Columbia Student Group May Be Overseas Extension of Communist Regime
The long-named Columbia University Chinese Student and Scholars Association: United for China's Peaceful Rising (CUCSSA) has taken the stance, as of a few weeks ago, that "Anyone who offends China will be executed no matter how far away they are!" and said so on their website for all to see. That's what 'peaceful rising' means in Mandarin, right? Someone translate for me.
Luckily for most of us, the Epoch Times tells us that 'anyone' just means Falun Gong practitioners. The Columbia University Falun Dafa Club is understandably upset. This was only the latest escalation in CUCSSA's extremist rhetoric in the months since the Falun Dafa Club hosted a panel discussion in April about China's spotty human rights record.
The April panel, titled "China's New Genocide-Organ Harvesting from Live Falun Gong Practitioners," caused an indignant CUCSSA to try to take disruptive action. They were not yet at the death-threat stage, instead:
The CUCSSA responded by sending out an email to its members the night before that referred to using "flags dyed red in blood to beat" the "high spirits" of Falun Gong. The email also repeated slanders of Falun Gong typically used in the Chinese regime's propaganda.
The Falun Dafa Club received a copy of the inflammatory e-mail and Columbia University police were on hand the next day when 20 to 30 CUCSSA members showed up carrying large red flags, which they were forced to leave outside the lecture hall.
During the panel discussion CUCSSA students held up small placards attacking Falun Gong using terms borrowed from the Chinese regime's anti-Falun Gong propaganda, flew paper airplanes in the direction of the speakers, and in other ways acted in a disruptive manner. Two students from the CUCSSA group were prevented from reentering the lecture hall because of their inappropriate behavior.
First question: Were the red flags actually dyed in blood? All of your questions answered after the break.
The president of the Falun Dafa club then filed a complaint against the president of CUCSSA, Xu Kai, alleging religious discrimination and Falun Gong defamation. This led to a World Organization to Investigate the Persecution of Falun Gong investigator calling Xu; in the transcript of that call Xu says the offending articles are taken from the Chinese Embassy's website. Note that the CUCSSA constitution was reviewed by the Consulate General of the PRC in New York. Who were the CUCSSA advisors at the time? Chinese consulate officials. After the April incident, two University administrators were added as advisors. This has apparently not resulted in a change in group behavior.
The former first secretary at the Sydney consulate, Chen Yonglin, reported to the Epoch Times after he defected to Australia that these groups "are an extension of the Chinese communist regime overseas." Chen continues, saying, "Often, it is not convenient for the Chinese mission to do certain things. So to use student organizations, with a neutral name, is more effective." Okay, so a foreign government may be using Columbia student organizations as a front for its propaganda distribution... what's the problem?
The downside, as an unnamed alumnus notes to the Epoch Times, is that if Xu is a consulate agent, "The minimum thing that Xu will do is to report any Falun Gong practitioners at Columbia University to the Chinese Consulate." This same alumnus seemed to think it was Columbia's desire to downplay the bad publicity and continue to receive funding from the Chinese government that leads them to drag their feet. What happens once spy-Xu reports someone? "Once someone is on the Chinese Communist Party blacklist, the CCP will do such things to them as deny passports or arrest them if they travel to China. This means he is exporting the persecution to Columbia and the CUCSSA is violating the principle of religious freedom," the alumnus said.
Send any further information about the CUCSSA, its suspicious volleyball club, or other Chinese puppet-clubs across the Ivy League to ivygate.guest@gmail.com.
--SAM JACKSON
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July 24th, 2007 at 10:37 am
This is actually quite interesting and relatively well written. Way to go Sam Jackson!
July 24th, 2007 at 10:42 am
this is not an objective article. the falun gong are crazy accusing everyone of being a communist agent, I’ve never seen any group as dumb as the falun gong. — these people wouldn’t hesitate to listen into your conversation on the street and then come up to ask if you are from the mainland and then offer their cd or dvds with their crap. …
July 24th, 2007 at 12:15 pm
Yes, sdjkflsaj, confound those people who speak to you on the street! Why, if only they had courage to post anonymously on blogs instead to convey their disapproval…
Very nicely done, Sam. This was an interesting article. You are now officially cool in my book. (I know that matters to you a great deal, but.)
July 24th, 2007 at 12:17 pm
This is very disturbing. That Columbia would allow a “student group” to intimidate and harass other student organizations is bad enough. The fact that these actions are apparently organized by the Chinese government makes it even worse. Shame on Columbia for not doing more to protect students’ free speech and freedom of religion.
July 24th, 2007 at 12:29 pm
I was also going to comment on how such an un-funny article is quite atypical for IvyGate. However, the fact that communist agents apparently read IvyGate is quite amusing to me (see sdjkflsaj, above). Congratulations to IvyGate for its status a must-read news source in the world of international espionage!
July 24th, 2007 at 4:41 pm
Wow, looking for ‘evil commies’… great. What is this, the McCarthy era?
July 24th, 2007 at 4:56 pm
Perhaps peaceful change is not possible anymore. Five years ago the 191 UN member nations agreed to the Millennium Development Goals which including eradication of global poverty by 2025. This program is underfunded and under supported by the United States government. Organizations such as the Borgen Project are working to bring political attention to these issues by applying some much needed pressure. In a world where 1.2 billion people live on less than $1 a day, something must be done!
July 24th, 2007 at 6:33 pm
I’m not taking sides here, but in the name of objectivity it should be mentioned that the Epoch Times is published by Falun Gong.
July 24th, 2007 at 8:54 pm
to Yale ‘10 and h94, yeah, i’m the communist agent, aka sdjkflsaj that is monitoring ivygate, but, don’t be afraid, although I’m quite afraid of those falungong maniacs who would threaten anyone who disagrees with them with a lawsuit — That is NOT free speech! The reason I bother to post here is that I think it’s quite ridiculous to accuse those student organizers of being agents for the beijing govt, they are good people and yes, they do have good relationships with the chinese embassy or consulate, but that doesn’t mean they are spies, I know quite a few of them, and I just don’t like the falungong acting like they are under the wing of senator McCarthy. IN fact, the falungong has no other belief other than they are on a crusade against the communist party in china, but the way they behave, the way they worship their leader/founder, is just like the communists worship chairman mao in the 1960s and 70s, they attack everyone who dares to challenge their Falun Dafa or their founder Li Hongzhi, and that’s how they got persecuted initially in china starting in 1999 when, apparently out of his miscalculation, Mr. Li orders thousands of his followers to surround the central leadership compound in beijing and that alarmed the communist party leadership and they outlawed the falungong….. and a few days before that, they surrounded a magazine’s editorial office just because that magazine published an article challenging the falun dafa, — where is free speech? In fact, if the falungong takes over China, it will probably be ten times worse than the communists….. now, call me a communist agent or whatever you like, i don’t give a damn, i think most columbians are sophisticated enough as not to be easily misguided by anyone …. I just believe the falungong should stop using its scare tactics to attack those students in the cucssa, don’t attack people by calling them communist agents when you don’t know for sure, not being against the communists doesn’t mean you are a communist agent….
July 25th, 2007 at 8:16 am
> those student organizers [...] they are good people
Right. Good people who exult that “Anyone who offends China will be executed.”
July 25th, 2007 at 8:56 am
> those student organizers [...] they are good people
So they didn’t announce that “Anyone who offends China will be executed”?
July 25th, 2007 at 9:12 am
“Anyone who offends China will be executed.” — that is an outrageous mistranslation, flg style….
July 25th, 2007 at 2:04 pm
>I just believe the falungong should stop using its scare tactics to attack those students in the cucssa, don’t attack people by calling them communist agents when you don’t know for sure
“Scare tactics”?? I’d say that threatening execution is a scare tactic, and that waving flags died in blood is a scare tactic.
Suggesting a connection between the club and the Communist government, on the other hand, is free speech.
Threatening someone with a lawsuit does not negate free speech either; the courts exist to determine whether something is protected under free speech. Law suits are a crucial part of the system.
It does not seem like Columbia’s falungong club is attempting to take over China.
Sam Jackson, while this article clearly is not meant to be objective, it was extremely interesting and now I’m excited to learn more about the issues! Great work.
July 25th, 2007 at 11:05 pm
Communists at Columbia? Shock horror. On the other hand Falun Gong is wack so I have no problem with this.
July 26th, 2007 at 12:29 pm
Spectator covered this story back when it happened.
July 26th, 2007 at 12:30 pm
Spectator covered this story back when it happened.
http://www.columbiaspectator.com/news/2007/04/23/News/Protest.Ensues.At.Falun.Dafa.Discussion-2874111.shtml
July 26th, 2007 at 1:00 pm
i’ve been around this summer and the falun gong people have been handing out fliers directly accusing the cucssa of being communist spies.
July 26th, 2007 at 11:35 pm
Um, sorry — it’s well known that most Chinese agents in the West began their tawdry careers as students. Hardly a Falungung claim. Check out what the FBI’s director of counter-espionage and others reveal about such students: http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/02/10/fbi.espionage/index.html
July 26th, 2007 at 11:46 pm
Actually Chinese student groups like that at Columbia have been spying for years… BBC reported it two years ago (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/4704691.stm) It’s just that now they’re getting busted. ’bout frickn time. Question is: how the hell have they gotten away with it? Utterly outrageous…
July 27th, 2007 at 1:20 am
These CNN/BBC reports make it sound like the Chinese students here are all robotic spies programmed by the Chinese govt to steal tech secrets… “truth” is – believe it or not — 99 pct of the chinese students who came here in the last 15 or 20 years were either funded by themselves/families or by US schools…. what’s the motivation for them to be so loyal to the chinese govt? they are all diehard patriots? that’s hogwash, most people hated the lack of “freedom” in china, – not political freedom, but the freedom to live in cities you want or work in companies you like, right, they can’t EASILY do that in China, because there is this little harsh restriction on your official residence and a personal file system that tracks you until you enter the grave, — while political freedom hyped by western media doesn’t really mean anything in china, you can talk anything you like, you can curse hu jintao or any of the govt officials, but you just can’t put that in the newspapers, now, does that really bother anybody? not much …. all in alll, there are bound to be spies from china, but not as bad as CNN thinks — just like there are certainly american spies in china, but the bad news is, china doesn’t have much advanced tech for US spies to steal, so, america ended up in an intelligence deficit, but things will change – when china gets ahead of america, US spies will bring home valuable stuff, for now, live with the deficit, and don’t believe so much in that word “Patriotism”, a free mind should not be fooled by that kind of crap from any govt — whether that govt is in beijing or by the Potomac river… rich people are never fooled by patriotism, the bush family have friends all over the arab world — the oil tycoons, not the average joe; while poor guys rush to put that patriotic badge on their face and in their heart,… as they say, from the times of the egyptian Pharaohs, what the rich has been doing to the poor has never changed… sorry i digressed, F*** the spies and flg…. — by a TRUE Communist.
July 28th, 2007 at 7:27 pm
the falun gong is hardly an unbiased source for all of this, but I find it silly that people can honestly claim that the chinese government does not engage in religious persecution.
January 1st, 2008 at 8:45 pm
Falun dafa’s stupidity outmatches that of any communist regime.
February 26th, 2008 at 11:55 pm
I agree with the posts by realcommie – he seems to have summarized all of the key facts.