Mer om yttrandefrihet och demokrati.
Debatten om kinesiska ambassadens på tryckningar tog lite fart i helgen, corren, dn, expressen, sr, och svt har lyft frågan. I debattforumet på corren finns mycket intressantläsning. För min del skulle jag bara vilja förtydliga att jag personligen har för lite kännedom om Falun Gong för att kunna värdera rörelsen. Och i det här fallet är det ointressant för min del för yttrandefrihet, demokrati och mänskliga rättigheter gäller alla oavsett vad jag som politiker tycker om dessa åsikter. Börjar vi tumma på den principen så är vi inte bättre än diktaturerna som vi vänder oss mot.
6 kommentarer:
I just post 2 letters here personally for you, my dear Swedish friend, your kindness of nature will be cherished by every decent men.
Zhao Meng
TM Vision ApS, Denmark
Gothenburg 071212
Dear Mr Meng!
Thank you very much for your letter and our phone call this morning.
We have broadcasted this “XIN TANG REN (belongs to FALUN GONG sect)”channel for two years and this is the first time I received complains regarding this channel.
The first thing I did this morning was to close this channel immediately. I contacted the Chinese Embassy and have spoken to Ms Chen Xiang. We have now got information for three different channels, CCTV9, CCTV4 and PCNE. We were recommended to broadcast PCNE, as also you recommended. We will now contact our supportcompany for our TV-system to check all these three channels and if they are possible to view at our hotel. When we are ready to start again I will personally contact you again.
Thank you also for the information regarding the free newspapers that we receive to the hotel. We will no longer distribute them to our guests. I will also personally give this information to our HQ and ask them to inform all our hotels within Choice Hotels Scandinavia so that they also will get this information.
Next time you visit Gothenburg and Quality Hotel Panorama please ask for me in the reception. I would like to thank you in person for this information you have helped us with.
Best regards
Richard Fredriksson
General Manager
Quality Hotel Panorama
+46 31 767 7040
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Protesting LetterOslo, the 8th.December.2007
We are a group of worrying Chinese people living in Scandinavian countries, many of us work within the Chinese travel business.
While working with our Chinese clients and personally staying at one of your hotels - Quality Hotel Panorama in Gothenburg, Sweden, we noticed that you have been using a very special Chinese language TV station called "Xin Tang Ren TV" for your Chinese speaking guests who stay at the hotel. I have to say that it is wrong that you have made such a choice!
First of all, we have to say we think "Xin Tang Ren TV" is not a normal TV station, it shows only ONE same program which takes merely 3 hours, called "Jiu ping gong chan dang" it means "the nine main issues about The Chinese Communist Party". As it sounds, it has a sole topic: that is the ruling parting in China - The Chinese Communist Party is an evil and disgusting political party. There are no daily news, no relaxing shows, no Chinese films, no nothing a commercial TV program must have! Strange! Right?
After viewing this 120% political propaganda program so many times as your hotel guest, we have to let you know that we do not think this TV channel is suitable for such a commercial hotel, like yours. It is probably totally wrong for you to have it. Further more we think it has been damaging the business image of your hotel chain severely.
After a short searching on the internet, you will easily find out that "Xin Tang Ren TV" belongs to a half religious(actually it has nothing to do with the definition of religion!), half political oriented sect called "Falun Gong"(the words mean "Magic Wheel Effect Sect" ). This sect started some 12 years ago in mainland China as one of thousands of new ways for people to reach better health and understanding of life. But only 3-4 years later, since it developed to be more and more extreme in its practicing rituals(details on internet), it soon draw the attention of the Chinese State Security. Finally it resulted that the Chinese government decided to outlaw it totally(further infomation obtained from governmental offices).
Its leader - Mr. Li Hong Zhi, fled to the U.S.A.. And since then, like all other politically active Chinese dicidents living abroad, he got all possible supports from all different sources, and of course, the all the supports he got are not unconditional. One of the main conditions is supposed to be that his "Magic Wheel Effect Sect" has to do things against the national interests of China (better seen on internet). The Falun Gong sect members, as known from all sources, are more likely to use very radical ways to make them heard or seen(as shown by photo copies incl.). During this whole mess, most normal Scandinavians are hopelessly not able to find out what is right or wrong inside this Chinese internal, political, cultural, social, historical and traditional complicities.
It has since caused a lot of misunderstanding among the people who saw "Magic Wheel Effect Sect" members put up their shows everywhere in the public places. But thank God, now, after Singapore, which is a western oriented democratic country, and with Chinese culture and language, got it forbidden a few years ago due to similar reasons, the western countries and normal western people are becoming more knowlegable what the "Magic Wheel Effect Sect" is about. But on the other hand, the "Magic Wheel Effect Sect" puts Singapore on its hate-list as well (better seen on internet, or you can obtain more official comment from the embassies).
We do not want to make further description of this deformed "Magic Wheel Effect Sect", because we are so crystal clear that, here in Scandinavian countries, the people are so lucky to live so freely, and to have so many liberal ideas about anything they may come up with in their lifes. We also know, for example, it is even totally OK to become a not quite beloved New Nazist, an ultra extreme Islamist, an antisocial type of Scientologist, a strangely-thinking Johovas witness or just openly express negatively about anything the government does etc......
But please do forgive me to ask you - the so successful Choice Hotel Headquarter Office Manager this easy and personal question: "Do you think it is also OK to let all TV programs, with all those above mentioned "fresh and fanatic" ideology ideas, be shown on your private-owned Hotel-TV programs non-stop, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year??" The answer is easy to give, isn´t it?
Finally, we will encourage you to remove the "Xin Tang Ren TV" immediately and for ever from the Quality Panorama Hotel in Gothenburg, Sweden. If you need to find a new Chinese language TV program for your normal Chinese speaking guests, you simply need to make a call and ask your partners or friends like Scandic Hotel and Clarion Hotel in Oslo, Stockholm or Copenhagen.
Anyhow, We hope by our heart that this letter will bring us tighter to understand each other on more equal bases, and lead us to find some truly respectable, realistic and positive life values from both of our different cultures.
Zhao Meng
Directer of TM Vision ApS, Denmark
Contact person of the worrying group
http://www.randi.org/jr/08-03-01.html
August 3, 2001
About Falun Gong, Wrong Saint, Yet More Geller Boo-Boos, Light on Buxton, Clarifying the JREF Challenge, KKK.....
The cult of Falun Gong is hardly different from so many of the numerous science-bashing movements, but this one is of note because it has taken in so many citizens of the world's most populous country, China. Other countries, too, have been infected by the nonsense behind it, and as with the Sai Baba cult of India, this one threatens to spread worldwide.
The Chinese government's concern with the popularity of Falun Gong is much more than political, I believe. Being very realistic, it's a fact that any pseudoscience, any superstition, any cult action, is a negative element in any society. And, when an individual assumes the position of a deity, there will always be enough persons to support him or her simply because of the charisma generated. Sai Baba - previously discussed in detail here - appeals to the masses because he performs a few crude sleight-of-hand tricks. Elizabeth Clare Prophet, of the Church Universal and Triumphant in the USA, bases her support on hyperbolized claims of imminent invasion from aliens of various kinds, and even though her promised events of this sort have failed to take place, she still holds her followers in a state of armed fear. Jim Jones and the People's Temple flourished due to the followers' terror of an outside world they did not understand. Falun Gong simply denies science, appeals to venerated Chinese traditions, and uses the fictional façade created by founder Li Hongzhi, as well as his also-failed predictions, as a romantic base for acceptance.
Li started out by changing his own birthdate to something more suitable for a deity. July 7th, 1952, was not an auspicious date, so he maneuvered local officials into giving him an I.D. card that says May 13th, 1951. Since Chinese tradition has the birthday of Buddha as the eighth day of the fourth lunar month, which is May 13th, this provided Li with a basis for divinity. His preposterous comic-book claims range from bringing all his disciples to fly in the sky, to the fact that all things are composed of water. He commands his followers to denounce all science, and to ignore doctors and medicine of all kinds. He says that he himself made his own grandparents. It goes on and on.
Li, now living comfortably in New York, supported by the wealth he has sucked from his disciples, is another nobody who seized an opportunity to become powerful and rich on the naivety of a populace. I differ with the government of China on political matters, but not on this humanitarian catastrophe.
The national constitution of China, while rejecting religion, states that all citizens have freedom of religious belief. They are constitutionally protected from forceful interference with their religious practice. The government encourages "democratic discussion" and "persuasive education," and Mao Tse-tung himself wrote that religions could not be abolished by decree or by force. That's what the official rules say. As with all such official stances, we must wonder if in practice it is the same.
Presently, we find an active movement - largely sponsored and promoted by Li Hongzhi's movement - that criticizes the official Chinese stance on Falun Gong, stating that it is an evil influence. My last visit to Australia produced an effective demonstration by my good friend and colleague Sima Nan, a man who has been very active in fighting superstition and pseudoscience in China. That appearance was preceded by an official representative of the Chinese government, a man who rather chilled the entire event with his repetitious reference to "the evil cult of Falun Gong." It was not at all welcome to that audience to hear such formulated recitations as, "The government of the People's Republic of China look upon the evil cult of Falun Gong as an evil force that denies the validity of science as embraced by the government of the People's Republic of China and the evil cult of Falun Gong has been teaching citizens of the People's Republic of China that the philosophy of the evil cult of Falun Gong is the means by which...." well, you get the idea. By simply demonstrating some of the side-show tricks that Falun Gong teachers use, Sima Nan was a hundred times as effective as any formula speech, believe me.
Go to www.falundafa.org and see what's offered. You'll find "How to Get Started," "Exercises." and "Common Questions," but not a word about the basic claims of the religion. You come away with the idea that this is a series of stately exercises performed in the park, not a science-bashing, fanatic, irrational, cult. The pages of L. Ron Hubbard's Scientology sites give the same kind of an impression, with no mention of the blue octopi in the volcanoes that eventually show up in their creed if you can pay long and bountifully enough.
The Danger of Promoting
Falun Gong
by Sanal Edamaruku
08. October 2004
Is Falun Gong a harmless crazy sect spreading meaningless spiritual gibberish and recommending slow motion exercises on which the repressive Chinese government cracks down brutally? Is the sort of pseudo-science it propagates tolerable nonsense only? The reports that appear in western media about the Falun Gong give the impression that the group is treated as a convenient political alternative fit to be promoted to tackle China and what China represents. For those who remember the days when progressive forces all over the world supported the movement of Ayatollah Khomeini against the repressive Shah of Iran, the present consensus of the west in its support of the Falun Gong movement is spine chilling. The outcome, if it finds its goals, may be disastrous in the history of human civilization.
Falun Gong has wider dimensions than the Jim Jones cult in Guyana, assorted bearded Indian gurus in the U S with fleets of Rolls Royce or the Texas based Branch Davidians. Falun Gong claims about 100 million followers worldwide. It discourages modern medical treatment or consultation with physicians. If the figures provided by the Chinese government are to be believed, more than 1500 people have already died unnecessarily as a result of spurning proper medical treatment. The claims of Falun Gong to win the gullible are amazing. Magical cures from recovery from advanced terminal cancer to deferring menopause are claimed and believed. There are reports that Falun believers have been coerced into slitting open their stomachs to look for the ‘wheel of law’.
Falun Gong gets its name from Fa Lun Da Fa, which is the precise name of the sect meaning "Law Wheel Big Way". The gullible falling in the trap of Falun Gong cut across several sections of Chinese population. The sect has long lunatic fringe and strange beliefs. The moon, for example, for the followers of Falun Gong, was constructed as an observation post for moon-making beings that live inside the moon closer to the back, and often fly out to watch earthings’ activities.
The leader of Falun Gong, Li Hongzhi, lives in New York. In 1992 Hongzhi developed a cosmic theory which reads like a fine blend of Book of Revelations and Star Wars. High level beings that represent the sinister are on one side. Dafa, the positive force is represented terrestrially by Hongzhi and his followers. Dafa has boundless inner meanings and has created everything at each level of the cosmos. Hongzhi periodically proclaims the imminence of the Consummation, an apocalypse that will cleanse the cosmos of vile forces and create a utopia for those who remain. He has also written about his ability to fly, powers of X-ray vision and other supernatural powers.
Falun Gong is much more than the crazy claims of a phony sect leader. Such movements can have more dangerous influence than one can imagine. China itself had the history of an apocalyptic cult taking millions of people for a ride. During the Qing dynasty in the 19th century, Hong Xiuquan, a peasant, claimed that he was the younger brother of Jesus and gathered an army of god-worshipping faithful. The rebellion led by him swept northwards and established a base for its putative New Jerusalem in Nanjing. They remained in control from 1853 to 1864 until a combined force of Qing and foreign troops overthrew them. Till then, more than 20 million people had lost their lives through battle or starvation.
Despite the political differences with China, civilization demands that China be helped to handle the Falun Gong crisis. China too should understand that suppression, banning or brutality are not the ways to face the challenge of this dangerous sect. Scientific education and the promotion of scientific temper are the tools in this fight against spiritual craziness. China deserves the support of the progressive world in this endeavor. Falun Gong is a threat against common sense and the achievements of modern civilization.
Kilde:
Para-nyt 2001 nr. 3
Fra: Rationalist International Bulletin # 50 (3 October, 2000)
The Danger of Promoting
Falun Gong
by Sanal Edamaruku
08. October 2004
Is Falun Gong a harmless crazy sect spreading meaningless spiritual gibberish and recommending slow motion exercises on which the repressive Chinese government cracks down brutally? Is the sort of pseudo-science it propagates tolerable nonsense only? The reports that appear in western media about the Falun Gong give the impression that the group is treated as a convenient political alternative fit to be promoted to tackle China and what China represents. For those who remember the days when progressive forces all over the world supported the movement of Ayatollah Khomeini against the repressive Shah of Iran, the present consensus of the west in its support of the Falun Gong movement is spine chilling. The outcome, if it finds its goals, may be disastrous in the history of human civilization.
Falun Gong has wider dimensions than the Jim Jones cult in Guyana, assorted bearded Indian gurus in the U S with fleets of Rolls Royce or the Texas based Branch Davidians. Falun Gong claims about 100 million followers worldwide. It discourages modern medical treatment or consultation with physicians. If the figures provided by the Chinese government are to be believed, more than 1500 people have already died unnecessarily as a result of spurning proper medical treatment. The claims of Falun Gong to win the gullible are amazing. Magical cures from recovery from advanced terminal cancer to deferring menopause are claimed and believed. There are reports that Falun believers have been coerced into slitting open their stomachs to look for the ‘wheel of law’.
Falun Gong gets its name from Fa Lun Da Fa, which is the precise name of the sect meaning "Law Wheel Big Way". The gullible falling in the trap of Falun Gong cut across several sections of Chinese population. The sect has long lunatic fringe and strange beliefs. The moon, for example, for the followers of Falun Gong, was constructed as an observation post for moon-making beings that live inside the moon closer to the back, and often fly out to watch earthings’ activities.
The leader of Falun Gong, Li Hongzhi, lives in New York. In 1992 Hongzhi developed a cosmic theory which reads like a fine blend of Book of Revelations and Star Wars. High level beings that represent the sinister are on one side. Dafa, the positive force is represented terrestrially by Hongzhi and his followers. Dafa has boundless inner meanings and has created everything at each level of the cosmos. Hongzhi periodically proclaims the imminence of the Consummation, an apocalypse that will cleanse the cosmos of vile forces and create a utopia for those who remain. He has also written about his ability to fly, powers of X-ray vision and other supernatural powers.
Falun Gong is much more than the crazy claims of a phony sect leader. Such movements can have more dangerous influence than one can imagine. China itself had the history of an apocalyptic cult taking millions of people for a ride. During the Qing dynasty in the 19th century, Hong Xiuquan, a peasant, claimed that he was the younger brother of Jesus and gathered an army of god-worshipping faithful. The rebellion led by him swept northwards and established a base for its putative New Jerusalem in Nanjing. They remained in control from 1853 to 1864 until a combined force of Qing and foreign troops overthrew them. Till then, more than 20 million people had lost their lives through battle or starvation.
Despite the political differences with China, civilization demands that China be helped to handle the Falun Gong crisis. China too should understand that suppression, banning or brutality are not the ways to face the challenge of this dangerous sect. Scientific education and the promotion of scientific temper are the tools in this fight against spiritual craziness. China deserves the support of the progressive world in this endeavor. Falun Gong is a threat against common sense and the achievements of modern civilization.
Kilde:
Para-nyt 2001 nr. 3
Fra: Rationalist International Bulletin # 50 (3 October, 2000)
http://medvetenhet.blogspot.com/2007/04/ateism-och-den-kinesiska-galenskapen.html
den 30 april 2007
Ateism och Den Kinesiska Galenskapen
I Kina hålls nästa år de Olympiska Spelen. Hur ser det egentligen ut i landet? Amnesty har levererat en purfärsk rapport om tillståndet i landet och vad som görs för att polera upp fasaden i världens största ideologiskt dogmatiska stat.
Dagens Nyheter rapporterar en bråkdel av vad som ingår i rapporten.
För den hugade som väljer att läsa större delar av rapporten är det en i sanning bedrövlig bild som framträder. Inte för att jag har haft någon rosenskimmrande tro på ett gulligt gosigt Kina tidigare, men när man läser rapporten så kommer allt på en gång. Det är inte roligt.
I korta drag kan ju sägas att Kina har beslutat att minska ner sina gigantiskt höga avrättningssiffror (för några år sedan uppskattades antalet avrättade till runt 10000 per år. Dock är jag osäker på vad det byggde på) genom att låta Högsta Domstolen bli enda instans som får utdöma dödsstraff. Dessutom släpps förbudet för journalister att resa fritt i landet en smula, dock enbart temporärt, och enbart för journalister som redan är stationerade där, så vitt jag har sett i rapporten.
Religionsfrågan:
För att styra in det hela en smula på frågan om religion och ateism, så kan man se att Kina fortsatt håller på att spärra in Falun Gong-anhängare och andra religiösa grupper, då dessa anses ägna sig åt samhällsomstörtande verksamhet. Detta är, naturligtvis, helt galet.
Falun Gong är en spännande sekt. De påminner lite om Scientologerna i det att deras "bakgrundshistoria" är fascinerande: Ledaren har uttalat sig själv som en gud, hans medlemmar kan bli gudar, och de har en apokalyptisk ådra som får en att må illa. Ledaren uttalade sig 2003 om SARS epedemin som "The first round of cleansing" och att hans kommande "Fa-rectification" snart skall svepa över hela världen, precis som SARS fast drabba alla som inte är med i hans gigantiska sekt. Sådant här får ju nackhåren att resa sig på varje nykter sekulär person och jämförelsen med de fundamentalistiskt kristna i USA är mycket svår att avhålla sig ifrån. Prominenta personer som Jerry Falwell, med mycket stor makt och inflytande i amerikansk politik, som talar vitt och brett om AIDS som Guds straff mot homosexuella, osv. Ja, jargongen känns igen.
Åh, vad jag önskar att Falun Gong bara var en uppsättning mysiga morgongymnastikövningar. Vad mycket bättre det hade varit då.
Nyktert tänkande:
Som ateist med humanistiska värderingar är det med tungt hjärta man inser att debattsugna teiser kommer att komma dragandes med "I Kina är man ateister och där låser man in religiösa och avrättar folk, se hur elak ateismen är" om och om igen. Tyvärr är det bara att spänna fast säkerhetsbältet och kontinuerligt påpeka att ateism inte är ett sammanhängande trosystem och peka på Det Stora Kategorifelet.
Både Humanisterna och representanter för religiösa grupper bör rikta skarp kritik mot det människovidriga samhällsskick som råder i Kina idag. Detta är ingen "tro vs icke-tro"-fråga, det är en fråga om vilket människovärde vi anser skall råda i världen. Att peka på fördelarna med större respekt för mänskligt liv och större respekt för mänskligt tänkande och talande är en i sanning gudibehaglig gärning och för en gångs skull bör sekulära och religiösa grupper ställa upp på enad front mot den kinesiska galenskapen.
Upplagd av Henrik på 08:01
Etiketter: kina ateism människovärde
2 kommentarer:
Anonym sa...
Du verkar ha missförstått Falun Gong. Falun Gong är inte en "sekt", såsom du kallar det. Falun Gong är en meditationsmetod med en filosofisk ideologi. Såvitt jag förstår det går ideologin ut på att man ska förbättra sig och bli en bättre människa genom att följa Sanning-Medkänsla-Tålamod. Boken finns gratis att ladda ner på svenska på FalunDafa.org. Du borde läsa den innan du uttalar dig om Falun Gong.
den 1 maj 2007 23:06
Henrik sa...
Anonym: Det är fint att du vill utbilda mig, men jag vet faktiskt vad det är jag talar om. När jag jämförde Falun Gong med Scientologerna så var det inte utan anledning: Båda har nämligen olika nivåer av inlärning, olika nivåer av hemliga lärosteg, osv. Om du inte kommit tillräckligt långt in i sekten för att lära dig det här så går det utmärkt att googla.
Jag rekommenderar t.ex: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_and_controversies_about_Falun_Gong
Där man dessutom kan läsa om Li Hongzis rasism, om hans apolyptiska visioner, och allt möjligt annat som bara kan sägas höra hemma i en kult eller en sekt.
Fortsätt du göra rörelserna, de är inte skadliga. Men ge dem inga mer pengar och gå inte på fler möten.
den 1 maj 2007 23:30
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