United Kingdom: Practitioners Expose the Persecution of Falun Gong While Taking Part in Annual Tough Guy Competition

On January 29th, 2006, two Falun Gong practitioners from the South East of England took part in the annual Tough Guy competition. Held in the countryside near Birmingham, the competition consists of cross country running, followed by a twenty part assault course, which features climbing over large structures, crawling under barbed wire, swimming through ice cold underwater tunnels and many steep hills. The course is approximately eight miles long.

The two practitioners practise the Falun Gong exercise “Buddha showing a thousand hands” just before the start of the race. They wore yellow waistcoats with “Racing to Rescue the children of Falun Gong practitioners tortured in China” printed on the back.

The two runners used the competition to spread the word about the persecution of Falun Gong. In the weeks before the competition they distributed leaflets in their local area, which carried the slogan: “What is tough? Being persecuted for believing in truthfulness, compassion and tolerance is tough” and explained that they were doing the competition in order to raise awareness about the persecution of Falun Gong other practitioners also went to support them on the day. Two of them held a banner with the same slogan, many spectators at the competition asked about the banner and the practitioners were able to let a lot of people learn about the persecution.

A third practitioner filmed a three hour video of the race, as well as interviews and what practitioners outside of China are doing to help end the persecution. The filem wiill be made into a documentary that focuses on how the two runners suffer great pains to complete the Tough Guy competition but, their suffering is absolutely nothing when compared to the suffering of Falun Gong practitioners being tortured in China. The idea of this approach is to present the persecution from a perspective that people in the west can relate to. The film also contains interviews with practitioners who have been arrested in China, as well as an explanation of the practice and the two practitioner’s activities leading up to the Tough Guy competition. The working title of the film is “What is tough?” and it is expected to be completed by late summer.