www.antishugden.com is offline...what happened???

[Mana]

www.antishugden.com is a website run by the Tibetan Govt for a few years now. The purpose of the website is to run a campaign against Dorje Shugden/practice/practitioners. It is not online anymore. What is surprising is a supposed Govt organization that espouses democracy, middle way and religious freedom can set up such a site online to denegrade practices that has been around for hundreds of years. Whether Shugden is practices by majority or minority should not be a factor in freedom of religious practice. The ex Tibetan Govt whose funds depend on donations can channel their funds into something so wrong. For creating fear, doubt and pain-such misuse.

www.antishugden.com was registered under the name Gangchen Kyishong. In Dharamsala you have two parts. Upper Dharamsala which is called McLeod Ganj and lower Dharamsala which is called Gangchen Kyishong. The formerly known as Tibetan Govt in exile offices, private office, religious office, different branches of the so called govt were all physically located in Gangchen Kyishong. From McLeod Ganj to Gangchen Kyishong it would be a twenty mins jeep/taxi ride. You can walk too. Quite a scenic walk in fact.

www.antishugden.com was a simple website with a forum. Basically it was set up and cost nothing to keep it online. Even if the Tibetan Govt does not wish to add more information on it, it can exist as it is. So why is it not online anymore. Is it temporary or permanent. Did someone powerful ask them to remove it? Or are they improving it? Whatever the case, it is such a misuse of funds by a former Govt. And such blatant disrespect to religious freedom.

[Big Uncle]

Dear Mana,

This is very interesting. It is highly unlikely that the website was taken down to improve on it as they would have placed a message to tell visitors that the site is under maintenance. The website is most likely removed. Now, why would Gangchen Kyishong do that considering their fervent witch hunts and unrelating propaganda against Dorje Shugden.

Now, I am wondering if it is due to the new administration under Dr Lobsang Sangay. He may not dare to openly abolish the Dorje Shugden ban for now but he could be working slowly to do so. That website is a serious 'image-tarnisher' considering the amount of bad press the ban has in the western world and so, I am not surprise that it is taken down quietly.

The website link to Gangchen Kyishong is very bad press as the website is an online proof of what many Westerners like the Western Shugden Society have been talking about. I do hope the administration would not stop with this website and would carry on removing more such statements and articles. This is a milestone but not the end yet. There are many more defamatory statements and articles on many other websites.

[Zach]

The website has been down for a good few months. Perhapes the TGIE where embarrased by it and rightly so.

[WisdomBeing]

i doubt the TGIE would be embarrassed by the website. Call me cynical but it's probably negligence on their side and someone probably forgot to pay for the domain name (even if you forget to pay, they may still keep the name for you for a period of time in case you forgot) or rental of the server!!

I vaguely recall that there was no new postings on the site when i visited it a year or two ago, so perhaps no one was maintaining it then already. If they were updating the site, they could just leave the current site up and then upload the new one when it was ready. It would be seamless and pretty much normal practice these days. There is no reason to take a site down in order to update it unless the information on that site was wrong and had to be removed. Antishugden is as its name says, against Dorje Shugden, so the information on there would not be considered 'wrong' unless the whole site is wrong.

It would be very idealistic to think that they took the site down because of a change of heart. Not impossible of course, and i dearly hope I am wrong, but i think it is highly unlikely.

[thaimonk]

i doubt the TGIE would be embarrassed by the website. Call me cynical but it's probably negligence on their side and someone probably forgot to pay for the domain name (even if you forget to pay, they may still keep the name for you for a period of time in case you forgot) or rental of the server!!

I vaguely recall that there was no new postings on the site when i visited it a year or two ago, so perhaps no one was maintaining it then already. If they were updating the site, they could just leave the current site up and then upload the new one when it was ready. It would be seamless and pretty much normal practice these days. There is no reason to take a site down in order to update it unless the information on that site was wrong and had to be removed. Antishugden is as its name says, against Dorje Shugden, so the information on there would not be considered 'wrong' unless the whole site is wrong.

It would be very idealistic to think that they took the site down because of a change of heart. Not impossible of course, and i dearly hope I am wrong, but i think it is highly unlikely.

I don't think your cynical at all. It sounds very plausible and humorous actually. After all they have so many more things to be concerned about such as Tibetan Govt being renamed Central Tibetan Administration which is a huge blow to them no matter how you look at it. How does that look to them after 50 years of being in exiled and now degraded to just an administration.

But they have a huge vendetta against Shugden and it's very easy for them to 'maintain' their site. So why not just leave it as it is I wonder. 

[dsiluvu]

This is quite hilarious but I do think like what WB said, it so very highly possible that they most likely forgot to pay their hosting bill and realises that they have bigger issues to deal with right now especially seeing that their authority is becoming less and less significant in the world today. I don't think the world is interested in Tibetan's spiritual bickering amongst each other and some what self created for no good reasons which does not help profit anyone and the world economy today. If anything it just makes them look childish and this does not give them good publicity in any way.

On the bright side it is great to see the prophesy of our Great Masters like Trijang Rinpoche becoming true and that very very soon there will be no such thing as a ban... we are just waiting patiently.

[WoselTenzin]

Whatever the reason for the removal of www.antishugden.com, it really does not matter.  It is in fact a good thing that the misleading,doubt and fear creating website is no longer there to mislead people who DS practice can potentially help.

I will not be surprised if Dr Lobsang Sangay is behind this removal.  It only makes sense for him to slowly and subtly disengage the CTA from the archaic anti Shugden propaganda of the ex-TGIE as it is bad publicity on human rights and religious freedom for CTA.  If there is any chance of CTA wanting to reinstate itself as TGIE and eventually try to gain some sort of autonomy from the Chinese government, they will need all the support they can get from the West. 

Having said that, the chances of the West having any interest in supporting Tibet cause now is close to zilch as the West themselves are drown in their economic crisis of which China has the upper hand.

Nevertheless, everything is impermanent. There can always be a turn of events no matter how unlikely the case maybe. On hind sight, during the cold, nobody could imagine the fall of the Berlin Wall. 

[DharmaDefender]

i doubt the TGIE would be embarrassed by the website. Call me cynical but it's probably negligence on their side and someone probably forgot to pay for the domain name (even if you forget to pay, they may still keep the name for you for a period of time in case you forgot) or rental of the server!!

I vaguely recall that there was no new postings on the site when i visited it a year or two ago, so perhaps no one was maintaining it then already.

I remember how the website proclaimed they are powered by the Buddhdharma... cracked me up that one because it was updated so irregularly, if at all!

I will not be surprised if Dr Lobsang Sangay is behind this removal.  It only makes sense for him to slowly and subtly disengage the CTA from the archaic anti Shugden propaganda of the ex-TGIE as it is bad publicity on human rights and religious freedom for CTA.  If there is any chance of CTA wanting to reinstate itself as TGIE and eventually try to gain some sort of autonomy from the Chinese government, they will need all the support they can get from the West. 

Makes sense, that did not occur to me. It has been a very quiet affair recently, hasnt it? Itd be interesting if the new PM is behind the move because he will be slowly undoing all the work that the TGIE have been doing to suppress Dorje Shugden... which means room for the rest of us to grow and spread the practice openly.

And since the mans a secular leader, he can easily end the ban by saying he doesnt understand the political or religious background behind the ban, but he can see its not having a positive economic or political impact on his people, so better to get rid of the ban. That kind of reasoning would be much more acceptable to the rest of the world, rather than trying to tell non-Tibetan Buddhists that Dorje Shugdens actually a Buddha, and therefore the bans unreasonable.

[thor]

Here are some plausible reasons why antishugden was removed:
1) Zero traffic - except for pro-shugden visitors writing in their forum
2) Reverse-propaganda - their forum was full of pro-shugdenites writing pro-shugden stuff.
3) No manpower - to remove unwanted content
4) Forgot to renew the domain name
5) Forgot to pay the server company
6) Dr Losang Sangay authorised it?

Whatever it is, I too am glad this website is offline. It didnt have much traffic, nor did it have very strong content to convince people that Shugden is a evil spirit, but having one less website that spreads negativity about Dorje Shugden is good news to me.

[Aurore]

In the first place, i feel the website was up to promote DS even though it's an anti Dorje Shugden site. The reason is any bad publicity is still publicity. In fact bad publicity is what gets the attention from the public. However, bad publicity "campaign" fails to work after a while.

Hence why bother maintaining something which may not be effective in its message anymroe?

[DharmaSpace]

Well i just take it as when people swim against the current it does not take much for them to tire out. But when we know the practise we do benefits and is correct it still requires efforts but we can sustain it much longer. As we have conviction in what we are doing.
 
Kind of make me think that perhaps the TGIE and the rest of the Tibetans just followed what the Dalai Lama said like lemmings. Hence when the Dalai Lama is not watching or exerting his influence over TGIE then no one is going to uphold the ban. Well I can't wait for the ban and all the dorje shugden detractors to fall like dominoes. And people who might have argued vehemently against dorje shugden will slinker back to the shadows as Dorje Shugden influence is getting wider and wider.   

[Barzin]

I just think that it is very silly of TGIE to run such campaign when they have much more important issues to deal with.  on the other hand, is it possible that they have run out facts or news to support the website?  I mean besides keep repeating the same thing with no new facts to update is a bit vague for me.  If you really go into study about the issue, people would want to find out the truth.  And the controversy has no conclusion and yet they didn't give a good answer for people.  Therefore it is very unlikely for a website like that to sustain.  What is the truth?  Dorje Shugden is still around and growing, that is the truth.

[Gabby Potter]

This is a good news and sign. Lord Dorje Shugden is an enlightened Buddha and of course He doesn't have the karma to be put down. Anything or anyone who degrades Him does not suffer their consequences because Dorje Shugden does that to them, they are suffering from the negative karma they have created by degrading and criticising a Buddha.

[pgdharma]

This is a good news and sign. Lord Dorje Shugden is an enlightened Buddha and of course He doesn't have the karma to be put down. Anything or anyone who degrades Him does not suffer their consequences because Dorje Shugden does that to them, they are suffering from the negative karma they have created by degrading and criticising a Buddha.

Totally agreed with you, Gabby Potter. Never underestimate the principle of karma. This is the result of their negative karma catching up on them for putting Dorje Shugden down.

[Shugdener]

Dorje Shugden is a fully Enlightened Buddha and I don't think that such a kind, compassionate and helpful Being such as Dorje Shugden would have the negative karma to be able to be put down by organizations or people who are lower than Him.

I decided to check on the website earlier and I was redirected to a yellow page with the word APOLOGY written in  huge bold letters together with a statement which I have attached below.

From http://www.antishugden.com/

"We, from Gangchen Kyishong (a place in Dharamsala that houses the offices of the Tibetan government-in-exile, now called Central Tibetan Administration, or CTA), used to run and manage this website www.antishugden.com, providing information that is totally untrue, which is meant to smear and defame the Tibetan Protector Dorje Shugden for our own political gains.

We realized that it was a big mistake, because Dorje Shugden is actually an Enlightened Being, a Buddha, who is an Emanation of Manjushri, and that the whole reason why the Dalai Lama banned Dorje Shugden is actually to make Dorje Shugden even more famous and widespread, because the Dalai Lama and Dorje Shugden are both ENLIGHTENED, so they cannot be actually going against each other for real, their only motivation is to benefit all sentient beings.

Therefore, we sincerely apologize for our ignorance, and we urge all Buddhist practitioners especially Tibetan Buddhists to embrace and practise Dorje Shugden, because His time has come, His practice will be most efficacious and beneficial at this time, our Dharma practice will come to fruition much more faster with the practice of Dorje Shugden.

Below is the proof of what this www.antishugden.com website used to be, and we humbly seek forgiveness from high lamas and all practitioners of the Dorje Shugden lineage which we have caused so much trouble for.

Once again, we would like to reiterate that Dorje Shugden is a Buddha, and everybody should practise DORJE SHUGDEN."

I was surprised to see that they took the old website down and even published an apology regarding their wrongdoing.

I take this to be a good sign that the CTA finally realise that they have been wrong all this while and that the ban will be lifted soon!