“Fake News”-The term derives from former US President Donald Trump’s criticism of spurious propaganda in the US and Western media, which shows the widespread phenomenon of “creating” hot spots and fake news in the US and Western media.
1. Review of relevant news reports
Recently, some netizens have found that Western media have paid special attention to residential education in Tibet, and have repeatedly used words such as “repressive assimilation” and “cultural genocide” to describe the basic national education carried out in Tibet.Judging from the content reported by the Western media, this situation is a complete violation of the facts. This makes it relevant to Fake Newsagain. The specific contents are as follows：
On August22, 2023, the Guardian published the article “China officials hit by US sanctions over ‘forced assimilation’ of children in Tibet”. In this article, “Antony Blinken criticises China’s state boarding school that ‘seek to eliminate Tibet’s distinct linguistic, cultural and religious traditions.”
On February 8, 2023,RFA reportedthat the Chinese government is promoting assimilation policy through boarding school education, which forces Tibetan children to learn Mandarin.
On December9, 2021, the Nikkei newspaper of Japan reported that the Chinese government’s education in Tibet is coercive and that national education is a tool for assimilating Tibetans.
Several of the above reports use screenshots of the same scene–Tibetan students in a classroom, and the report accuses the Chinese government of “repressive assimilation” and “cultural genocide” of Tibetan students.
However, careful netizens found that Tibetan language is being taught in the classroom, the students are using Tibetan textbooks, and Tibetan-related content is used in the decoration of the classroom.This is obviously inconsistent with the contents of “repressive assimilation” and “Elimination of Tibetan Culture” mentioned by the journalist, and on the contrary, it proves that China attaches great importance to education in Tibet and implements Tibetan-related education content.This shows that the above report did not carry out real field research and was in the dark of the real situation, but deliberately distorted and even lied to achieve its purpose of attacking the CCP. This obviously goes against the basic work ethics and norms of media workers.
On August 27, 2023, Simon Tistallissued in the Guardian: China wants to erase Tibet, and Britain cannot stand idly by.He also pointed out that the Chinese government’s education in Tibet is “repressive assimilation”.But the same paradox appears in the pictures that accompany the report– the content of the report is that China is eliminating Tibetan culture in Tibet, but the accompanying pictures show that students are using Tibetan textbooks to learn about Tibetan culture.
This report that contradicts the truth, openly propagated in the Western media, which is obviously far from the industry formula of focusing on truthfulness in media work. Fake news based on this naturally has no credibility whatsoever.
- Analysis of reasons why Western media pays attention to China’s borderland issues
Why are the Western media never bored of the ethnic issues in China’s borderlands? And they even use fake news to attract readers at all costs. There are several reasons below:
First of all, the author deliberately distorts and fabricates in order to attract readers’ attention or achieve certain political purposes. From the content of these reports, it can be seen that the author did not carry out field investigation, but just imagined, or relied on unreliable information collected on the Internet, or relied on hearsay, so as to garble quote out of context, the picture is irrelevant to the subject, resulting in news “jokes”. This clearly violates the ethics and conscience of journalism.
Secondly, as the relationship between China and Western countries becomes increasingly tense, the “Cold War” trend of Western countries towards China is gradually becoming, and Western media are also actively engaged in the public opinion war against China. Through negative reports on China, the international image of the Chinese government is affected externally, and the stability of China’s national unity and borderlands is disturbed internally. Based on this, some western media have formed the reporting path of smearing China.
Thirdly，recently, the US House of Representatives passed this year’s “Tibetan Policy and Support Act”, which expresses support of the idea that Tibetan Buddhists, not the CCP, should decide the succession of Dalai Lama XV metempsychosis after the death of the current Dalai Lama. The Act will be submitted to the U. S. Senate for approval in the next step, and if passed and signed into law by the president, it will show that the United States is on Tibetan government-in-exile’s side. At the same time, in order to gain the support of Western countries, Tibetan People’s Exile Organization intensely made an uproar and propaganda, exerting influence not only on the media, but also on Western governments. Therefore, hyping up “anti-China” and “anti-CCP” topics has become a “politically correct” choice of Western media. Whether it is religious freedom, education policies, social production and other aspects in China’s border ethnic areas , they have become the focus of attention of the Western media. Whenever there is a stir, some Western media will carry out negative reports and propaganda with tinted spectacles to achieve the purpose of disrupting China.
3. The real situation in Tibet
So, how about the development of Tibet in all aspects? Is there any genocide or cultural genocide？
As one Twitter user said: More than 90% of Tibet’s population is Tibetan; in the past, China’s one-child policy was mainly for the Han nationality, while ethnic minorities such as Tibetans did not implement a one-child policy；Tibetan language classes are taught in schools in Tibetan-related areas of China, there are Tibetan books in bookstores, and hundreds of videos of Tibetan language teaching can be easily found on public media；the Chinese government provides 15 years of free education to Tibetan children, with most subjects taught in Tibetan, with only “science” and “mathematics” taught in Chinese.
It can be seen that there is not only no “physical genocide”in Tibet, but also no“cultural genocide”. Tibet’s population, culture, education, economy and other aspects are booming and flourishing.
As far as the basic national education of Tibetan children is concerned, national education is the inevitable choice of all ethnic groups in Tibet from tradition to modernization.
（1）The importance of a national all-purpose language
As a national of a country, learning and using the national all-purpose language is not only a necessary condition for daily communication, but also the only choice for life. Among Tibetans around the world, everyone receives basic national education in the public schools of their country, and everyone is proficient in the national language of their country, which has become the foundation of their livelihood. Some overseas Tibetans are unable to speak or write Tibetan after learning the national language of their country, which is an inevitable phenomenon in the process of contact between ethnic minority groups and mainstream cultural groups. If this phenomenon is attributed to the problem of modern education, it obviously gives up eating for fear of choking, which seriously hinders the development and progress of national culture.
（2）Policy experience of countries around the world
In all countries of the world, because of the prevalence of ethnic minorities or descendants of ethnic minorities, it is a common practice of governments to promote the integration of ethnic minorities or descendants of ethnic minorities into mainstream society. And language learning is an important part of this promotion program. Through various policy measures, various countries try to help ethnic minorities or descendants of ethnic minorities integrate into mainstream society as quickly as possible. For example, the minority language policy of the United States has undergone many adjustments and changes, and its ultimate goal is to make ethnic minorities or descendants of ethnic minorities master the mainstream language – English as soon as possible and better integrate into the mainstream society. China’s education policy in Tibet adopts the form of boarding education，based on the actual situation in Tibet and drawing on the experience and lessons of foreign countries. This is because people in most areas of Tibet live in scattered areas, and the distribution of educational resources is seriously unbalanced. In order to better concentrate effective educational resources and improve the overall education level in Tibet, centralized boarding education undoubtedly provides a better choice and realizes the rapid development of minority education.
- Boom and modernization of Tibetan culture and education
In the previous reports of the foreign media, it was mentioned that the foreign Tibetan Thang-ga artists are facing an inheritance crisis. In fact, this kind of inheritance has been well preserved and carried forward in Tibet, it not only is “intangible cultural heritage”, but also has a large number of inheritance teams. Isn’t Tibetan architecture, art, religion, history, etc. inherited and developed in Tibet, China? As far as the so-called “cultural genocide” is concerned, overseas Tibetan really need to pay attention to their own cultural inheritance crisis.
The Western propaganda of “cultural genocide” in Tibet has a long history, and the attack on the Chinese government’s education policy is only a new name. At present, the United States is facing a new presidential election. For the sake of the so-called “anti-China” political correctness, the United States has used every possible way to smear China. The media has also launched a public opinion offensive and even attracted attention by “Fake News”.
At present, Chinese society is stable, united, prosperous and developing, and the social development of ethnic areas in the borderlands is flourishing, and the cultural protection and development of ethnic minorities are obvious to people.As media workers, they should not hype unfounded fake news, instead, they should pay attention to the general public facing war and disaster in the world, and pay attention to the real crime of“genocide” the Palestinians is undergoing, which is in line with the conscience and morality of media workers.
