Kritik am Buch „The Shadow Of The Dalai Lama ... - Neues von Shi De

women in exile in the last 35 years. For example, they now have the right to vote and to stand as a
candidate. Nonetheless, complaints about traditional mechanisms of suppression in the families are a
major topic, which thanks to the support of western campaigners for women’s rights do not seldom
reach a wider public. Nonetheless, here too the Kundun plays the reformer and we earnestly believe
that he is completely serious about this, then he has had for many years been able to experience the
dedication, skillfulness, and courage of many women acting for his concerns. All Tibetan women in
exile are encouraged by the Kundun to participate in the business of state. The Tibetan Women's
Association, extremely active in pursuing societal interests, was also founded with his support.
Despite these outwardly favorable conditions, progress towards emancipation has been very slow. For
example, the three permanent seats reserved for women in the parliament in exile could not be filled
for a long period, simply because there were no candidates. (There are 130,000 Tibetans living in
exile.) This has improved somewhat in the meantime. In 1990 the Kundun induced his sister, Jetsun
Pema, to be the first woman to take up an important office in government. In 1996 eight women were
elected to the public assembly.
Sometimes, under the influence of the western feminism, the question of women’s rights flares up
fiercely within the exile Tibetan community. But such eruptions can again and again be successfully
cut off and brought to nothing through two arguments:
1. The question of women’s rights is of secondary nature and disrupts the national front against
the Chinese which must be maintained at all costs. Hence, the question of women’s rights is a
topic which will only become current once Tibet has been freed from the Chinese yoke.
2. The chief duty of the women in exile is to guarantee the survival of the Tibetan race (which
is threatened by extinction) through the production of children.
The Kundun’s encounters with western feminism
In the West the Dalai Lama is constantly confronted with emancipation topics, particularly since no
few female Buddhists originally hailed from the feminist camp or later — the wave has just begun —
migrated to it. As in every area of modern life, here too the god-king presents an image of the openminded
man of the world, liberal and in recent times even verbally revolutionary. In 1993, as critical
voices accusing several lamas of uninhibited excessive and degrading sexual behavior grew louder, he
took things seriously and promised that all cases would be properly investigated. In the same year, a
group of two dozen western teachers under the leadership of Jack Kornfield met and spoke with His
Holiness about the meanwhile increasingly precarious topic of “sexual abuse by Tibetan gurus”. The
Kundun told the Americans to “always let the people know when things go wrong. Get it in the
newspapers themselves if needs be” (Lattin, Newsgroup 17).
In 1983, at a congress in Alpach, Austria, His Holiness came under strong feminist fire and was
attacked by the women present. One of the participants completely overtaxed him with the statement
that, “I am very surprised that there is no woman on the stage today, and I would have been very glad
to see at least one woman sitting up there, and I have the feeling that the reason why there are no
female Dalai Lamas is simply that they are not offered enough room” (Kakuska, 1984, p. 61). Another
participant at the same meeting abused him for the same reasons as “Dalai Lama, His
Phoniness!” (Kakuska, 1984, p. 60).
The Kundun learned quickly from such confrontations, of which there were certainly a few in the