It has been almost 12 years since the Tiananmen massacre. No matter how hard the Chinese Communist Party has been trying to extricate itself from this debacle and how hard the people of China have been trying to let it fade from their memories, the date, June 4, 1989, whenever being mentioned or thought about, will always bring the most complicated, confusing and controversial feelings to every Chinese. Those feelings, combined with pain, guilt and confusion are beyond the words and cannot be explained.
It has become an old, familiar story. However, yesterday, January 30, once again the host on CCTV [China Central TV station, the official "organ" of the Communist Party in China] indignantly "exposed" to the 1.3 billion Chinese citizens' audience the fabricated "truth" of the so-called Falun Gong practitioners' self-immolation at Tiananmen Square. The setting and the demeanor of the announcer in the TV studio immediately brought me back to a decade ago when the same TV station fabricated and contrived the program "On-the-spot Record of the Suppression of the Riot," to lull people into thinking that it was the government that was attacked and therefore had to defend itself, a great big lie.
At that time, I did not like or understand politics. Nevertheless, in 1989, influenced by the spontaneous strong demand of the Chinese people for democratic reform, I joined the students day and night, to protest for the brighter future of our country. I was not even aware of the struggle between the people of the Reform Group and the Conservative Group. I did not know about the organization of National University Union, neither did I know about the collusion between these students and the foreign "anti-China" forces. However, all the ordinary people I knew and I, myself, understood that we did what we should have done, what we believed needed to be done, and we spoke out for ourselves. It seemed at that moment that we stood up for what we believed in and what seemed right.
Then, the unexpected, sudden gunshots in the Capital on the night of June 3, 1989 astonished us. What shocked us even more was the "On-the-spot Record of the Suppression of the Riot" being continuously broadcast on the TV, the radio and published in the newspapers nationwide for many days after June 5. We, who have witnessed the massacre, could not believe our own ears, eyes and brains. Yuan Mu [a high ranking government official of China at that time] said the death toll of the military soldiers was over 200. However, what I had witnessed at the night of June 3 was something different. The streets leading to the hospitals were covered with pools of blood - stains from the students and residents who were shot by the soldiers. The experienced military troops dropped a vehicle full of steel helmets and weapons (who knows whether they were equipped with bullets or not at that time), on Changan Street in the Xidan Business area. This had provided the mob a chance to take advantage of the chaos. Although the fact was that a military vehicle was knocked over by their own military tanks, the TV program, however, portrayed this incident falsely and made it appear as if it was the civilians who had overturned the vehicle.
We have had enough these kind of lies.
Since the People's Republic of China was established more than forty years ago, there have been too many political movements in her short history: "Three Against and Five Against Movement" [1951-1952], the "Three Years of Natural Disasters", the "Gang of Four" etc. Those movements all utilized the Communist propaganda machine to deceive people. The state-run propaganda was indeed exceedingly useful in helping the authorities and those in power to achieve their goals.
Twelve years have elapsed. The effects of the Communist Party's swindling propaganda and the extent of their lying and smear campaigns are difficult to imagine. It is almost beyond comprehension. I believe it was a tremendous success for the party. My friends and relatives in Beijing all flaunt their ignorance of politics. In those people's eyes, whosoever even merely mentions the Tiananmen massacre these days must be a fool and out of his mind. Well, keep on laughing, there is another incident in Tiananmen Square now.
I believe that Falun Gong has very strong vitality.
It is true that practitioners have been persisting on appealing peacefully at Tiananmen Square after being defamed as [slanderous words respectfully omitted].
Self-immolation seemed to be a reasonable consequence of persecution.
Tiananmen Square was covered with police. The pictures of the patrol soldiers carrying the fire extinguishers were sent all over the world through the Internet. It was indeed very unusual.
The CCTV immediately reported on and criticized the incident. The scenario seemed so familiar.
What is the true story? Not only a lot of the Chinese people and myself and people all over the world urgently desire to see and hear the truth, the Communist Party is also in favor of reporting the "true story."
Let us wait and see what happens.
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