On Saturday I reported on my visit to the Charlottesville Vegetarian Festival (see Visualize Industrial Collapse). Groups like “The Coalition Against Civilization” weren’t the only ones I encountered; there were also some more-or-less normal people there. But all of them had in common a certain level of political activism, plus a center of ideological gravity that definitely listed to the left.
Then I came around a corner and encountered the Falun Gong.
There were two people on a prayer mat meditating silently while Chinese music played on a sound system. Next to them an earnest young Chinese man presided over a table diplaying posters and literature. I spent some time looking through the materials on the table, and then turned to the young man.
“You realize that you’re kind of in the enemy camp?” I asked him, sweeping my arm around to indicate Lee Park with all the other exhibitors and their visitors.
“Yes?” he said tentatively, smiling at me.
“I mean, these people, they’re all leftists — until quite recently they were great admirers of the People’s Republic of China.”
“OK,” he said. “Yes?”
I realized that he had no idea what I was talking about, so I let it go. I continued to look at the table, then took a brochure, thanked him, and moved on.
It’s true that the Left is not as fond of the PRC as it used to be. After all, they don’t like the new capitalism that China has introduced — how could true socialists do such a thing! But you don’t hear too much from them about China any more, not much mention of Tibet or forced abortion or Tiananmen Square or the laogai.
Or Falun Gong.
The brochure is packed with information.
| Why is Falun Gong being persecuted? | |
| With government estimates of as many as 100 million practicing, the regime banned Falun Gong on July 20, 1999, suddenly casting millions as criminals. Emerging evidence reveals that Jiang himself orchestrated the persecution, jealous of the practice’s popularity and growing numbers, among other reasons. Unable to crush the millions who had benefited from the practice, Jiang intensified the regime’s propaganda campaign to turn public opinion against Falun Gong while quietly imprisoning, torturing, and even murdering those who practice it. |
Not all of the Falun Gong practitioners being persecuted are Chinese or in China itself:
| Dr. Charles Lee, a Falun Gong practitioner and U.S. citizen from Menlo Park, California, was sentenced in March 2003 to three years in prison after a brief show trial. He was charged with attempting to broadcast information on state-run television about the persecution of Falun Gong. Dr. Lee has been subjected to the torture of forcefeeding and brainwashing, beatings by guards and inmates, and denied contact with friends and family. His sole legal appeal was rejected in May. | |
| In a letter to the U.S. Consulate, Dr. Lee stated, “They tried not to connect my case to the Falun Gong issue and treated this completely as a criminal case… Their purpose was to cover up their illegal persecution of Falun Gong.” |
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| “One learns from incidents like this that the law in China is a tool to be used in the persecution against Falun Gong. It has nothing to do with safeguarding justice.” | |
| U.S. Families Affected by the Persecution | |
| Charles Lee is not the only American affected by the persecution in China. There are 40 families in the U.S. known to have relatives suffering in Chinese jails and prison camps. In many cases, the families have no idea where their loved ones are being held or of their condition. | |
| Blacklists and Harassment on U.S. Soil | |
| Many U.S. citizens and residents who practice Falun Gong, along with those of other countries, were shocked to discover their names on blacklists compiled by the Chinese government. Because of these blacklists, practitioners were prohibited from entering Iceland in June 2002 and Hong Kong in July 2002, during former leader Jiang’s visit to those countries. Many were even kept from boarding Iceland-bound planes at major U.S. airports. | |
| Other incidents of harassment and violence abound. Chinese officials have reportedly interfered with Falun Gong parades and activities, had practitioners’ hotel reservations canceled, and denied practitioners’ passports. | |
| In New York, the chairman of an overseas Chinese association was arrested for allegedly directing and participating in an assault on Falun Gong practitioners during a peaceful demonstration in June 2003. |
All of this for something that looks to an inexperienced outsider more or less like yoga.
Imagine it. It’s easy, if you try.
Falun Gong philosophy is mumbo-jumbo, but they are harmless. Sadly, the oppression by the PRC government only strengthen them and increase their numbers.
One factor in my growing hatred of the left is not just its indifference to, but passionate defense of, the persecution of Falun Gong, Catholics, and so on. Some of the rationales sounded much like old fascist glorifications of state power.
A fellow who works for me and comes from China also agrees that they are harmless and their persecution is helping them grow and, perhaps, become political. He hasn’t been back to China in over a decade but he keeps up on the news. Being an American citizen now, a Christian, and having more than the legal number of children, he is glad to be here.
In any case, Falun Gong is a reminder that China is still a repressive state.
Well, it seems like all they do is talk and meditate.
I think thats much less violent than most of the other “Religions”.
Papa Ray
West Texas
USA
If a conspiracy to murder an individual is aggressively prosecuted by LE, what vigor will conspirators be prosecuted with who advocate the murder of 6 billion people? What is the name for the extermination of a species? Controlled extinction? Perhaps the problem is diluted into Stalin’s precept that the murder of millions is a mere statistic.
Nah, I don’t think these people would care if the Eskimos remain semi-industrialized or that most socialist societies remain intact. They have to be goal oriented and work at things right at hand, which is to say that they intend on destroying the industrialized West, beginning with the USA. After all, familiarity breeds contempt, and these would be genocidal tyrants are all so familiar with the West. Maybe it is time for them to fan out in areas that are already being expunged in the matter they advocate, how about Dafur or Zimbabwe? Both are lovely this time of year.
Rainbow Six was, in my opinion, about 600 pages too long, but had some clever plot lines that allowed the Greens to spread their engineered disease around the planet, in that case the Olympics, but it could have been as easy through the UN.
The line at Jim Jones punch party was long but only so long as his personal coercion could muster. Thank god for the second amendment. As long as it remains intact the people have recourse from moonbats and a government that feels a need to rule popularly with extremists. Viva la Azlan.
Thank god for little girls. The world that feminists collectively envision is truly one that I would not be a part of. Fortunately, these women and their misandry have ruled me out of being in any such world. Could you imagine what pap they teach their daughters? Such enlightened thought solves much, women can live blissfully unaware of the outside world in their fantasies while the flesh eating Morlacs live in a violent underground waiting for the soft fleshy ones to ripen.
The USA needs more Mexicans and less whities, fortunately the white women are doing everything they can to guarantee this outcome. Diversity now!
Uh,
I meant to post this elsewhere… sorry for the slight OT tone.
It is an interesting thing with Falun Gong. You often hear the line ”Islam, the fastest growing religion” trotted out. Of course it isn’t true. Probably never was, except perhaps for a spell in the seventh century. Not true in absolute numbers. And of course even less true in percentage. Probably the number of Muslims are stagnant or slightly in decline, mostly due to Christian conversions in Africa. No, Christianity and Falun Gong, as far as it can be termed a religion, would fit the bill as being the fastest growing religion in absolute numbers and of religions with more than a million members, the fastest growing in percentage.
Rune —
Islam will remain the fastest-growing religion as long as:
1. Muslims get to make the numbers up themselves, and
2. The MSM report them uncritically.
On a visit to NYC with our children we passed the Falun Gong demonstrators doing “performance art” in Times Square.
My #2 freaked out because the re-enactment of the burning with a hot iron was so realistic.
Funny enough, although here is a group of people targeted for annihilation for their religious beliefs – something that should cause leftists to run pell mell to their cause… And I counted no less than three Che shirts, and infinate weed bags pass on by without a second glance.
– in such position and posture, it would be easy for the jihadis to stone her, IF she was practicing her religion in an islamic state.
The reason dictatorship and totatalian regimes stay in power very long until they die either being purged by their own guards or by natural death (with a few exceptions as in Saddam Hussein case) is they decimate any large crowd following unrelated to their cause very early on. They are always suspicious of the crowd unrelated to their cause because they are the master of crowd manipulation and knowing how to play the crowd like a puppet. In addition to the fact that they are in the driver seat, they are also the master of brutality and they know with a VERY few exceptions of a few man, man is very weak against brutality. Watch Venezuela on its way to hell.
Of course there is the other extreme. Where you are so concerned about infringing on religious freedom that even if you suspect anti-government activities are going on behind closed Mosque doors, you wont demand the sermons be video taped, because you don’t want your sermons monitored by the government either.
The Falun Gong would probably be treated worse if they were in Saudi Arabia, but even then American homes and gas tanks would still be full of Chinese or Saudi exports.
Redneck — You are right about the other extreme.
We are loath to confront the bitter truth about Islam: it is not just a religion, but is also a political ideology, and sermons in mosques are political statements and often incitements to rebeliion, and to levy war against the country which allows them to be expressed. A mosque is the equivalent of Tammany Hall, only much more dangerous.
No doubt the religion of peace is a front for the global spreading of Arab cultural values by justifying the violence with doctrine, but Muslims dont have a monopoly on the use of sermons for political gain.
In Dallas right now every local politician’s performance is judged with a formula based primarily on his or hers race. The black community holds white politicians to the highest ethical standards, while making excuses for the fact that every single black local politician is currently under FBI investigation for corruption….they were all profiled you see.
Virtually every local newscast shows a belligerent black preacher spewing politics from the pulpit. Recall petitions are passed around for the congregation to sign. They have basically become community centers for political activism, yet no politician has the nerve to suggest they should lose their tax-exempt status, because that would bring down their political wrath.
And of course come election time, every politician, local or national starts going to church regularly…if there is gonna be a camera crew there.
How very easy it is for a janus-faced cult to delude gullible Westerners. These groups know perfectly well how to play the strings of the PC sensibilities of the weak Westerners. And this is supposedly a site where people should have been vaccinated against such things. Lazy Westernerns never take the time to investigate things more deeply, they merely look at the surface, and the janus-faced cults know all to well how too play the Western fools.
Islam is doing great in this game. Falun Gong is doing even better. Of course, since Falun Gong is in their “Medina”-phase, they have an easier game to play. Well, I’m not saying Falun Gong must come to a “Mecca”-phase, but the fact of the matter is that they have all the things in place in order to launch one. The same story as Islam: A religious cult based on obey, obey, obey the leader. Intolerance, and aggressive opposition to any kind of criticism. A serious problem is how cult members are encouraged to commit suicide (as a means to go to heaven). But since the basis of the cult is obey, obey, obey the leader, this violence could easily be turned into another direction.
My conclusion is that in the hypothetical case of Muhammad turning up at this point of history and being in his Medina phase, you guys here would not only have accepted him, you would also have supported him. (I can hear your voices about how poor Muhammed is being oppressed by the reactionary Meccans, bla, bla, bla).
Another conclusion is that Islam is not really the problem, the Western mentality is. Western civilization has reached its peak, and is now in its suicidal phase.
http://www.apologeticsindex.org/f02.html
http://www.falungonginfo.org/index.html
http://www.rickross.com/reference/fa_lun_gong/falun249.html
PS. Even after my hypothetical Muhammad comparison — and after understanding my intention of he comparison — I sure that many of you here would still have been proud to support Muhammad when he was weak… because it would have been the morally correct thing to do at the time… because he was weak, and oppressed by “reactionaries”.
Be true to yourself: Is this how you feel? Then you know that you are truly a PC junkie, deep inside of your heart. Being negative about Islam doesn’t change that.
End of message.
Herr Unswedenizer —
How dare you?
How dare you assume that you know my opinion of this particular religion? I have no opinion about Falun Gong as a religion; I know next to nothing about it.
But I do know that they are persecuted in China; that is well-attested.
If they have ever espoused violence or employed violent methods to promote their religion, I have never heard about it. In contrast, Islam was ideologically violent from day one, promoted violence, advocated violence, utilized violence to convert or elminate non-believers, and remains violent to this day.
Once again: How dare you?
Baron,
I’m not after you here. And you did nothing wrong — according to Western standards.
It’s the fallacy of the Western standards that makes me despair. Reading through this thread it made me realized quite clearly how we ended up with this mess with Islam and demographic Jihad in the first place. All the signs were there to see already thirty years ago, but our minds and eyes are twisted in such a way so that common sense is blinded in favour of moral correctness. I believe this will kill our civilization.
Regarding Falun Gong and the whole issue. There’s so much to write. I should need to devote a site to it, to give you the whole picture.
Just to give a quick example, quoting from the Falun Gong brochure you posted:
“torture of forcefeeding and brainwashing…”
When knowing the ins and outs of a cult better it is possible to fisking the messages — we all know that from the case of Islam. Knowing Falun Gong, it is easy to see how “forcefeeding” means stopping him from committing suicide by starvation, and how “brainwashing” means de-programming.
But just as was the case, and still is the case in most places, about Islam, Westerners swallow the propaganda of a cult without questioning it. If they can also make it fit the PC pattern, which they always know how to do, it is already a home run.
Baron: How dare you assume that you know my opinion of this particular religion? I have no opinion about Falun Gong as a religion; I know next to nothing about it.
The point is: I didn’t make any assumption. I didn’t have to. The whole point is: What does a typical Westerner, such as yourself, make out of it when he knows nothing (except for what he absorbs from MSM)? What he will always make sure is to stay within moral correctness. I’m not saying that you are a bad person for this. I’m merely saying that this attitude is at the core of what is killing our civilization.
Falun Gong is really clever. The acting with the burning with a hot iron strikes Westerners just in our weak spot. Our sentiments is just a music instrument at their finger tips that they play so very easily. It’s not a left-right thing. Right-wingers are just as gullible.
I happen to have first hand knowledge of this cult. A friend of a friend died at their hands. She was convinced to commit suicide by the teachings of Master Li. And thousands and thousands more are going to die thanks to Master Li.
Baron,
I should clear that what I wrote was not a comment to your post as such. And my comment would never have looked like that as a first comment in the thread. But after reading through the whole thread until the point where I posted, and only seeing the typically morally correct comments, this was my reaction. Then I had come to the point when I reached a general conclusion.
The fact that this is a great site with enlighted visitors, and the fact that you are a great blogger, only made the negative reaction stronger for me, if you see what I mean. There are situations when you get a glimpse of reality, and the light suddenly shines through, and this was a very depressing one.
To Jason Pappas:
Your Chinese friend didn’t have any family member being part of Falun Gong, did he? Quite as with Islam it is not until you have someone close to you being part of the cult that your eyes open and you are able to arrange the information (much of which you already had) to see the true face of it.
So if you want to find the truth about Falun Gong: Find someone with a family member who is part of the cult. (Talking to them you will also find out the PRC is on the side of the families here). And if you are not into finding out the truth (it’s quite an effort, I know), at least skip that awful moral correctness, instead apply common sense, ask yourself: Why are they doing this? What’s in it for them? Why this enormous lobbying at Westerners? And please be suspicious about a nutty cult that is about racism, extraterrestrials, suicide, etc. Why do you expect them to be truthful when they enact a play about burning with a hot iron? They are very smart. Just as the anti-globalists they know how to provoke the police to act, and how to make the police look bad. And they know how the Westerners will fall for the whole thing. It’s all about power, for Master Li and the inner circle of Falun Gong. And only the future will tell how they are going to use this enormous power (around 50 million followers).