On the early morning of July 20 three years ago, the police in Mainland China, in a prelude to the persecution of Falun Gong, kidnapped volunteer coordinators of Falun Gong from every area under the secret directions of Jiang Zemin. He mobilized his political power and the government's propaganda machine against this peaceful group of people who practice "Truthfulness-Benevolence-Forbearance." When this happened, many people exclaimed in disbelief, "The Great Cultural Revolution has come back!" And the Chinese people, who had experienced political movements one after another, all predicted that Falun Gong would vanish in no time without leaving a trace behind. Few were able to anticipate that they, along with people concerned about this matter in every other country, would be so tremendously surprised and shaken by nature of the continuingly unfolding saga in the ensuring three years.
We have been stricken by savagery and brutality of this persecution campaign. So far, at least 438 people have been tortured to death. Among them, many fell victim to vicious excesses at detention centers and prisons. Sadly, these cases only represent the tip of the iceberg of the campaign, due to the tight control over information by Jiang's regime. And they are not mere numbers. Each involves the tragic death of an innocent person. At this moment, tens and thousands of people are being illegally detained and physically damaged, with their lives in constant danger.
We have been transfixed by the persecutors' nastiness and shamelessness. At Harbin's railway station, a picture of Falun Gong's founder was placed on the floor in a hallway that everyone has to walk over. Each passenger must therefore tread on the picture before allowed to board the train, otherwise, they would be stopped and interrogated. Again, in the city of Harbin, relatives of detained Falun Gong practitioners at the Wanjia Detention Center were forced to fling abuse at Falun Gong before they were granted a visit. In Beijing, the police at Tiananmen tested whether tourists were Falun Gong practitioners by demanding them to verbally abuse Falun Gong's founder. The police at the capital city's Qianmen branch severely beat and raped a female Falun Gong practitioner when she posted the truth about Falun Gong under a street bridge. The police in Mainland China even made it a practice of shocking female practitioners' breasts and private parts with electric batons. For female Falun Gong practitioners, a high percentage of the Falun Gong population, they have to endure physical abuse and, worse yet, the police often sexually them as well.
We have been astonished by the Cultural-Revolution-style public mass criticisms and frame-ups. Throughout the summer three years ago, all the media in China, including TV and newspapers, went full blast to recklessly rail against and frame up Falun Gong, a system of exercises anchored upon moral teachings. During the following three years, similar diatribes, ever more ridiculous and venomous, have been incessantly featured in the media. Among them, it was notable that the spokesperson of the Foreign Ministry once blamed Falun Gong for an "anthrax attack," only to be forced to retract it as a fabrication a few days later. A talk show host of the official CCTV labeled a psychopath a Falun Gong practitioner. What is more, the Jiang regime even produced the loophole-riddled staged-immolation case in order to instigate hatred against Falun Gong. The regime's mouthpieces also piled every laughable political label onto Falun Gong. With all this, China seemed to be forced into living through another dark age of the Cultural Revolution.
We have been stunned by the scale of brainwashing and deceit. The Jiang regime established "610 Offices" throughout China. This organization acts above the law and is specialized in persecuting Falun Gong. Its routine activity involves numerous brainwashing classes it runs in Mainland China, under the euphemisms of "educational class" or "school of legal studies." People working for "610" arbitrarily arrest and detain Falun Gong practitioners, depriving their sleep, forcing them through brainwashing, and coercing them into writing "letter of repentance" with violence. The brainwashing of this kind is no different from spiritual murder, and is even more ferocious than physical elimination.
Nevertheless, the shocks brought about by this barbarous persecution were culminated in admirations the world people have for Falun Gong after being shaken by its practitioners' peaceful disobedience and steely tenacity.
We are shaken by the devoutness of Falun Gong practitioners to their belief. Ian Johnson, a Wall Street Journal reporter, won 2001 Pulitzer Prize for his in-depth reporting of Falun Gong--please see http://www.clearwisdom.net/emh/articles/2000/4/21/8441.html. In his Pulitzer-winning article entitled "A Deadly Exercise: Practicing Falun Gong Was a Right, Ms. Chen Said, to Her Last Day," Mr. Johnson wrote at its beginning, "The day before Chen Zixiu died, her captors again demanded that she renounce her faith in Falun Dafa. Barely conscious after repeated jolts from a cattle prod, the 58-year-old stubbornly shook her head...Enraged, the local officials ordered Ms. Chen to run barefoot in the snow. Two days of torture had left her legs bruised and her short black hair matted with pus and blood, said cellmates and other prisoners who witnessed the incident. She crawled outside, vomited and collapsed. She never regained consciousness, and died on Feb. 21."
In the past three years, this stirring saga, epitomized by the noble spirit of craving the truth to the end and no submission in the face of death, has repeated itself time and again, giving us the chance to witness the tremendous power of belief in "Truthfulness-Benevolence-Forbearance."
We are shaken by the peacefulness and compassion displayed by Falun Gong under violence. Within those three years, Falun Gong practitioners endured the sufferings of all kinds and numerous abuses, but there has been no single incident of physical revenge by the practitioners, who have always been steadfast in upholding their beliefs. In the dictionary of Chinese history, there have only been two adjectives to describe masses, one "docile" and the other "riotous." Neither of the two is applicable to Falun Gong practitioners, who are not obsequious and cowardly under persecution, and who are not revengeful with brutality either. Indeed, they are a remarkable exception in Chinese history. Even the prisoners living with Falun Gong practitioners have been moved by their sincerity and kindness; many of those prisoners said, "I'll practice Falun Gong when I get out."
We are shaken by the uncompromising and tenacious spirit of Falun Gong in the face of absolute power. Today's Chinese on the Mainland have been indoctrinated with too much twisted logic. More often than not, they tend to see things unwittingly from the perspective of the corrupt ruling class. So, in the minds of the Chinese, the murders and arsons openly committed by those so-proclaimed "people's servants" were necessities to quell a "counter-revolutionary rebellion." Moreover, the bubble of prosperity of the past ten years rationalized "killing the innocent." Every humble appeal to the so-callled "people's servants" was branded as a plot to destroy "stability and solidarity," with every attempt to tell the truth interpreted as "anti-government and anti-China." It is precisely this perverse logic that has emboldened the dictator to mindlessly persecute the innocent, and to recklessly rob others. Falun Gong practitioners believe in "Truthfulness-Benevolence-Forbearance." They practice those principles with heart and soul. When the authoritarian regime went rampant with miscarriage of justice and lie-mongering, for the practitioners, there was no way back out other than by acting to clarify the truth. This is because any compromise is encouragement to the evil, and is a betrayal to those principles. Thus, we saw Falun Gong practitioners going to Beijing and Tiananmen to make valiant appeals. We saw them posting banners, distributing flyers everywhere. We saw practitioners outside China continually protesting the dictator's visits. We saw them using the Internet, media, and other forums to let the public know the true situation. Rather than being deterred by the scary labels thrown out from the Jiang regime, Falun Gong practitioners firmly defended themselves against violence and slanders under the guidance of "Truthfulness-Benevolence-Forbearance." By doing so, they have allowed the whole world to see the spineless nature of China's rulers.
Of course, like every one of us, Falun Gong practitioners are human, too. They are not perfect. They have all varieties of emotion, including fear, fatigue and bewilderment. They also have imperfections of human character. In spite of their inadequacies and defects, they have still managed to resolutely practice their belief as one body. This is what has cut their nobleness in relief.
Falun Gong practitioners do not engage in the so-called "politics." Politics simply cannot summon cohesive power of such magnitude. On the other hand, it is precisely their apolitical nature, which transcends all the worldly matters, that has resiliently sustained them to this day. Falun Gong practitioners do not participate in "anti-China" activities. It is the corrupt and repressive Party regime that is truly "anti-China." All that Falun Gong practitioners do is to protest and reveal the crimes committed by the dictator and his servants, because doing so is an action every real patriot will and should take.
While practicing the principles of "Truthfulness-Benevolence-Forbearance," Falun Gong practitioners safeguard human morality as well as the fortune of humankind. In today's world, characterized by insatiable worldly desires, there is this group of people who resolutely practice their belief in "Truthfulness-Benevolence-Forbearance" even though doing so means personal adversity and tribulations. Nothing in the world can make their resolve waver a bit, and nothing in the world can prevent them from sowing the seeds of illumination in every corner. Their struggle for the right to freedom of expression and belief is an act to safeguard that same cherished right for every one of us. Their effort to clarify the truth to the public is also an act to safeguard the right of every one of us to know the truth and not to be deceived. Their resilience against arbitrary abuse and their peaceful resistance have set examples for us so that we will not be so treated by dictators in the future. Their safeguarding of the principles of "Truthfulness-Benevolence-Forbearance" is protection of the ultimate values of our society. When history turns this page, we will discover that our time is magnificent because of them.
There sacrifices that Falun Gong practitioners have made are many. While they are tirelessly try to stop the persecution by the evil against the principles of "Truthfulness-Benevolence-Forbearance," and to clean up the vicious slander, every kind-hearted person should step forward, joining them to end this three-year-long persecution against "Truthfulness-Benevolence-Forbearance."
