Junction for a Functionary

Vision of CCP censorship in a not-so-far-future Tibet. Originally published for Majlis Magazine.

Image generated using Canva AI

The last corridor light had long switched off. To anyone looking through the government building’s glass walls, the computer screen was suspended in front of Thupten Nangpa like a mirror palely illuminating his tired face. He rubbed his eyes and tried looking outside. But all he could see was a tunnel of his own reflections, identical men at desks stretching into infinity. A band of light fell across the General Secretary’s portrait on his desk, eyes glittering out at him from the darkness.

Thupten was the only cadre working this late. Next week marked the 90^th anniversary of the 2008 Sino-Tibetan Uprising. For this momentous occasion, he’d been tasked with writing a commemoration of the Uprising to be included in the forthcoming re-release of history textbooks in the Tibetan Autonomous Region (TAR).

It was a task he was uniquely suited to. He was among the last generation of ethnic Tibetans raised speaking their mother tongue before the Party decreed that all Tibetan children attend Chinese-medium boarding schools. His Mandarin was perfect too. As perfect as a Tibetan’s could ever be. He couldn’t remember much before boarding school, but his teachers all assured him how lucky he was to have been rescued from his primitive pastoral life.

His only clear recollection was a face from a photograph: dark eyebrows knotting over darker eyes, a vivid red birthmark curving from the corner of one eye, down through bristly cheek to coarse lips. Learning it was his grandfather’s face didn’t make it scare him less. Even as other memories faded, his grandfather’s face remained etched as deeply into his mind as the lines etched on its leathery skin. He knew nothing else about the man, only that he’d died when Thupten was very young. His mother never mentioned how.

After one last attempt to penetrate the darkness outside, Thupten turned his attention back to his task. While lengthy, writing the main body was easy enough. The Beijing Chief Bureau for Pedagogical Correctness had already sent him a list of government-approved statistics about the Uprising and instructions for their use. With each re-release of TAR history textbooks and their updated statistics, previous textbooks were recalled from schools and previous statistics deleted from the Lhasa Bureau’s databases. He understood the importance of eliminating any “historical ambiguity” the Chief Bureau warned against. The Party’s achievements must be preserved in their full glory.

Thupten knew the government’s explanation of events perfectly, but the statistics were strangely slippery. Despite seeming so vivid while he worked with them, each set of statistics was shunted to the back of his memory by the arrival of new ones and soon forgotten. It was as if he were a camera aperture across which cycled endless reels of government statistics, every snapshot replaced by another as soon as it was captured.

By this late hour, he’d already faithfully reported how Tibetan terrorists unhappy with the post-Liberation harmony between Tibetans and Han had launched an insurgency in Lhasa and murdered hundreds of Tibetans and Han. He’d darkly insinuated the suspected involvement of capitalist monasteries with clandestine support from Western imperialist regimes. He’d swelled with pride as he praised the patriotic Tibetans who waved Chinese flags in protest and trampled the images of the splittist Dalai Lama emblazed on the terrorists’ pamphlets. He’d dedicated a whole section to saluting the noble Chinese military for indiscriminately defending both Tibetan and Han civilians from the terrorists.

As he read the government’s reports of the atrocities the terrorists committed, his feelings darkened into anger. Anger tempered only by shame at being Tibetan like them. Shame in turn tempered by burning pride that no, he was born Tibetan but chose to be Chinese. His Han wife and son’s faces threaded through the images of the victims swimming before him. It could have been them. Innocent people, just trying to reclaim a land rightfully theirs.

All his commemoration now needed was reproductions of the original photographs of the Uprising, along with their annotations. Since the Party adopted its policy of Cultural and Historical Digital Preservation after extremists vandalised several museum exhibitions during the late-2040’s, all major historical artefacts including photographs had been taken into its custody for safekeeping and replaced with government-issued copies. Photographs were reproduced in black-and-white, again to eliminate “historical ambiguity”.

Thupten was honoured to be one of very few cadres trusted with access to reproductions. He leaned further into the computer, its screen’s reflection in his glasses eclipsing his eyes, and scanned his fingerprint to access the reproductions. His eyes widened as he saw they were in colour, and widened further as he saw they were missing the watermark indicating they were government-issued. A suspicion swiftly blossomed in his mind that he couldn’t suppress. These must be unedited copies of original photographs.

Checking the file’s date confirmed it: 17/06/2049, the very year that Cultural and Historical Digital Preservation began.

Hunching over the computer, he looked closer at the first picture. Thupten instantly recognised its general outlines from the pixelated black-and-white reproductions shown in his history lessons about the Uprising. Several men in combat fatigues assaulting an unarmed man on his back, his head snapped towards the camera by a big black boot arcing back for another kick. Then, the annotations had labelled it as depicting Tibetan terrorists assaulting an unarmed Han shopkeeper.

But the higher definition and presence of colour told another story. He knew those combat fatigues – as would anyone who’d witnessed a military parade in the General Secretary’s honour. Flicking through the next few images confirmed this. But he swiftly returned to the first one. On the man’s upturned face, distorted by the kick’s impact yet unmistakable, was a vivid birthmark curving from bristled cheek to coarse, bloody lips.

The night lengthened, its shadows sifting across Thupten’s immobile figure. His tears sparkled in the screen’s glow as they fell. After some time he straightened and gazed at the Chinese flag flying at his desk. The portrait next to it was in shadow. He gazed at the flag for a long time. Eventually, he started typing. He knew what he had to do.

“Thupten” means “one with the capacity for attaining truth”. “Nangpa” means “illumination”. This story uses the 2008 Uprising to explore CCP historical propaganda and its rewriting of China’s invasion and occupation of Tibet.

Thupten realises his grandfather was murdered by Chinese forces in the 2008 Uprising, and that his Han identity is a fabrication. With this knowledge, he reveals the truth in his commemoration.