China doesn't deserve art

For the past five months, the government of China has been fighting to get its ancient artifacts and priceless heirlooms of the country's history and heritage back from American and European museum houses claiming they were removed illegally.\nAnd during these same five months, the same Chinese government has continued its unwavering abuse of the people of Tibet and many of the government's other citizens.\nWe ask simply, where are your priorities, China?\nAnd we offer a deal: when you stop torturing the innocent and begin to recognize the unalienable rights all individuals share -- including the right, "to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security" (words from our Declaration of Independence), you can have your artifacts back.\nBut the fact is, you don't necessarily deserve them.\nThe thousands of examples of Chinese heritage have become as much a part of American and European education as Chinese history. In saying they would keep their artifacts, a consortium of the 18 largest museums in the world said the gifts "have become part of the museums that have cared for them, and by extension part of the heritage of the nations which house them."\nThe Louvre in Paris and the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York are two of the greatest repositories of Chinese art and some of the greatest educational excursions anyone could make. To rip the artifacts from the millions of people interested only to hide them in an inaccessible and unwelcoming environment would greatly diminish the purpose they now serve.\n-- Aaron Sharockman for the Editorial Board