PureInsight | April 6, 2019
[PureInsight.org]
The Third Event
The third documentary screening, themed “Forced Organ Harvesting in China and Its Effect on the U.S.”, was held in the Byrne Memorial Hall on the Spring Hill College campus on the afternoon of October 26, 2018. The Byrne Memorial Hall is not impressively large or grandiose, but the ceiling is pretty high, so it feels fairly spacious. There’re quite a few big windows which let plenty of sunlight in the hall. The settings inside the hall are simple yet elegant, emanating some traditional academic feeling. It’s undoubtedly an ideal venue for such an event. This time we got more people in the audience, than either of the precious two events, including both students and teachers. And Kyle also got more friends to help. And even the food catered was of a bigger variety and higher quality.
This time Kyle formally worked as a host, and, at the very beginning of the event, introduced himself, David Matas, Weldon, and me, and then very briefly the process of the screening event, thus making the event very formal and professional. Then the short documentary The Persecution of Falun Gong was screened. Matas gave his speech right after the documentary. This time he started from a more personal perspective, compared to his first speech that day, explaining how he got from initially knowing nothing about Falun Gong, the persecution and forced organ harvesting of Falun Gong practitioners, to starting to investigate the communist regime’s genocide with barely any clue available, and further to drawing an undeniable conclusion of the existence and evilness of forced organ harvesting in China. Then Weldon made his speech. And I did mine right after him.
My Speech
Knowing that I got plenty of time to talk, I decided to make some relevant and decent opening remarks first so as to be emotionally connected with the audience and show my gratitude to Kyle. I stepped to the podium, adjusted the microphone, looked at the audience with a smile and started my speech.
“Hi, everyone! My name is Roy Manning. And I’m currently living in Salt Lake City, Utah. Actually, this is my first time to be in Alabama. I like it here. (Everyone smiled.) I like the mild weather, the greenness, the food — (Leaning a bit closer to the microphone) delicious food, … (They all laughed.) and above all, the great people here, especially you guys. (All laughed again, happily.) It’s such a pity I have to leave this evening and don't get to know you guys better. But since yesterday, I’ve got to know Kyle a bit. Wow, he’s such a great guy! I can’t thank him enough for playing such an essential role in making this happen! I bet he has done tons of work to get everything ready for this. I know it requires altruism, determination, dedication, patience, and various abilities or talent to do such a great job. I find that his intelligent and rational mind, and more importantly, his exceptionally pure and righteous heart, are so admirable! (Leaning closer to the microphone again) Make friends with Kyle. (Everyone laughed and turned to warmly look at Kyle who sitting at the front left corner. I smiled and looked at them and then Kyle.) He’d be one of the best buddies that you could ever have in your life. I know each of you here is equally great. (“Ha ha…” Everyone was amused and burst into laughter heartily.) It’s just that, I need more time to know you guys better.
“I am really honored and humbled to be here to tell you what happened to me. Back in August 2013 I left China and came to the States, and then applied for asylum, because back in China I was illegally arrested three times, detained three times, and jailed in the labor camp for one and a half years. (Everyone looked very serious and attentive.) I guess now you’ve already figured out why I was persecuted so badly by the Chinese communist regime. Yes, the reason was very simple yet extremely ridiculous — just because I’m a Falun Dafa practitioner. Then why does the communist regime hate Falun Dafa so much and persecute Falun Dafa practitioners so viciously? So far you’ve already got a pretty deep understanding of it, I believe, but I still would like to share my understanding: The fundamental reason is that the communist regime is way too evil to stand the universal values Truthfulness, Compassion, and Tolerance that we Falun Dafa cultivators follow.
“Falun Dafa is the formal name of this great practice. It’s more widely known as Falun Gong. It’s a spiritual practice of mind and body, not a religion although many people consider it as one and in the Western world it falls into the category of religion. No church or temple, no membership, no charge or solicitation for donation. It keeps you free of disease and makes you age much slower than normal. Many Falun Dafa practitioners used to have serious diseases like cancer, heart disease, diabetes, etc.. But a few weeks or even just several days after they started the practice, their diseases miraculously disappeared. The practice is really amazing for healing and fitness. This is the physical part of Falun Dafa’s wonderfulness.
“Yet what I’m more attracted to is the spiritual part of it. The traditional Chinese culture which lasted five thousand years was truly great. Sadly enough, it’s systematically destroyed by the evil regime. There were three major pillars in that culture. Do you know what they were, by any chance? (I looked around. Nobody answered and some of them shook their heads.) Actually, most Chinese people don't know it, either, owing to the regime’s purposeful destruction of the culture. They were Buddhism, Daoism and Confucianism. By the way, speaking of Confucianism, you might think of those Confucius Institutes. Currently there’re two or three of them in Alabama. … (I wasn't sure and turned to Weldon. “Two.” He said.) Yes, two of them. Those are one of the Chinese communist regime’s tactics of expanding its ideological, political, cultural and economic turf in the world in the name of Confucius. They are dangerous and must be shut down. You can find the essence of the traditional Chinese culture in Falun Dafa, but in fact this practice is far beyond that culture. If you really do look into it, you’ll see that it is boundlessly broad, profound, and also tremendously beneficial to the world. Let’s think in a very simple way about how great it is. Truthfulness, Compassion, and Tolerance is the fundamental characteristic or principle of Falun Dafa. If everyone in society were to be really truthful, compassionate and tolerant, the whole society would be totally different. There wouldn't even be any police because everyone would discipline themselves and people wouldn't have to ensue justice. (Some in the audience nodded.) How great would that be!
“It is exactly these great physical and spiritual benefits that make this practice so appealing to people inside and outside of China, including America. Falun Dafa was made public in 1992. There’s no advertisement at all and people just spread it heart to heart, mouth to mouth. And seven short years later in 1999, the number of Falun Dafa practitioners rocketed from zero to about 100 million. Back then there were about 66 million Chinese Communist Party members. So we far outnumbered them. It was undoubtedly good for that society as so many people were following Truthfulness, Compassion and Tolerance instead of the vicious Party’s propaganda. But the regime was terrified by this. It was terrified for a crucial reason. The Party is evil to its core and maintains its power based on lies/propaganda, atheism and violence, which is completely opposite to the universal value Truthfulness, Compassion, and Tolerance. If everyone, or maybe not everyone but most people, in China, were to genuinely practice Truthfulness, Compassion and Tolerance, nobody would join such an evil party and even those party members would renounce it. Then the evil Party would have no foothold in that society and completely disappear in a short while. How come the regime could bear such scary potential possibility? Absolutely not. Back in 1999 the then ringleader of the regime Jiang Zemin who is totally evil rampantly announced to “ruin Falun Gong practitioners’ reputation, cut off their financial source, and destroy their bodies”. In order to wipe us out, he colluded with the Party and launched the persecution of Falun Gong in July 1999
“I guess you guys know that in China all the media are firmly owned and controlled by the regime and there’s not even a single private one. All the media serve as the evil regime’s mouthpiece, slandering, attacking and demonizing Falun Dafa and its practitioners day and night, brainwashing and poisoning over a billion Chinese people who don't practice Falun Dafa, especially when the persecution started, in order to incite hatred among them against Falun Dafa and legitimize the persecution. Falun Dafa practitioners are completely voiceless on the media. It is extremely dangerous when most people, due to the regime’s brainwash, harbor hatred toward such a group of good and kind people. I find that in this society, most people are so nice. They have normal and rational mentalities and can discern right from wrong and virtue from vice. You guys are perfect examples. But in China, things are astonishingly different: The great traditional culture has been destroyed by the evil regime; people’s mentalities have thus been terribly messed up and distorted; and their moral values have alarmingly collapsed. Falun Dafa practitioners are without a doubt the best people in that society. However, these best people, these elites, are being persecuted and killed by the evil regime and hated by the rest of society. Don't you think it’s absolutely dangerous for the whole society? Therefore, Falun Dafa practitioners try their best to clarify the truth to people in various hard ways. One way is to go to the government to peacefully appeal although they are always illegally arrested, jailed and even killed for doing this.
“On October 1, 2000, I went to Beijing to peacefully appeal for Falun Dafa but ended up being illegally arrested right at Tiananmen Square. I was taken to the police station, interrogated and brutally tortured. (Everyone was looking at me sadly.) Three cops, two male and one female, tortured me together. They cuffed me to a chair and kept beating me with batons. The female cop even threatened to smash my genitals with the baton in her hand. At about midnight, they forced me to take of my clothes, pushed me to the yard, cuffed me to a wire fence in the yard and left me there naked for a while. Later they took me back to the room and started beating me up again, and tortured me in some other ways. The most vicious cop just bluntly said to me that they would crush me both physically and psychologically to make me give up the practice. It was so devastating… (I paused and saw some wipe tears.) and I literally felt that I was being tortured to death…
“I was illegally arrested twice in 2011, once in July and then in October. In October 2011 I went to Beijing to visit some local fellow practitioners. The police followed some of the practitioners for a while and broke into their apartment and illegally arrested them exactly the day I went there. I knew nothing about what’s going on and the police were still in the apartment when I knocked on the door. And I was immediately arrested just for being a Falun Dafa practitioner and visiting my friends. I was sentenced to the labor camp. In the labor camp I was mistreated in various ways, both physically and mentally, and was also forced to do slave labor, including weaving patio chairs which were to be exported to some countries very likely including the States.
“More horribly, I was subjected to at least four blood tests and some physical check-ups which were focused on my organs and corneas. The evil regime has illegally detained and imprisoned a huge number of Falun Dafa practitioners, gathered the information of their blood types, organs, and established a large database to serve live organ harvesting. If a CCP’s official wants to have new organs, or if someone tells one of the hospitals in mainland China that he or she needs a heart or liver transplant, those doctors working for the regime will go to the database and find a match or even more than one in case the transplant surgery fails, and then kill the practitioners for their organs. So, basically the regime systematically kills on demand! The live organ source is so huge that the wait time for a heart, liver or kidney is within two weeks or even just several days! In order to get fresh organs, they… (Starting to choke.) cut the victims open… alive… without anesthesia… (Bursting into tears, gasping heavily, and pausing for several seconds.) After the killing, those murders would throw the victims’ bodies into the furnace or sell them to body processing factories to be processed for human body exhibits. (Gasping again.) Please, never ever go to human body exhibits — they are… (Leaning to the microphone, speaking resolutely) evil! (Pausing.) I suffered the persecution, but even so, it’s still impossible for me to imagine the unbearable pain those victims suffered! ... (Choking again.)
“Undoubtedly, the data of my blood type and organs was in the database, which meant that I was on the black list for live organ harvesting. I didn't know how close I was to being killed for my organs. The time I spent in the detention center and then the labor camp was the longest, most horrible and desperate nightmare in my life! I felt so desperate and didn't even know if I could get out of the labor camp on my own feet. I suffered great losses in multiple ways. I lost a lot of hair, but fortunately, I didn't lose my organs, and didn't lose my life. I survived. In late April 2013 when the notorious labor camp system in communist China had to be gradually abolished because of the pressure from the international community especially the States, I was unconditionally released although I refused to give up Falun Dafa. As a matter of fact, many Falun Dafa practitioners jailed in labor camps were transferred to prisons or brainwash centers. I was one of the lucky ones.
“Compared to those Falun Dafa practitioners who have been persecuted even worse, and especially those who have been brutally murdered, what I went through was actually minor. Those who have been murdered are completely voiceless and will never have a chance to tell the world what happened to them. As a witness and survivor of the persecution and genocide, I feel huge responsibility and obligation to be a tiny voice of those voiceless, to speak out on their behalf and raise awareness. Awareness is powerful, more powerful than we might imagine it to be.
“Please share this with your family, friends, classmates, and colleagues face to face or via any other channel, because I strongly believe that, the more people in the world know about the truth, the sooner we can put an end to this appalling persecution and genocide.
“The evil, anti-human regime must be brought to justice; those perpetrators and murderers must and will pay for what they have committed!
“(Leaning to the microphone) Thank you so much! (I earnestly looked at the whole audience while slowly stepping away from the podium, hands firmly holding on to each other in front of my chest. Everybody applauded sincerely and warmly for a while, looking at me with shocked, sad and grateful expressions in their eyes.)”
On the 27th I started to write my speech out by memory after coming back from Alabama. Some minor changes and adjustments were made while writing, but the whole written speech is very close to what I actually said to the audience.
