,b>[Minghui Net] I have many kind-hearted friends, and all of them think that Dafa practitioners are good persons. They dislike Jiang Zemin and his followers' one-sided propaganda campaign and can also see through the vicious performance of the self-immolation incident. But after listening to the lies so many times, they all came to believe that Falun Gong's peaceful appeals make Chinese authorities seem dreadful, and that this will provide excuses for foreign countries to attack or criticize China. They say: "Why do you have to become martyrs?" They all feel that what we are doing is being controlled by others. As a Falun Dafa practitioner and your friend, I would like to sincerely share my thoughts with you:
The government always said that social stability is all-important, but it is impossible to obtain stability through violence and domination. The government cannot control people's mouths any more than it can control the rivers, so they should encourage people to present different opinions. Several decades ago, when tens of thousands of African Americans marched to Washington and assembled before the Lincoln Memorial, the leader of the movement, Martin Luther King, gave his famous "I Have a Dream" speech. If African Americans had resigned themselves to adversity because America had once enacted laws discriminating against them, then Dr. King's vision would have forever been only a dream.
Falun Dafa is experiencing severe suppression in China, and many of us Dafa practitioners are suffering brutal persecution, yet we have no normal channels to voice our concerns to the government. A person being unfairly mistreated should be allowed the minimal human right to speak out against the injustice. Jiang Zemin's group said that the assembly of Dafa practitioners in Zhongnanhai did not have an authorization permit and was therefore an illegal gathering. Since we will be arrested if we go to the appealing bureau for help, we can only go to Tiananmen Square and shout out loudly "Falun Dafa is good!" We do not use any overly impulsive words or do bad deeds. We only want to make our voices heard, because we are good people and we do not want to be slandered as evil believers. Acting on our own accord, we try our best to reveal the truth and appeal for justice.
Jiang Zemin's group continues to suppress Falun Gong, and Dafa practitioners' persistent petitions also continue. The foreign media are simply carrying out their jobs to objectively report on the actual situation in China, and their reports have enabled people of good conscience to sympathize with Falun Dafa. How could it be said that the overseas forces use Falun Gong as some kind of tool against China? It is Jiang Zemin's irrational policies that cause problems with world opinion, so Chinese patriots should not blame Falun Gong.
Didn't China's most authoritative Central Television Station also report that there was a crowd of Americans demonstrating outside George Bush's grand presidential inauguration ceremony to question the fairness of their general election? Did the American people accuse these Americans, who were exercising their lawful rights, of creating a disturbance in the USA? Did the American government protest that the Central Television Station's report of this story had slandered the USA? What has enabled Jiang Zemin's group to handle domestic and foreign topics with a double standard, and to disregard the joint pledge in the International Human Rights Treaty?
On the Central Television Station's program to portray the condition of public order in the USA, there was one section mentioning that American President John F. Kennedy was attacked by an assassin, and the comment was: "Even the safety of the head of a country cannot be safeguarded, so how can the safety of the people be safeguarded?" But, wasn't the death of Liu Shaoqi, a Chinese head of state and a founder of new China, more painful than Kennedy's death? How many ordinary people have been unjustly killed in China? Moreover, this unjust situation is still continuing. More than 160 Dafa practitioners have been persecuted to death, and up to ten thousand practitioners are suffering different degrees of persecution.
When congressmen overseas hold a meeting, anyone may casually sit in, including foreigners. However, the recent "Two National Meetings" became a nightmare for Beijing's residents. The "Three ID Cards" of workers from areas outside Beijing were torn up by the police, and these workers were sent back to their hometowns. Small business owners were prohibited from making their living by setting up booths, and traffic was tightly controlled. Being in Tiananmen Square was like experiencing the invasion of the archenemy. Jiang Zemin's group took strict precautions, along the order of martial law, because they feared protests against unfair treatment would disturb the atmosphere of the meeting and affect the leaders' moods. Friends, you really should think about the environment in which you are living. You urge me: "Just do the practice at home, manage your own life well, and don't worry anymore about others' matters and national matters, because you cannot help these, even if you want to." I know you are worried that you will also be persecuted. There is so much sadness and helplessness in your words. Several decades of constraint have caused people to become numb to what is happening in front of them. Actually, aren't all of you hoping to live in a fair environment, and aren't you hoping that the motherland will be good?
Li Ruihuan [Chairman of People's Political Consultative Conference] said it well, "Our country is the country of the people, our government is the government of the people, our army is the army of the people, our court is the court of the people, and our police is the police of the people." Then, if an individual or a party makes a decision to damage the people, isn't protest and resistance to this decision precisely something that a patriot should do?
I've shared these thoughts with you, hoping you will come to understand that protecting Dafa is an extension of our benevolent nature, after we have enlightened to the truth. We fearlessly do everything that we should do, because we are acting out of our own enlightenment. No persons or parties can urge us to do anything, nor can the suppression by vicious forces prevent us from doing anything. But what we have done will benefit all good people.
My friends, perhaps you do not dare take the side of Falun Dafa in this dangerous and malicious situation, and in this contest between truth-compassion-forbearance and evil-unkindness-violence, you are only willing to be on-lookers. In time you will see that evil cannot subdue righteousness, and that truth-compassion-forbearance is bound to win. This is absolutely not wishful thinking; this is the law of the universe. However, your future depends upon which side you stand for, and I hope you will stand for the side of justice and truth.
A Dafa Practitioner from China
March 21, 2001
