For the most part, I’ll be polite and when I’m back home will do some digging to see if what I was told is fact or false. I hate to use the word “truth” since “truth” doesn’t always seem to fit its definition as stated in Longman Advanced American Dictionary— “the true facts about something, as opposed to what is not true , is imagined, or is guessed”. There were nine definitions for truth. The one I quoted is the first entry. In America today the truth has been twisted out of context by this war between America’s idealistic left and right. After listening to the verbal combat between these two forces for decades, I have little respect for either side and no trust.
Now, I’m going to step aside from the focus of this piece and point out that although I earned a BA in journalism, I never worked in the media. I worked in industry; in a nightclub as a maitre d, and as a classroom teacher in the public schools for thirty years. When I was fifteen, I had a night job washing dishes. After high school, I joined the United States Marines and fought in Vietnam in 1966. I even did some card counting in Las Vegas. By the way, card counting is legal but casinos have the right to throw you out if they catch you. After all, what business wants a customer to have the edge when it comes to making a profit?
I have little respect/trust in the media and take what I read or hear from the media with a large tablespoon of salt. That lack of respect/trust isn’t because the ‘far right’ has built a flimsy house around the media by its exaggerated claims that the media is liberal and biased (I feel that there is ‘some’ truth to these claims but not as bad as most think.). However, my opinion is due to deadline pressures and the media’s nature as part of a market economy. The media often stumbles in the rush to get the news out and make a profit.
Earning a BA in journalism taught me a lot about the media and that was, “Don’t trust what you see or hear. Always go deeper to find out what is fact or fiction.” Most Americans won’t do that. They won’t dig to find out what is fact or fiction. Instead they listen to their favorite person—be he a friend or a talk show host, or someone that writes opinion pieces that get printed in newspapers. The sad thing is that few seem to check the facts to see what is fiction. At times, I’ve been guilty of that myself.
I have a friend that E-mails me opinionated pieces all the time from Websites and Blogs he reads. I took a class in writing opinion pieces and know what one looks like—especially one that is poorly supported. I erase most of what this friend sends me and do not respond. I learned the hard way that you can’t reason with someone that gathers most of his information from sources that are sadly one hundred percent biased instead of slightly biased like most of the media ‘seems’ to be.
I posted another article on Authors Den this week and had a few interesting responses. I’m going to pull a few quotes from those responses. First: “... I am not so familiar with China, but I do know that it was not very good for them under a communist regime . . .”
It is a fact that communists were not good for China, but that was a long time ago under Mao. Other than that, the current government of China is doing an amazing job to improve the standard of living there considering the number of people involved. It is no secret that Mao was a brutal man. Under him, at least thirty-seven million Chinese died due to his failed Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution that followed (the deaths in Tibet are included in that huge number).
However, after Mao’s death, Deng Xiaoping, a man educated in the West that believed in a market economy, managed to wrest power from the Maoists and put China on the path that has led to the economic powerhouse that country is today. Under Deng, the Communist party underwent a metamorphosis.
Everyone in China suffered under Mao. Deng’s only son was tossed off a building by Mao’s people to send a message to Deng to keep quiet, which he did until Mao died. Deng also packed up his entire family and fled south where he sought protection under a powerful Communist general. Deng’s son survived and spent the rest of his life in a wheelchair. Deng and his wife had to bathe and change their son’s diapers since he was paralyzed.
Mao brutally killed off or threw in prison anyone in the Communist Party that disagreed with him. The survivors learned to keep their mouths shut and become invisible. That’s how Deng survived until Mao died. Under Mao, China was not ruled by a Communist Party that had seventy million members. China was ruled by a modern emperor by the name of Mao. After Mao’s death, not wanting what Mao did to China to happen again, China’s Communist Party made changes like term limits and age limits for political positions of power— something we don’t have in the United States at the federal level except for the President of the United States, which I believe is a good thing.
Regarding Tibet: During congressional hearings in the 1970s, the Dalai Lama admitted he was supported by the CIA after he fled Tibet. He also said he would not accept those funds any longer. On the other hand, there are three other Tibetan separatist movements, all controlled by the huge landowners that once ruled most of Tibet (that part not ruled by the Lamas) before Mao’s brutal invasion in the early 50s or should I say reoccupation? After Mao died, many of the larger temples were rebuilt and Buddhist Monks allowed to worship as they saw fit but without the mandatory policy that every family in Tibet send at least one son to a monastery at an early age—a practice that existed for centuries.
I’ve had the opportunity to talk to a Tibetan exile that fled with his family when he was nine. He’s several decades older now and lives in the United States. I’ve watched the documentary Ten Questions for the Dalai Lama; I’ve had long conversations with a retired Communist that is almost eighty. He fought the Japanese during WWII and also fought with Mao during the revolution. I ask lots of questions and don’t believe all that I’m told.
I’ve also been to China several times in the last ten years and talked to people that are not Communists. As a matter of fact, I’ve only talked to one retired communist. I doubt if many in America realize that if we sliced China up into a pie, there would be fifty-eight slices. Tibet would be one. The Communists would be another slice. There are fifty-six minorities in China that make up another hundred million people (Tibetans are one of those minorities). Two of the fifty-six minorities want to split from China and rule themselves—four Tibetan separatist movements (think disposed land owners and lamas) and four Islamic separatist movements (think Taliban) in the far northwest. That leaves 1.1 billion people, the Han majority, to make up the largest slice.
On the other hand, America has more separatist movements than China. We don’t hear much about them but they are in Texas, California, Alaska, Hawaii and a few other places. What they don’t have is the Tibetan Dalai Lama that was given a Noble Peace Prize. It also helps that the Dalai Lama has a lot of friends in Hollywood.
By the way, what did America do when thirteen southern states left the union in 1861?
During my trips to China, I’ve seen and talked to a lot of happy people. Oh sure, there is misery, but we can find misery anywhere—even in America.
The next pull quote I want to focus on is, “However, Half Bright Fulbright was traitorous idiot that gave aid and comfort to the enemies that were killing American soldiers.” I received this, because I used a quote from Fulbright in my last Article posted at Authors Den. I admit that I was ignorant about Fulbright’s history. I did a search for quotes from famous people on the focus of my piece and liked what he said. Fulbright was someone famous, so I used his quote. That quote held a message I wanted to slip into my piece. At the time, I didn’t know Fulbright was once a U.S. Senator. Since then, I did some research to learn more about Fulbright and found out who nicknamed him ‘Half Bright Fulbright’ and called him a traitorous idiot. What I found out was revealing. Joseph McCarthy, another U.S. Senator, tagged Fulbright that name during America’s Red Scare era, a movement started by McCarthy but ended by President Eisenhower when it started to trample the American Bill of Rights—created to protect us from our government. By the way, China doesn’t have our Bill of Rights. Most of the world doesn’t. We are lucky.
I don’t want to dwell any more on McCarthy, Fulbright or the Red Scare. Find out for yourself if you are interested. Do more digging than I did. After you have gathered the facts, decide what you want to believe. Along the way, you might want to Google this book and read the review on it. After you read it, make sure you verify the facts. I didn’t want to spend the time to do that. After all, we only have so many hours in a day.
April 15, 1989
BOOKS OF THE TIMES; Fulbright Has the Last Laugh on Many Critics
By HERBERT MITGANG
LEAD: The Price of Empire J. William Fulbright, with Seth P. Tillman 243 pages. Pantheon Books. $17.95.
The third pull quote I’m going to deal with is, “
I would like to see a more in-depth treatment of why you defend China's claim to Tibet.” That’s an easy one. During the nine years of research into Robert Hart’s life and learning about the history and culture of China to write
My Splendid Concubine, I stumbled on facts that were not related to my books topic.
During the Olympics, when I heard Tibetans and their supporters claiming that China never ruled Tibet prior to Mao’s invasion in the 1950s, I said, “Wait a minute! That isn’t true !” It was obvious that since the Chinese Communists are disliked so much by both the right and the left in America, a lot of people wouldn’t believe the Communists.
On the other hand, who wouldn’t believe a great guy like the Dalai Lama?” Did you know that the videos the Tibetans used to show Communist brutality were shot in Nepal and India? Look closely at the uniforms of the police.
Robert Hart lived in China from 1854 to 1908. There were few communists around then and the Russia Revolution didn’t take place until 1917. Hart died in 1913. He was a rich capitalist that owned his own town back in England. Hart was respected and trusted by both the Chinese (at that time) and many other nations around the world. Hart was honored by Queen Victoria of Great Britain; the Emperor of China and the Vatican along with a dozen other nations for what he achieved during his life. He also wrote a lot of letters and journals where I discovered the fact that China did rule Tibet for centuries. If you want to know more, I suggest you read about
China & Tibet on my Website where I’ve posted some of those facts. Another source I stumbled on during my research for My Splendid Concubine was the October 1912 issue of National Geographic Magazine. I bought a copy and have it in front of me. I’ve quoted one of the articles in that issue at China & Tibet.You might find it interesting that most people in China do not believe what is printed in the government controlled media. When the Communist media says one thing, more than a billion Chinese believe the opposite. That’s why I have not used any of the evidence behind the Communist claims regarding Tibet. My sources have nothing to do with Communist China (remember, there are only seventy million Communists in China but there are 1.3 billion people there). Once you know that most Chinese don’t believe what the Communist Party says most of the time, it might be interesting to note that most Chinese believe that China ruled over Tibet for centuries. Tibetans claim that the Chinese have been brainwashed. The facts say otherwise.
Now, if you want to refute anything I’ve written in this article, be my guest, but make sure your facts are correct. I have little or no respect for opinions that are not backed with solid facts from reputable sources instead of biased ones. On the other hand, I think that Robert Hart and National Geographic Magazine are good sources for anyone seeking the truth as the dictionary defines it.
When I started researching and writing My Splendid Concubine, I wanted to write about a love story. I never intended to be defending the current Communist government of China. I could have ignored what was happening, but I believed facts leading to truth deserved to be heard.
