Shen Yun scam?

While beginning (and possibly, hopefully, completing) my holiday shopping at the mall last night, I bought a present for us, me and the Wizard, or more accurately, myself, two tickets to January’s performance of Shen Yun. I’d just selected a couple of Aloha shirts at Macy’s (the former Liberty House, as most of us who have been in Hawaii for some time still call it) for him and his father, choosing them in less time than it took me to pay for them. Was it my current preoccupation with K-drama that drew me to some really very nice shirts made in Korea? And 40% off, which I discovered after I pulled them off the rack. I am at my most decisive, and lucky, at Christmas. (Read about picking out a tree over on the Yang Side.)

Then a stop at Sephora whose $20 discount coupon was burning a hole in my complexion. (Only Sephora discounts cosmetics; the big department stores like Macy’s/Liberty House never do.) I have largely overcome my obsession with maquillage et parfum, but every now and then, I succumb to a girly desire. It was my birthday, more or less; they promised me a birthday gift. But the clerk forgot to give it to me. It is a test of my obsession: do I go back to claim it?

Still, good scores in hand, I was feeling a little drunk on plastic money when I was attracted to a kiosk promoting a big Chinese performing arts spectacular to occur in January at our concert hall where we have season tickets to the opera. On the signage, a leaping Chinese guy in a topknot with an archer’s bow–that will stop me in my tracks any time. Two Chinese women were touting the show…”a visually dazzling tour of Chinese history and culture.” Having missed Zhang Yimou’s big production at Hangzhou’s West Lake, and as an afficionado of shows like the Shaolin Monks (in Beijing); a bizarre Las Vegas/Disney-esque survey of 5,000 years of Chinese history in a different venue in Hangzhou; Cantonese, Peking, and televised Revolutionary Opera (in Hong Kong, Beijing, and Honolulu), to say nothing of the various odd Chinese vaudeville extravaganzas that come through Honolulu every year around Moon Festival and Chinese New Year, I was intrigued.

A very nice Chinese woman chatted with me about the show. I said I traveled to China frequently and had been to Wudangshan several times. She knew where that was. “Lots of Taoist culture there,” she said. I told her I enjoyed the local Phoenix Dance Chamber performances. She knew who they were.

I looked at the brochures, curious that the performance was presented by The Falun Dafa Association of Hawaii, but you wouldn’t know this without looking at the mouseprint. I know who Falun Dafa (Falun Gong) are. I said I’d think about it. “It has nothing to do with Falun Gong,” she assured me.

Then, in a Costco/shopping network moment, get-it-while-it’s-available, I caved and bought two tickets. The Wizard buys the opera tickets; I drag him to the odd Chinese culture events.

At home in a fit of shopper’s remorse, I poked around the net for reviews and comments about the show, just starting its 2011 World Tour, which will not include the really big chunk of the world known as the People’s Republic of China. Apparently Shen Yun has everything to do with Falun Gong. Shen Yun was banned in Hong Kong (now part of the PRC as an SAR; it is not banned in Taiwan) because its association with Falun Gong puts it in an adversarial position with the CCP. The reviews boil down to, on one hand, amazing art with a spiritual message, and on the other, propaganda (for Falun Gong) and mediocre art. (The Chinese invented propaganda. I say this while watching Sunzi Bingfa, a Chinese TV series about Sun Tzu, Sun Bin, and the 36 Stratagems, all of which is basically about deceitful strategy and propaganda, or The Art of War.)

But now I am committed. No refunds on the ticket. So, I look forward to the event as another research point in my ongoing independent study of Chinese history and culture. It’s real-life drama, a little like Perhaps Love, an excellent Chinese movie I just watched, a movie about making a movie, with two levels of the same story. (I highly recommend it.)

I am caught in a yin/yang moment. Though, had I read the reviews and various commentaries prior to swiping my credit card, I still would have bought the tickets (but maybe only one, and a cheaper seat) just to find out for myself. I look forward to observing this, and will post my own opinion come January. Probably on the observing Yang Side.

text from: http://facts.org.cn/puop/201103/t125942.htm

“Inner strife” confirmed preliminarily through exclusive interviews

Oct. 31 (Kaiwind) – The “Inner strife” of Falun Gong got a seething speculation on the internet recently. Kaiwind ever reported this before with an article “Innerl Strife” of Falun Gong Widely Spreads on the Internet. On the afternoon of October 28, the reporter did telephone interviews with chairman of Hong Kong Falun Dafa Association Jian Hongzhang, vice chairman Chen Yongguang and Mary Kwong, who is in charge of the practicing spot in North Point of Hong Kong, in order to seek confirmation.

Jian Hongzhang neither gave a direct answer to the reporter’s questions, nor denied them.

The reporter called Jian Hongzhang first. After verifying his identify, the reporter asked some questions: “First, the Shen Yun Performance in Hong Kong has been hampered, Dafa disciples in Hong Kong attribute this to your poor job, what do you think of that? Second, it is said on the internet that some fellow practitioners died, but you blockaded the news, which caused more deaths and illness of people, what’s your view on this issue? Third, some people say that you have an affair with He Lixia, which is also criticized by Li Hongzhi, please explain this.”

Apparently, Jian Hongzhang was not prepared for this interview. For the first two questions, he responded by saying that “I won’t answer your questions”. On hearing the third question, Jian hung up immediately.

Chen Yongguang admitted he was ill in hospital, but he said he was forced to do this.

Then the reporter called Chen Yongguang. Chen admitted he was ill in hospital and was in poor physical condition at present. He said: “I don’t know how I get to the hospital and who sent me there. I fainted away suddenly and someone took me to the hospital.”

As for someone’s saying that he was not diligent on Fa study and his karma was too much, he hummed and hawed, giving no definite reply. He just reiterated that “I have a correct understanding on it”.

Mary Kwong said that many of Li Hongzhi’s miracles can not be performed in man’s world.

For the gossip about Jian Hongzhang on the internet, Mary Kwong admitted that “people around the world believe those are true basically”, but she said the information was actually false. When the reporter continued saying that it caused He Lixia’s divorce with her husband Zeng Yining, Mary Kwong began to side-step the issue by saying that “it is their personal problem, and it’s nothing.”

The reporter asked that the Shen Yun Performance in Hong Kong died on the vine, why didn’t the omnipotent Master Li Hongzhi bail it out? Mary Kwong answered that “many of Li Hongzhi’s miracles can not be performed in man’s world.”

According to the interviews, the informations on the internet are not groundless, which have been confirmed by the manners of the parties concerned. In fact, the inner strife of Falun Gong is not the focus of Kaiwind, what Kaiwind concerns is how Falun Gong and Li Hongzhi who claim that “human’s moral is declining” and “only believing in Falun Gong can people be saved” sail under false colors. Kaiwind will pay further attention to this event and give report on it.

Attachment:

　　1. The interview recording with Jian Hongzhang (click to start playing, download：Jian Hongzhang recording）

　　
　　2. The interview recording with Chen Yongguang (click to start playing, download：Chen Yongguang recording）
　　
　　3. The interview recording with Mary Kwong (click to start playing, download：Mary Kwong recording）
　　

(Kaiwind.com, October 31, 2010)

text from: http://facts.org.cn/Reports/China/201103/t125811.htm

Practicing Falun Gong bungles illness of Ye Hao’s kith and kin

As the central person of Falun Gong, the founder and principal of Minghui net, Ye Hao has a prominent position in Falun Gong organization. His wife Jiang Xuemei was born in Lanxi City, Zhejiang Province. Influenced by both of them, Jiang Xuemei’selder brother Wang and Wang’s wife Ge Cuidi began to practice Falun Gong in 1992. But Wang died of apoplexy in November 2009.

Ge Cuidi kept practicing up to now and was in charge of the assistance station in Pinghu before. She was very “diligent” and in high “level”, and firmly believed that she would reach Consummation after practicing.

In order to cure the illness for Wang, who suffered from apoplexy, the couple came to Beijing in July 1992. Jiang Xuemei told Ge Cuidi that there was a miraculous practice method called Falun Gong, which could cure disease and improve health. The Master could make the quadriplegic stand up instantly and get well by sending out Gong. Also he could cure the hunchbacks and other chronic and stubborn diseases. Both Ge Cuidi and her husband believed Jiang Xuemei without a shadow of doubt and became interested in this mysterious practice. They entered for the second Falun Gong study class hold in Second Artillery Corps auditorium by Li Hongzhi. During the 10-day study class, Ge Cuidi “saw” the so-called miracles of Falun Gong and was obsessed with it. She firmly believed that Falun Gong could surely make her husband recover and enjoy a healthy life. After that, she practiced Falun Gong with all her heart and also asked her disable husband to practice all day long. In Zhejang Province, Ge Cuidi’s family was one of the earliest families involved in Falun Gong.

Ge Cuijdi also took part in the eleventh Falun Gong training class hold in Beijing in July 1997. After seeing the book of Chinese Falun Gong in this class, she began to learn the Fa, not just practice. She was enchanted with the goldenparadise described by Li Hongzhi, and could not extricate herself. What she thought everyday were “eliminating attachments”, “cultivating character”, “going up to high level” and “reaching Consummation”, there was only Falun Gong in her world.

To learn the Fa and enhance the level better, Ge Cuidi and her husband came to Beijing again for a one-month collective training and Fa studying in February 1995. Sometimes the couple went to the practicing spot together with Jiang Xuemei and Ye Hao. The practicing atmosphere affected Ge Cuidi and made her long for the “Consummation” even more. At the same time, Jiang Xuemei told Ge Cuidi that it was not enough to just practice and learn the Fa seriously, she also needed to improve character and promote the Fa actively. After going back home from Beijing, Ge Cuidi concentrated on promoting the Fa and established the Falun Dafa assistance station in Pinghu. She sold lots of Falun Gong books bought by Jiang Xuemei to her fellow practitioners. Later she gathered over 10 people to practice and watch the teaching videos about Falun Dafa at her home. She ordered other practitioners to read books, recite books, learn the Fa, and have a discussion together after learning. As more people practiced Falun Gong, Ge Cuidi founded some other practicing spots and bought all kinds of Falun Gong books in large quantities from the assistance station in Wuhan. Then the books were sold to the practitioners to strengthen their awareness of practicing and learning the Fa. Under the influence of Ge Cuidi, there were hundreds of people practicing Falun Gong in Pinghu and Lanxi counties. She also organized over 40 diligent people to attend the “Falun Dafa conference for experience sharing” hold in Hangzhou. After obsessing with Falun Gong, Ge Cuidi went to practice every morning, and went out to promote the Fa in the afternoon after attending her husband. In the evening, she called everyone together to practice collectively. She often said that she had seen the miracles of the Master, so as to encourage all the people to practice seriously and reach “Consummation” as soon as possible.

After Falun Gong was banned, Ge Cuidi kept practicing and “promoting the Fa” in secret. She often said to people that she won’t be in good health and be vigorous to take care of her husband if not practiced; the government made a mistake for misunderstanding Falun Dafa.,The truth would come out someday, while Falun Dafa would be promoted and it could save people”. In order to “promote the Fa”, she bought a fax machine and a duplicator with her limited retirement pay for publicity materials. She also went through the formalities of so-called quitting the CCP for her son and other relatives, and told her youngest son overseas that he must learn from his uncle-in-law Ye Hao and cousin Ye Fanghong who had deeper insight into Falun Gong, follow their advices and enhance himself.

Although persisting in practicing and going out to promote the Fa, Ge Cuidi’s husband didn’t get well as imagined. The relatives suggested they should send him to the hospital, but Ge refused resolutely. She said both of them were cultivators, her husband deserved it due to the great “karma” of previous life. Only by practicing seriously could he pay it back. Later her husband lost consciousness and she couldn’t look after him alone, so she requested a nanny to help her. Most of the time her husband reclined on a cane chair without any consciousness and response. Sometimes Ge Cuidi and the nanny had to pick the husband up when he slid off the chair. At the same time she needed to take the phlegm out from the mouth of the husband with her hand. Even in such a case, she still introduced Falun Gong to everyone at every opportunity, and said that it was a practice that cultivated both your nature and longevity, one could attain the Tao and reach Consummation if cultivating sincerely.

Ge Cuidi’s husband, who had practiced Falun Gong from 1992, died of apoplexy in November 2009.

Ge Cuidi found there were lumps in her breast in 2009, but she thought she was a cultivator and would never be ill. The Master said clearly that “Qigong practice and true cultivation practice will not lead to illness, particularly under this condition. It is known that what actually causes people to become ill is seventy percent psychological and thirty percent physiological. As a practitioner, if you always think that it is an illness, you are actually asking for it. If you ask for an illness, it will come inside your body. As a practitioner, your xinxing level should be high.” She thought in order to make her pay back quickly and achieve Unlocking, the Master increased the hardships on her. And if she practiced diligently everyday, the “karma” must be removed, her “level” would also be raised. She didn’t go to hospital until the pain on the breast was unbearable. The lumps in her breast already got black and another breast began to discharge pus. Ge Cuidi was diagnosed with terminal cancer in March 2010.

As the relatives of second in command in Falun Gong group Ye Hao, Ge Cuidi and her husband Wang are both “diligent” Falun Gong disciples, but one died of serious illness and the other suffered from advanced breast cancer. Where are Li Hongzhi’s “Law Bodies”? How does he “protect” his disciples? Where are the blessings of Falun Gong disciples then?

(Kaiwind.com, June 29, 2010)

text from: http://facts.org.cn/Data/02/201103/t125691.htm

Canadian Professor of Philosophy criticizes Falun Gong again

Professor Udo Schuklenk is a professor of philosophy at Queen’s, and has recently been offered the Ontario Research Chair in Bioethics.

In August 2010, he posted an article Falun Gong Harmless Exercise Fanatics in his blog and said, “I agree with the authorities verdict that this is a dangerous cult. The cult is clearly racist and homophobic, not to forget outright crazy.”

After that, he received a letter from a self-declared Falun Gong practitioner. The practitioner claimed himself “a Falun gong practitioner for 15 years”, “has seen countless silver lights flying and dancing all over the sky that appear to be Falun”, and “Master’s hint helped me to avoid a severe train accident.” The practitioner asked professor Udo Schuklenk to “practice together” “for human.”

On November 24, 2010, professor Udo Schuklenk posted another article attaching with this letter, in which he said, “I think the bits about flying Faluns are pretty funny. My personal favourite though, changing gays, mixed-race and computer engineers who were sent by extraterrestrial aliens to destroy earth. That’s pretty cool as far as crazy stuff goes.”

This article got some comments:

Saul Garcia Lopez commented that “Good script for a fiction movie”, while Infidel753 said, “Bad enough to believe in nonsense. Worse to believe in such cliches, hackneyed nonsense.” Another anonymous person said that “I wouldn’t even call that religious – it’s just plain foolishness.”

However, a Falun Gong member Balance who also self-declared an American citizen and a grad student at a prestigious U.S. school argued for Falun Gong group. He said, “The ‘compassion’ and ‘tolerance’ aspects of the practice are universally held to prohibit any form of violence, or indeed any intentional harm to another living being, even emotional”, so he asked Professor Udo Schuklenk “to take a balanced view”.

Professor Udo Schuklenk replied Balance on the same day that, “You won’t be surprised that I disagree with you.” He thought “This Master bloke invented the cult and its ideology. Accordingly his views are held in very high regard. Unsurprisingly his no-harm teachings have not stopped him from watching his followers burning themselves in protests (non-violent, no doubt) to make their point. Interesting. I take it you don’t mean to say that your guru will pass his skills on to whoever will take over the business from him? Certainly not while he can continue being guru. That’s really not how gurus function.”

About the “balanced view”, professor Udo said, “Ask yourself, might it be a tad bit implausible to waffle on about tolerance and non-violence while your ideology espouses racist views? You don’t mean to cause emotional hurt? Well, how about repudiating such harmful teachings? Not gonna happen, I know. We know the patterns from Catholicism and its homophobic agenda. ‘Love the sinner’. Nonsense.”

“There is plenty of evidence that Falun Gong followers omit to get health care believing their adherence to Faun Gong will sort it for them. No harm? Really?’

“What I think is that you’d consider doing those exercises (or any other for that matter), do your meditation and be tolerant and compassionate without supporting this cult.

“I’m always puzzled how otherwise bright folks manage to switch off their critical thinking skills the moment it comes to guru stuff. ”

text from: http://facts.org.cn/Views/201103/t125655.htm

A battle for Chinese hearts and minds in Flushing

On the bustling thoroughfare of Chinese immigrants that is Main Street in Flushing, Queens, countless people hand out fliers for massage parlors, calling cards, English classes, money-wiring stores and other services.

But one group of regulars that offers fliers from its daily spot is not commercially minded. Its message is an ideological one: to disparage Falun Gong, the spiritual and meditation movement founded in China. It’s a movement, Falun Gong organizers say, that has found its largest following outside Asia in Flushing.

The group denounces Falun Gong as a cult, and it incorporates this charge into its name: the Chinese Anti-Cult World Alliance. The alliance set up a small folding table in the summer of 2008 on Main Street near Sanford Avenue, not far from the numerous tables staffed by Falun Gong volunteers who hand out literature lambasting the Chinese Communist Party and the Chinese government, which has banned and persecuted Falun Gong, also called Falun Dafa.

For two years, the two factions have staked out their turf on Main Street like rival gangs, and they have waged a bitter ideological battle nearly daily for hearts and minds. They have created a scaled-down version of the tension between Falun Gong and the Chinese government.

Falun Gong members are convinced that this opposition group is an arm of the Chinese government and that its members are working as political operatives to oppress Falun Gong here.

“They are secret agents for the Chinese Communist Party,” said Rong Yi, 45, a Falun Gong organizer in Flushing. “They are puppets for the Chinese government. The Chinese Communist Party is paying them to suppress Falun Gong.”

Ms. Yi’s nemesis on Main Street is Huahong Li, 49, chairwoman of the anti-Falun Gong group, who has become a well-known and polarizing figure in Flushing. Ms. Yi said Ms. Li’s group was trying to keep Falun Gong from publicizing the mistreatment of many of its members in China by the government.

Ms. Li calls the spy accusation laughable and says she is simply motivated by the need to warn the public that Falun Gong is an “evil cult” that has “severely damaged the image and reputation of the Chinese people.”

Ms. Li has gotten into countless confrontations with Falun Gong members. She has been arrested, sued and vilified constantly in The Epoch Times, the free daily newspaper that supports Falun Gong. She keeps scores of clippings from the paper on display at her booth, along with a poster-size collage of snapshots of Falun Gong followers she has argued with. She claims the members have come to her table to harass her, seize her camera and strike her with objects.

Ms. Yi said, however, that these members were approached by Ms. Li. She also accused Ms. Li of orchestrating the distribution of “hate material” against Falun Gong, instigating attacks on members and routinely gathering up and destroying copies of The Epoch Times in sidewalk boxes. Ms. Yi claims Ms. Li has been seen — videotaped, in fact — entering the Chinese Consulate in Manhattan.

Ms. Yi is president of a group called the Global Service Center for Quitting the Chinese Communist Party, whose mission is to find immigrants who were party members in China and persuade them to swear off their membership. The center’s headquarters are above a Chinese bakery on Main Street, two blocks from where Ms. Li sets up her table, and they double as the main offices for Falun Gong in Flushing.

Ms. Yi said that despite Ms. Li’s efforts to thwart her group, about 80 people a day shed their party affiliations with the group’s help. These people sign a list and agree to have their identities entered into a database on a private page on The Epoch Times Web site, she said.

Ms. Yi said she told immigrants that even if they planned never to return to China, it was crucial to quit the party officially in protest of its oppressive actions. To remain a member is to essentially condone all this, she says, but to quit is to obtain freedom from the bottom of their hearts.

“We tell them that God or Buddha will punish you in this life or the future if you still follow them,” Ms. Yi said. “It will be bad luck for you and your family. We tell them that if they quit, their future will be secured and God will bless them.”

Several blocks away, Ms. Li, urges immigrants to quit the “Quitting” party.

“Departing from cult resuscitates oneself,” one of her signs reads.

The two sides have been feuding since the 2008 earthquake in Sichuan Province that killed more than 60,000 people. Groups of Flushing residents accused Falun Gong of disrupting fund-raising efforts on Main Street for victims by demonstrating with lively music and attacks on the Chinese government.

Ms. Li calls Falun Gong disingenuous and insulting to Chinese immigrants. Her literature charges that Falun Gong practices “anti-human and anti-society practices” and irresponsibly advises members to eschew conventional medicine for daily exercise and meditation for health.

Her main charge is that Falun Gong paints itself as a peaceful, persecuted group, but behind the scenes it is highly disciplined and ruthless, and burnishes its image with its media outlets, political alliances, ubiquitous demonstrations and lobbying tables.

Ms. Li said she lacked the political, strategic and English-language skills to defend herself against Falun Gong’s attacks on her. She said her anti-Falun Gong group had grown in two years to more than 100 people, though its numbers are dwarfed by the thousands of Falun Gong members in Flushing. Last month, for the first time, her group gained a spot in the annual Chinese New Year parade on Main Street, marching near Falun Gong members.

Ms. Li’s most prominent run-in was with a well-known Falun Gong member named Wenyi Wang. In June 2009, Ms. Wang accused Ms. Li of destroying copies of The Epoch Times and approached her with a camera. Ms. Wang said Ms. Li seized the camera, and Ms. Li was arrested and charged with fourth-degree grand larceny. She is now under an order of protection forbidding her to approach Ms. Wang.

All this was reported extensively in The Epoch Times, where Ms. Wang is a contributor and somewhat of a celebrity among Falun Gong adherents for her actions at the White House in 2006 when she gained admittance with Epoch Times press credentials and shouted against Chinese President Hu Jintao while he spoke. She was quickly escorted away, and President Bush later apologized to Mr. Hu.

Ms. Li and her supporters roll their eyes at the idea that their sidewalk spot is a front for cloak-and-dagger espionage.

“Who knew it was that easy to become a government agent?” said one of her colleagues, Zhu Zhirou.

text from: http://facts.org.cn/Reports/World/201103/t125607.htm

The Epoch Times removes fake news stealthily

Sep. 25 (Kaiwind) – Fang Zhouzi, a campaigner against cult and academic fraud, was attacked by two men using unknown liquid spray and iron hammer near his residence in Beijing on August 29, 2010.Then the Epoch Times gloated and published a piece of news titled “the fraud fighter got ambushed, which was suspected to be feigned case”. On September 1, the Epoch Times also selected some offensive comments on Fang Zhouzi from the Internet as news and said the attack of Fang Zhouzi was trumped up by himself, which was “entertaining and malicious”. It also hyped this with some blog posts.

Fang Zhouzi, the founder of “New Threads” monthly magazine and website, was born in September 1967 in Yunxiao County, Zhangzhou City, Fujian Province. His autonym is Fang Shiming while Fang Zhouzi is his pen name. Since 1999, he found the website of New Threads and published many articles of net friends and his own to expose the academic corruption in Chinese scientific community and educational circles and to criticize the fake news of the press, the pseudoscience, the pseudo-Qigong and pseudo-environmental protection.

Criticizing Falun Gong is one of his contribution to China and his related articles are choiced in expert anthology of Kaiwind website. His articles such as “Ten Analysises of Falun Gong” disclose the anti-society, anti-humanity, and anti-science nature of the cult. Falun Gong regards him as a thorn in the flesh, so the Epoch Times has abused him many times before.

Xiao Chuanguo, the main suspect (male, 54 years old, head of the Urology Surgery in the medical school of a university) of the case was arrested at 17:00 on September 21. After careful investigation, Beijing Public Security Bureau cracked the case. They arrested 4 suspects and seized some tools for crime. According to initial examination, Xiao Chuanguo believed that his failing to be the academician of Chinese Academy of Sciences was due to Fang’s disclosure of his academic fraud. So Xiao Chuanguo instigated Dai Jianxiang and other people to commit crime in revenge for this.

At this point, Fang Zhouzi case came out in the wash and the fake news by the Epoch Times collapsed of itself. In order to cover its defamatory news, the Epoch Times removed the news hurriedly. But unfortunately, people can still search the related directory in website of the Epoch Times (see picture as follows). However, you can’t open the webpage anymore.

Making pseudo event is the “persistent ailment” of the Epoch Times, and it relapsed again. See how the Epoch Times resort to sophistry this time.

(Kaiwind.com, September 25, 2010)

text from: http://facts.org.cn/Reports/China/201103/t125520.htm

The Chinese professor who started a ruckus

BEIJING, Feb. 4 — In the spring of 1999, Professor He Zuoxiu, an elderly theoretical physicist whose avocation is debunking pseudoscience, hoped to provoke some debate with a short article warning about the “deceitful lies” of certain “qigong” meditation sects. One called Falun Gong, he charged, led a student into mental illness.

At the time, his provocative views were not welcome in the mainstream press, and the article appeared in the April issue of “Science and Technology for Youth,”an obscure magazine published by a teacher-training university in Tianjin, 100 miles southeast of Beijing.

Neither the professor nor anyone else could have imagined that the article would touch off some of China’s most tumultuous events in years: nothing less than the broadest popular resistance to Communist authority since the 1989 democracy movement and the harsh government crackdown that followed.

It was anger over the professor’s article that led 10,000 or more Falun Gong believers to hold a vigil on April 25, 1999, outside the leadership compound in Beijing, demanding an official apology and legal recognition. And it was that unauthorized demonstration that led the frightened authorities to outlaw the spiritual group, which had attracted millions of Chinese with its promises of physical and spiritual salvation through meditative exercises.

Mr. He, now 74, is a Chinese original. As a physicist he aided China’s development of nuclear weapons in the early 1960’s. Today, he said in an interview at his small apartment in a compound of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, he is still collaborating with scientists at M.I.T. in the search for “dark matter” in the universe.

Yet this advocate of scientific methods is also a devout Marxist who has published essays questioning whether today’s pell-mell market reforms are steering China off the true path of Marx and socialism.

“As a scientist I make my judgments based on universal laws,” he said in the interview. “And Marxism is a science just like all the others.”

If his orthodox Marxism is not always welcomed by the leadership, his diatribes against”evil cults”garner more official respect these days, and he has no regrets about his cameo role in the bizarre national drama of Falun Gong.

He said that the latest news, of seven apparent followers trying to immolate themselves in Tiananmen Square, only meant that Li Hongzhi, the Falun Gong founder, was even more despicable than he had asserted before. “This proves that Falun Gong is more evil than other cults,” Mr. He said. “With the Branch Davidians in the United States, at least the head of the cult burned himself together with the others. Here the head wanted to sacrifice his followers to achieve his own ulterior motives.”

The immolation attempts, on Jan. 23, left one woman dead and four people severely burned. Two others were stopped from lighting themselves, the authorities said. Falun Gong representatives in the United States insist that the incident could not have involved followers and that ”Master Li” opposes suicide. The government has launched a renewed campaign to discredit the spiritual movement.

Mr. He was born 1927 to an affluent family in Shanghai, with Christians and Buddhists in his family background, he said. His father, who died when the boy was only 2, had an engineering doctorate from Cornell University. Like many idealistic students during the war against Japanese invaders and the civil war that followed, he became interested in Marxism. In 1947, when he moved to Qinghua University in Beijing to study physics, he became an underground Communist Party member.

In the 1950’s, in the new People’s Republic of China, he mainly worked not in laboratories but in the Department of Propaganda, where he helped oversee the development of science and technology and wrote major articles on the Marxist theory of science.

During Mao’s Cultural Revolution of 1966 to 1976, Mr. He and his wife also a physicist, fell into disfavor. Though they did not land in prison, with their upper-class backgrounds and insufficient enthusiasm for Maoist turmoil, they did wind up in a strange confinement: each day they had to go to separate places where they were kept locked up, then were released each night to sleep at home.

“Mao had an excessive belief in class struggle, and that became an obstacle to the development of productive forces,” Mr. He said. “To my point of view, such thinking was not consistent with Marxism.”

So was Mao, in the end, a kind of cult leader himself? Mr. He smiled disdainfully. ”You can’t compare Mao to Li Hongzhi,” he said.

“Mao hoped to raise the living standards of the people,” he said. “He personally lost six family members to the revolution, and during that period he made great contributions to our people.”
“Mao made mistakes during his later years, but these were the mistakes of a great man.”

For the last 20 years or so, Mr. He has pursued a part-time, unofficial crusade against what he considers superstition and bogus science. Qigong masters, who sprang up by the dozens in the 1980’s, were common targets.

Mr. He is among the minority of Chinese who deny the existence of qi, the supposed cosmic forces in the body and universe that are the basis of qigong exercises as well as much of traditional Chinese medical theory. But while he says the crackdown on Falun Gong should if anything be intensified — associated rights abuses, he says, have been greatly exaggerated abroad — he does not call for a blanket ban on qigong.

“I’ve never been against endeavors by old people to practice qigong in pursuit of health and longevity,” he said.”But if you claim that it can work all wonders, that’s cheating people.”

“My field is the quantum theory of fields,” he said. “When people say qigong is a field, I cannot agree.”

Since the Falun Gong troubles, the government has tied itself in knots trying to distinguish between “good” and ” bad” forms of qigong. Mr. He would only say that China “has not fully solved” the question of how to handle different schools.

Mr. He is unfazed by reports that some Falun Gong members have tried to direct supernatural punishments at him. “I welcome that,” he said, “because I know it’s impossible” Then, laughing, he added, “But if someone tries to use physical force against me they’ll succeed, because I’m old and frail and I believe in Newton’s laws of physics.”

 text from: http://www.facts.org.cn/Reports/World/201103/t125252.htm

The joy of sects

Though perhaps no saint, Heather Kavan has done her share of suffering for religion. For 11 months, Kavan, constitutionally not a morning person, rose before 6am to join a group of Falun Gong practitioners for half an hour of silent exercises.
 
Did she find transcendence? Not exactly. For Kavan, who is of slim build, a defining memory is of penetrating cold.
 
“I was stuck in the lotus position in a temperature below zero when I knew I just had to get my coat. And when I tried to stand up, I found I was paralysed from the waist down. So of course I went crashing down to the ground, and I crawled over to get my coat, and one of them looked at me and said, somewhat offhandedly, ‘If you had been meditating properly you wouldn’t have felt the cold.'”
 
It doesn’t help that the 6am exercise sessions seem to have gone into abeyance when Kavan stopped attending.
 
She suspects her presence was the impetus for the sessions all along.
 

Kavan’s small, corner office on the Manawatu campus is surprisingly pleasant. Long and narrow, with two intersecting rows of windows, it feels a little like the bridge of a ship, and the view, while largely of concrete, is softened by Kavan’s thriving collection of indoor plants.
 
On the wall is her framed 2009 national award for sustained excellence in teaching, and, alongside, its tongue-in-cheek complement, a Pre-Raphaelite print entitled The Accolade and featuring a kneeling Prince Valiant-like figure in chainmail being knighted by a white-robed, long haired damsel.
 
So far, so standard. While radiating more order and serenity than most, this is just another academic garret, and the books – Bill Bryson’s Mother Tongue and Lyn Truss’ Eats Shoots and Leaves – are those you would expect to find in the collection of someone who teaches speech writing and the art of writing.
 
What isn’t in evidence is Kavan’s alter ego: Kavan the investigator of religions, cults and ‘altered states’.
 
The room is bare of religious iconography, crystals, and uplifting homilies.
 
Yet here is a woman who professes to be, if anything, more comfortable in a revivalist meeting or meditation group than in the confines of academia.
 
And away from the university surrounds, Kavan’s clinical remove falls away. “Most of us can suspend reality for a temporary period when we go to a movie; I suspend it when I go to a religious meeting.” She shares the fervour of those around her.
 
Some things, she says, have to be experienced to be understood.
 
 
 Take, for example, the case of Janet Moses, the mother of two who drowned during a marathon exorcism session. Were those who forced cold water on her to expel the demons guilty of manslaughter? A jury thought so.
 
Kavan, who attended the six-week trial in the cause of research, is not so sure.
 
“The Moses case hinged on the consent issue. The judge advised the jury that if they believed that the accused had an honest belief that Janet Moses consented to the water being poured down her throat just before death, then they would have to find the defendants not guilty.
 
“The prosecutor argued, eloquently, – he should have been a writer – how can anyone say they thought she consented; they weren’t thinking at all; there was no thought involved – at least not towards the end. And it did ring true. They were so much in an altered state that they weren’t thinking.
 
“Similarly, what the defence said rang true, that at times Janet called the shots during the exorcism; she would say ‘the demon is here’ and the defendants would rush to expel it for her; she believed she was possessed. They were trying to help her. They did have an honest belief she was consenting because she declined offers to take her away from the situation.”
 
There is no denying that the events surrounding Moses’ death were bizarre. Up to 50 people were present at any time in the small lounge where the exorcism was held. The windows were tightly sealed to prevent demons entering. The temperatures rose to “furnace-like” levels. The laundry – which held clothing contaminated by vomit – and the toilet beyond were declared off limits. The room was awash with water. People had taken to relieving themselves in a corner.
 
“It’s understandable that people who hadn’t experienced [anything like this] couldn’t comprehend the defendants’ responses,” says Kavan.
 
“Witness after witness testified that Janet had a strange look in her eyes and that was what convinced them that she was possessed: while there were other unusual behaviours, it was this very strange look in her eyes that everyone recalled. I’ve seen that look in people’s eyes, and it is frightening. I don’t interpret it as possession, but I can understand how someone else would.”
 
How then does Kavan propose to interpret the trial for the purposes of her research?
 
Her proposal to the presiding judge was that she apply the lens of collective entrapment, a subset of group think2, in which members escalate their commitment to a course of action even though it is obviously failing.
 
Now she is more inclined to interpret the events surrounding Janet Moses’ death in terms of trance or altered states.
 
She also finds herself interested in the issue of gender: in most exorcisms it is the woman who is exorcised, the man who is the exorcist.
 
“Usually that is because the exorcist sees women as easy targets, less likely to say ‘no, what a load of rubbish’. But in this instance the people who were perceived as possessed were often those who fainted under the heat. So they were more likely to be female. The stronger males had a better chance of being able to physically endure.
 
“If you’re in a group and someone is checking out who has a demon, and they see you as the next target for an exorcism, there are really only a couple of ways of getting out of it. You can’t say, ‘no, I’m not possessed’, because that would just be evidence that you are. You could fake deliverance, which one of the witnesses in the Lee case3 did: he went along with it, and at the first possible moment [he faked deliverance]. And, of course, the other way is to turn on someone else really quickly. ‘Yes, there it is. It’s just flown to you!’
 
“Whoever is quick-witted enough to put themselves in the position of the discerner [and say], ‘it’s on him’, or on her – usually it’s her – is the survivor.
 
“I often think that exorcisms are like a game of spiritual poker: it’s about bluff. Whoever can bluff the best wins. However, I don’t believe anyone was bluffing in the Moses case. The family were tragically inexperienced.”
 
 
Set out in print – or related to a jury – the events leading up to Janet Moses’ death in fact sound insane. In coldly rational terms, what was to stop someone opening the windows, stepping outside the door, asking for help, simply saying “enough”?
 
Those caught up in the events – even those who stood accused of her manslaughter – acknowledged that to an outsider how it all played out would seem incomprehensible.
 
Yet at times during the testimony, Kavan was seized by an almost overpowering sense of empathy: she wanted to approach the defendants and say, “I do understand”.
 
Similarly, many other religious phenomena can only truly be understood through direct experience.
 
“When the anti-cult people criticise cult members, I often think that they’ve never been near a cult leader. Because the big-name cult leaders, the gurus, emanate an energy: it’s magnetic, it’s addictive. People let down their guard, all rational thought goes out the window. It’s like falling in love.”
 
 
What is the lure for Kavan personally? Part of it is that as a self-described child of the sixties and seventies she comes from a generation of spiritual seekers.
 
But there is also a certain in-the-moment thrill. “You can feel the adrenalin that goes around the room. Even if you’re a sceptic, the most mundane activity takes on an air of excitement.
 
“If I go into a room where people believe in spiritual entities, even a simple act like choosing where to sit takes on a whole new dynamic. I could inadvertently sit on a chair that someone believes an invisible entity is occupying. Every move is filled with adrenalin. There’s a whole game that goes on. It’s compelling.”
 
She enjoys the sense of uplift that revival meetings and meditation groups sometimes achieve. She likes the camaraderie, the moments of transcendence, and the “fantastic stories” they weave. In some groups, she says, the intimacy is closer than you would find in many families.
 
But unlike the true believers, Kavan does not believe there is only one true path to the divine.
 
Indeed, you could almost think of Kavan as a spiritual mystery shopper, sampling the range and setting out her insights in academic papers.
 
It is time-consuming work. Often the face a group of believers presents to the outside world will be at odds with the behind-the-scenes reality.
 
“With a cult, particularly an extreme cult, you have to spend about six months with the organisation before you even discover the cult. Usually there is a fairly straightforward-sounding religion, which is a front. And after six months you discover that there are other meetings.”
 
Even for the non-cult-like manifestations of religions, developing an understanding takes time.
 
To produce her research on glossolalia – aka speaking in tongues – Kavan spent over three years observing the practice in two very different religious groups4 – a Pentecostal congregation and an apocalyptic millenarian yoga-based sect. For her paper on Falun Gong5 there was the 11-month period of rising before daylight to participate in 6 o’clock group exercises.
 
Her approach to Falun Gong was made when she discovered it was inviting academic institutions to conduct unbiased research.
 
Kavan immersed herself in her research topic, conducting ethnographic research (part of which was her 6am exercise attendance), analysing Falun Gong leader Li Hongzhi’s speeches and writings, and extensively consulting external courses.
 
To begin with, her sympathies lay firmly with Falun Gong, but as she became more knowledgeable a shift took place. Though the Falun Gong members she met were “humble and courageous”, Falun Gong itself was less attractive: it was adept at working the media to its advantage, was less than forthcoming about some of the less palatable aspects of its dogma, and was only too ready to bring defamation suits against anyone who published unfavourable material.
 
Is Falun Gong a cult? It certainly seems to display characteristics that are cult-like, writes Kavan: “An idolised charismatic leader who exploits people by letting them believe he – and it is usually a ‘he’ – is God’s mouthpiece; mind control techniques; an apocalyptic world view used to manipulate members; exclusivity (‘only our religion can save people’); alienation from society; and a view of members as superior to the rest of humanity.”
 
 
In her eclectic approach to religion, Kavan may be unusual, but she says the quest for ecstasy – to be outside of ourselves – is one of the most basic human drives.
 
By international yardsticks, New Zealand is highly secular, but, as seems to be embedded in the nature of being human, many of us hunger for something more.
 
In a recent survey, 30.5 per cent of New Zealanders agreed with the statement “I don’t follow a religion, but am a spiritual person interested in the sacred or the supernatural”6.
 
The trouble, says Kavan, comes when the spiritual experience people seek – “which is a state of higher consciousness” – becomes encumbered with other people’s ideas. “The person’s genuine experience becomes interpreted in terms of the group’s ideology, and the leader’s ego and dogmas and rules start dominating the experience.
 
“What’s the old saying?” she jokes. “I love Jesus; it’s his fan club I can’t stomach.”
 
And unlike Kavan, who will in the end return to her office to question and analyse every aspect of her experience, many people lose all scepticism, however strange the doctrines they are asked to believe.
 
“[People] get into the habit of suspending doubt for such long periods it becomes part of their personality; it becomes a way of living.”
 
Can the benefits be come by without the drawbacks? Imagine.
 
“One of the things I’ve been looking at, and other scholars have been searching for, is a way that people can have these amazing experiences without having a leader who will manipulate them.”
 
This is no longer so far fetched. With the neurological basis of religious experience being increasingly well understood, perhaps the day will come when drug- and guru-free spiritual epiphanies will be available on demand.
 
“If people could have these experiences without being driven by someone else’s ideology and ego, that would be great,” says Kavan. “There would be a lot less religious violence in the world.”

text from: http://www.facts.org.cn/puop/201102/t125103.htm

The Epoch Times’ old stance on China not unexpected

The Epoch Times, the US Central Intelligence Agency’s unofficial mouthpiece, is parroting the Tibetan independence movement party line. This is not surprising at all. Rebutting the Epoch Times would be like shooting fish in a barrel, and I have better use of my time.

Enough said.

Of course the Epoch Times is a Falungong organ. That’s why I said it was a CIA mouthpiece.

Falungong’s mission is to deliberately provoke the CCP regime into clamping down. That lays the groundwork for the “human rights” charges.

Response

Taikor said…

Epoch Times is a joke, suitable for amusement at times.

For example, the media claimed that Sichuan’s earthquake was caused by an underground nuclear explosion.

It’s funny reading through the article as they cite how the authority blocks access to certain sites to suggest something sinister was going on.

For heaven’s sake, it’s for safety and international rescuers are able to enter. If there’s nuke explosion, there would have huge mushroom cloud or a big hole in the ground and the rescuers would have all contracted radiation by now.

About Bevin Chu
Bevin Chu is an American architect and author currently living and working in Taipei and Shanghai. He is the son of Tsing-kang Chu, a retired high-ranking diplomat with the Republic of China government on Taiwan. He is the translator of the English language edition of “Taiwan at the Crossroads: An Expose of Taiwan’s New Dictatorship,” a landmark book by the celebrated native Taiwanese liberal reformer and political commentator, Joyce C. Huang (Huang Chi-hsien).

 text from: http://www.facts.org.cn/puop/201103/t125221.htm

Wang Wenyi’s husband dies of illness

Aug. 9 (Kaiwind) – It is reported and confirmed by some American netizens that the husband of Wang Wenyi, a U.S. Falun Gong backbone, dies of illness in their Newark home earlier this month. Wang Wenyi is the Falun Gong backbone in American. In April 2006, She made trouble at South Lawn of the White House when U.S. then president George. W. Bush was holding a welcoming ceremony for Chinese president Hu Jintao, so she was deemed as the trusted follower by Falun Gong leader Li Hongzhi. It was said that Wang Wenyi was not at her husband’s side most of the time during his illness, but “promoted the Fa” and propagandized Falun Gong cult all around. According to Li Hongzhi, Wang Wenyi and her husband are both “diligent” Dafa disciples, they ought to achieve “Consummation” in the future and become the “Buddha, Taoist and God”, they won’t die of illness as ordinary people. Similarly, in accordance with Li Hongzhi’s theory, Falun Gong members are not allowed to see doctor when falling ill. It was said that Wang’s husband didn’t seek medical advice during his illness. Instead, some Falun Gong members in New York “sentforth righteous thoughts” for him to cure his illness, but in vain. So far, many Falun Gong backbones who are considered to be “diligent”, achieve “Consummation” and become “god” inevitably died of illness, such as Feng Lili, Li Guodong etc.   (Kaiwind, August 9, 2010) text from: http://www.facts.org.cn/Reports/China/201102/t125034.htm