In a golden autumn, Zhang Zhiqiang, a citizen living in Datong City, Shanxi Province, took down the iron cage at home that measured 2 meters square, and finally let loose a long sigh of relief.
Five years ago, Zhang Zhiqiang and his wife put their mentally ill son Zhang Fan into an iron cage, where he ate and relieved himself every day. Not only did the iron cage confine their son to a limited space, but also it deprived the whole family of their chance to purse a good life in the future.
Zhang Zhiqiang is in his fifties. He graduated from a high school, and he is so keen on learning that he has a nimble mind. In the early 1990s, he and his wife opened a small store in a scenic spot in Datong to sell souvenirs. Not only could the money they earned cover all their daily expenses, but also they could save 10,000 yuan to 20,000 yuan each year. So, they became the so-called “ten-thousand yuan income family ” and admired by their neighbors.
Zhang Zhiqiang always had a thing for alcohol. Furthermore, he had irregular diets for a long time due to being busy with their small business. Therefore, he suffered from a stomach disease. He would have swelling pains when his stomachache struck. In order to cure his disease and improve his health conditions, he started to practice Falun Gong under the encouragement of his friends in 1998. In the meantime, he also gave up smoking and alcohol. After abandoning his bad habits, Zhang Zhiqiang felt much better than before with the regular lifestyle he adopted, but he mistakenly gave credit to Falun Gong, which caused his wife to join him in practicing Falun Gong for the sake of her lower back pain. In July 1999, they stopped their “cultivation” after Falun Gong was banned by the state in accordance with the law.
Around 2006, Zhang Zhiqiang had stomachache again. At the interval of stomachaches, all those Li Hongzhi’s fallacies found its way back into his heart, which said that everything in one’s life including childbirth, old age, illness as well as death was all determined by “Karma”, and that practicing Falun Gong was the only way to eliminate “Karma”, and the only effective way to cure diseases. Therefore, the couple began to practice Falun Gong once again and became even more obsessed with the extent that they seemed to be crazy. In 2008, they closed their small shop because they were too busy practicing Falun Gong and furtively going everywhere to defend Falun Gong by engaging in “facts clarification” activities.
In September 2011, Zhang Fan was in junior high school. But at that time, the previous warmth and harmony in the family were gone, which was replaced with a chillingly atmosphere. The couple who used to give tutoring to their son when he had difficulties with homework and care much about his son’s well-being, started to only get busy with their own Falun Gong “homework” and rarely communicated with their son, let alone paying attention to his academic performance at school. No parental disciplines plus adolescent rebellion made Zhang Fan’s grades decline steadily. In the end, Zhang Fan was asked to drop out of school for hating study, fooling around, as well as “severely disrupting classroom orders”.
After quitting school, Zhang Fan often got angry and quarreled with his parents. He would suddenly throw plates and bowls for no reason from time to time, deliberately finding fault at home. Even so, the couple still concentrated on their “cultivation”, quite indifferent to their son’s development. All they wanted to do was to find a different place to settle their son down so that he couldn’t disturb their “Dafa learning”.
After a few years, Zhang Fan applied for jobs in many places. Because his expectations were higher than his capabilities, he was refused a lot and got frustrated and depressed. So he either stayed at home playing with his cellphone or spent several days in a row in Internet cafes.
Actually, it was Zhang Fan’s own way to ask his parents for help. But the signal was totally ignored by his parents who, once loved him so much. All the couple cared about then was nothing but their “cultivation” and “Dafa learning”. They were even busy with “Truth Clarification” activities hither and thither, spreading Falun Gong fallacies in accordance with demands of the Falun Gong organization.
Late at night on February 7, 2017, Zhang Fan abruptly shouted “Kill me now! I want to die!” during his sleep. The couple ran to his son’s bed, realizing their son was talking nonsense in his delirium. Then their son fell asleep again after their comforts. But when it was near the dawn, they suddenly heard a loud noise caused by glass of a broken window. Unexpectedly, it turned out that their son smashed the window glass with his head. Since then, Zhan Fan often had his head broken and bleeding by hitting against walls on purpose. On one hand, the couple had to take care of their son day and night to prevent him from self-harming, and on the other hand, they were still insisting on their diligent “cultivation and Dafa learning”, therefore, every single day was an ordeal for the couple.
Zhang Zhiqiang finally realized that his son was very ill. However, being brainwashed for a long time by the Falun Gong cult, he firmly believed that he could cure his son because Li Hongzhi once said that "the true cultivator won’t get sick". At the suggestion of his fellow practitioners, he welded a big iron cage in his house and locked his son in it. Then he played sound recordings of Li Hongzhi’s lectures, taught his son to learn Dafa and practice Falun Gong by instilling “Karma”, “Consummation”, “Levels”, “Dharmakaya”, etc. into his son’s mind, hoping it could be conducive to his son’s recovery. But after several years’ confinement, Zhan Fan got worse and worse instead of turning better, became moody and tried to commit suicide many times. Looking at their poor son, the couple could not help crying.
It’s really a pity that a formerly enviable family ended up in such a bad situation. But the couple were still mistakenly cling to their belief in Falun Gong and failed to have any doubt about it. Since the breakout of the Covid-19 pandemic, incited by rumors fabricated by the Falun Gong cult organization abroad, the couple printed many reactionary propaganda materials, discredited the party and government’s epidemic prevention and control measures and achievements, disturbed and sabotaged the country’s work against the plague. With public tip-offs, one day in March 2020, the public security authority seized a large number of illegal Falun Gong propaganda materials, production tools used, and raw materials at the couple’s house. Then the couple, Zhang Zhiqiang and Wang Lanzhen, were reprimanded and then freed on bail, pending an appeal according to law.
As for how to handle followers of the Falun Gong cult or any other cult, the party and the government always adhere to the principle of “Saving the vast majority by uniting and educating them while cracking down on the minority of diehards in accordance to law”, and make enormous efforts to help them free their mind from spiritual shackles of cults.
At the beginning of the rescue and education, the couple were quite resistant. However, the deprogramming teachers made well-targeted efforts to popularize law for them, provide them with psychological counseling, and help them distinguish the essential differences between religions and cults, eliminating their doubts and improving their understanding bit by bit. Gradually, their thoughts changed. Sometimes they argued with the teachers and sometimes they turned to teachers for advices. Especially after watching the video of Falun Gong self-immolators in Tiananmen Square, they started to question the fallacy preached by Falun Gong that “those who committed suicide are ones who were guilty”. Furthermore, they reflected on their own experience of how their family turned from a wealthy one to a ruined one after they were obsessed with “Falun Gong”. Then they finally opened their mind and gradually realized the anti-human, anti-science, anti-society and anti-government nature of Falun Gong cult. They were also aware of the facts that, their son neglected his studies and got delayed three and half years for his treatment were all consequences of their obsession with Falun Gong cult.
After coming to their senses, they sincerely confessed their mistakes and repented, pledging to break away from Falun Gong cult. In September 2020, they were accorded lenient treatment by the judicial authority in accordance with relevant laws. In the meantime, the local government came to their aid by sending Zhang Fan to a mental hospital for treatment.
Zhang Zhiqiang, who now works as a taxi driver, said in sincere, “my experience over years proves that it was not Falun Gong but the party and the government that can save my family, and put it back to the right track again. That’s why we are enjoying a normal life once more.”
(All names in the article are pseudonyms)
