Why Is Falun Gong Worth Dying For?

In his article, "Rooting out Falun Gong: China Cracks Down on Mysticism," in the April 30th New York Times, Mr. Craig Smith raised the question of why so many people feel Falun Gong is worth dying for. Mr. Smith suggested that paradises with no interracial children allowed, folk superstitions of fox and weasel spirits, an earth infiltrated by aliens, and other lurid and sensational features that he attributed to Falun Gong, are what have misled millions of Falun Gong practitioners into readiness to die for Falun Gong.

As a person named in Mr. Smith's article, and someone recently jailed in China for my faith in Falun Gong, I want to express why I believe Falun Gong is worth dying for.

I am an assistant professor at The Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, California. Last December, I took a trip to visit my parents in China, but was arrested in the city of Shenzhen, at midnight of December 15. I was charged with "disruptions of social orders," though no one could explain to me how that was done from a private home and while sleeping. It did not matter, as they knew it and I knew it -- I was arrested for my faith in Falun Gong and was thrown in a jail for the next 13 days.

Those 13 days were the harshest days of my life. A jail in China is nothing that an American can imagine. The moment you are arrested, you lose every right, and practically disappear from the world. I was not allowed contact with anyone, by phone or by mail. No one on the outside was able to locate me either. My husband, after being informed of the news by my friends, called from San Diego to find out which detention center I was in. He was promptly told by the police that criminals couldn't receive phone calls; when he explained that he was trying to locate his wife, he was told to come in person.

Being cut off from the world was only a small part of the hardship. I was not allowed to get extra clothes when I was arrested. Two days after my arrest, Shenzhen was hit by the coldest weather in this century. I slept on the cement floor, and I could hear the cold wind howling through the prison wall. Worse yet, we were not allowed to wear shoes. As a result, my feet became badly chapped and suffered a deep sore that did not heal for the next two months. All the inmates were forced to labor from 8 a.m. to 10 p.m. every day, making hair brushes or shoes for export to the US. For all my forced labor there, I had to pay my own per diem, total of 130 Chinese Yuan for my 13 days of detention.

Yet, those were the 13 worthiest days of my life, for I experienced the amazing power of salvation of Falun Gong on myself and the people around me. Of the more than 50 inmates that I shared the cells with, most were prostitutes, drug addicts, or both. Some of them were forced into prostitution by their husbands or families. The harsh life had given them an absolute negative view of the world. Fighting, beating, and abuse were commonplace. On the contrary, I came from a well-off family. To me, the stories told by Hugo, Tolstoy, and others, though touching, existed only in novels, and prostitutes were, after all, people who sell their bodies for cheap and easy money. It was Falun Gong that changed me and gave me the compassion and sympathy for my inmates. Witnessing their suffering, I forgot my own agony and did my best to ease their pain. One day, a 17-year old prostitute embraced me and asked:"Lili, you are a big professor from the United States, while we are the smallest of scum and dregs of the society, but you have treated us with dignity and respect as no one else did. Is it because Falun Gong? If so, can I learn Falun Gong?"

During my 13 days in jail, most, if not all, of my inmates learned Falun Gong. Fighting, beating and abuses were dramatically reduced, and by the time I was released, the three most powerful and vicious inmates announced that they would adopt Falun Gong's principle of "Truth-Benevolence-Forbearance" to run the cell. All the drug addicts in the cell lost their craving for drugs, and they did not even have the usual symptoms associated with drug withdrawal.

There was an inmate who had a 3-day overlap with me in the cell. At the time of her release, she begged the police: "Can I stay for a few more days? I want to learn more about Falun Gong." When we first met, she was talking about revenge against her neighbors using sulfuric acid, but she told me that she would never do a bad thing after learning Falun Gong. It was she, claiming to be a Falun Gong practitioner, who contacted other practitioners in Shenzhen and made known the actual location of my detention.

One 17-year old girl, upon her release, promised to me: "Professor, I will never sell my body. The next time I am in jail, it will be for Falun Gong." A 19-year-old prostitute told me that as soon as she was released she would go to Beijing to tell the government that Falun Gong saved her.

I cried my heart out for their awakening.

For the reason that it eases the pain and saves the souls of these "lowest class" people, people that no one else cares for, Falun Gong is worth my dying for.

I am a Falun Gong practitioner, and I presume I know more about Falun Gong teaching than Mr. Smith. At no time during my detention had I talked about those lurid features Mr. Smith claimed to be Falun Gong teaching. It was possible that my inmates were misled by Falun Gong. However, is it so bad to mislead people to quit drugs, to give up violence, to stop selling their bodies, and, to become better people? If it were a fraud to do all these things, then this act of fraud should be rewarded and respected.

Falun Gong is simply a popular movement of mental and physical cultivation. Like my inmates, people have come to Falun Gong because they want to be the best people they can be. In the short 8 years since its founding, and entirely through the word-of-mouth, Falun Gong has drawn 100 million followers in China and around the world, and helped them to achieve higher morality and total health. As a result and in return, Falun Gong practitioners have become better family members, dedicated workers, and conscientious citizens. They are the good friends, dependable colleagues, nice neighbors, and peace-loving people you want to have near you and around the world.

Before being thrown in jail, I was asked what I had to say. I said: "Falun Gong is good." The police exclaimed: "Is that all you want to say coming all the way from the US?" And two of the three policemen questioning me shed tears: "Is it really worth it?"

This is what described by Mr. Smith as "defend the Fa" that is "more than harmless." It indeed is more than harmless, but who is doing the harm?

Since the crackdown, millions of Falun Gong practitioners have gone to Beijing to tell the government that "Falun Gong is good." From the very beginning of their ruling, the Chinese Communist dictators have successfully implanted the "5% vs. 95%" psychology: At any time, in any political persecution, only 5% of the people are targeted, and the other 95% are safe. This brings out the very worst of human nature--cling to the 95% side at any cost, even at the expense of others, and close the eyes to the rights of the 5%. That 5%, of course, was rotated so often that the whole nation was suppressed into submission. Now, for the first time, Falun Gong practitioners courageously have broken out of this pattern. They are not afraid to be that 5%. They stand up for their beliefs regardless of whether they are on the side of 5%, 1%, or alone!

An editorial in the North Dakota Grand Forks Herald stated: "In China, freedom is spelled, Falun Gong."

For the reason that Falun Gong has given tens of millions of people the courage to stand up for their rights, Falun Gong is worth dying for.

The crackdown on Falun Gong by the Chinese government, therefore, is not, as Mr. Smith suggested, a crackdown on mysticism. At the very fundamental level, it is the seekers of totalitarian evil power against seekers of individual freedom.

The pursuit of individual freedom by Falun Gong practitioners and millions of other Chinese citizens represents the same spirit and value on which the United States was founded. For this, may I humbly suggest and hope that the spirit with which Patrick Henry proclaimed "Give me liberty, or give me death," a spirit that an American felt was worth dying for over 200 years ago, is still worth dying for today, around the world.