Rolling Stone on Tibet

I am currently getting a free subscription to Rolling Stone Magazine. We signed up for this when we visited the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame last August.

In the latest issue, there was a long article titled The End of Tibet. The subhead summarizes the main theme of the article:

As China tortures monks and drives Tibetans into poverty, many young activists are renouncing the Dalai Lama and resorting to violence. Is one of the world's most ancient cultures facing extinction?

I found the article to be quite interesting: full of anecdotes, and good descriptions of the egregious past (and to some extent, present) mistreatment of native Tibetans by the Chinese. There are clearly some biases in the article -- such as vague assertions of growing wrongs against Tibetans that might actually just be markets (or something approaching markets), technology, and capitalism being introduced by the Chinese. Not enough detail is given on these issues, so one can't tell from the article. And one doesn't get the sense that they are attempting to show both sides of the issues involved. Then again, in most the most egregious cases -- especially those of the past -- there really just is the one side that deserves to be heard, the other side being the Communist regime blatantly violating the rights of the Tibetan people (including torture, murder, and so on).

So I recommend the article as an interesting read at least. But my big question is this:

What is this article doing in Rolling Stone magazine? There was absolutely no connection whatsoever to music, or even entertainment more broadly. I guess I'm just new to this magazine -- it is extremely leftist politically, so I guess any favorite causes of the left can get lengthy writeups in Rolling Stone?

And this raises something, more seriously now, that I find curious. The entire Tibet/China situation is very puzzling when you think about it in terms of traditional political ideologies in the West. I mean, the activist left has for several decades fought to improve the lives of the Tibetan people, even striving to gain them independence... from... a brutal Communist regime. But... Communism and Socialism are, or at least were, the pride and joy of the political left. Remember all those in America and elsewhere who fell for, and created and perpetuated, the propoganda myths of how wonderful life was in the USSR and China, and how evil capitalism (and the USA) were by contrast. Not to mention academics who argued for (and a smaller number who still do argue for) the superiority of such statist systems.

And then there is the odd situation that by fighting to protect the culture of the Tibetan people, those on the left are actually fighting to preserve one of the most deeply religious cultures on the planet (or so it seems). And yet, in the US and elsewhere, the most religious tend to be on the political right, the conservatives. So why isn't it members of the American Republican party who are the most vocal about freeing Tibet -- since that would be both a fight for religion and a fight against communism, two things that American conservatives have long believed in. Oh, right... it is a different religion. Oops. I'm not asserting that no conservatives have stood up for the rights of Tibetans -- no doubt many have. But if the Tibetans had an ancient and deeply Christian-based culture, instead of a Buddhist one, presumably such conservatives from the West would be greater in numbers, and perhaps even leading the activist rallies for the Tibet cause?

Its enough to make your head spin...