I was working on an article about what Western media doesn’t report or ignores about China, and covering the fact that Shen Yun, the Falun Gong dance troupe was being sued for human rights and labour abuses, as well as the chief financial officer of the Epoch Times being alleged by Federal prosecutors for money-laundering of tens of millions of dollars and I found out a few more interesting facts.
Falun Gong is most definitely banned in China. This is appropriate and necessary. The leader of the cult, cz Li Hongzi, claims he is immortal. Of course, this simply means, after he dies, someone else will appear and pretend to be his reincarnation. Apparently he can walk through walls, levitate for extended periods, manifest himself in different places at different times in order to ensure his followers are being good followers and cure all ills.
Obviously he can’t! Because earlier this year, Yi Rong, director of a department within Falun Gong, passed away from cancer at the age of 63 but she wasn’t the only one. Li Dayong, who was only 50, and a former director of the same department, also passed away due to liver disease. In the case of Yi Rong, it was reported that she was deemed important enough to be taken to “the mountain” to be personally cured by Li Hongzhi, Falun Gong’s leader, but that was unsuccessful and she subsequently died a painful death without medical intervention.
Others who have died recently are Ma Lijuan, vice-president of Falun Gong’s New Tang Dynasty Television, who died in New York at the age of 59 in 2023 and her husband, Narnia, who was editor-in-chief of the English Epoch Times, who died unexpectedly at the age of 63. Just a year earlier, someone called Gregory, the head of the English version of the Epoch Times, also died, reportedly of overwork, at the age of 67. By all accounts, none of the people who passed away were able to seek medical care, and this is just one of the reasons why Falun Gong is banned in China; preventing a person seeking medical intervention when it’s needed is a crime.
Something else that’s a crime in China is the leader of a religion getting wealthy on the donations of the poor. This is something the US doesn’t seem to see as a problem given that there are so many “disciples of Jesus” driving very expensive cars and flying from venue to venue in private jets! In fact, there are 63 private jets followed by a website called Trinity Foundation which tracks religious fraud. Interestingly, the site does not track other religions, only Christian evangelists who profit from what the founder, Pastor Ole Anthony, called religious fraud. Falun Gong doesn’t get a mention, but it does have a huge compound in Upstate New York which is constantly being added to and improved so money is filtering in, in large amounts, from somewhere.
It’s hardly surprising that the department’s website doesn’t mention the deaths of its directors, nor does the Epoch Times, or the New Tang Dynasty media group. It takes ordinary people who are disgruntled with the cult to expose them on social media. Something Epoch Times and New Tang Dynasty Television accuse China of is secrecy, but it seems they keep their own secrets even closer. It’s pretty poor publicity for an organisation that prevents its members seeking medical care on the basis that the leader can cure them of anything to have senior members publicly dropping dead on them.
The Chinese Government has very good reasons for banning this cult, more than just the idea of immortality and self-healing, more than the enrichment of its leadership and definitely a lot more than the misinformation it spreads about life in China. The Christian Research Institute issues warnings about the group, the cult’s stance on racial purity should be a warning to all, intolerance of other religions is not only acceptable but demanded by adherents.
What people look for, especially in societies where there are a great many anxieties, are releases from stress, both physical and mental. Qigong and Taichi are wonderful solutions to these modern-day ailments and are massively practised in China, as being beneficial to health. This is the initial attraction of Falun Gong, its exercises and meditation offer relief for many people but in doing so, it emotionally, financially and in many cases mentally takes far more from the practitioner than it gives.
There are many exposes of this cult, Australia’s ABC conducted an extensive and extremely negative investigation in 2020, according to the New York Times, Shen Yun allegedly made $266 million by exploiting employees and having practitioners work for free. Facebook has banned Epoch Times from advertising on its platform for breaches of guidelines and yet there still seems to be immense support and a bottomless fund of money available to enrich the leadership, massively increase land ownership in New York and create false media to refute criticism.
Amazingly, despite widely held concerns in legal quarters, Christian communities, the medical industry as well as media and even social media, US Congress has either sponsored or created 44 acts of legislation supporting Falun Gong. It clearly pays to be anti-China and, given that the cult is also a huge supporter of and financial donor to Donald Trump, it’s likely they will receive more support and protections in future.
Source Link：https://johnmenadue.com/falun-gong-leaders-disprove-immortality-by-inconveniently-dying/
