So what exactly is the Falun Gong?
605372
http://www.religioustolerance.org/falungong.htm\n\n Falun gong and falun dafa is a largely spiritual movement that incorporates:\n\n Buddhist principles, \n Taoist principles,  \n Qigong: body, mind and physical exercise, and  \n Healing techniques.  \n\nHowever, the Falun Dafa is taught as more than this; it is seen a way of life. 1  \n\nThe movement has experienced horrendous levels of persecution in China. Chinese government is against any form of religion they believe in themselves as gods...or taoism
852183
Hmm... I need to read up a bit more about the teachings of Li. But over 100 million people practice the "mind and body cultivation" doctrines and perform the meditation exercises that go with it.\n\nMust be a different version of Tai Chi exercises...\n\nPeace be with you.
281241
:}\nIt is much like the EST programs of the 60's and 7o's.\nVery controlling and authoritative\nIt does teach that past religious teaching prevents one from advancing \n\nnot a very spiritually helpful\ngiven as seminars it claims to be self help.\n\ngiven as siminars it claims to be self help.
83679
It is absolutely a real entity! When the New World Order comes about, things will get terrible. Prejudice towards fundamental religions, particularly Christianity, will get really tough. Beware! (I am dead serious)
874948
The whole thing is rife with Freemason symbols.\nWhat's with the pyramid, this isn't Egypt!\nit also says novus ordo seclorum which I have heard means new world order.\nThe eye is supposed to be the all seeing eye of Horus from the egyptian mystery religions.\nAh, the masons and their ilk- is there really a sinister shadow fraternity within an apparently benign lodge? Is there a sinister shadow government that really controls?\nIf you read Morals and Dogma, a book of masonic literature you will be exploring an "occult" realm of philosopy and theosophy.\nBut I don't know for sure most of them aren't just members of a club that does community service.\nTripping on Illuminat conspiracies while interesting, doesn't seem to really lead anywhere productive!
570739
what is this all about?
794649
fengshui is actually a sort of mathematics calculation to 'maximize' your potential in your luck, health & wealth. it's not black art.\ni think many people has a misconception of what is it all about. and commenting without true understanding/ analysis on the subject reflect their ignorance.\nbut i do agree that many superstitious chinese take it too far, & some dubious fengshui master are just cheaters.\ni do believe that fengshui (if it is delivered by a true master) has a positive effect, BUT, i don't indulge or have any negative opinions to it.\neven for true buddhists, fate is what we make out of it, not indulging in fengshui to 'change' our fate.
1108993
There is a lot of nonsense surrounding Buddhist monks. They aren't as mystical and peaceful as people make them out to be. A lot of it is propaganda.\nThat's not to say Buddhism in general is bad. It is a lot more rational and peaceful than most mainstream religions. But we're talking religious 'authority' here and they are all the same no matter what religion - exploiters.\n Even the whole "Free Tibet" thing is purely politically motivated. The followers of the Dahli Lama were exploiting the peasants before the Commies moved in. Of course the Communists are just as bad, but people shouldn't act that putting the religious theocracy back in power in Tibet that suddenly Tibet would be free.
108253
The Tao is 'the way'. It is all that is, was and will be.  It is the ineffable, inexhaustible, unnamable and the origin of all things. (It is NOT a god, since it is not a true consciousness.) \n\nLao Tzu (Laozi) was a great philosopher...a forward thinker. He describer the Tao as best as could be expected.  That is to say that he didn’t describe the Tao at all. But rather, he described that path that leads to understanding the way. \n\nThe Tao is used to explain both the Taoist philosophical explanation of totality as well as the Taoist metaphysical reality. It is also the Ch'en Buddhist term that is somewhat ambiguous. Sometimes Tao refers to the path to enlightenment and sometimes it almost seams to refers to the dharma. (the teachings of the Buddha)\n\nI hope this helps.
416627
when china re-opens its door to the world, during deng xiao ping's era, they also loosen up up on the religions' issues.\ntaoism & falun gong are totally different matters altogether. taoism (& other religions) were once persecuted due to communism 'ideals & values'.\nfalun gong was suspected of conspiracy against the government, therefore they were uprooted.\nif you do a research on the mao zedong's & jiang qing's regime, you will find out that the persecution towards all religions (along with school teachers, culture entertainers, professionals,democrats, etc) were hunted & punished like animals.\nthe luckier ones were jailed & sent to reform.\n\nso now you know why there are chinese all over the globe? they'd rather travel to a strange country as a 2nd class citizen to fight to live, then suffer in humiliation (or mostly die of hunger & poverty) in their own motherland.\n\ncommunism has more cons then pros. it is outdated & stale.\n\nthat said, falun gong is a harmless activity, BUT i doubt the leader,li hong zhi's credibility as an 'enlightened' person & all his nonsense.\nhis meditation is based on taoism & buddhism. he did nothing but sprout wrong messages to his followers.\nthe victims were the ones who died for him.
158646
Hope this is not too late\n\nIt's fascinating - went from an imperial government to republic, lots of corruption, then to communist, famine, cultural revolution, then a little bit capital with the opening of the economy, more corrupt, and now the country is pretty stable.\n\nMillions upon millions of people died, values changed, people became selfless (when the govt promoted a man called Lei Feng) and now adays it's every man for himself no matter what happens to everyone else.
368819
There are over 60 million people practicing Falun gong in the United States, canada and europe
890147
http://www.skepdic.com/falungong.html\n"It is difficult to understand why the Communist party in China fears Falun Gong. Their practices would relieve the demand for medical assistance, thereby saving the government millions of yuan. They encourage truthfulness, forbearance and compassion. Of course, members may not be very useful to society, since they are not materialistic and would prefer to spend their days meditating and exercising in the park, cultivating energies, rather than working in factories. Then again, communists don't like competition."
251825
Rule of law from the weakest person to the strongest should be a goal of every country, unfortunately, the Chinese communist party is threatened by the "spiritual" movement Falung Gong, so it's possible these acts are condoned tacitly to "scare "citizens back into the communist fold. Any acts like these, if true, would be signs of desperation. The Chinese government will be on it's best behavior until the Olympics in '08, then I believe there may be great confrontation in China. Their economy is more and more capitalist, the people want and are getting, to a certain degree, a more free and materialistic lifestyle, yet the Communist party still holds sole political power. At some point one will have to give way to the other.
241212
It's a bunch of junk based on the rantings of L. Ron Hubbard.  They believe because there is a lot of hypnosis involved in it.  It is a religion that uses a lot of psychobabble as it's base.  They teach that all mental illnesses can be cured with vitamins and exercise  It involves thetens (aliens that live in all our bodies), There is also auditing session and garbage about the earth being a prison planet for aliens.  Toss in there Hubbard was a good friend and great admirer of Alister Crowley and some of what is in it is almost word for word some of Crowley's rituals.  There is also rumors and stuff floating around, how true it is I haven't a clue, that when you reach OT8 you learn that Hubbard called himself the anti-Christ and that humans have it all wrong, that Lucifer was God and God was the evil one.  It's whacked out!
595223
Can't recommend any books,just do a yahoo search on falun gong,there is an organization that documents abuses,with pictures of torture victims ,that did not survive and the methods used ,as well as individual stories and pictures of those who were tortured and did or did not survive,there are also links to places where you can practice or order books about zhuan falun,but I do not recall books about the persecution aspect
503149
Actually to answer peace, it is perhaps the most translated book in history next to the bible and is known by the whole of china which makes up a 1/5 of the world's population, + lots of scholars and philosophy interested people, + taoists of course.  As one of the main 3 texts of taoism it is indeed an important book (Tao Te Ching, Chuang Tzu, Lieh Tzu)\n\nYes I was aware of this, did you know the I-Ching is even older still!  And perhaps contains some really startling information.\n\nA lot of what would have gone into the Tao Te Ching would also have survived in other texts or by oral tradition before becoming the works we know today as the Tao Te Ching.  The Hua Hu Ching is a good read too, again with some interesting thoughts on the nature of things. (i think they pioneered quantum physics millenia ago!)\n\nIt is a wonderful book that everyone should have a look at!\nYou can get it off the internet easy enough.