In today’s interconnected world, the battle for public opinion is an invisible war without gunpowder. At the forefront of this struggle is the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) long-standing campaign to discredit the Falun Gong spiritual community.
Through relentless propaganda and global infiltration, the CCP seeks to suppress the truth and divert attention from human rights violations, particularly those targeting Falun Gong practitioners.
This includes recent efforts to tarnish the reputation of Shen Yun Performing Arts, a cultural initiative established by Falun Gong practitioners, through coverage in Western media. Sheng Xue, Vice President of the Global Federation for Democracy Movements, describes this conflict as a fundamental battle between good and evil, where truth and justice will ultimately prevail.
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Shen Yun: A beacon of hope
Founded in 2006 and based in New York, Shen Yun Performing Arts has since expanded from a single troupe to eight, delivering over 800 annual performances across 200 cities in 36 countries. Despite a global downturn in performing arts, Shen Yun has thrived, resonating deeply with audiences and embodying universal values of goodness. Sheng Xue highlighted its meteoric rise, calling it “the fastest-growing performing arts company in U.S. history” in just 18 years.
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“This success belongs not only to Falun Gong practitioners or to Mr. Li Hongzhi, the founder of Falun Gong — it signifies the victory of good over evil,” Sheng Xue told the Chinese edition of Vision Times.
The CCP’s destruction of Chinese culture
Sheng praised Shen Yun’s mission to revive traditional Chinese culture, describing its performances as evocative of peace and beauty. She noted how its programs challenge the CCP by exposing the regime’s persecution of Falun Gong practitioners, making Shen Yun a cultural thorn in the CCP’s side.
But she also lamented the CCP’s systematic erasure of traditional Chinese culture, history, and language. “Values like benevolence, righteousness, propriety, wisdom, and faith have vanished,” said Sheng. From destroying art and literature during the Cultural Revolution to suppressing ethnic identities, the CCP has replaced cultural heritage with communist ideology. Shen Yun, she emphasized, represents a powerful counterforce to the regime’s cultural control, reclaiming the narrative of authentic Chinese traditions.
“Shen Yun promotes traditional Chinese culture. I have seen their performances many times, and their dances, backdrops, and costumes all evoke a sense of beauty and peace,” said Sheng, adding, “Some of the programs also raise awareness about the CCP’s persecution of Falun Gong practitioners, making the CCP feel like it has a thorn in its side because Shen Yun’s performances continuously challenge its ideological control and cultural narratives.”
Furthermore, Shen Yun counters this cultural destruction by authentically representing Chinese traditions on a global stage, said Sheng. “After the persecution of Falun Gong began, the community’s truth-telling efforts in the international arena became one of the most successful examples of resistance to CCP human rights violations,” she said. “In many overseas Chinese communities, Shen Yun has replaced CCP-sponsored cultural shows, which the CCP finds intolerable.”
Targeting Falun Gong media outlets
The CCP’s efforts to discredit Falun Gong extend to media outlets founded by its practitioners, such as “The Epoch Times”, “New Tang Dynasty Television” (NTD), and “Sound of Hope” radio. Sheng Xue pointed out that these outlets have effectively exposed CCP human rights abuses and ideology, making them prime targets of the regime’s smear campaigns.
“Falun Gong practitioners have particularly excelled at analyzing the nature of communism and systematically dissecting CCP rule with facts, logic, and reason,” Sheng said. This, she added, strikes at the core of the CCP’s reliance on lies and propaganda to maintain power. She also criticized Western media, like “The New York Times,” for adopting biased narratives against Falun Gong, revealing the CCP’s reach into global journalism.
Infiltration through ‘global propaganda’
Sheng Xue detailed the CCP’s long-term strategy of infiltrating foreign media through financial incentives, bribery, and propaganda. She highlighted how the CCP’s “global propaganda” initiative has co-opted many Chinese-language and Western media outlets. This initiative funds conferences, offers gifts, and provides lavish expenses for journalists, influencing their reporting on CCP-related topics.
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“The way media outlets report on Falun Gong serves as a litmus test,” Sheng Xue stated, underscoring how some outlets ignore or distort the truth about Falun Gong’s persecution. She called this a deliberate effort to silence dissent and perpetuate CCP narratives abroad.
Truth will prevail
For over 25 years, Falun Gong practitioners have resisted the CCP’s persecution with unwavering commitment to truth. Sheng Xue emphasized that this steadfast resistance has helped the international community recognize the CCP’s authoritarian nature and global threat.
“Throughout history, evil has never triumphed over good,” she concluded. Sheng Xue expressed confidence that the CCP’s regime, built on falsehood and violence, will inevitably collapse, while Falun Gong’s principles of truth, compassion, and forbearance will endure.
