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“A picture is worth a thousand words,” or so the saying goes. However, a few more are sometimes required to explain what has been captured on film (or memory card). For example, China’s official news agency, Xinhua, recently published a couple of striking images of the Ganden Ngamchoe celebration in Lhasa which took place in front of the Jokhang temple. The celebration, observed across Tibet, marks the anniversary of the death of the Buddhist teacher Je Tsongkapa, founder of the Gelugpa school of Tibetan Buddhism. What the images do not show are the armed security personnel stationed in the area in case of…well, there seems to be a litany of things the armed personnel would act upon in a manner many would deem disproportionate, but let’s just generalize and say “in case of behavior not officially sanctioned by an authority figure.”

Images of the security personnel stationed near the Jokhang during this year’s celebration can be viewed here. Images such as these also help explain why Tibetans in Ngaba felt it necessary to celebrate Ganden Ngamchoe earlier than usual this year, in case authorities there decided to ban the celebration altogether (see ICT report, 9 December 2011).

This image was posted by Woeser on her blog, but the orginal source is unknown.

If these are simply police stationed to “keep the peace,” then why shy away from showing them online in the official news outlet? Did the photographers simply miss the (painfully obvious) armed police? Did the photographers and editors, more simply, think the security outfits and guns clashed with the beautiful Jokhang surroundings? Or maybe the juxtaposition of soldiers with guns and monks lighting butter lamps was too much artistic commentating for the general public to appreciate? Who knows (besides the photographers, editors, and possibly most everyone else involved with taking and publishing these images)?

That armed security personnel are deployed for “crowd control” is certainly not unique to Tibet, leading some to find it easy to brush this aside. However, this incident, like so many things in this world, must be viewed in context, a context that includes an extensive crackdown following the protests which began in 2008, the overwhelmingly majority of which were peaceful; a context in which virtually every Tibetan is viewed as a potential “separatist” (if not an outright “separatist”) when expressing any aspect of their identity that is not officially sanctioned; a context in which seeing a Tibetan being treated fairly under the law is about as common as a Snow Lion sighting.

A single picture may well be worth a thousand words, but I still prefer a few words strewn together that ask more questions than they answer, rather than glossy images that beg to be considered a complete portrayal of a situation that leaves so much outside of the frame.