The Chinese Communist Party’s Self-destructive Promotion of Corruption and Suppressing the Upright

(Minghui.org) Zi Gong, a student of Confucius, was appointed as head of Xinyang County (in today’s Henan Province) and he went to Confucius to bid farewell. Confucius reminded him of the principles of “no seizing or crusading, and no bullying or stealing.” 

To replace a virtuous and competent person with another capable person is called “seizing,” while replacing someone capable with an incompetent person is called “crusading,” explained Confucius. On the other hand, harsh punishment without warning is known as “bullying” while taking possession of good things not belonging to oneself is known as “stealing.”

Throughout history, there are many good examples of “no seizing or crusading, and no bullying or stealing.” Since the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) took power in 1949, however, it has been constant “seizing, crusading, bulling, and stealing.” Especially after Jiang Zemin rose to the top position in the CCP after 1989, China had been turned into a land of corruption. 

Below are several contrasting ancient and modern examples of approaches to governance. 

Honesty and Integrity in Ancient Times

Emperor Taizong and his Tang Dynasty were often considered to be at the pinnacle of Chinese history. By governing with virtue and promoting talents, the entire country was civilized and properous. Historians wrote that the prisons were sometimes nearly empty. During the sixth year of his rule as emperor, Taizong allowed 390 death row prisoners to return home to be with their families and to come back after the Chinese New Year for their executions. Seeing all 390 prisoners coming back as promised, the Emperor praised their credibility and pardoned their death sentences.

Another peak of history occurred during the reign of Emperor Kangxi of the Qing Dynasty. Shortly after he came to power, he prohibited seizing land to enrich the royal families as previous emperors did. In addition, he extended the tax-free period for the newly claimed wasteland. Later on, he waived the taxes of all provinces for one year and issued a new policy to stop tax increases. During his 60 years as emperor, Kangxi waived taxes 545 times in total. This added to 150 million taels of silver (one tael is 50 grams, or 0.05 kilograms), about six times the country’s revenue per year. 

These stories help explain how Chinese civilization lasted thousands of years. From time to time, there were self-indulgent emperors and officials who seized, crusaded, bullied, or stole, but their overall impact on society was limited. 

Era of Jiang Zemin and the CCP

Modern China under the rule of the CCP couldn’t be further from the divinely-inspired Chinese civilization of ancient times. The decline in society became even worse after Jiang Zemin rose to the top of the CCP for his active role in cracking down on the student democratic movement in 1989. 

Since the CCP’s 18th National Congress in 2012, 4.08 million CCP members have been disciplined. Among them were 1.4 million government officials, including over 500 province-level or higher-ranking officials. Most of them were investigated or convicted for taking bribes. Many people attributed this messy situation to Jiang Zemin, who is often known as the “head coach of corruption.”

The CCP’s core ideology of falsehood, evilness, and class struggle rendered the regime and its officials susceptible to “seizing, crusading, bullying, and stealing.” Nonetheless, it was during Jiang’s tenure that the corruption issue really got out of control. After all, he rose to the top by suppressing the democratic moment, and without any other merits. In order to win loyalty from officials, he encouraged corruption on their part. After he ordered the persecution of Falun Gong in 1999, Jiang further used financial incentives to instigate officials, the police, procuratorates, the courts, and other government agencies to carry out his persecution policy. 

Such a “deal” between Jiang and his followers – anyone who followed him closely would be rewarded with privilege and/or money – could be considered a co-destruction model [a concept in marketing research that refers to the collaborative destruction of value by providers and customers], as all who do wrong will eventually face consequences.

The corruption of Jiang and other CCP officials soon trickled down to the general public, with almost everyone seeking to maximize their own benefits at all costs. Counterfeit goods and poisonous food became commonplace. Those who sold counterfeit rice would not eat their own rice, and those who sold poisonous pork did not eat their own pork. But that does not necessarily mean they could avoid fake or unhealthy food from other merchants. When people are knowingly or unknowingly harming others for their own benefit, the whole of society has sunken into a “co-destruction” state.

Such a problem can endanger people’s lives. Because of poor construction, a large number of school buildings collapsed in the 2008 Wenchuan Earthquake, which killed at least 70,000 people (many of them school children). Many deceased students’ parents went to the local court to protest against the poor quality of the school buildings and request that the courts accept their lawsuits against the builders and the schools. But many of them were arrested instead. Tan Zuoren, a writer who devoted himself to investigating the quality of school buildings, was sentenced to a five-year term in 2010. 

In ancient times, corruption of officials was often limited to individual cases. But after the CCP destroyed traditional Chinese culture and Jiang further plunged the nation into moral decay, corruption has become commonplace. Instead of serving the people, CCP officials have only been concerned about lining their own pockets. In the above earthquake example, local officials greenlighted school building projects without looking into the quality issues because builders had bribed them into accepting their bids. 

Suppressing the Upright

Besides promoting corruption, Jiang also suppressed those who could bring society back on track. During the major flooding of the Yangtze River in 1998, Jiang visited the scene and was impressed by a group of people who worked extremely hard fighting the flood and rescuing people. Jiang sent someone to ask if they were CCP members, and the answer was that they were practitioners of Falun Gong, a meditation system based on the principles of Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance. Jiang immediately became very unhappy because he could not tolerate the fact that Falun Gong practitioners were well regarded everywhere for being good people.

Jiang feared that Falun Gong’s popularity could threaten his own control over the people and singlehandedly launched the persecution of the practice in July 1999, despite Falun Gong’s huge health benefits and promotion of moral improvement. 

According to Minghui Report: The 20-Year Persecution of Falun Gong in China, at least 2.5 or 3 million practitioners were arrested between 1999 and 2019. Over 4,800 practitioners have been confirmed to have lost their lives as a direct result of the persecution. Furthermore, a larger number of practitioners were terminated from their jobs, detained, imprisoned, and tortured. Some were also subjected to psychiatric abuse and forced labor, and an unknown number became victims of forced organ harvesting. 

By suppressing Falun Gong and the principles of Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance, Jiang further destroyed China’s moral foundation. When a reporter asked a six-year-old girl in Guangdong Province what she wanted to do after she grew up, the girl said she wanted to become a governmental official.

“What kind of official?” asked the reporter.

“A corrupt one,” the girl replied, “because I’d then get lots of good, free stuff that way.”

Society is truly in danger when an innocent child aspires to be a corrupt official. 

A Lesson for Mankind

Looking back at the history of communism over the past 100-plus years, especially the past few decades since the CCP took power, one may find the good and bad sides of human nature in full display. 

Some were afraid of the CCP’s brutality and chose to follow the regime out of their own self-interest; some took advantage of the opportunities and raked in more fortune for themselves; some, including both Chinese and non-Chinese, knew that Jiang and the CCP suppressed the innocent, but could not resist the lucrative financial incentives. 

To a degree, what has happened in China is similar to what is described in Revelations: “For all nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her fornication, and the kings of the earth have committed fornication with her, and the merchants of the earth are waxed rich through the abundance of her delicacies.”

Anyone who follows the CCP will face consequences when the time of reckoning comes against the CCP for its crimes against innocent people. More than 405 million Chinese people have quit the CCP organizations (which also include its two junior organizations, the Communist Youth League and the Young Pioneers). As more citizens from around the world choose to reject the CCP, we will see hope on the horizon.