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Stepping into the Uncanny, Unsettling World of Shen Yun
- hprotagonist 8y agoShen Yun was a Baader-Meinhof object: once I saw it, I started to see it everywhere. More than that -- until I read this, I had half-convinced myself that I'd been seeing these posters since the early 90s, not 2007!
- snowwrestler 8y agoI love the next sentence: > Shen Yun greeted me silently at the bus stop and loomed over highway exits, following me around on the physical plane of existence the way anything you shop for on the Internet starts to follow you around online.
- hhs 8y agoLikewise, I'd see endless commercials of Shen Yun in papers and TV shows. I checked out a different, neat, performance in China but didn't see SY. This makes me think of the strategy the great showman P.T. Barnum would use, typically by bombarding people with larger-than-life posters, to raise awareness of his acts. He earned a lot of business doing this.
- stronglikedan 8y agoSpeaking of Baader-Meinhof effect, I can't remember the last time I saw anything about it - probably last year sometime - but I just got a brochure in the mail yesterday, and now this!
- jscheel 8y agoI often see it advertised at Chinese restaurants around town. Whenever I ask the proprietors if it part of Falun Gong, they all claim not to understand, or they just say no. I can't tell if they actually know what it is and don't want to admit it, or if they legitimately don't know.
- compiler-guy 8y agoThey know. It is a strategic and extremely carefully phrased denial.
- stcredzero 8y agoThey probably don't have the time to waste on such a conversation/explanation.
- jscheel 8y agoEh, they are actually pretty conversational here. Part of running a business in the South I guess. I'm not asking someone at a packed Chinese restaurant in NYC.
- stcredzero 8y agoWhenever I ask the proprietors if it part of Falun Gong, they all claim not to understand, or they just say no. I can't tell if they actually know what it is and don't want to admit it, or if they legitimately don't know. Don't know, don't care, they got a restaurant to run! [1] They're probably just getting past your question and getting onto the next task. My wife grew up in mainland China. She thinks of them as wackos and/or somewhat like "carnies." If they can live and let live, and they don't do something like human trafficking, then they can believe what they want and make whatever art and dance they want, as far as I'm concerned. ([1] I used to work at a local midwest bookstore chain that Borders seemed to steal its ideas from. Customers got a totally relaxed vibe, even from the workers. However, being a worker there was a workout! I probably did enough walking for that one activity to qualify as a fitness program. So if you go to a restaurant that seems hectic, there's a good chance it's not just hectic, but that just getting through your shift is a heroic feat of endurance and optimizing on your feet. (I've also worked in restaurants.))
- jscheel 8y agoFair point, though these restaurants are in a small, rural, southern town, so they usually aren't exactly "hopping" :)
- badcede 8y ago"The fact that both Falun Gong and the Communist Party communicate via propaganda makes it almost impossible to understand what’s really happening."
- stcredzero 8y agoGeneralized it for you: "The fact that everyone in 2019 communicates via propaganda makes it almost impossible to understand what’s really happening." "Social media" is a bit of a whitewash. It should really be called, "Everyone Propaganda!"
- GauntletWizard 8y agoAmerican Idiot really was ahead of its time.
- hvs 8y agoMy family and I went a couple of years ago. It seemed fairly benign, if a bit corny/garish. The whole "evolution is evil" thing kind of comes out of nowhere. Afterwards I looked up the group behind it and read about Falun Dafa. It won't convince anyone to join their group, but it probably raises a fair amount of funds for it. As entertainment it is moderately interesting, but I wouldn't go again.
- compiler-guy 8y agoI've been once too. The acrobatics and dance and production values are quite professional and nice. But the side-trips into propaganda made me feel like I had been deceived by the advertising, which really turned me off.
- stcredzero 8y agoI've been once too. The acrobatics and dance and production values are quite professional and nice. But the side-trips into propaganda made me feel like I had been deceived by the advertising, which really turned me off. Propaganda makes for mediocre art. I think one of the seminal essays to that effect was actually written by a prominent propagandist. It's a very important idea for 2019.
- thewakalix 8y agoWas the essay any good?
- stcredzero 8y agoDon't know but the YouTube video about it was okay. I'll have to search it down.
- Simon_says 8y agoI believe evolution is evil, too. Doesn't mean it's not true.
- forkLding 8y agoFor those who don't know, Falun Gong is perceived like the Chinese version of Scientology in China, although a lot of injustice was done to Falun Gong followers and most of their assets frozen, there isn't much sympathy for them and they're typically regarded as a bit weird, believing in Qi, faith healing and all that.
- ng12 8y agoI've had first-hand experience of people defending the PRC's treatment of Uighurs, so I'll take the perception in China with a few grains of salt.
- a-nikolaev 8y agoYes, this is true. But Falun Gong does not become less of a cult, whether you agree with the official Chinese opinion about them or not. They have a lot of weird beliefs: https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Falun_Gong https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Falun_Gong . And they are persecuted by Chinese government. Both facts are pretty much true, I think.
- stcredzero 8y agoalthough a lot of injustice was done to Falun Gong followers and most of their assets frozen No individual human rights in China. The government can squash them as they like, and if the public doesn't like that group, no one will complain. (Which makes propaganda very useful for both sides.) First they came for the wackos, the conspiracy theorists, and the minority religions...
- dmitrygr 8y ago> although a lot of injustice was done to Falun Gong followers Where do I sign up "the church of" Scientology to have harm done to them?
- TomMckenny 8y agoIt's also pretty counter productive and even tone deaf to put on program that alienates and denigrates the very groups in the States that would have been their biggest sympathizers against that oppression. It also reminds us that there are worlds views even worse than the status quo. As unbelievable as that may seem.
- chb 8y agoEmbarrassed to say that my wife and I were duped into purchasing tickets to the show. We had thought it would be a highly choreographed, theatrical re-enactment of significant events in pre-Mao China, and had not done any research on it. Instead, it was horribly amateurish propaganda (the entire "set" was a projected CG image). Heavy-handed plays for sympathy and the demonization of the Chinese state culminated in a spiritual Armageddon where a Christ-like deity leads his followers out of a world-consuming conflagration. The audience lapped it up (this was Arizona, by the way). There were no misgivings or complaints voiced as we shuffled out of the theater. We felt suckered, and, to this day, share knowing looks of sheepishness and incredulity when we see billboards around the country advertising the show.
- chrisweekly 8y agoYeah I couldn't stand it either. For me the low point was a mediocre male tenor singing solo at the top of his lungs in his native Chinese, as the lyrics' English translation appeared on the screen behind him: "Denounce the heresy of evolution!" Total waste of time and $.
- xkcd-sucks 8y agoTo be fair, Chinese propaganda comes off as heavy-handed to a Western audience, FG is putting on a propaganda show for literal survival, and FG has received the treatment which happens to "bad" groups of people. FG is a nutty cult, but (in my opinion) dont deserve to get organ harvested for belonging to a cult. Other "bad" groups might be Uyghurs now, Hui 5 years in the future, "intellectuals" fifty years ago, and lots more. The quote about "first they came for the Jews, and I was silent because I was not one" comes to mind.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- stickfigure 8y agoDid you read the article? The organ-harvesting thing appears to be disputed.
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- vernie 8y agoI urge anyone who likes weird stuff to not read this or anything else about the show and go see it immediately.
- Glyptodon 8y agoYeah, I'm interested in seeing it in a "I like roadside attractions and pulpy weird stuff" kind of way, but not at the price they charge for tickets.
- youeseh 8y agoHey, you might even get away with asking for a free ticket! I remember walking in by mistake and an old lady on her way out promptly asked if we wanted to see it - she was very excited. I was just there to check out the theater itself. Five minutes later we were in the theater, watching the thing, trying to find ways to leave without offending the nice lady who'd just given us free tickets to the show :)
- jerf 8y agoWell, I guess my priors need a bit of tuning; they picked up from the pervasiveness of the advertising that this must be a funded propaganda push, but I assumed it would be from the Chinese government, not someone rather bitterly opposed to them. (This is not an *-ist comment; that governments promote their cultures in other countries to create "soft power" is an established fact. I for one would love in many ways to live in a world where all our conflicts were solved with such soft power, rather than the harder kind.)
- rdtsc 8y ago> but I assumed it would be from the Chinese government, not someone rather bitterly opposed to them. I have to admit, I thought exactly the same. Just yesterday saw a booth with a nicely dressed man in a suit, selling Shen Yun tickets and thought it must a troupe from China and wondered how much propaganda is in it. I was imagining something like https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confucius_Institute https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confucius_Institute. Then today saw this on the HN front page. It turns out yes, it is selling propaganda, but not the kind I thought.
- zerocrates 8y agoI think a Falun Gong association was my initial assumption (don't really remember now, to be honest), but I was already quite familiar with the significant push behind the Epoch Times, which tends to wear its anti-Chinese-government stance rather more on its sleeve in the form of headlines. Of course on the other end of things there's China Daily so... maybe not such a helpful data point.
- LiamMcCalloway 8y agoJia Tolentino's pieces often resonate, in that particular way of things that are at the right distance to what they are talking about: close enough to understand them but far enough to show their place in time and space, culturally.
- gaogao 8y agoHer article on Juul is one of my favorites.
- ilamont 8y agoI live in the Boston area and they are very, very persistent when it comes to promoting the event. It seems like every local business has a Shen Yun poster in the window, and they go to door-to-door with flyers. There are TV ads on local broadcasters. And of course they are all over Facebook with ads. This reflects not only the zeal of the volunteers but a very large budget to do the broadcast ads. The local media and most of the public seems to have no clue that it's a propaganda gambit.
- kevin_thibedeau 8y agoThey heavily blanket every metro area surrounding their home base in southeastern NY.
- coupdejarnac 8y agoFor those interested in China, serpentza's youtube channel recently did a video about this. The youtube channel China Uncensored is also funded by people associated with Falun Gong. It is ridiculous anti-China propaganda, though some of it is warranted.
- JumpCrisscross 8y agoWhat are good, non-cultish Chinese dance productions in New York or the Bay Area?
- obiefernandez 8y agoI got duped into buying tickets to this show for my wife as an anniversary present a couple years ago. (This was in Atlanta, GA) We spent the first half in utter disbelief of the crap we were witnessing, and left in disgust during intermission. However we were definitely in the minority, and found that very puzzling. Maybe the political religious stuff was going over most people's heads?
- perl4ever 8y ago"Chinese scientists with doctorates from prestigious American universities who practice Falun Gong claim that modern physics (for example, superstring theory) and biology (specifically the pineal gland's function) provide a scientific basis for their beliefs." ... "For further information, consult your pineal gland."
- euske 8y agoThe other day I found a video about the "cultural war" between Falun Gong and Chinese govt., in the form of two disguised fronts (Shen Yun and Confucius Institute, respectively) within the US soil. This was made by a Western guy who's associated with neither of them. It's quite interesting. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7tsXtk7psUc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7tsXtk7psUc Here in Japan, I see that a few large private universities are affiliated with Confucius Institute, and I have seen a Shen Yun ad on YouTube. The cultural war is certainly going on here too.
- IOT_Apprentice 8y agoThe Chinese government does not need or want a "Taiping Rebellion" equivalent to that of the infamous Hong Xiuquan -- which was the largest war in human history in terms of casualties and destruction. So to them, Falun Gong and it's leader represent that kind of threat, once it reached tens of millions in size. That is orders of magnitude larger than the student protests in Tiananmen, and that was brutally suppressed. Totalitarian regimes are going to be just that, brutal/monsterous and unforgiving.
- Apocryphon 8y agoThe Taiping movement sprung up during the failing days of the Qing when governance was declining and life for the common people worsened, so maybe the PRC government should focus on fixing that first before torturing dissidents
- Pharmakon 8y agoMaking life better for hundreds of millions of people is a very hard problem. Crushing dissent with terror and violence by contrast is relatively simple. It’s no wonder that tyrants tend to the latter and only the former as it impacts their greatest sources of support. In other words, Kim Jong-Un only worries about the population of Pyongyang elites, especially the military, and feels free to let the rest starve or rot in a camp.
- Laforet 8y agoThe rise of Falun Gong was well correlated to a period of economic uncertainty in the late 90s, especially in the Manchurian rust belt cities where neoliberal reforms lead to massive unemployment and poverty. While the allegation of torture and organ harvesting are substantive, these acts were in no way targeted at FG followers or political prisoners in general. And FG's attempt at monopolizing such victimhood only comes off as disingenious. Nowadays FG is very much a shadow of its former glory these days in China thanks to both supression efforts as well as improved economic prospects. Its influence has aged much better outside China because the Chinese diaspora's world view is more or less stuck in the 1990s, like it was the end of history according to Francis Fukuyama.
- solidsnack9000 8y agoI'm surprised that an article like this does not mention the long history of religious-revolutionary movements in China. Just a few: 0184 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow_Turban_Rebellion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow_Turban_Rebellion 1351 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Turban_Rebellion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Turban_Rebellion 1794 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Lotus_Rebellion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Lotus_Rebellion These rebellions usually have a frame story of an ancient way of life founded on people's harmony with nature and one another. Because the government operates at variance with this harmony, the government is not legitimate and must be replaced. Francis Fukuyama talks at length about the "Mandate of Heaven" concept and its impact on legitimacy in China in his recent books.
- SampleBourgeois 8y agoDon't forget the biggest of them all, the Taiping Rebellion https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taiping_Rebellion https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taiping_Rebellion
- twblalock 8y agoThat one is the best. When I tell people about it they think it is too ridiculous to be true. A guy who thought he was Jesus's brother started a war that killed tens of millions of people.
- solidsnack9000 8y agoSo many of them, all so good...
- jinushaun 8y agoMy wife and I went a few years back and felt like we got scammed. Low quality acrobatics, with heavy handed propaganda and unexpected religious messaging. We didn’t sign up for that.
- jdlyga 8y agoMost Chinese people I know already have a clear understanding of how creepy and weird Shen Yun is, and view it in the same light as Scientology. But that message hasn't gotten out to everyone else yet. It's not a beautiful chinese art, culture, and dance show.