Celebrations for the 100th anniversary also reached the centers where members of xie jiao are “transformed”—or else.
by Zhao Zhangyong
“Glory to the Chinese Communist Party!” “No Communist Party, no new China!” These songs and slogans are shouted everywhere in China to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).
What was unusual on June 27 in a building in Gulou district in Nanjing city, Jiangsu province, was the group of people singing and shouting. They were the guards (“volunteers”) and the inmates of a “Love Home.”
The name “Love Home” is somewhat generic for a number of different facilities, but in fact Gulou district’s “Love Home” is one of the oldest centers in the province where members of xie jiao (“heterodox teachings,” i.e., banned religious movements, sometimes less correctly translated as “evil cults”) are detained and deprogrammed.
Gulou district’s “Love Home” was established in 2009 and also train anti-xie-jiao volunteers. Xie jiao members are “transformed through education,” in the hope they will not only renounce their faith, but will become themselves active in the anti-xie-jiao propaganda. If the “transformation” is not successful, they will be sent back to jail.
While official propaganda insists that xie jiao members are “transformed” through education, love, and care, tales of brutality, threats, violence, and even torture in these deprogramming centers are frequent.
On June 27, Cheng Dongxiao, director of the Anti-xie-jiao Association of Gulou district, lectured the inmates and volunteers on the “glorious” history of the CCP, introduced other celebrative speeches, and showed a propaganda movie. Then, all had to sing. And they were reminded that they are there to learn to “firmly believe in the Party, love the Party and follow the Party.”
