Nuns have played a prominent role in orchestrating and participating in political protest far more than their traditional status in Tibetan society or their percentage of the present population would suggest. As a result, nuns have been subjected to increasing arrest, torture and lengthy periods of detention. Nuns involved in protest have explained that their position outside lay life has both allowed them greater latitude and presented them with a greater sense of responsibility to engage in political dissent, considering the potential risks and the suffering this would bring on family dependents.
Background
Nuns have been a part of the religious landscape of Tibet since the 8th century. Traditionally, their status within Tibetan society and Buddhist institutions was not equal to that of monks, and they rarely participated in local or national political power structures. Unlike the large monastic universities, nunneries were smaller, poorer and did not offer advanced philosophical studies. Some nuns practiced outside of the institutional system, remaining at home or seeking teachers on their own initiative. Becoming a nun is a default option for widows or those considered unsuited for marriage; it was also common that many families took pride in sending their daughter to a nunnery. Unlike in recent years, nuns did not have political motivations in joining nunneries. For centuries nuns were not allowed to become fully ordained, a very important step for the hierarchical clergy. Thus, women could not undertake the study and exams for the Geshe degree, the equivalent of the western doctorate, although this is now beginning to change in exile.
Between 1950 and the late 1970's, nuns and nunneries suffered similar persecution and destruction under China's repressive policies as monks and monasteries. Since the end of the Cultural Revolution, hundreds of nunneries have been restored, and many of the nunneries around Lhasa, such as Garu and Shungseb, grew to house several hundred nuns each.
Chinese Government Policy
For the most part, government policies toward nuns parallel policies towards monks, but the remoteness of many nunneries had allowed a larger percentage of nuns to live with less government regulation through most of the 1980s and early 1990s. Chinese government organs attempt to strictly control nunneries through officially imposed "Democratic management Committees," restricting the numbers of nuns allowed in each nunnery and subjecting nuns to invasive political education sessions.
Since the implementation of the "Patriotic Education" campaign in 1996, China has required Buddhism to adapt itself to socialist society by following the campaign's main slogan, "Love the nation, Love religion," which amounts to acceptance of three essential points: (1) denunciation of the Dalai Lama; (2) acceptance of the Chinese-selected Panchen Lama; (3) acknowledgement that Tibet has long been an inalienable part of China. Virtually all Tibetan nuns cannot accept these precepts because of their religious vows and personal beliefs, but most sign the required statements saying they do accept the precepts in order to remain in the nunnery. The Dalai Lama has also urged monks and nuns not to defy government mandates that they sign such forms.
Recent Trends
When nationalist protests broke out in Lhasa in 1987, monks and nuns were among the strongest supporters. In recurrent demonstrations from 1988-1997, nuns peacefully expressed their desire for an independent Tibet and their allegiance to the Dalai Lama. Hundreds were detained, most were tortured, and scores charged with inciting counter-revolutionary propaganda, and sentenced to lengthy prison terms. Inside prison, nuns have staged numerous protests, resulting in vicious beatings, long periods of solitary confinement and sentence extensions. Eight nuns are known to have died of severe abuse in Lhasa's main prison, Drapchi, between 1994 and 1998.
Relentless political campaigns, inevitable arrest and the certainty of harsh treatment in prison combined to discourage overt political protest in the late 1990's, and few new detentions of nuns have occurred recently. Nuns continue to seek ways to maintain their religious practice within these restrictions. Thousands joined the monastic community of Larung Gar near Serthar township in Kham, until Chinese work teams demolished most of the residences there for alleged building violations in fall 2001, leaving hundreds of nuns homeless. Numerous nuns still come into exile in the hope of finding greater religious freedom outside Tibet.
Methods of torture include the use of attack dogs for fear and injury, the removal of clothing for humiliation, burning the skin with lit cigarettes, and the use of electronic batons on sensitive parts of the body, such as the eyes, mouth, soles of the feet, and vagina. Rape is also occasionally reported. The more recent trend of subjecting political prisoners to military style drills, which alternate from pushing prisoners to extreme physical exertion to long hours of holding awkward motionless positions, is a more subtle form of torture that can lead to beatings for performing incorrectly or collapsing during a session.
Recommendations
- Release all nuns detained for non-violent expression of their views.
- Investigate allegations of torture and sexual abuse and make public the findings.
- Adhere to the Standard Minimum Rules for the treatment of prisoners, as dictated by the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights.
- Make legal proceedings and evidence upon which convictions have been based publicly available.
Further Reading
Anna Grinshaw, Servants of the Buddha
Hanna Havnevik, Tibetan Buddhist Nuns: History, Cultural Norms and Social Reality, Oslo, 1989.
International Campaign for Tibet, A Season to Purge: Religious Repression in Tibet, Washington, 1996.
Steven D. Marshall, Rukhag 3: The Nuns of Drapchi Prison, London, Tibet Information Network, 2000.
Janice D. Willis (ed), Feminine Ground: Essays on Women and Tibet, Ithaca NY, Snow Lion Publications, 1987.
