The Gong Shows: Why bother now?


(NB, in advance: Other than the first link at the top, many links here are of dubious quality and origin.  Take everything with a block of salt.)

For unfathomable reasons, members of the falun gong cult held a rally in Taipei on Saturday in support of Cheetolini.

Pro-Trump crowd holds rally in Taipei

A crowd yesterday marched in Taipei to rally support for US President Donald Trump and show opposition to the Chinese Communist Party.

At the parade organized by Epoch Media Group — publisher of the Epoch Times and affiliated with Falun Gong — participants carried placards with slogans such as: “Taiwan-US cooperation, we support Trump to dispose communist China” and “Taiwan, Fight for Trump.”

Some signs echoed messages used by Trump supporters who believe he won the US election last month, with phrases such as: “Stop the Steal” and “Make America Great Again.”

[. . .]

With drums and music, the march traveled several blocks around Taipei 101, ending at a nearby plaza, where talks and music videos were presented and streamed online.

Event organizers estimated that about 8,000 people turned out for the event.

“Without US protection, Taiwan would not have its freedom, and instead we would be slaves ruled by communist China. Trump is the best US president for Taiwan, signing laws to have officials visit and sell US weapons for us to fend off a Chinese military attack,” pro-Taiwan independence campaigner Rishen Wu (吳日昇) said at the march.

In the crowd, an American, who identified himself as Jerry, said he was touched to see so many Taiwanese at the rally.

Jerry, with no picture or last name.  I wonder of he’s one of the “mask refuseniks” in Taiwan facebook groups.  And “epoch times”?  Epic fail is more like it.

I have a suspicion the cultists were hoping something negative would happen, that someone would attempt to silence them or attack them.  No such luck, considering how ineffectual they are in Taiwan and how openly democratic the country is.  If they want to change things, they should run for political office.  Nobody would stop them.

The cult spends a lot of its time around the Ximending area of Taipei.  They go there primarily because it’s a trendy and busy shopping district for young people, with about 800m^2 of sidewalks and many wide roads restricted to pedestrians.  But Ximending is also LGBTQIA central, with many shops selling clothes, makeup and sex toys in the day, and fifteen small clubs at night.  The falun gong cult hate LGBTQIA people as much as they hate atheists.  They support “corrective therapy” for one, and likely death camps for the other.

From the Asian Pacific Post:

Is The Falun Gong An Evil, Anti-Gay Cult?

published by Asianpost on Wed, 03/18/2009 – 11:47

The following excerpt is from a paper that was presented by Rick Ross at the January 2009 International Forum on Cultic Studies sponsored by the Centre for the Study of Destructive Cults in China and published by the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.

My work in the area of cults, controversial groups and movements began in 1982 and has included professionally consulting with hundreds of affected families, mental health professionals, attorneys, clergy, law enforcement and the media.  I have been qualified and accepted as an expert witness across the United States in numerous court cases. This has included testimony given in United States federal courts.  I am the founder and Executive Director of the Ross Institute of New Jersey (RI).  Each year, through my work at RI, I respond to thousands of inquiries.

One subsection within the RI archives is devoted to Falun Dafa also known as Falun Gong and the teachings of its founder Li Hongzhi.

Falun Dafa, which was founded in 1992, is an idiosyncratic blend of beliefs and practises as assembled by its founder Li Hongzhi. This includes Taoist and Buddhist references predicated upon a belief in extraterrestrials and practised through a set of prescribed exercises and meditation techniques.

[. . .]

Li Hongzhi also encourages hatred of homosexuals. “The disgusting homosexuality shows the dirty abnormal psychology of the gay who has lost his ability of reasoning at the present time,” Li Hongzhi wrote in Volume II of Zhuan Falun, or Turning the Law Wheel, which was translated into English in 1996.

In his talk in Switzerland, Li Hongzhi also stated that gay people would be “eliminated” by “the gods.” Asked in Frankfurt, Germany, in 1998 whether gays could practice Falun Gong, Mr. Li answered, “You can cultivate, but you must give up the bad conduct.”

I include this item because the Asian Pacific Post is a weekly Vancouver newspaper serving the ethnic Chinese community. They used to be published by the same company as “epoch times” until in 2009 the publisher tried to shut down the newspaper over a story critical of the cult. The APP changed to a new publisher and continues publishing today.

I’m against the CCP’s mass murder of falun gong members, killing on spec and selling their organs for profit to transplant tourists.  But that doesn’t make the cult a friend either.

Comments

  1. Numenaster, whose eyes are up here says

    “I’m against the CCP’s mass murder of falun gong members, killing on spec and selling their organs for profit to transplant tourists. But that doesn’t make the cult a friend either.”

    Yes to both pieces of this. I find Falun Gong kinda mysterious, actually: they seem to spend more money than they have visible means of earning. The things they do remind me of what the Koch money does in US politics, only directed at politics in China and China’s nearest targets.

    I went to see the Shen Yun show once, in a fit of nostalgia for Peking opera. The first act is a decent adaptation of the style for western people and I enjoyed it. But the second act begins with the oppressed Falun Gong members in their prison cells being sprung by divine beings. It was so over-the-top I very nearly walked out. By the end of the 2nd act I was wishing I had done so because the heavy-handed propaganda just DID NOT LET UP.