. Just simliar to the case in Rwanda. Did you know how many wars China was fighting that time when Tibet declared independences??? China never even accepted it either in the first place and when back to regain it when it could. And if you look at that them people welcomed China, but majority of people have the impression it was like iraq and an invasion but no it's not. BTW were you the one that left that stupid comment saying I was ignorant on the rep? Or was that someone else..
To get a rough Idea of the other side watch all of these 3 and all of it. If you haven't please keep your mouth shut, you are distorting and even if your intention may be good you maybe not be doing good with the extremely lack of information you have. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xsoc4-QnplY http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nrTwvzNsIYg&feature=related http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jWbTT6hIR8M Everyone needs to watch these 3 videos and think with reason. I encourage you to watch CNN, Fox, CCTV, and other separatist sources too. Watch them from all sides look at the cases the bring up and then make your own opinion. Don't be a bandwagon jumper! The reason why I just picked these 3 videos out is because I don't think lots of westerns understand this or maybe haven't seen it. It can give you a rough Idea of the case on the on the other side. With this said I want to add that I feel human rights issue that concern not just tibet but all of china, should be a seperate topic from Tibet Seperation. I'm speaking strictly of separating Tibet part.
What do you want or need Tibet for? Doesn't China have enough land already? I've been for a FREE TIBET for years. Long before it became the latest cause. Just because people SAY Tibet is part of China, doesn't make it true.
Well what do you mean doesn't make it true????? It's not really about the land, it's the fact that a part of the country is being separated. Like Quebec wanted to break apart from Canada and Canada said no. It almost happened btw. Even if tibet was 10 times smaller it wouldn't make a difference. China would still not accept separation like Canada won't accept Quebec as an individual country. We're together and a group of separatist advocates isn't going to split the country up.
OK, interesting point of view. No time to respond at the moment - just wanted to say that I did not leave that comment on your rep.
Majority of the ethnic tibetan's would want separation, but that's not the issue. It's more about the human rights violations.
I think you just answered your question of why Tibet wants independence. Executions of the innocent and corrupt officials is a fairly reasonable reason for not wanting anything to do with China. Tibet already had independence until 1950 when China invaded and took control again.