Falun Gong and its Dance Troupe Hit With Another Scandal

Last week, the New York Times published their bombshell investigation of the dance group Shen Yun and the price the dancers have had to pay in untreated injuries and emotional abuse to amplify the Falun Gong’s anti-Communist message.

Over several rounds of interviews across many months, the Times got nine people to share their stories on the record. The Times reported that almost all of them were terrified to be quoted using their real names because they were fearful of retaliation and harassment from other Falun Gong practitioners. 

The Times said of the feat, “We know they risked a lot to speak to us, and we’re so grateful for their courage.”

The dance group Shen Yun sends troupes of Chinese dancers swirling in colorful costumes to cities like New York, Paris, Toronto, and Taipei. Shen Yun’s mission is more than entertainment: The shows amplify the anti-Communist message of Falun Gong, a religious movement that the Chinese Communist Party has tried to stamp out. Shen Yun has been led in exile by Falun Gong’s founder, Li Hongzhi, from a 400-acre compound in upstate New York, where many of the performers live and train.

A New York Times investigation found that Shen Yun routinely discouraged dancers from seeking medical care and demanded obedience to rigid schedules.

Their reporting showed that their training compound had a controlling atmosphere and that the young student performers were subject to a long list of rules. They were limited in the books they could read, the music they could listen to, and the news outlets they could access and they needed special permission to leave the compound and often saw their families only once a year.

The dancers, according to the Times investigation, faced tremendous pressure to serve their spiritual leader, who has a residence inside the compound and helps oversee their training. They were told that performing with Shen Yun was part of a holy mission to save humanity — and that any mistakes onstage could doom their audiences to hell.

Female dancers were particularly affected.

The ones we interviewed told the Times that they were subjected to regular weigh-ins and that their instructors would yell at them in front of their classmates for being too fat.

This is just the latest scandal the group has faced. This past June, the chief financial officer of the publishing arm of the Falun Gong, Epoch Times, Weidong “Bill” Guan was arrested and charged with money laundering charges. The Justice Department said he had participated in a transnational scheme to launder $67 million of illegally obtained funds to benefit himself and the media company.

Federal prosecutors said members of the company’s “Make Money Online” team, which Guan managed, used cryptocurrency to “knowingly purchase tens of millions of dollars in crime proceeds,” including funds from fraudulently obtained unemployment benefits that were loaded onto prepaid debit cards.