Posted on 11/01/2007 3:53:02 PM PDT by knighthawk
Having never met the Dalai Lama, I am not sure why he appears to be giggling so often. Perhaps he is just overflowing with joy. Perhaps he has a great sense of humour and is waiting for an opportunity to share a joke. Perhaps he finds it incongruous that a simple monk travels the world like a leading diplomat or captain of industry. Or perhaps he is laughing at how foolish his travels make the People's Republic of China look.
To be sure, what the PRC has done to Tibet and the Buddhist monks who animate its culture is no laughing matter. For over 50 years now, the PRC has set itself the goal of eliminating Tibet entirely as a political and cultural reality. The political task was easy enough to do by sheer force; Tibet has disappeared from the map as a political entity. The cultural task has proven harder -- to change a culture by force is an act of violence, and a bloody one at that.
The PRC has moved against the cultural institutions of Tibet, primary among them the role of the Buddhist monks. Restrictions have been placed on their own internal decision-making and designation of leaders. Most pointedly, the Dalai Lama is forced to live in exile, as he refuses to accept the PRC's swallowing of Tibet as legitimate.
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“Having never met the Dalai Lama, I am not sure why he appears to be giggling so often. Perhaps he is just overflowing with joy. Perhaps he has a great sense of humour and is waiting for an opportunity to share a joke. Perhaps he finds it incongruous that a simple monk travels the world like a leading diplomat or captain of industry. Or perhaps he is laughing at how foolish his travels make the People’s Republic of China look”.
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