Why Terry is boycotting the Beijing Olympics

There are very few ways for a twenty-five year old American consumer to actively and effectively protest the treatment of the Tibetan people by the Chinese Government.

Walk into a store and try to boycott Chinese products, while getting the things you "need". In today's market, this just is not possible.

Here is a quick history lesson on the history of the conflict.

The People's Liberation Army (PLA) defeated the Tibetan army in a bloodless war at Chamdo on October 7 1950. This attack marked the beginning of Beijing’s campaign to incorporate Tibet into People's Republic of China

According to Samdhong Rinpoche and the 14th Dalai Lama, on January 1 1950 the PRC promised to "liberate" Tibet. The People's Liberation Army first entered eastern Tibet (Chamdo) on October 7 1950. The highly mobile units of the PLA quickly surrounded the outnumbered Tibetan forces, and by October 19 1950, 5,000 Tibetan troops had surrendered. After confiscating their weapons, the PLA soldiers gave their prisoners lectures on socialism, and a small amount of money, and allowed them to return to their homes.

The PLA then continued on to central Tibet, but halted its advance 200km to the east of Lhasa, at what China claimed was the de jure boundary of Tibet, where they stopped and demanded Tibet's "peaceful liberation."

The PLA, while possessing overwhelming military advantage, was also set on winning the hearts and minds of the Tibetan populace. At first, they treated the local populace very well, building roads, and paying locals for their labor.[2] According to Tenzin Gyatso, the current Dalai Lama, the PLA did not attack civilians: "The Chinese were very disciplined. They were like the British soldiers (in 1904). Even better than the British, because they distributed some money (to villagers and local leaders). So they carefully planned."

The PLA sent released prisoners (among them Ngapoi Ngawang Jigme, a captured governor) to Lhasa to negotiate with the Dalai Lama on the PLA's behalf. The PLA promised that if Tibet was "peacefully liberated", the Tibetan elites would keep their privileges and power. At the same time, Jigme and other released captives testified to their good treatment by the PLA. As the PLA had stopped and was asking for peaceful negotiations instead of entering Lhasa unimpeded, the United Nations unanimously dropped the issue from the agenda. The combination of military pressure, reports of good treatment from locals and released prisoners, and the lack of international support convinced the Tibetan representatives to enter negotiations with the PLA.

Several months later, in May 1951, the Tibetan representatives signed a seventeen-point agreement in Beijing with the PRC's Central People's Government affirming China's sovereignty over Tibet. The agreement was ratified in Lhasa a few months later. An article released by the Tibetan Government in Exile in 1996 states that the treaty was imposed on Tibet by force and it "was never validly concluded and was rejected by Tibetans." After a visit to determine human rights abuses in Tibet, UK parliament's Select Committee on Foreign Affairs' Seventh Report on Human Rights supported the Tibetan position.


Samdhong Rinpoche, the 14th Dalai Lama, and other Tibetans in exile have accused the PRC government of a campaign of terror which led to the destruction of monasteries and disappearance of up to 1.2 million Tibetans. By 1962 only 70 of the original 2,500 monasteries in the Tibet Autonomous Region were left and 93% of the monks were forced out. The "1.2 million" figure for deaths since 1950 dates to a figure from the Tibetan Government-in-exile which they break down to 433,000 through military action, 343,000 through famine, 173,000 through imprisonment, 157,000 through execution, 93,000 through torture and 9,000 through suicide.



In July 2001 a monument was established to commemorate the event. Beijing says that Tibet was under an uninterrupted series of Chinese governments that has ruled Tibet and China since Genghis Khan. In 2005 president Hu Jintao asserted Tibet has been an "inalienable part of Chinese territory" from the time of the Mongol conquest onward. This has been taught to Chinese students since 1912.


The UN General Assembly passed resolutions condemning China for "violations of fundamental human rights of the Tibetan people" in 1959, 1961 and 1965. German Federal Parliament held hearings on Tibet on June 19 1995, and passed a resolution on June 20 1996 stating they were "deeply concerned that this independent identity has been threatened by destruction since the Chinese action by brutal force of arms in 1950" and that China had deprived the Tibetans of self-determination. The US Congressional Human Rights Caucus in 1987 reviewed testimony from Tibetans who detailed human rights abuses, resulting in a congressional motion that condemned Chinese actions in Tibet. In 2006 a lawsuit was filed by the Madrid-based Committee to Support Tibet in a Spanish court. The group said that more than one million Tibetans had been killed or gone missing since China occupied Tibet in 1951.


I am doing my part. I would have to think long and hard about my support of Olympic games in this country as well.