Falun Gong: Difference between revisions - Wikipedia
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Spiritual authority is vested exclusively in the teachings of founder Li Hongzhi.<ref name="Palmer241">{{harvp|Palmer|2007|pp=241–46}}</ref> Volunteer "assistants" or "contact persons" do not hold authority over other practitioners, regardless of how long they have practiced Falun Gong.<ref name="Chou" /><ref name="burgdoff" /><ref>{{Cite book |last=Junker |first=Andrew |title=Becoming Activists in Global China |year= 2019 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=9781108685382 |pages=186}}</ref> Li stipulates that practitioners of Falun Gong cannot collect money or charge fees, conduct healings, or teach or interpret doctrine for others.<ref name="Palmer241" /> There is no system of membership within the practice and no rituals of worship.<ref name="Palmer241" /><ref name="porterthesis" /><ref name=":6">{{Cite journal |last1=Noakes |first1=Stephen |last2=Ford |first2=Caylan |date=2015-07-23 |title=Managing Political Opposition Groups in China: Explaining the Continuing Anti-Falun Gong Campaign |url=http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0305741015000788 |journal=The China Quarterly |volume=223 |pages=658–679 |doi=10.1017/s0305741015000788 |issn=0305-7410 |access-date=1 March 2024 |archive-date=14 May 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240514023813/https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/china-quarterly/article/abs/managing-political-opposition-groups-in-china-explaining-the-continuing-antifalun-gong-campaign/166ED80891F97564F01F61FA4C6933EF |url-status=live }}</ref> Falun Gong operates through a global, networked, and largely virtual online community. In particular, electronic communications, email lists and a collection of websites are the primary means of coordinating activities and disseminating Li Hongzhi's teachings.<ref>{{Cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=lrQV2Wi1RdgC&q=Kevin+McDonald%2C+Global+Movements%3A+Action+and+Culture%2C+chapter+7%2C+%E2%80%98Healing+Movements%2C+embodied+subjects%E2%80%99%2C+Wiley-Blackwell+%282006%29&pg=PA140 |title=Global movements: action and culture |last=McDonald |first=Kevin |publisher=Wiley-Blackwell |year=2006 |isbn=978-1405116138 |access-date=25 October 2020 |archive-date=5 April 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230405191428/https://books.google.com/books?id=lrQV2Wi1RdgC&q=Kevin+McDonald%2C+Global+Movements%3A+Action+and+Culture%2C+chapter+7%2C+%E2%80%98Healing+Movements%2C+embodied+subjects%E2%80%99%2C+Wiley-Blackwell+%282006%29&pg=PA140 |url-status=live }}</ref>
Outside Mainland China, a network of volunteer 'contact persons', regional Falun Dafa Associations and university clubs exist in approximately 80 countries.{{citation needed|date=July 2020}} Li Hongzhi's teachings are principally spread through the Internet.<ref name=fieldnotes/><ref>Mark R. Bell, Taylor C. Boas, "Falun Gong and the Internet: Evangelism, Community, and Struggle for Survival", ''Nova Religio'', April 2003, Vol. 6, No. 2, pp. 277–293</ref> In most mid- to large-sized cities, Falun Gong practitioners organize regular group meditation or study sessions in which they practice Falun Gong exercises and read Li Hongzhi's writings. The exercise and meditation sessions are described as informal groups of practitioners who gather in public parks—usually in the morning—for one to two hours.<ref name=porterthesis/><ref name="fieldnotes">Susan Palmer and David Ownby, ''Field Notes: Falun Dafa Practitioners: A Preliminary Research Report'', Nova Religio, 2000.4.1.133</ref><ref>Craig Burgdoff, "How Falun Gong Practice Undermines Li Hongzhi's Totalistic Rhetoric", p. 336.</ref> Group study sessions typically take place in the evenings in private residences or university or high school classrooms, and are described by David Ownby as "the closest thing to a regular 'congregational experience{{'"}} that Falun Gong offers.<ref name="Ownby313">David Ownby, "Falun Gong in the New World", ''European Journal of East Asian Studies'' (2003), pp. 313–314.</ref> Individuals who are too busy, isolated, or who simply prefer solitude may elect to practice privately.<ref name=Ownby313/> When there are expenses to be covered (such as for the rental of facilities for large-scale conferences), costs are borne by self-nominated and relatively affluent individual members of the community.<ref name=Ownby313/><ref>Craig Burgdoff, "How Falun Gong Practice Undermines Li Hongzhi's Totalistic Rhetoric", p. 338.</ref>
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|url=https://www.christiancentury.org/article/2004-08/china-syndrome
|volume=121 | issue=16
|access-date=2023-05-19|archive-date=28 June 2009|archive-url=http://arquivo.pt/wayback/20090628140710/http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1058/is_16_121/ai_n8702386/pg_4/}}</ref><ref name="Saich">Tony Saich, ''Governance and Politics in China,'' Palgrave Macmillan, 2nd ed. (2004) {{ISBN?}}</ref> Peerman cited reasons such as suspected personal jealousy of Li Hongzhi; Saich points to Jiang's anger at Falun Gong's widespread appeal, and ideological struggle as causes for the crackdown that followed. [[Willy Wo-Lap Lam]] suggests Jiang's decision to suppress Falun Gong was related to a desire to consolidate his power within the Politburo.<ref name=":3">Lam, Willy Wo-Lap. [https://www.cnn.com/2001/WORLD/asiapcf/east/02/05/china.willycolumn/index.html "China's sect suppression carries a high price"], CNN, 9 February 2001. {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20010211105808/https://www.cnn.com/2001/WORLD/asiapcf/east/02/05/china.willycolumn/index.html|date=February 11, 2001}}</ref> According to [[Human Rights Watch]], Communist Party leaders and ruling elite were far from unified in their support for the crackdown.<ref name=Dangerous/>
==Persecution==
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[[Ian Johnson (writer)|Ian Johnson]] argued that applying the 'cult' label to Falun Gong effectively "cloaked the government's crackdown with the legitimacy of the West's anticult movement." He wrote that Falun Gong does not satisfy common definitions of a cult: "its members marry outside the group, have outside friends, hold normal jobs, do not live isolated from society, do not believe that the world's end is imminent and do not give significant amounts of money to the organisation{{nbsp}}... it does not advocate violence and is at heart an apolitical, inward-oriented discipline, one aimed at cleansing oneself spiritually and improving one's health."<ref name="wildgrass"/>{{rp|224}} David Ownby similarly wrote that "the entire issue of the supposed cultic nature of Falun Gong was a red herring from the beginning, cleverly exploited by the Chinese state to blunt the appeal of Falun Gong".<ref name=Ownbyfuture/> According to John Powers and Meg Y. M. Lee, because the Falun Gong was categorized in the popular perception as an "apolitical, qigong exercise club", it was not seen as a threat to the government. The most critical strategy in the Falun Gong suppression campaign, therefore, was to convince people to reclassify the Falun Gong into a number of "negatively charged religious labels",<ref name="powerslee">Powers, John and Meg Y. M. Lee. "Dueling Media: Symbolic Conflict in China's Falun Gong Suppression Campaign" in Chinese Conflict Management and Resolution, by Guo-Ming Chen and Ringo Ma (2001), Greenwood Publishing Group</ref> like "evil cult", "sect", or "superstition". The group's silent protests were reclassified as creating "social disturbances". In this process of relabelling, the government was attempting to tap into a "deep reservoir of negative feelings related to the historical role of quasi-religious cults as a destabilising force in Chinese political history."<ref name=powerslee/>
A turning point in the propaganda campaign came on the eve of [[Chinese New Year]] on 23 January 2001, when [[Tiananmen Square self-immolation incident|five people attempted to set themselves ablaze]] on Tiananmen Square. The official Chinese press agency, [[Xinhua News Agency]], and other state media asserted that the [[Self-immolation|self-immolators]] were practitioners, though the Falun Dafa Information Center disputed this,<ref name="FDI_PressRelease">{{Cite web |url=http://www.clearwisdom.net/eng/2001/jan/23/vsf012301_3.html |title=Press Statement |date=23 January 2001 |publisher=Clearwisdom |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070310213800/http://www.clearwisdom.net/eng/2001/jan/23/vsf012301_3.html |archive-date=10 March 2007 |access-date=9 February 2007 |df=dmy-all}}</ref> on the grounds that the movement's teachings explicitly forbid suicide and killing,{{citation<ref needed|datename=July"wildgrass" 2020/>{{rp|224}}<ref name="FDI_PressRelease" /> further alleging that the event was "a cruel (but clever) piece of stunt-work."<ref name="brady08">[[Anne-Marie Brady]], ''Marketing dictatorship: propaganda and thought work in contemporary China'', Rowman & Littlefield, 2008{{ISBN?}}{{page?|date=May 2024}}</ref> The incident received international news coverage, and video footage of the burnings were broadcast later inside China by [[China Central Television]] (CCTV). The broadcasts showed images of a 12-year-old girl, Liu Siying, burning, and interviews with the other participants in which they stated a belief that self-immolation would lead them to paradise.<ref name="FDI_PressRelease"/><ref name="oneway">{{Cite news |title=One-Way Trip to the End in Beijing |last=Pan |first=Philip P. |date=5 February 2001 |work=International Herald Tribune}}</ref> But one of the CNN producers on the scene did not even see a child there. Falun Gong sources and other commentators pointed out that the main participants' account of the incident and other aspects of the participants' behavior were inconsistent with Falun Gong's teachings.<ref name="WOIPFG2">{{Cite web |url=http://www.zhuichaguoji.org/en/node/54 |title=New Evidence Confirms Alleged Falun Gong 'Tiananmen Square Self-Immolation' Was a State Conspiracy |date=August 2004 |publisher=World Organization to Investigate the Persecution of Falun Gong |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130325173957/http://www.zhuichaguoji.org/en/node/54 |archive-date=2013-03-25 |access-date=22 July 2013}}</ref> Media Channel and the International Education Development (IED) agree that the supposed self-immolation incident was staged by CCP to "prove" that Falun Gong brainwashes its followers to commit suicide and has therefore to be banned as a threat to the nation. IED's statement at the 53rd UN session describes China's violent assault on Falun Gong practitioners as [[state terrorism]] and that the self-immolation "was staged by the government." ''[[Washington Post]]'' journalist Phillip Pan wrote that the two self-immolators who died were not actually Falun Gong practitioners.<ref name="oneway"/> On March 21, 2001, Liu Siying suddenly died after appearing very lively and being deemed ready to leave the hospital to go home. ''[[Time (magazine)|Time]]'' reported that prior to the self-immolation incident, many Chinese had felt that Falun Gong posed no real threat, and that the state's crackdown had gone too far. After the event, however, the mainland Chinese media campaign against Falun Gong gained significant traction.<ref name="breakingpoint">{{cite magazine |last=Forney |first=Matthew |date=25 June 2001 |url=http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,165163,00.html |title=The Breaking Point |magazine=Time |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071013111614/http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,165163,00.html |archive-date=13 October 2007}}</ref> As public sympathy for Falun Gong declined, the government began sanctioning "systematic use of violence" against the group.<ref>Philip Pan and John Pomfret, [https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/2001/08/05/torture-is-breaking-falun-gong/ea6c5341-c7a7-47c9-9674-053049b7323d/ "Torture is Breaking Falun Gong"]. ''The Washington Post'', 5 August 2001. {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191005165937/https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/2001/08/05/torture-is-breaking-falun-gong/ea6c5341-c7a7-47c9-9674-053049b7323d/|date=October 5, 2019}}</ref>
In February, 2001, the month following the Tiananmen Square self-immolation incident, Jiang Zemin convened a rare Central Work Conference to stress the importance of continuity in the anti-Falun Gong campaign and unite senior party officials behind the effort.<ref name=Dangerous/> Under Jiang's leadership, the crackdown on Falun Gong became part of the Chinese political ethos of "upholding stability"—much the same rhetoric employed by the party during 1989 Tiananmen Square protests and massacre. Jiang's message was echoed at the 2001 National People's Congress, where the Falun Gong's eradication was tied to China's economic progress.<ref name=Dangerous/> Though less prominent on the national agenda, the persecution of Falun Gong has carried on after Jiang was retired; successive, high-level "strike hard" campaigns against Falun Gong were initiated in both 2008 and 2009. In 2010, a three-year campaign was launched to renew attempts at the coercive "transformation" of Falun Gong practitioners.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Communist Party Calls for Increased Efforts To 'Transform' Falun Gong Practitioners as Part of Three-Year Campaign
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Falun Gong's response to the persecution in China began in July 1999 with appeals to local, provincial, and central petitioning offices in Beijing.<ref>Elisabeth Rosenthal and Erik Eckholm, "Vast Numbers of Sect Members Keep Pressure on Beijing", ''The New York Times'', 28 October 1999.</ref> It soon progressed to larger demonstrations, with hundreds of Falun Gong practitioners traveling daily to Tiananmen Square to perform Falun Gong exercises or raise banners in defense of the practice. These demonstrations were invariably broken up by security forces, and the practitioners involved were arrested—sometimes violently—and detained. By 25 April 2000, a total of more than 30,000 practitioners had been arrested on the square;<ref name="johnson2000">{{Cite web |url=http://www.pulitzer.org/archives/6464 |title=Defiant Falun Dafa Members Converge on Tiananmen |last=Johnson |first=Ian |date=25 April 2000 |website=The Wall Street Journal |publisher=Pulitzer.org |page=A21 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20091229022658/http://www.pulitzer.org/archives/6464 |archive-date=29 December 2009 |access-date=10 October 2009 |df=dmy-all}}</ref> seven hundred Falun Gong followers were arrested during a demonstration in the square on 1 January 2001.<ref name="Perry">{{Cite book |title=Chinese Society: Change, Conflict and Resistance |last1=Selden |first1=Elizabeth J. |last2=Perry |first2=Mark |publisher=[[Routledge]] |year=2003 |isbn=978-0415301701}}</ref> Public protests continued well into 2001. Writing for the ''Wall Street Journal'', Ian Johnson wrote that "Falun Gong faithful have mustered what is arguably the most sustained challenge to authority in 50 years of Communist rule."<ref name="DE"/>
By late 2001, demonstrations in Tiananmen Square had become less frequent, and the practice was driven deeper underground. As public protest fell out of favor, practitioners established underground "material sites", which would produce literature and DVDs to counter the portrayal of Falun Gong in the official media. Practitioners then distribute these materials, often door-to-door.<ref>Liao Yiwu. "The Corpse Walker: Real Life Stories: China from the Bottom Up." p. 230.</ref> Falun Gong sources estimated in 2009 that over 200,000 such sites exist across China today.{{citation<ref needed|datename=July":6" 2020}}/> The production, possession, or distribution of these materials is frequently grounds for security agents to incarcerate or [[sentence (law)|sentence]] Falun Gong practitioners.<ref>{{Cite web|title=2009 Annual Report |author=Congressional-Executive Commission on China|url=https://www.cecc.gov/publications/annual-reports/2009-annual-report|access-date=2023-02-10|website=cecc.gov|archive-date=10 February 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230210134452/https://www.cecc.gov/publications/annual-reports/2009-annual-report|url-status=live}}</ref>
In 2002, Falun Gong activists in China tapped into television broadcasts, replacing regular state-run programming with their own content. One of the more notable instances occurred in March 2002, when Falun Gong practitioners in [[Changchun]] intercepted eight cable television networks in Jilin Province, and for nearly an hour, televised a program titled "Self-Immolation or a Staged Act?". All six of the Falun Gong practitioners involved were captured over the next few months. Two were killed immediately, while the other four were all dead by 2010 as a result of injuries sustained while imprisoned.<ref name="mediacontrol">{{Cite book |url=http://hrichina.org/sites/default/files/oldsite/PDFs/Reports/HRIC-Fog-of-Censorship.pdf |title=The Fog of Censorship: Media Control in China |last=He Qinglian |publisher=Human Rights in China |year=2008 |isbn=978-0971735620 |pages=xii |author-link=He Qinglian |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120229083633/http://hrichina.org/sites/default/files/oldsite/PDFs/Reports/HRIC-Fog-of-Censorship.pdf |archive-date=29 February 2012 |url-status=dead |df=dmy-all}}</ref><ref name="ws-20101206">{{Cite news |url=http://www.weeklystandard.com/articles/thin-airwaves_519589.html?nopager=1 |title=Into Thin Airwaves |last=Gutmann |first=Ethan |date=6 December 2010 |work=The Weekly Standard |access-date=1 January 2012 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120105190542/http://www.weeklystandard.com/articles/thin-airwaves_519589.html?nopager=1 |archive-date=5 January 2012 |df=dmy-all}}</ref>
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Falun Gong software developers in the United States are also responsible for the creation of several popular censorship-circumvention tools employed by internet users in China.<ref name="Beiser, Vince 2010">{{cite magazine |author-link=Vince Beiser |last=Beiser |first=Vince |date=1 November 2010 |url=https://www.wired.com/2010/11/ff_firewallfighters/ |title=Digital Weapons Help Dissidents Punch Holes in China's Great Firewall |magazine=[[Wired (magazine)|Wired]] |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161222135454/https://www.wired.com/2010/11/ff_firewallfighters/ |archive-date=22 December 2016}}</ref>
Falun Gong practitioners outside China have filed dozens of lawsuits against Jiang Zemin, Luo Gan, Bo Xilai, and other Chinese officials alleging genocide and crimes against humanity.<ref>Human Rights Law Foundation, [http://www.hrlf.net/direct.html Direct Litigation] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111111144251/http://www.hrlf.net/direct.html |date=11 November 2011 }}. Retrieved 19 March 2011</ref> According to ''International Advocates for Justice'', Falun Gong has filed the largest number of human rights lawsuits in the 21st century and the charges are among the most severe international crimes defined by international criminal laws.<ref name="Ownby2008">{{harvp|Ownby|2008}}</ref> As of 2006, 54 civil and criminal lawsuits were under way in 33 countries.<ref name=Ownbyfuture/> In many instances, courts have refused to adjudicate the cases on the grounds of sovereign immunity. In late 2009, however, separate courts in Spain and Argentina indicted [[Jiang Zemin]] and [[Luo Gan]] on charges of "crimes of humanity" and genocide, and asked for their arrest—the ruling is acknowledged to be largely symbolic and unlikely to be carried out.<ref name="elmundo">{{Cite web|title=La Audiencia pide interrogar al ex presidente chino Jiang por genocidio
| date = 14 November 2009
|url=https://www.elmundo.es/elmundo/2009/11/14/espana/1258230601.html|access-date=2023-02-10|website=elmundo.es|archive-date=10 February 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230210134441/https://www.elmundo.es/elmundo/2009/11/14/espana/1258230601.html|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news|date=2009-12-23|title=Argentine judge asks China arrests over Falun Gong