Dalai Lama: Half Marxist, Half Buddhist

It's no secret that the real threat to the Chinese Communist Party doesn't come from capitalism, but Marxism. U.S. corporations like Cisco have been helping the Chinese government build and maintain its ruthless surveillance state, while Apple pays off officials in order to rake in profits by violating basic labour standards. One of the main pillars of the Chinese system is American capital.

The Marxists are the dissidents, the real party poopers. They remind everyone of the class struggle, of social justice and equality, all things that have become incompatible with China's feverish embrace of globalization. A recent article in Tricycle, "Occupy Buddhism, or Why the Dalai Lama is a Marxist," explains why this dissident's claim to be "half-Marxist, half-Buddhist" makes perfect sense. For one thing, both share a fundamental belief in dialectical materialism.

(Tibet - Drepung Monastery, by Yewco)

The Dalai Lama has acknowledged his Marxist affinities for a long time, admitting that its central appeal lies in its emphasis on equality and fairness:

"Of all the modern economic theories, the economic system of Marxism is founded on moral principles, while capitalism is concerned with only with gain and profitability. Marxism is concerned with the distribution of wealth on an equal basis and the equitable utilization of the means of production.

It is also concerned with the fate of the working classes—that is the majority—as well as with the fate of those who are underprivileged and in need, and Marxism cares about the victims of minority-imposed exploitation. For those reasons the system appeals to me, and it seems fair...

The failure of the regime in the Soviet Union was, for me not the failure of Marxism but the failure of totalitarianism. For this reason I think of myself as half-Marxist, half-Buddhist."

So if a synthesis between Buddha and Marx is possible, maybe it's not easier to imagine the end of all life on earth than to imagine a radical change in capitalism. As Marx and Engels wrote in German Ideology:

"Communism is for us not a state of affairs which is to be established, an ideal to which reality [will] have to adjust itself. We call communism the real movement which abolishes the present state of things."

Today, a Buddhist-Marxist alliance isn't needed to achieve this - Wall Street is enough.

World's Youngest Political Prisoner: Tibet & China

“Our prime purpose in this life is to help others. And if you can't help them, at least don't hurt them.” ~ Dalai Lama

The Chinese Consulate in San Francisco is in an awkward location. Wedged between Saint Mary's Cathedral, the mother church for Catholics in the San Francisco area, and Japantown, it appears to be condemned to a life of penance. While visiting a few weeks ago, we passed a demonstration to release the 11th Panchen Lama of Tibet.

It was April 25th, the 23rd birthday of Gedhun Choekyi Nyima, the real Panchen Lama, who went missing 17 years ago in 1995. Human rights groups have since dubbed him "the youngest political prisoner in the world."

In May 1995, the Dalai Lama recognized Nyima as the 11th reincarnation of the Panchen Lama, one of Tibet’s most important religious leaders. Just after this he and his family were taken into custody by the Chinese authorities and he hasn't been seen since. Then in November 1995, the Chinese government installed a fake Panchen Lama, Gyaincain Norbu.

(Norbu in Hong Kong at the Third World Buddhist Forum, April 26, 2012, the day after Nyima's birthday)

China has been in the news lately regarding blind activist Chen Guangcheng's escape from house detention late last month. Reports have been circulating about China's regressive actions of late and how the country's moneyed elite is making arrangements to flee. If true, the Middle Kingdom may be finally doing itself in.

Tibet: "Sky Burial"

I recently received some very good news - my poem, "Sky Burial" came second in This Magazine's Great Canadian Literary Hunt 2010!

Sky Burial

The path behind Ganden
cuts through a clutch
of wild flowers, continues
beneath a flutter of prayer
flags and rises to the crown
of a hill. We walk towards
a large, flat stone where
the body was divided
from itself. Instruments lie
scattered like a toolbox emptied
in a slaughterhouse: rusted
machetes, axes, a blood-stained
rope. To the side a fire pit
cradles jigsaw pieces of charred
bone in its ashen basket: a skull
plate, a jaw missing teeth, broken
chunks of spine. Ochre stained
tsampa, soaked with blood, is left
for the vultures to clean. Beyond
this cutting board the valley rolls
out its tongue, licks the sky blue.
A gust of wind tosses up a maroon
coloured cloth, spins it in the air
like a monk rising as the birds circle
above. On the drive back to Lhasa
we pass a lamb still breathing,
its eyes flaring as blood
spills from its mouth.

The poem is based on a trip Yuko and I took to the Ganden Monastery, about an hour's drive outside of Lhasa, Tibet. Ganden, meaning "joyful paradise", was once a huge university that was home to 3,300 monks. It was desecrated and razed before and during the Cultural Revolution. It was nothing more than a blackened shell until the early 1990s when the Chinese authorities allowed restoration work to begin. Today, much of it has been rebuilt. Rather than apologize for past atrocities, it seems the Chinese authorities have allowed such projects to go ahead to make up for the damage once inflicted.


Ganden straddles Wangbur mountain and overlooks a sprawling valley. Dating from 1409, it has been a centre for the "yellow hat" Buddhist sect and its founder, Tsongkapa. It's of significance to the current Dalai Lama, who originates from the same sect. Tensions have erupted within the past few years between the Dalai Lama and a small group of monks at Ganden. The Dalai Lama issued a decree banning the worship of a controversial figure here, and some monks refused to accept it. Small clashes have broken out.


Our guide tried to discourage us from visiting but eventually agreed after saying some prayers to protect himself from any bad karma. Once at the top, we began walking the kora with stunning views of the surrounding hills and valleys. A kora is a core ritual for Tibetans that involves a clockwise circumambulation around a holy site or sacred object. Believed to bestow blessings on those who complete it, most monasteries have one. It includes prayer wheels and colourful flags known as "wind horses", which most Tibetans believe deliver prayers across the sky to the gods.


Ganden is one of the few sites to hold sky burials, a Tibetan ritual for disposing of the dead. Tibetan Buddhists believe the material body represents nothing at death and that all meaning resides in the soul. A sky burial entails cutting the body into pieces and burning the bones. No ceremonies were planned for the day we visited, but a large flat stone and tools stained with blood suggested that one took place within the last day or two. As we gathered at the site, vultures were circling overhead.

Tibet: Autonomy Now!

The Tibetan National Flag is beautiful...it's also outlawed in China.

Today is the 50th anniversary of the 1959 Tibetan uprising. The Chinese Communist Party still refuses to negotiate in good faith with the Dalai Lama despite his repeated rejection of Tibetan independence - he seeks autonomy for the region, not independence. He's the greatest hope the Chinese communists have, but they're too stupid to realize it and they've been tightening the screws, sowing the seeds of violence...for both their own citizens and the Tibetans.

In the summer of 2006 we visited Tibet - here's my piece (photos by Yuko) from the January 2007 issue of Adbusters:

"Few cultures could have survived an invasion the magnitude of which Tibet experienced at the hands of the Chinese in 1959. Everything from the basic food staple, tsampa -- roasted barley flour -- to the current Dalai Lama was targeted in the wake of the brutal takeover. The so-called liberation left monasteries decimated and claimed over 1.5 million lives resulting in cultural genocide according to the exiled Tibetan government based in Dharmsala, India.

"As the Dalai Lama escaped across the Himalayas disguised as a soldier on a white pony, Mao Tse-tung was heard to say, "In that case, we have lost the battle." Indeed, Tibet has overcome the odds and its core institutions endure, albeit in a crippled form. The Dalai Lama is still widely revered, the Potala Palace has hosted a record number of visitors this summer, and Tibetan Buddhism remains one of the world's most alluring faiths. As the carnage of the Cultural Revolution began to subside in the mid-70s, the Chinese realized that Tibet's pristine wilderness and rich traditions were worth preserving, if for only one reason - their tourist cache."