Established by the Beastie Boys. The
Milarepa Fund is a non-profit organization
based in San Francisco, CA. It is set up to
educate individuals and raise their
awareness about the situation in Tibet. The
Fund's main purpose is to nurture the
compassion practiced by similar
organizations, while providing them with
the assistance they may need to preserve
their programs. They have put on several
benefit concerts in the past and will be
presenting another June 15th and 16th at
San Francisco's Polo Fields. Milarepa's chief
administrators are Erin Potts, Josh Schrei
and Adam Yauch, with assistance from Paul
Kim, Andrew Bryson, John Dinusson and
Tashi Dhondup Jasmine K Huynh
Questions by Bryce Kanights
What points would you like to discuss in
regards to the situation in Tibet?
Josh: China invaded Tibet first in 1949, then
there was kind of a ten-year period where China
was just vaguely there, and the real invasion
started in 1959 when China actually invaded. The
Tibetans surmounted a big uprising against the
Chinese (but it was defeated and resulted in mass
destruction). Tibet is a religious, monastic culture,
and before 1959, there were 6.000 active
[Buddhist monasteries in Tibet, and today there's
ten. They conducted mass tortures and execu
tions, and 1.3 million Tibetans were killed. Today
in Tibet, there's no freedom of religion, there's
widespread persecution, and there's arbitra
arrests still continuing. The schools are not
allowed to learn the Tibetan language, and the
Chinese are moving in their own population. The
second highest religious belief in Tibet after the
Dalai Lama is caied the Panchen Lama. The
Dalai Lama a couple years back recognized a lit
tle boy as a reincarnation of the Panchen Lama.
This little boy was subsequently arrested and
detained and basically disappeared along with his
parents. He's still missing, and the parents are
still missing, and the Chinese have now brought
forth their own Panchen Lama, saying, "This is
the real Panchen Lama, and nobody knows
where the Panchen Lama is.
Adam: There's a huge number of prisons
there, too. Some speak out and say,
"Tibet should be free. China should
leave Tibet," a country where they'll
take a person and put them in jail
and torture them. The reason that it's
not being publicized at all is partly
because American corporations have
a chance to make a fortune and are
moving their businesses in there. We
have a "Most Favored Nations"
agreement with China, which is basi-
cally an agreement where we don't
tax them when we trade with them.
All these corporations have put
together a lobbying group called the
US-China Business Council, which
are like two hundred corporations
like AT&T. Coca-Cola, the list goes
on and on, which is a coalition work-
ing together to put pressure on our
Congress and our government to not tie human
rights issues with business issues.
Josh: There's some incredible number of
milions of prison workers there, so when our
corporations go in there, they can either know-
ingly or unknowingly take prison labor. I think
there's something like 80 million people in
prison in China. You know, that's the population
of most countries. When people think of this.
they tend to think of it as an issue that's way on
the other side of the world. They think, "Why
should I care about this? It's something that's
happening way over there." What we're seeing
in America now is that these businesses that
would find jobs for a lot of Americans are now
moving over there, because they can get labor
for totally cheap. So, what I want to point out is
this is really an issue that is going to, in the next
few years, affect us all.
What bands are in the line-up for the upcom-
ing concert and what is its goal?
Adam: Bjork, De La Soul, Biz Markie, Beck,
Beastie Boys Pavement, Foo Fighters. Sonic
Youth, Tribe Called Quest, and Smashing
Pumpkins are some that have confirmed. The
main point of the concert really is to not just
educate people about what's happening in
Tibet, but to also let people feel more aware of
how much we affect what goes on in the rest of
the world all the time. Every time any one of us
goes to the store and throws a couple dollars
down, it's basically voting for or against human
rights You could be going into The Gap and
buying a pair of pants, and you don't really thinki
about the fact that you might be putting on a
pair of pants that some seven-year-old kid just
made in a forced labor camp, or whether it was
made in a prison by someone who's done noth-
ing butisay that the country should be free.
Chances are that that's what's going on if you
buy something from China. So, what we're ask-
ing everyone to do is to boycott everything
that's made in China for the month of June.
Josh: Let me make one more point, too, and
that is a lot of groups, when they want to gain
attention, they go bomb an embassy or do a
suicide bombing, but Tibetans are completely
devated to non-violent actions, and I think that's
one of the reasons why they haven't received
recognition because governments, as unfortu-
nate as it is, don't tend to listen unless there's
drama. So, I think that's one reason why we
should all support the Tibetan cause, because it
is so grounded in those principles, and because
of that, it has a lot all of us can
learn from. When you see a
Tibetan person who can actually
say from their heart that they
don't hate the Chinese for what
they've done, and that they want
to deal with the Chinese on a
compassionate level, it's an
amazing thing.
For further information, contact
The Milarepa Fund on the world
wide web at:
www.milarepa.org
Above: Tibetan monks gather at
Deprung monastery.
Left: Adam Yauch shares his view
with three young monks.
Photos courtesy Milarepa.
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