China Borrows Terms From U.S. Lexicon
Chinese officials appropriate the “suicide bomber” label. Reminting the oppression of Tibetans in the currency of the war against terror, with a threat of “suicide squads,” they may hope to gain western support for whatever tactics they will employ next. This certainly goes against a discussion in the recent entertaining survey of evolutionary psychology, Why Beautiful People Have More Daughters, which posits that most suicide bombers are the product of cultures which enshrine the custom of one man taking many wives, leaving a large pool of frustrated young men who believe their best reproductive chances lie with a plenitude of maidens who are only available in the afterlife. The jarring concept of Buddhist “suicide squads” makes no sense except as propaganda. On the other hand, given the Chinese suppression and interference in the practice of Buddhism in Tibet, the culture of peace seems like an inevitable casualty.