View America's Double Standard on Human Rights from Its Attitude Toward the "Falun Gong" Cult

By Xinhua News Agency Special Commentator

Some anti-China elements in the United States have been interfering in China's internal affairs under the guise of "safeguarding human rights." Since July 1999, when the Chinese government banned "Falun Gong" according to law, the anti-China forces in the United States have quickly taken up the cult as a new card in their anti-China campaign on human rights. On November 18, the US House of Representatives adopted a bill put forward by some anti-China congressmen, demanding that the US government to put pressure on Chin on the issue of "Falun Gong." The proposal was passed "unanimously" in the presence of only seven or eight congressmen, as the Congress was about to recess.

On March 23, 2000, the representative of the US government attacked all those countries that are not to the taste of the United States at the UN Human Rights Commission Conference in Geneva, and in the attack on China, the representative linked the "Falun Gong" cult with the issue of human rights. To use the "Falun Gong" issue to interfere in China's internal affairs has, for a time, become a hot topic among the American anti-China elements.

It is widely known that the "Falun Gong" is a cult that has forcibly indoctrinated its practitioners with Li Hongzhi's heretic theories and brainwashed them with its peculiar "spiritual" beliefs, which have done irreparable emotional and physical damage to them. To date, more than 1,500 "Falun Gong" practitioners have died as a result of following the heretic teachings of Li Hongzhi, while many other "Falun Gong" believers have gone insane, been disowned by their families and even committed murder. Meanwhile, the "Falun Gong" ring leaders have frequently instigated illegal gatherings to protest against those who have voiced different views, encroaching upon others' right of the person and endangering social stability. Some in the United States have intentionally turn a deaf ear toward these facts and give support to the "Falun Gong" cult that is acting against human rights and humanity. Have they forgotten their own slogan of "protecting human rights" that they chant every day? The US government, which knows clearly what infringement a cult can bring on the American people's human rights, has never been softhearted when cracking down on cults on their own land.

According to media report, on May 13, 1985, in a siege against a local cult group in Philadelphia, the US police used helicopters to drop C-4 explosives, killing 11 people, including five children. A total of 60 families were destroyed during the police action. On February 28, 1993, dozens of US federal marshals and FBI agents, together with 450 armed police officers and soldiers, scores of tanks, armored vehicles and helicopters, joined in a massive assault on a branch of the Davidian cult organization at Waco, Texas. Eighty-six cult members died in fires.

The US government, which is keenly aware of the threat a cult poses to social order and the normal life of people, has resorted to judicial and administrative means and even used armed forces to crack down on domestic cult groups. This shows that the "human rights guardians" in the United States fully understand the dangerous nature of any cult and they did not put forward any human rights motions when they themselves employed armed police officers, tanks, armored vehicles and helicopters in the attacks against cults and even when the headquarters of the cult groups were leveled to the ground. To the "human rights guardians" in the United States, all these are acceptable. Yet, when the Chinese government merely legally banned a cult group in China that had not followed the legal procedures in registration, the anti-China forces in the United States had made much uproar. "You're infringing on human rights," shouted anti-China elements in the United States.

While the United States is allowed to set a fire, China is not allowed to light a lamp. This is the so-called principle of human rights upheld by these people. It indicates that the United States has adopted a double standard on the issue of human rights, and their sole aim is to serve the United States' interests.

People with a little common knowledge know that cults threaten normal social order and must not be allowed to run wild in any country. Therefore, the US government has always been vigilant against any cults on their own land and has taken preventive measures to stop them. As for those cult groups that have become powerful enough to endanger the society, the US government has taken various measures to restrict or prohibit them, and even used armed forces to crack down upon them.

But their attitudes toward other countries, especially those with different social systems, are completely different. On the one hand, the cult usually causes social disorder in a country, which is to the interest of certain people in the United States. On the other, if the cult is facing a responsible government who cannot bear its jeopardizing to the social security, it becomes an ideal tool to put pressure on that country and to interfere in its internal affairs.

American cults are cults, and Chinese cults are human rights problems. This is a typical double standard on the human rights issue adopted by the US government.

Some in the US are inordinately fond of "Falun Gong," not because they believe in the heretical teachings and mystical powers of Li Hongzhi, but because the issue simply given them another opportunity to interfere in China's internal affairs.