[Selected Opinion Articles] The Persecution of Falun Gong Calls into Question Each Person’s Humanity

(Minghui.org) The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has been persecuting Falun Gong since July 1999. Despite Falun Gong practitioners’ efforts to raise awareness of the illegality and brutality of the persecution, there are still people who feel that the persecution has nothing to do with them. But is that really the case?

Accepting the CCP’s Lies Is the Same as Becoming the CCP’s Accomplices

Falun Gong, also known as Falun Dafa, is a mind-body Buddhist practice based on the principles of Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance. The CCP launched a full-scale nationwide campaign against the practice on July 20, 1999 due to its unprecedented popularity. Police arrested practitioners and shut down their exercise sites. Televisions and newspapers repeatedly broadcast information to slander Falun Gong. Even overseas media infiltrated by the CCP republished the propaganda in an attempt to mislead the rest of the world against Falun Gong. 

Two major propaganda pieces spread by the CCP are the “1,400 death cases” and the “Tiananmen self-immolation hoax.” 

In the “1,400 death cases” propaganda, the CCP claimed that 1,400 people died or committed suicide because of practicing Falun Gong. Where individuals have managed to investigate, cases of alleged Falun-Gong-induced "deaths" have been found to be fabricated, with some instances the victim never having existed. Nor have such "deaths" ever occurred outside of communist China, where Falun Gong is practiced freely. The claim is also staked on a distortion of Falun Gong's teachings on health and medicine, often depicting the Falun Gong practice as dangerous or unhealthy. However, even on its own terms, the claim fails to hold up upon analysis.

The “Tiananmen self-immolation hoax,” on the other hand, has a far more damaging role in instigating the public’s hatred towards Falun Gong. The incident happened on Tiananmen Square on January 23, 2001, the eve of the Chinese New Year. When people tuned in to watch the annual new year gala, what they saw on TV was something else, the horrific scene of men, women, and even children setting themselves on fire. The authorities claimed the self-immolators were Falun Gong practitioners. While much evidence indicated that none of the self-immolators were Falun Gong practitioners and that the whole event was staged, many Chinese people still believe the propaganda and harbor hatred towards Falun Gong.

Under the CCP’s bombarding propaganda campaign, how many people could maintain a clear head and not to be brainwashed? 

The CCP mobilized and coerced the entire country to participate in the persecution, such as denouncing Falun Gong verbally or in writing, discriminating against Falun Gong practitioners, punishing or mistreating practitioners or their relatives, monitoring practitioners, or reporting practitioners to the authorities, etc.

Those directly tasked with carrying out the persecution, such as police, judges, prosecutors, guards at detention centers, prisons, and brainwashing centers, as well as medical workers, are perpetrators involved in arresting, indicting, sentencing, jailing, torturing, or even killing Falun Gong practitioners for their organs.

The persecution has reached every corner of Chinese society. Many Chinese people, knowingly or unknowingly, willingly or unwillingly, have been dragged into the CCP’s persecution war on practitioners, but they still feel they are not responsible for the persecution, just like Stanislaw Jerzy Lec, a Polish poet, once said, “No snowflake in an avalanche ever feels responsible.”

However, when it is time to bring the CCP to justice, its followers and accomplices will also be held responsible.

Standing up for Falun Gong Is for One’s Own Good

In my opinion, on the issue of the CCP’s persecution of Falun Gong, everyone has to take a position. 

Think about it: Everyone lives as a member of the Earth and a particle in the cosmos. No one can escape if the Earth or the cosmos were to be totally destroyed. That is, there is no bystanders – we are all in this together when the Earth or the cosmos faces imminent danger. 

As I see it, when innocent Falun Gong practitioners are being persecuted for their belief in Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance, the whole society should stand up to condemn the persecution; otherwise, people’s indifference would lead to further moral decline and corruption of society. Everyone would eventually become a victim because anyone could become the next “enemy” targeted by the CCP.

Good receives good and evil begets evil. Those who understand, sympathize for, or support Falun Gong will be blessed for their kindness. There have been many stories published by Minghui.org of people with positive attitude toward Falun Gong having their illness cured, surviving deadly accidents, enjoying smooth career or a harmonious family. On the other hand, Minghui.org has also recorded incidents of perpetrators facing consequences for their crimes against Falun Gong.

Answers to Some CCP Fallacies

The CCP has created fallacies about Falun Gong and caused people to harbor misunderstandings about the practice. Here I’d like to offer some explanations for the misunderstandings.

Q: “What benefits did Falun Gong give you?”

A: Since the CCP denies the existence of gods, it implicitly narrows the meaning of benefits to tangible, material gains. But to humans, our gain is not limited to this material world. Falun Gong has brought practitioners countless benefits, both physically and spiritually. 

Q: “(Your insisting on practicing Falun Gong) has destroyed your family and ruined your child’s future.”

A: This is like an invader shifting the blame to the victim. It is the CCP’s policy of persecuting Falun Gong that caused numerous tragedies and losses to the practitioners and their families. The culprit is the CCP; Falun Gong practitioners are the victims and should not be blamed.

Q: “By insisting on your belief, you chose not to live a good life.”

A: Everyone wants to live a good, normal life. It’s not that Falun Gong practitioners gave up their good life, but it’s the CCP that didn’t allow them to live a normal life it. When the CCP deprived practitioners of their freedom to religion, freedom to speech, and freedom to gathering, should practitioners be obedient to live as a soul-less person? In the past, some Chinese kept yielding to the CCP, but in the end, the CCP took away their property, their dignity, and eventually their lives.

Q: “Everything you have was given by the CCP. Why are you still against it?”

A: What we have are from our own hard work. The CCP has never produced wealth on their own and it relies on heavy taxes to sustain its rule, including the persecution of Falun Gong. The CCP is like a parasite sucking the blood of the taxpayers.

Q: “What you are doing is opposing the Party.”

A: The CCP has imposed a negative connotation to the term “opposing the Party,” for its own ruling – to brainwash people to believe that “opposing the Party” is a bad thing.

But in the Western free world, not only can political parties criticize each other but the public also can. People can even criticize their own Presidents without consequences. It is perfectly normal. There is nothing wrong to oppose a political party. 

In China, the CCP has branded the Party as the savior of the Chinese people. But it is not and will never be.

Ending

Falun Gong practitioners only aspire after spiritual improvement and have no interests in mundane power. But they will not simply cave in when the CCP persecutes their belief. Yielding to the CCP is conspiring with the evil and being irresponsible to oneself and the world. How can a truly good person stand motionless while murder or arson are committed?

Refusing to yield to the CCP is to defend divinity, the conscience of human beings, and universal values. The Falun Gong issue is related to everyone. It calls into question our fundamental humanity and everyone needs to take a position.