Shen Yun, the Falun Gong, and far right politics
A copy of The Epoch Times, December 20-26, 2023, U.S. Edition, appeared on nearly every driveway Spokane last month (at least on the South Hill where I walk). A partial wrap-around page of the main section advertised that the entertainment spectacular, Shen Yun, would be on stage at the First Interstate Center for Arts in downtown Spokane. Shen Yun will perform Saturday and Sunday March 9 and 10, each day at 2PM. Tickets range from $80 to $150, depending on the seating.
You can watch the 30 second Trailer here on YouTube, where you will see some impressive gymnastic dance clips and a short notice that the show encompasses “5,000 years of history. Inspired by The Divine”, the latter illustrated by horses with wings flying at you out of the screen.
You are invited to think of Shen Yun as an introduction to traditional Chinese culture, a stage show that must have paid The Epoch Times for the advertising. In reality, Shen Yun, with its eight companies comprised of nearly 500 individuals, is an outreach effort of the Falun Gong (aka Falun Dafa). The Falun Gong is a Chinese “new religious movement” with End Times overtones headquartered in their 427 acre Dragon Springs compound in the town of Deerpark, New York, about 70 miles northwest of New York City. The Falun Gong was founded in the early 1990s by Li Hongzhi in northeastern China. Li Hongzhi took up permanent legal residence in the U.S. in 1998, shortly before the Chinese government declared the Falun Gong movement a doomsday cult and suppressed the movement in China.
The Epoch Times digital and paper newspaper, New Tang Dynasty Television, and Shen Yun are all closely intertwined, sharing “missions, money, and executives”. The Falun Gong in the U.S. mostly stayed away from politics until the movement started to see Donald Trump as their Savior. An excellent and exhaustive 2019 NBC News article, “Trump, QAnon and an impending judgment day: Behind the Facebook-fueled rise of The Epoch Times”, details the propaganda efforts of the Falun Gong/Trump alliance:
Former practitioners of Falun Gong told NBC News that believers think the world is headed toward a judgment day, where those labeled “communists” will be sent to a kind of hell, and those sympathetic to the spiritual community will be spared. Trump is viewed as a key ally in the anti-communist fight, former Epoch Times employees said.
The Falun Gong possesses religious roots in Taoism and Buddhism, meditation and gentle movement (think simplified qigong), all leavened with Li Hongzhi’s particular views:
It [the Chinese crackdown on the Falun Gong] has also invited scrutiny of the spiritual leader’s more unconventional ideas. Among them, Li has railed against what he called the wickedness of homosexuality, feminism and popular music while holding that he is a god-like figure who can levitate and walk through walls.
Li has also taught that sickness is a symptom of evil that can only be truly cured with meditation and devotion, and that aliens from undiscovered dimensions have invaded the minds and bodies of humans, bringing corruption and inventions such as computers and airplanes.
You would be forgiven if, having found The Epoch Times last month in your driveway, you tossed it into your recycling bin, but it might have been worth a look. A two page spread in the main section is titled “Trump’s Legal Challenges Explained.” The paragraph under the title establishes the tenor of the article with the notation that most of the lawsuits stem “from his efforts to challenge the results of the 2020 election”—as if these were simple, benign “challenges”. For anyone who has followed the six legal cases against Trump, this article fairly drips pro-Trump bias, presenting defense arguments with a tone of fact and the indictments as overreach. Reading the article, though, goes a long way to explaining the attitudes of people who believe The Epoch Times is demonstrating “Truth and Tradition” as claimed under its masthead. (Even Fox finally gave up “Fair and Balanced”—but not The Epoch Times.)
The Epoch Times has all the trappings of a conventional mainstream news source, including testimonials like this one:
“Very informative, well balanced and trustworthy. My eyes have been opened to many things I wasn’t even aware of and my suspicions were confirmed on other things that mainstream media was choosing to misrepresent.”
– DAVID OLSON
It would be unwise to dismiss The Epoch Times and Shen Yun as trivial or irrelevant. Its multimedia reach is broad with tendrils piercing even ‘lil ole Spokane. Almost three years ago a dear, elderly, former neighbor of mine declared to me her delight in her $16.90 monthly subscription to the Epoch Times. She went on to say she was recommending it to all her friends and relatives. One of the things she said she’d learned from it was that “Biden is ruining the country!”
Keep to the high ground,
Jerry