On August 18th, 2007 in front of the City Hall in Memphis, people from Tennessee, Arkansas, Alabama and Mississippi gathered to celebrate 25 million people quitting the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and raise awareness of organ harvesting from living people in China.
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| Prof. Yang from Alabama A&M University Speaks at the Rally |
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| Rhodes College senior John Jester Takes Pictures of the Display Board |
They held banners reading "No more CCP", "25 million Chinese people quit the CCP" and "CCP: Stop Harvesting Organs from Living People" and more. The exhibit boards showed the torture taking place in China and how the CCP implements systematic destruction of the ancient Chinese culture.
Dr. Jason Wang from Alabama A&M University spoke at the rally about how the number of people quitting the CCP and its related organisations are counted: "According to the Quitting CCP Service Center, the center receives numerous phone calls, faxes, emails from mainland China, requesting to quit the Chinese Communist Party, the Communist Youth League, and the Communist Young Pioneers. More Chinese people quit the CCP via Internet using anti-internet blockade software. The total number of people who have quit the CCP has reached 25 million."
Dr. Sabina Kupershmidt from Vanderbilt University in Nashville talked about practices in China that harvest organs from live Falun Gong practitioners for profit: "If we do not take a stand against such practices today, we as a society will slowly become desensitised to the problem of unethical medicine if the profits are right. To prevent this cancer from spreading, we need to speak up right now."
Memphis resident Ronald Greyhen said to the reporter when passing by the rally, "Actually this is the first time I've heard about it, really. But I'm against anything that's depressing and oppresses people, anything of that nature. I think it's wrong, it's immoral, and it's not right." He also expressed his support to the organisers of the rally.
Ronald's wife Sheila Taylor said in response to hearing about the harvesting of organs from living people in China: "It's a very sad situation that we live in 2007 and this is still going on. Very sad."
Raven Walker is a Medical staff member and also a minister of a church in Memphis. He expressed a positive opinion about the rally: "Well, looks like news reporters, looks like they're scared of reporting things like this here. But I felt like instead of getting out there reporting things that are not necessary you need to report things that are necessary. And what you all are doing is necessary. It's more important than things that are not worth listening to. Give me things I want to hear, not what I don't want to hear. Things like this are what I want to hear. You got my support, you got my support."
Karin Wells from Fayetteville, Tennessee informed the people about several human rights violation cases that had just happened in August. "About 2 weeks ago, over 40 Falun Gong practitioners were arrested during an experience sharing meeting. Among them Ms. Hu Yanrong died while in police custody. Her face showed bruises and was bloody." Karin appealed at the end of her speech: "For 8 years Falun Gong practitioners have suffered from brutal persecution, and for 8 years they have proven their peacefulness. The persecution of Falun Gong practitioners must come to an end now."
Dr. Wade Yang from Alabama A&M University also spoke at the rally: "The persecution of Falun Gong by the CCP has drawn the attention of the world to China's human rights records, especially as the 2008 Beijing Olympics draws near. The Coalition to Investigate the Persecution of Falun Gong in China (CIPFG) has sent out a clear message to the CCP: The Olympics and crimes against humanity cannot co-exist in China."
Rhodes College senior student John Jester was very interested in the rally. He said to the reporter, "It's something that unfortunately goes unnoticed. You don't hear much about it. It may make the news every now and then, on the bottom line, but aside from that, there's no local politics, no national agenda that spreads it. It's tough. The only reason I found about it was because the demonstration here and I worked in Argentina with human rights. It's hard, because you have to put yourself out for it or you don't hear about it. It's unfortunate."
The rally lasted about an hour and ended around noon.
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