My Take on the Recent Slanderous Campaign Against Shen Yun

(Minghui.org) Since its establishment in 2006, Shen Yun Performing Arts has developed from one, to eight equally large companies, performing in top theaters around the world every year. In the 2024 season, Shen Yun performed 810 shows in 200 cities in over 20 countries, on five continents. Over one million audience members enjoyed the beautiful performance of authentic Chinese culture. 

In response to Shen Yun’s rapid growth, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has spared no efforts to sabotage the shows, using disinformation, economic coercion, and other threats to pressure local theaters and governments to cancel the shows. As more and more theaters become aware of the CCP’s despicable tactics and continue to host the shows despite such pressure, the CCP’s secret agents outside of China interviewed former Shen Yun dancers, attempting to smear the company in another disinformation campaign. 

I’d like to share some of my thoughts on this from the perspective of spiritual cultivation.

Not Everyone Can Stay in Shen Yun

In every school or company, there is always a process of selection and only those who are qualified can stay. In other words, everyone has their different positions and roles in society. Not everyone can attend Ivy League schools and it’s also not possible for everyone to become a superstar. For the students at Fei Tian College, not everyone can achieve the requirements of Shen Yun and be hired by the company. Even for its full-time dancers, if they cannot keep up the standard, they will have to leave. It’s just the process of keeping the company running. 

We know that Fei Tian College is a religious school and most of its students practice Falun Dafa. For any cultivation community, not every disciple can stay and finish their cultivation. In both Buddhism and Christianity, there are people who leave a school as they cannot follow the precepts or may have even betrayed their masters. 

When the persecution of Falun Dafa first began in 1999, some veteran practitioners who were very close to Master also came out to slander Dafa. Even today, there are former practitioners who help the CCP brainwash steadfast practitioners in China’s brainwashing centers or prisons. 

For those who have turned against Dafa, it is because they couldn’t endure the tests and difficulties associated with spiritual cultivation. Once they are tempted, they easily fall for it or turn to the dark side. 

Cultivation is bound to be hard. In the cultivation story of Milarepa, his master ordered him to carry large rocks to the mountain top to build a house. After he was done, his master told him to tear it down and rebuild it. As a result of the hard work, his back was rubbed raw, with deep sores. The sores formed scars, but the scars were worn off again and again. Then new scars formed, and it was extremely painful. But despite the suffering, Milarepa never resented his master. His master also revealed later on that he was using this method to help Milarepa eliminate his karma, as his master knew that only people like Milarepa, who had a great spiritual foundation, can cultivate this way. As for people who don’t have the same endurance, they wouldn’t be able to make it under this cultivation method. 

Of course, Shen Yun dancers don’t suffer such extreme hardship as Milarepa, but it does require a lot of hard training and perseverance to be a professional dancer. Even dancing for a regular performing arts company or being a professional athlete requires many hours of training every day and other restrictions to one’s lifestyle. If one wants to do well and achieve success, one must train very hard. 

Learning to Be Grateful

It’s a traditional Chinese virtue to be grateful. There is a story about Han Xin, a great general of the Han dynasty. Once day Han went fishing near the river. Back then, he was very poor and was often without food. Feeling pity for him, a woman who came to the river to wash clothes offered him some food. Han was very grateful. Once he became the great general years later, he found the woman and gave her 1,000 taels of gold, which the woman accepted only upon his insistence. It’s just like the old saying, “The kindness of a drop of water should be repaid with a spring of water.” 

As far as I know, all students attending Fei Tian Academy of the Arts and Fei Tian College have their tuition waived. They also have free dormitory and food. I heard that Master gives some students pocket money from his own pocket. For the performers who are on a practicum touring with Shen Yun, they receive monthly subsidies as well. Once on tour, the students not only get to perform at top theaters around the world, they can also enjoy traveling in different countries and learn various cultures. Not everyone can have such experiences at a young age. For most students and their parents, they are very grateful for these opportunities. As for those former dancers who went public to defame Shen Yun, I want to ask them, “Have you forgotten all the benefits you’ve received from Shen Yun already?”

I believe the new rounds of slander toward Shen Yun and Falun Dafa on social media and in the Western media is the CCP’s expansion of the persecution overseas. But no matter what they do, truth will speak for itself and justice will prevail.