on this episode of china uncensored china and tibet hi welcome to china censored i'm your host chris chappell the chinese communist party has some shall we say difficulties winning over the tibetan people perhaps it has something to do with the disappearances torture arbitrary arrests and detention and genocide both culturally and otherwise but the days of misunderstanding are over because now the chinese regime is putting on a fabulous play right in the heart of lhasa it's a multi-million dollar drama with a cast of 600 performing the story of princess won chun a tong dynasty princess who married a tibetan king starting the long and harmonious relationship that china has always had with tibet the story plays out on a 300-foot long stage in the pothola palace well technically a knockoff of the potella palace the former residents of the dalai lama built right across from the real one and they're going to perform it 180 times a year sure lhasa is under military lockdown you can see snipers on the rooftops and citizens are under intense surveillance but this propaganda plate will totally make tibetans forget about all those years of bloodshed is it any surprise that the ccp never really got a grasp for how tibetans are feeling since 2009 over 100 tibetans have self-immolated to protest communist rule and yet the chinese communist party still insists that living conditions in tibet are way better since they took over and that the dalai lama is a terrorist ringleader yeah that's the face of evil right there so how did tibet find itself under the heel of the chinese regime well tibet has actually been a part of china since the yuan dynasty at least according to the chinese regime actually that's not really true the yuan dynasty was founded by mongolians an ethnic group to the northwest of china led by genghis khan his grandson kubla khan conquered china ending the song dynasty and tibet became a part of china sort of there's a lot of debate about how the un dynasty actually governed tibet from direct control to a tributary vassal to simply being an autonomous region but what is clear is that tibetan culture had a major influence on yuan china kubla khan showed particular preference for the culture and tibetan buddhism that china actually respected tibetan culture after the u.n fell tibet stayed independent until the mid qing dynasty when that fell tibet was independent again until 1950 after the communists invaded claiming to liberate the tibetans from their oppressive feudalistic slave masters then they spent the next several decades killing scores of tibetans the dalai lama has said 1.2 million tibetans have died as a result of starvation violence or other indirect causes of communist policy that number is contested but even those who do like former director of london-based free tibet campaign patrick french says that at least four hundred thousand have died and before the communists took over tibet had over six thousand monasteries by 1976 that number was reduced to eight not to mention the countless number of shrines and religious texts destroyed tibet is not technically a province of china but an autonomous region like xinjiang that is supposed to have a degree of autonomy now the communist party has says it's built all kinds of new infrastructure and improve the quality of living but what with that whole over a hundred self-immolations tibetans generally don't feel that their quality of life has improved if anything they're facing cultural extinction they're not allowed to speak their own language in schools they can only teach mandarin tibetans are also contending with mass immigration of han and hui chinese this cultural genocide is actually the same thing the communist party did in mainland china to chinese culture traditional chinese culture certainly didn't have no songs about mao and here's a fun fact not many people know everywhere in china despite its massive size is locked into beijing time that means if it's 10 a.m in beijing it's 10 a.m everywhere else in china but because tibet is so far away 10 a.m in beijing would really feel like 7 a.m in tibet but they still have to say it's officially 10 a.m now we all know that the 14th dalai lama the central figure of tibetan buddhism has been living in exile since 1959 but then there's also the pension lama the pension lamba is the number two figure in tibetan buddhism the 10th pachin lama mysteriously died in january 1989. he had been openly critical of the ccp's policy towards tibet one chinese dissident has even suggested that hujin tao the former chinese leader who was in charge of tibet during the late 80s may have had a hand in the pachin lama's death two months later in march one of the largest uprisings ever to shake tibet happened it resulted in a massive crackdown and massacre and foreign media was expelled of course i like to think the people's liberation army was just getting practice for the next massacre in june so according to tibetan buddhism after the pancha lama dies he would reincarnate and the dalai lama would find the new incarnation in turn when the dalai lama passes away the panchayan llama would be responsible for finding his reincarnation so what the chinese regime does after the 10th patent lama died is to name their own the boy the dalai lama chose along with his whole family has conveniently disappeared so that means the chinese regime gets to put out brilliant pieces of propaganda like this now if you didn't know better you'd think china allows religious freedom and supports tibetan culture there's the pachin lama being worshiped by tibetan monks and there are chinese officials totally supporting religious activities but this guy is just a puppet chosen by the officially atheist communist party they're trying to trick tibetans and the rest of the world because what they're doing is paving the road to eventually create their own dalai lama that's right a dalai lama chosen by these people eventually the current dalai lama will pass away and the search will begin for his reincarnation not only does the chinese regime have their own pachin laman who will choose whomever he's told to but in 2007 the regime also banned reincarnation without government permission now that may sound like a laughable joke but that's just creating a legal justification to make sure the next dalai lama is one groomed by the communist party to lead the tibetan people into further subjugation meanwhile the tibetan government in exile will continue to operate in dharmasala india the current dalai lama will travel around the world for support and the chinese regime will keep threatening foreign governments that if they meet with the dalai lama they'll take back the pandas they loan to their zoos like they just did in austria back in june so what do you think is in store for tibet and the tibetan people comment below or on china and censors facebook or twitter page and check back again tomorrow for another new episode once again i'm chris chapple see you next time [Music] foreign