A few quick and final hits on a week of Tibetan nonsense…Michael Albada has a nice piece in the Stanford Progressive that reminds us cutting through the rhetoric from both sides of the Tibet debate is essential to reconciling the situation there:
Tibet has gained a highly romanticized, idealistic image that does not stand up to the test of history. Tibetan history has been bloody, quarrelsome, and oppressive and does not match the idyllic Buddhist paradise painted by writers and Tibetan nationalists in the west. Tibet is not, on the other hand, merely a province that has been ruled by China since antiquity. The debate over Tibetan sovereignty has raged since the Chinese takeover of the region in 1950, yet we are little closer to compromise. Opinions remain highly polarized both within and without Tibet. Both sides assert uncompromisingly and refuse to back down. Both sides ascribe strong nationalistic narratives which distort the true historical background to the controversy. Tibetan sovereignty can best be understood in its full historical complexity; efforts at oversimplification will only prolong the controversy.
I couldn’t agree more, though as I’ve said until hoarse, history is not always the best arbiter of contemporary political disputes. Not