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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by 134.173.232.68 (talk) at 23:07, 15 October 2005 (→RE: allegations regarding Falun Gong and Epoch Times). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

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Is there any truth in the allegations that The Epoch Times employs a disproportionate number of Falun Gong practitioners? That might warrant an mention, if true...

Wall Street Journal once ran an investigation on Epoch Times's tax records, and found that XU Kangang, a FLG speaker, is the chairman of the paper's board.

Hello!? It's the "Epoch" Times, isn't it transparent from the name what it's all about? Don't people know what Falun Gong is about any more?

History

I've been updating the languages some, which are sometimes still switched back. Korean and Ukrainian editions are in fact apparently in print. To verify the lanugages listed, go to http://english.epochtimes.com/language.html. I think it best if the article stays consistent and lists the same number of languages stated in the introduction (which should at this point be 9), until that number gets too long to be practical. (Of course, if someone thinks it's already too long of a list, let me know how long you think it should be so I won't keep updating!)

RE: allegations regarding Falun Gong and Epoch Times

The Epoch Times from what I can tell is largely put together by Falun Gong practitioners at present, who as I understand were instrumental in its founding. However, contributions to the paper do not consist solely of practitioners' contributions, nor is it by any means intended to be that way. I don't think the large practitioner contribution is something that people who work on the paper generally deny when asked. It just isn't necessarily something that they shout to the rooftops because the paper is not intended to be judged by the spiritual inclinations of its writers; it is intended to be judged by its content. If you need my source, it is my own experience helping with the paper.

It says, "The paper rarely publishes letters and opinions that do not suit its cause, such as pro-communist and anti-Falun Gong comments, which the paper deems unnecessary. The Times argues that most, if not all government-censored Chinese news sources already contain opinions in agreement with Chinese governmental policies."

Where is the news in this paper? Why do they need to masquerade as a newspaper if their objective is to cast Falun Gong in a sympathetic light by propagandizing "the other side," whatever that is...

It says "The Epoch Times is a conservative Chinese newspaper, " It's not a newspaper and it's not conservative (conservative in what?) It's an anti-CCP pamphlet with a mix of editorialized news and shrill opinions, printed in a newspaper form factor and left out in Chinatowns everywhere for free and picked up by people for entertainment or to wrap fish.

Even if there are more articles about Falun Gong in the paper than in others, its mission is not to cast Falun Gong in a sympathetic light. If you want to see the paper's goal, go to http://english.epochtimes.com/aboutus.html.

Yeah, whatever. They didn't start out as the English version. Their reputation precedes them.

RE: allegations regarding Falun Gong and Epoch Times

If my personal experience is any guide, The Epoch Times definitely is connected to the Falun Gong organization. I was given a copy by someone who was proselytizing for them. She was distributing the paper together with other pieces of literature promoting Falun Gong and their web site. And she told me that by reading these things I would understand better who the Falun Gong were.

Falun Gong practitioners do not normally distribute the Epoch Times with their flyers. This inaccuracy has been up as fact several times in the article, despite its subsequent removal by different parties. Also, although the Epoch Times is most definitely not meant to be a newspaper on Falun Gong and reports mostly on other topics, it does contain more articles than most other media sources to update people on the difficulties facing the practice in China today. Letting people know about this is actually more important to most practitioners than trying to convince people to start practicing, which they aren't supposed to push or force onto anyone anyway. This leads me to wonder whether "proselytize" is actually an accurate word for what they are attempting to do, although I agree that the reality of it might often seem otherwise. Regardless of any connection to Falun Gong, the greater number of Falun Gong articles may have been her actual reason for distributing it along with the flyers.

The number of people associated with Epoch Times is few compared to the total number of Falun Gong believers. Without commenting on my strong suspicion of the strong link as originally stated, it still seems quite conceivable that a few individuals with anti-CCP political agendas may take advantage of Falun Gong as a haven.--yiliu60 03:51, 13 August 2005 (UTC)

With regards to the accusation of Epoch Times as the mouthpiece of Falun Gong, it seems there are already at least one or two publications out there through which Falun Gong represents itself openly. Compassion magazine is one of them. I think I remember someone mentioning another to me, although I can't remember what it was called.

The Chicago Reader recently published about the Epoch Times, and mentions some of the connections with Falun Gong. One section in particular says, "In 2000 a group of practitioners retaliated , choosing a name evocative of the new millennium and launching the Epoch Times as a Chinese-language newspaper distributed in expatriate communities. The paper's representatives insist the Epoch Times isn't controlled by Falun Gong and doesn't speak for Falun Gong -- though contributions from individual Falun Gong practioners help keep it afloat. What's certain is that if China hadn't put its foot on Falun Gong's neck the Epoch Times wouldn't exist." The link to the article is http://www.chicagoreader.com/hottype/2005/051014_1.html.

Criticism

A previous version of this article stated that with regards to the Epoch Times' penchant for negative reporting on China, "It should be noted that although a concentration of these articles may be published in the Epoch Times, many of these negative reports can also be found in neutral overseas Chinese newspapers." Does anyone know if other overseas Chinese papers do carry these articles? A lot of US papers do carry some of them. Should something about this be added back in?

CCP renunciations

The number of CCP renunciations reported by the Epoch Times is constantly revised on their site. This number recently broke 4 million, so it would be more current to keep this number in the article than to change it back to 3.5 million. If you want to check revisions to this number, go to their English website at http://english.epochtimes.com. It's not too hard to find their updates on this subject. Thanks.

The number of CCP renunciations reported by the Epoch Times is still going up. It is now over 4.6 million.

Their so called 'renunciations' are a joke, and should be put onto petitiononline.com. There's no confirmation of identity or membership, and even non-members, babies, dead people, and non-existant people can be signed into, and each IP can be signed more than once. They recently held an anti-China rally on October 1 in Sydney, and I saw local Australians signing, 'renouncing' their CCP membership. Since when did CCP employ foreigners as members? These 'renunciations' means nothing and are not legally recognised, unless done through the proper channels (US immigration forms I-400 & I-485, and .

The current article says that "no major CCP official in either the central or regional governments had ever resigned because of the 'Commentaries.'" I'm not entirely convinced that this is not at least a little misleading. There was a case this summer of two diplomats in Australia, Chen Yonglin and Hao Fengjun, who resigned within about a month of each other. I don't know what you'd count as a major officials, but the cases were widely publicized in Australia, and Chen Yonglin received some attention from the New York Times. It seems the Chinese government was (naturally) a bit worried about the publicity the defections were receiving, in any case. It seems also that they may both have been influenced by the Nine Commentaries in their renunciations. Although most reports mentioning this specific point are associated with the Epoch Times, there seem to be a few mentions elsewhere, too.

Diplomats hold little power in or outside China, and it's more likely that these two left the embassy (not resigned) for personal reasons (such as wanting to betray China because its poor) rather than the 'Nine Commentaries'. These two never quoted from 'Nine Commentaries' and are, according to themselves, free from outside influences. Since then these two has disappeared off the media, and faced wrath from the general Chinese community in Australia.

Reversions

When making reversions, please make sure you check all the reversions you make to be sure the edits you are cutting aren't actually based on anything. Among the last few reversions, there was a mention of a second recent award won by the Epoch Times in Canada during Ethnomedia Week 2005 earlier this month (September). The Epoch Times did receive recognition in this ceremony, and it is worth note regardless of Misplaced Pages writers' opinions of the newspaper itself. The mention of the Epoch Times itself can be found at http://www.nepmcc.ca/articles/awards03.htm (the paper's publisher was recognized), which can be reached from Ethnomedia Week website at http://www.nepmcc.ca/frnt.htm. Thanks.

I find it rather ironic that this cut was made by the editor who seems to want to cut out any seemingly negative parts of the article, and limit the views presented on this page. One of the other editors accused you of "Falun Gong vandalism" in his reversion because of this, as the significant number of Falun Gong practitioners involved in the paper was discussed above. I don't know if you're a practitioner trying to defend the paper or not, but if you really consider yourself to be one, I am rather surprised that you would go about engaging in edit wars when there is a perfectly decent discussion page on which to explain your edits, and perhaps reach some resolution might be reached. (I would appreciate your using the discussion page a little more regardless. Having the page change so often makes it more difficult for the article to stay stable, gain any reliability, and eventually be updated and improved.) I'm sorry for my impatience with this, as I realize I haven't been much of a help taking a stance in or stopping the edit wars up to now.

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