Bitter Winter

Religious belief is common among China’s rural population, representing the most significant base of believers. In an effort to attack religion at its core, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has been mobilizing the masses to monitor and report each other using a variety of means. The latest tool is the revival of Cultural Revolution-era tip-off measures. ...

Another Chinese cultural icon is nothing but rubble after government officials in Pingshan county, under the jurisdiction of Shijiazhuang city in northern Hebei Province, detonated and destroyed a standing Guanyin statue, which was carved out of a cliff and measured 57.9 meters in height on February 2, 2019. ...

In August 2014, Li Xiangyang and many other bystanders in Ningbo city in eastern China’s Zhejiang Province witnessed a brutal police assault on demonstrators. Many people took out their cellphones and filmed the violence, but the police shouted at them to stop recording and confiscated their phones. Mr. Li managed to take a few photos and later posted them, as well as videos taken by others, on WeChat and other online platforms. ...

Significant changes in the structure created for fighting xie jiao are slowly being implemented in China. Several government and party units have been tasked in the past with monitoring and controlling xie jiao issues, including Office 610, the China Anti-Xie-Jiao Association (中国反邪教协会),in English, China Anti-Cult Association, (CACA), and the Ministry of Public Security Anti-Xie-Jiao Bureau (公安部反邪教局). Of the three, Office 610, as an office reporting directly to the Standing Committee of the Politburo, has been the highest ranking. It has also been the least understood. ...

Martial arts students are used to delivering – and taking – hits, but they have never suffered a blow like the one delivered by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP)’s crackdown on Buddhism. Buddhist symbols have been stripped from the Shaolin Temple martial arts schools, the world-famous home of Chinese martial arts. ...