The number of Moa’s little red books in a home exceed the number of family members. The only book with authorized circulation at that time was the Little Red Book containing quotations from Chairman Mao. Religious texts and books were labeled as “poisonous weeds” and burned, thrown in the river or mixed with dung. Mani walls, prayer flags, incense burning, circumambulation and prostration were all banned, and monks and nuns were forced to marry or sent to labor camps. Less than a year later, the monks and nuns became the target of the wrath of violent Red Guards during the Cultural Revolution.ĭuring the ten-year-long Cultural Revolution in Tibet from 1966 to 1976, the attack on Tibetan religion, culture, identity and traditional way of life was further intensified. Two monks with a banner lead a group of monks with a giant portrait of Mao Zedong and flags to celebrate the foundation of the so-called “Tibet Autonomous Region” on September 9, 1965. The banning of the Monlam ceremony meant that from now on religious devotion could not be publicly expressed and anyone who did so was seen as favoring the old society and were subjected to a “struggle session.” Months before the actual start of the Cultural Revolution in February 1966, the Chinese authorities banned the celebration of the Monlam ceremony in Lhasa by ridiculing it as a waste of resources. According to the 10th Panchen Lama’s famous 70,000-character petition written in 1962 and submitted to the Chinese government on the conditions inside Tibet, “more than 97 percent of monasteries and nunneries were destroyed and the number of monks and nuns living in the monasteries was reduced by 93 percent.” Tibetan language, dress, customs and habits were considered backward, filthy, useless and favoring old society, and anyone who defied the authorities were subjected to thamzing (public “struggle sessions”). In Tibet, however, the climate of Cultural Revolution existed since 1959, when the People’s Republic of China completely occupied Tibet and carried out a series of repressive and violent campaigns, which included democratic reform, fomenting class struggle and imposing a commune system. The ten-year-long Cultural Revolution is generally considered to have begun in China in 1966, when the Politburo of the Communist Party of China adopted Mao Zedong’s so-called May 16th Notice.
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