A narrative that conveniently ignores that the Dalai Llama was, and is, more of a socialist than the CCP ever mustered to be and was always very much on board with reforming everything. Or, well, the current incarnation always was. The split only came after it became clear that tankies gonna tank, that is, the CCP cared less about the freedom of the people (both in a spiritual and material sense) than about having full control over a mineral-rich mountain fortress to build a military-industrial base that couldn’t be shelled from the ocean. Tibet alas is, geographically, the Switzerland of the Himalayas. Another factor was the sheer popularity of the Llama in Tibet, spiritual leader + socialist is a sure-fire double whammy to popularity but threatened the party’s prerogative of interpretation not to mention orthodox Marxist doctrine, opium for the people and everything.
You know what’s the most absurd thing about all this, especially considering Marxist materialism? That the CCP is claiming that it can legislate on reincarnation. And not in the “yeah this is all BS” sense, that’d be par for the course, but in the “ok here is how it’s going to be done” sense. Went so far as to accuse the Dalai Llama of blasphemy for suggesting that whether and how he reincarnates will be up to him. And I guess the CCP is stuck on insisting that incarnation is real because otherwise the can’t blame the current Dalai Llama for the politics of his previous lives?
Wasnt Tibetan society like 90% slaves working for the monastic rulers?
A narrative that conveniently ignores that the Dalai Llama was, and is, more of a socialist than the CCP ever mustered to be and was always very much on board with reforming everything. Or, well, the current incarnation always was. The split only came after it became clear that tankies gonna tank, that is, the CCP cared less about the freedom of the people (both in a spiritual and material sense) than about having full control over a mineral-rich mountain fortress to build a military-industrial base that couldn’t be shelled from the ocean. Tibet alas is, geographically, the Switzerland of the Himalayas. Another factor was the sheer popularity of the Llama in Tibet, spiritual leader + socialist is a sure-fire double whammy to popularity but threatened the party’s prerogative of interpretation not to mention orthodox Marxist doctrine, opium for the people and everything.
You know what’s the most absurd thing about all this, especially considering Marxist materialism? That the CCP is claiming that it can legislate on reincarnation. And not in the “yeah this is all BS” sense, that’d be par for the course, but in the “ok here is how it’s going to be done” sense. Went so far as to accuse the Dalai Llama of blasphemy for suggesting that whether and how he reincarnates will be up to him. And I guess the CCP is stuck on insisting that incarnation is real because otherwise the can’t blame the current Dalai Llama for the politics of his previous lives?
Yes.