Comment by dumb1224

My wife is from Sichuan which is bordering Tibet. It is a bit more complicated than that. Over the years the development has been fast but still far behind the majority of China. The polices to 'encourage' and harness the great overall economic growth were uniquely shaped and had an element of 'outdated' fashion (or USSR style if that's your opinion). And the flags and posters you saw is probably a chicken and egg problem: the gov sees misinformation (or propaganda from west depends on your view) and wants more territorial control (against the largely available chinese language free Tibet tabloids) and people who actually wants to use it as a way to get more support from the gov. It was nothing like that a decade ago, the social media amplification definitely accelerated that as well.