Over the top

An Allegory for Niyamgiri and the Dongria Kondh.

Green Ants is a movie that can be interpreted at various levels- it can be constructed as a classic tale of the human and environmental costs of human greed, as a study of the encroaching tides of western rationality upon profoundly different ways of thought or as an indictment of a civilisation that respects no other. At its heart is a question: can you really consider yourself civilised if you cannot understand another person’s perspective, or at the very least respect it?

The story of green ants is a tale about corporate profit clashing with aboriginal beliefs. It is, in some ways, the story of advancing capitalism. Capitalism has always laid waste what came before it- whether it was the “red” Indian or the brown one, the yellow man or the black one. The white man, they say, was blind to his own history and imported his blindness to the colonies. This was done by subordinating, undermining and dividing cultures with the ruthlessness only the religion of profiteering can muster. How can it be otherwise? If all is fair where money is to be made, how easy it must be to poison societies where wealth is respected but not worshipped. Historically, imperial ambitions have always mixed well with religious fervour: the only difference in the modern world is that money is the new false god.

In Herzog’s movie, a mining company wants to excavate the holy ground of a group of Australian aborigines: they believe that the land that is to be mined is where the green ants, upon whom existence depends, dream; and upon that dream rests reality. On the face of it, it is irrational and absurd, but really is it any more absurd that ordering existence for the benefit of the unqualified zeal for profit? Than unrestrainedly exploiting resources, when the finiteness of them is beyond question? The “American dream” is today what constructs reality- and it is no more tangible (and some would argue possible) than the green ants’ dream. This film, to some extent, exposes it for the myth it is by deconstructing other myths that have sustained other cultures in their fight for survival.

The sharpest voice protesting capitalism today says that it steals from the poor to reward the rich. The latest recession, for instance, will hit aid to dependant Africa and the sundry poor of the world worse than anyone else, because they are the most expendable. It was caused because of the recklessness of big business and banks; yet they received a trillion dollars in stimulus packages. This is a story about how stealing from the poor, the unrepresented, the helpless, is the easiest and quickest crime in history and one that has always borne rich dividends. It is made easy by dismissing their qualms and their claims as irrational, backward, irrelevant and placing them against “real” truths, like the fact that the world needs to mine constantly to support a wasteful and extravagant system. It is made easy by the fact that the privileged of the world- economically, culturally, socially privileged- are so few and yet so powerful, and the only ones that have the resources to be able to stick together. And the fact that they disguise their minority so effectively by forcing the majority to fight between themselves for scraps. In fights for survival, metaphysical questions about the “system” and its validity are a luxury. It is only when one’s basic beliefs about existence are questioned that one begins to consider actually fighting, and by then it is often too late.

photo credit: SFTHQ

“For more than a year and a half”, Himal noted in September 2009, the Tibetan filmmaker Dhondup Wangchen “has languished in prison … awaiting trial on charges of ‘inciting separatism’.” Now, that wrong has been ‘righted’.

Wangchen fell afoul of the Chinese authorities in March 2008. He had shot some 35 hours of frank interviews with ethnic Tibetans across the high plateau, in which they discussed their feelings regarding the continued Chinese presence in Tibet and well as the then-upcoming Beijing Olympic Games, slated for the following August. Although Wangchen and his collaborator, Jigme Gyatso, were subsequently arrested, the tapes themselves were shipped out to Wangchen’s cousin, who was living in exile in Switzerland; the material was eventually made into a 25-minute film, Jigdrel (Leaving Fear Behind). It is unclear whether the subsequent international acclaim that the film received – having been filmed in more than 30 countries over the past two years, including at a secret showing in Beijing during the Olympics – helped or hindered Wangchen’s subsequent fate. Either way, in late December, the Chinese authorities put an end to their dithering over how to deal with the 36-year-old filmmaker, and sentenced him to six years of imprisonment for ‘subversion’. (Jigme Gyatso, meanwhile, was released after being held for seven months, during which time he was allegedly tortured.)

It is also unclear whether the international outcry that had continued to rise in recent months over Wangchen’s imprisonment helped or hurt that court ruling. While six years is clearly an unacceptable prison sentence for having been involved in producing what is by any standard a laudably even-handed, un-sensationalistic bit of filmmaking (particularly for such a notoriously explosive subject), it is also clear that far more draconian means were available to the Chinese authorities, should they have wished to use them. Wangchen’s chosen court representation was officially disallowed from involvement, after all, and observers had long been clear that there was no reason to assume that the eventual court action would be either transparent or fair. In the event, Wangchen’s family – including those in Xining, Qinghai, where the case was heard – were not even alerted to the fact that the hearing was finally going forward.

In this context, a six-year sentence might strike some as better than many of the alternatives. Almost simultaneous with Wangchen’s ruling, after all, the Chinese authorities sentenced five more ethnic Uyghurs to death for their involvement in the July 2009 demonstrations in Urumqi, in Xinjiang; that brought the total number of death sentences for the Xinjiang violence to 22 since September alone, while at least a dozen more have been given life sentences for their participation in the separatism-inspired violence. Yet given the continued rumours of Wangchen’s ill health – he is reported to have contracted Hepatitis B while in prison, and not to be receiving adequate medical care – it is possible to read the ruling as a relatively ‘lenient’ reaction arrived at in response to the international spotlight that has been shone on the case – but one that will nonetheless put Wangchen permanently out of commission.

The work, meanwhile, remains for all to see. “It is those who agreed to speak boldly on camera who have left their fear behind,” Himal wrote in September. “As can be seen from the aftermath, it is perhaps the Chinese authorities who have not.” Unfortunately, this most recent action again underscores the fact that fear-based reactions are oftentimes the most dangerous of all. Yet at this point, it is important to recall that Wangchen, despite his relative inexperience as a filmmaker, did not stumble blindly into his current situation. Prior to beginning his interviewing, he moved his wife and children out of Tibet, to India, where they remain today. Indeed, that type of courage is imbued in each of the more than 100 Tibetans who agreed to speak with Wangchen (around 20 are featured), particularly those whose faces remained notably uncovered. “They were willing to be filmed,” Wangchen explains in the film. “I also asked clearly about filming and explained that they didn’t have to show their faces. Some said that we absolutely had to show their faces, otherwise it wasn’t worth speaking to them.” Read a full transcript of what they had to say here. For more info http://www.leavingfearbehind.com/

– Carey L Biron

Stills from 'Jigdrel, Leaving Fear Behind'

Burma watchers get used to hearing about the grizzly punishments meted out upon the countries dissenting voices. This week however the military junta returned to worrying ways when it sentenced two of its own to death. Others were sentenced under Burma’s seemingly ludite ‘electronics act’. Which is a surprisingly broad act that can be applied to anyone who uses anything ‘tech’.

Majors Win Naing Kyaw and Thura Kyaw were given the death sentence for leaking a report about a weapons shopping trip that a senior junta member made to North Korea and of details of a bizarre tunnel network that Pyongyang is apparently helping to build in Burma, whilst the electronics act was applied to 3 others presumably for having some part in the act of transmitting the data.

It comes only days after a journalist, Hla Hla Win, was jailed for 20 years simply for working for my own organisation, the Democratic Voice of Burma. He was convicted on new year’s eve, a day before the country’s promised election year on its ‘road map to democracy’.

Which is what is so troubling about such sensitivity towards information, the horrible truth, not unlike discovering that, as suspected, one’s wife is having an affair, is that the junta probably have no intention of delivering anything resembling accountable governance or freedom of expression and association.There has, as yet been no official date for an election, with speculation and rumour variously suggesting March or October. With most opposition groups refusing to take part, largely due to the last mass exercise in polling, a referendum on a 2008 constitution, that was roundly dismissed.

Indeed in keeping with Burma’s dictatorial traditions it was illegal to campaign against the constitution and passed with over 98% of the supposed vote, indeed people I have met say that shortly after they were battered by cyclone Nargis survivors names were taken and simply marked as yes votes by the village head, at the behest of the millitary. The document is deeply ‘undemocratic’ insuring that military personnel cannot be prosecuted by civilian courts and guaranteeing that at least 25% of parliamentary seats be assigned to the military amongst other such legal offenses to the notion of democracy.

The serious millitary projects such as the tunnels and the other Korean acquisitions also betray an insincerity towards civilian government. Ever since the pivotal protests of the late 80’s and early 90’s when Aung San Suu Kyi emerged as the leader of the democratic opposition the military has drastically increased numbers of men and expenditure on foreign hardware. The relationship with North Korea has predictably lead to fears that the generals want to join the nuclear club. All have ultimately been to perpetuate the institution of military rule.

People wait eagerly for the ‘elections’, whether with genuine hope or just for any sense of change, anything to break the monotony of military rule, but as two men wait to meet their end for leaking a document, what is probably best, as Robert Mugabe used to say about himself; ‘Watch what I do, not what I say’.

Joseph Allchin