A lot of Falun Gong practitioners, deluded by such heretical ideas as "Truthfulness, Compassion and Tolerance", "to be elevated", and "to reach consummation", had been bereft of reason and paid no regard to familial affections. And this had led to countless tragedies. Nowadays most of them have broken away from the trap of Falun Gong and start to live a new life. Looking back on their appalling experiences, they gave self-reflections from the bottom of their hearts and wept bitter tears of remorse. These experiences tell people how poisonous a cult can be.
In this paper, I’d like to take several cases as examples and examine Li Hongzhi’s favorite tricks of mental controlling followers from the psychological aspect.
Trick 1: Taking advantage of followers’ mentality of worship and fear, cult groups indoctrinate heretical ideas to junior believers and the general audience.
Each person, limited by life experience and academic knowledge, has blind areas in decision-making. In the face of an uncertain event beyond one’s knowledge and experience, almost everyone feels fear or at a loss, prone to dependence on and obedience to others. And that’s why so many people with limited ability to make discriminations in a scientific way readily believe the remarks of so-called experts or masters, following them around like a flock of sheep. The cult group takes advantage of such mentality, and deifies its ringleader into an omniscient and omnipotent supreme authority, which brings forth strong sense of dependence and trust among followers, and intensifies the mental control in steps.
A former Falun Gong practitioner surnamed Tan was a good example. He learned to practice Falun Gong by chance, but step by step became deeply obsessed with the cult.
In May 1997, Tan heard about the heretical theory "truthfulness, compassion and tolerance" fabricated by Li Hongzhi, then began to practice Falun Gong and finally was obsessed with it. Now Tan has been completely free from Falun Gong and he told me the real reason why, once someone was entrapped into Falun Gong, it’s hard to escape. "Li Hongzhi conducted mental control over us. Li said: ‘Every word I pronounce is Fa’ and ‘each letter in my books represents my law bodies’. We dared not doubt what he said." "Li demanded the practitioners to read his books as much as possible and I know that he’s trying to replace our common sense with his heresies. Sometimes I found something paradoxical in the books, but didn’t dare to question them as other people prostrated themselves in worship and made a fetish of those books. I just thought myself not intelligent enough to understand them. When I exchanged ideas with my fellow practitioners, some talked about their "enlightenment", some claimed they had seen something in other spaces, some had a certain disease cured by practicing, some had his karma removed, all these made me think I was not devoted enough to make rapid progress and get elevated. In Zhuan Falun, Li Hongzhi said: ‘Who is your mother? Who are your children? After you have taken your last breath in this world, they are all strangers to you.’ I could not understand his words, but just follow what the master told me to do, and stepped on the cult’s road unconsciously."
Trick 2: The cult group makes use of people’s selfishness to conduct intimidation, which serves as psychological strike and devastation to those who wavered or dared to question the heretical ideas.
It’s human that everyone seeks advantages and avoids disadvantages. Anyone who is mentally healthy should be able to restrain oneself from being too selfish, comply with social norms, and maximize one’s own interest without harming the social morality or the interest of others’. However, those more selfish and less able to make discriminations in a scientific way are easy preys to the mental control of cult groups’ heretical theory.
In order to attract believers, such illusions as "self-curing for diseases", "getting rid of bad fortunes", and "consummation and ascension" are fabricated into cult heresies. When one or two believers express doubts about the heresies and meanwhile the cult group fails to justify itself, it has to fence with such fallacies as "It works only with those who put faith in it" and "you have not done enough cultivation to understand it". The cult group goes so far as to threaten the personal safety of believers with such fallacies as "being punished in a future life for the sins in this one" and "punished by the power of Fa" until they finally give up their own thinking and discrimination. The horrible experiences of a lot of former Falun Gong practitioners who eventually broke away reveal that most of them were enticed into Falun Gong by the desirable ideas of "truthfulness, compassion and tolerance", but once they fell in the trap well framed by Li Hongzhi, they were menaced to go further on the road of removing karma, getting elevated and seeking consummation. However, as long as these obsessed followers, who were willing to pay any price for Dafa, remove the psychological pressure, they cast off easily the cult shackles and gain a new life.
Another Falun Gong practitioner surnamed Zhang, after getting rid of the mental control, told me his true state of mind.
In July 1997, Zhang, enticed by Li Hongzhi’s ideas of "truthfulness, compassion and tolerance" and "to be good people", joined the group of Falun Gong. In order to be elevated as quickly as possible, he spent a lot of time in studying Fa, transcribing and memorizing books written by Li Hongzhi. Even after Falun Gong was officially banned by the government, Zhang persisted bigotedly and participated in the illegal activities organized by Falun Gong. Volunteers tried patiently to dissuade him time and again，but at that time he "was afraid of standing opposite to Dafa, of being labeled by fellow practitioners as ‘renegade’ and even more afraid of being punished for ‘defaming Buddha’". Therefore he turned a deaf ear to the petition of his family, relatives and friends, and said: "This is a test against affection which the Master wants me to pass lightly. If I fail to persist, I will be punished by the Master’s law body."
Zhang added: "I had thought my strongest pressure was ‘fear’, but now I know it better. Behind the ‘fear’ there was ‘selfishness’ which was the principle reason why I was unable to break away from Falun Gong for years. In fact, at the very beginning, we fell into the trap deliberately designed by Li Hongzhi. All of us were deceived. Li Hongzhi played tricks on us by calling followers to ‘study the Fa’, ‘promote the Fa,’ and ‘protect the Fa’, and incited thousands of innocent people to surround Zhongnanhai in demonstration. He pushed us onto the evil road against people. He did all these to achieve his ulterior purposes."
Trick 3: The cult group distorts ethical values and binds cultic ideas with believers’ morality, which serves as "an abduction of moral integrity" against the deeply obsessed.
In the historical course of over 5,000 years, the Chinese nation has developed social values centered upon Confucianism. Such motto as "not to be corrupted by riches and honors, not to depart from principle despite poverty or humble origin, and not to submit to force or threat" has been recited with admiration and served as the moral foundation of Chinese people for generations.
The cult group has been aware that these morality ideas take root in the hearts of the common people, so it distorts these principles by preaching cultic ideas that sound similar to traditional values. But in reality, there are fundamental differences between the traditional value and these cultic ideas. As such, if a believer fails to be conscious of this, he is subject to more harms, because once cult activities are tied up to individual value standard, the first step to get rid of the cult is to deny the personal value standard the cult advocated . A handful of Falun Gong addicts follow Li Hongzhi wholeheartedly, disregarding their lives and family affections, largely because of the blind loyalty.
A former Falun Gong practitioner surnamed Pan, was originally a well-off self-employed entrepreneur. In order to improve health and have her disease cured, Pan began to practice Falun Gong in 1998. She was so obsessed that she participated in the illegal activities organized by the cult group, and was punished by police for disturbing public order. In order to get rid of "attachments", she regarded her business, family and relatives as encumbrances, giving her business a disastrous blow and pushing her family into the brink of breakup.
Pan told the author: "Some fellow practitioners who had freed from Falun Gong asked me to give up practicing, and I was really shocked and felt sad for them and even reprimanded them for cowardice and disgrace…now looking it back, I am aware how ridiculous and funny I was then!"
