As the State Theatre in New Brunswick, New Jersey, prepares to welcome the return of Shen Yun Performing Arts next week, the theater’s chairman and CEO received threatening e-mails from someone claiming to be a Falun Gong practitioner.
Similar e-mails have been received by theaters in Providence, Rhode Island, and in San Francisco.
Since Shen Yun first began bringing performances of classical Chinese dance and music to audiences around the world, the Chinese communist regime has sought to stop the group from performing.
Mr. Tom Liang of the New Jersey Falun Dafa Association said he believes the e-mails were sent by someone working for the Chinese regime. “The e-mail took on a very odd tone, threatening and demanding the theater’s full support for the show. It tried to portray its author as a ‘mentally-disordered’ person and wanted others to believe that it’s from a Falun Gong practitioner,” said Liang.
The New Jersey Falun Dafa Association is one of the presenters of the show in New Jersey. Local Falun Dafa associations typically help host Shen Yun shows for the New York-based company, which is on its annual world tour.
This e-mail campaign seeks to damage Shen Yun by portraying the Falun Gong practitioners who support it in negative ways. Falun Gong (also known as Falun Dafa) is a spiritual meditation practice, which the Chinese regime has persecuted since July 1999.
Mr. Sen Yang is president of the Mid-USA Falun Dafa Association. He believes the purpose of e-mails such as those received in New Jersey is to give theaters a negative impression of Falun Gong practitioners as being irrational and weird, so that the theaters will cancel the Shen Yun shows.
These e-mails are not the only forms of harassment that have been aimed at the New Brunswick show.
Mr. Liang said, “The Chinese Consulate in New York also made threatening phone calls to the theater.” In addition, according to Mr. Liang, individuals working for the Chinese regime have also spread rumors among the Chinese community in an attempt to disrupt the marketing of the show.
However, Mr. Liang believes the interference won’t have much effect as both the State Theatre and the New Jersey Performing Arts Center (NJPAC) have successfully hosted Shen Yun shows in the past.
“These theaters have a good relationship with Shen Yun Performing Arts and are familiar with Shen Yun’s high quality,” he said.
Similar E-mails
The e-mails received in Providence, Rhode Island, and San Francisco were similar to those in New Jersey.
The Providence Performing Arts Center at Rhode Island received an e-mail from someone claiming to be a Falun Gong practitioner. The e-mail highly recommended the Shen Yun show, but also strongly asked the people in charge of the theater to “promote” and “practice” Falun Gong or else “punishment” and “bad luck” would follow.
The author of the e-mail sent to the San Francisco War Memorial and Performing Arts Center claimed to be from a Falun Gong practitioner and a “Shen Yun fan.” It also threatened the recipients if they did not take up the practice of Falun Gong.
Pattern of Harassment
These e-mails follow upon various other forms of harassment that have targeted Shen Yun.
In Calgary, Canada, on the morning of March 31, the day of the show, somebody claiming to be one of the hosts called the theater manager to cancel the show in the evening.
Theaters hosting Shen Yun routinely have received letters such as the 13-page missive sent by the Chinese Consulate in Houston, Texas, to the Robinson Center Music Hall in Little Rock, Arkansas. The letter attacked Falun Gong and accused Shen Yun of “damaging Sino-America relations,” and “disrupting China’s stability.” The letter also asked the theater to reject the Shen Yun show.
There have been several cases in which individuals claiming to be members of the audience have complained to the theater about the show and asked the theater not to offer any reservations to Shen Yun in the future.
According to Ms. Huishar Chen, from the Falun Dafa Association of Edmonton, the Minister of Culture in British Columbia received a phone call from someone claiming to have attended Shen Yun who complained about the show and asked that no theater should allow Shen Yun to perform. The Minster of Culture refused, and told this individual that he had seen the show and did not agree with the complaints.
Support for Shen Yun
The Minister of Culture in British Columbia is not alone in objecting to efforts to stop Shen Yun from performing.
Mr. Liang said that the director of NJPAC, where Shen Yun performed in January 2009, received daily harassment calls from the Chinese Consulate in New York, urging her to stop hosting Shen Yun.
He said she was very upset and phoned the Chinese consul back to tell him: “We are not in China. Anyone who follows the regulations has the right to use the theater. Please do not interfere anymore.” After that, the Chinese Consulate stopped harassing NJPAC.
U.S. Congressman Rush Holt attended Shen Yun at NJPAC and said afterwards, “The performance is unforgettable! I love every single program. The performers are incredible!”
When the Shen Yun show scheduled to be performed in Kiev, Ukraine, faced cancellation due to pressure from the CCP, Rep. Holt wrote a letter to President Yanukovych of Ukraine. He referred to Shen Yun as “one of the world’s premier Chinese dance and music companies.”
“It aims to revive traditional Chinese arts and has performed to critical acclaim in 100 cities around the world. I found [Shen Yun] both educational and inspirational,” the Congressman said.
Shen Yun will hold two performances on June 20 in the State Theatre. Nine U.S. Congressmen, the New Jersey State Senate, and the mayor and city council of New Brunswick have sent congratulatory letters welcoming the show’s return to New Jersey.
The email seeking to damage Shen Yun’s performance in New Jersey has been turned over to the FBI.
With reporting by Shi Yu and Weilin Wu.
Read the original Chinese article. http://epochtimes.com/gb/10/6/14/n2937157.htm
To read the German version http://www.epochtimes.de/articles/2010/06/16/588904.html
