China
A major persecution is looming over China. Though it will be different – less bloody, more hi-tech – it will be just as insidious as that of Mao’s Cultural Revolution.
During the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976) Chairman Mao Zedong identified “five black categories”: landlords, rich farmers, counter-revolutionaries, evil influences (bad elements) and Rightists.
Deemed “enemies” of the communist revolution, members of these “five black categories” had to be neutralised – i.e., persecuted, re-educated and, if necessary, eliminated – for the revolution to succeed.
After the Tiananmen Square massacre (June 1989), the fall of the Berlin Wall (November 1989), the collapse of Communism across Eastern Europe and the disintegration of the Soviet Union (1990-1991), the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) knew it needed a new narrative to legitimise its rule and unite the people.
Since the early 1990s – courtesy of the CCP’s Patriotic Education Campaign – a new narrative has been taught in schools and universities across the nation. In what is essentially a radical reinterpretation of China’s history, the Marxist narrative of class struggle has been replaced with an ultra-nationalist narrative of national struggle.
The new narrative is two-fold, covering:
(1) National Humiliation. Beginning with the Opium Wars (from 1839), China suffered 100 years of humiliation at the hands of hostile, imperialistic, foreign [i.e. Western] forces;
(2) National Rejuvenation. Since the founding of the People's Republic (1949) the Communist Party has been leading China on a 100-year marathon to restore the nation to global supremacy. Hostile foreign forces – i.e., the West – are the problem/enemy, for which the CCP is the solution/saviour. To be patriotic, to love China, is to love the CCP.
On 31 July 2012 an overseas edition of the People’s Daily (the official mouthpiece of the Central Committee of the CCP) identified “five new black categories”: human rights lawyers, underground religious practitioners, dissidents, commentators who influence opinions via the internet and disadvantaged social groups.
According to the CCP, members of these “five new black categories” are in “collusion” with “hostile, foreign [i.e. Western] forces” with the aim of ending Communist Party rule.
Consequently, members of these “five new black categories” will need to be neutralised – i.e., persecuted, re-educated and, if necessary, eliminated – if the China Dream is to be realised.
To that end, the CCP has established a “labyrinthine, all-weather, 24-hour quasi-police-state apparatus to keep even ordinary citizens under control”
(1) National Humiliation. Beginning with the Opium Wars (from 1839), China suffered 100 years of humiliation at the hands of hostile, imperialistic, foreign [i.e. Western] forces;
(2) National Rejuvenation. Since the founding of the People's Republic (1949) the Communist Party has been leading China on a 100-year marathon to restore the nation to global supremacy. Hostile foreign forces – i.e., the West – are the problem/enemy, for which the CCP is the solution/saviour. To be patriotic, to love China, is to love the CCP.
On 31 July 2012 an overseas edition of the People’s Daily (the official mouthpiece of the Central Committee of the CCP) identified “five new black categories”: human rights lawyers, underground religious practitioners, dissidents, commentators who influence opinions via the internet and disadvantaged social groups.
According to the CCP, members of these “five new black categories” are in “collusion” with “hostile, foreign [i.e. Western] forces” with the aim of ending Communist Party rule.
Consequently, members of these “five new black categories” will need to be neutralised – i.e., persecuted, re-educated and, if necessary, eliminated – if the China Dream is to be realised.
To that end, the CCP has established a “labyrinthine, all-weather, 24-hour quasi-police-state apparatus to keep even ordinary citizens under control”
(1) National Humiliation. Beginning with the Opium Wars (from 1839), China suffered 100 years of humiliation at the hands of hostile, imperialistic, foreign [i.e. Western] forces;
(2) National Rejuvenation. Since the founding of the People's Republic (1949) the Communist Party has been leading China on a 100-year marathon to restore the nation to global supremacy. Hostile foreign forces – i.e., the West – are the problem/enemy, for which the CCP is the solution/saviour. To be patriotic, to love China, is to love the CCP.
On 31 July 2012 an overseas edition of the People’s Daily (the official mouthpiece of the Central Committee of the CCP) identified “five new black categories”: human rights lawyers, underground religious practitioners, dissidents, commentators who influence opinions via the internet and disadvantaged social groups.
According to the CCP, members of these “five new black categories” are in “collusion” with “hostile, foreign [i.e. Western] forces” with the aim of ending Communist Party rule.
Consequently, members of these “five new black categories” will need to be neutralised – i.e., persecuted, re-educated and, if necessary, eliminated – if the China Dream is to be realised.
To that end, the CCP has established a “labyrinthine, all-weather, 24-hour quasi-police-state apparatus to keep even ordinary citizens under control”
GAO ZHISHENG
Internationally acclaimed human rights lawyer and religious liberty advocate Gao Zhisheng has been “disappeared” repeatedly since his first abduction in November 2004. His human rights and religious liberty advocacy had brought him into contact with persecuted Christians, and it was during these early persecutions, that Gao converted to Protestant Christianity. A torture survivor, Gao is doubtless China’s most severely persecuted Christian. [Chronology by Human Rights Watch, to August 2014.]
In August 2014, when Gao Zhisheng emerged from three years secret detention, much of that in solitary confinement, he was a shadow of his former self; indeed many surmised he’d been “utterly destroyed”.
Subsequently placed under house arrest, isolated and denied access to medical care, Gao could have withered and died; but he did not. Instead, he rallied and threw his energy into secret writing. Defying serious health issues and intensive supervision, he was able to write both a memoir and a 40-page human rights report while working on a new constitution. Smuggled out of the country at great risk, Gao’s secret writings have since been published.
Recommended:
Unwavering Convictions
Gao Zhisheng’s memoir, published in Taiwan in Chinese in June 2016 and in the US in English in January 2017.
An English translation of his 40-page report, “2016 Human Rights Report for China”, was published in October 2017. Briefing and summary & Full Text .
Gao’s current status: he has been “disappeared” since November 2017.
See: Christian advocate confined in an “infinite darkness”
-- the plight of Gao Zhisheng
By Elizabeth Kendal, Religious Liberty Prayer Bulletin,15 November 2017.
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