(Clearwisdom.net) I have met many Chinese people who, when we began talking about Falun Gong and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), would say to me, "You can do whatever you want to, but it's best not to touch the issue of ideology." In today's China, when encountering the word "ideology," people "turn pale as if they see a tiger." Many people don't dare to talk about the issue of "ideology."

Why are people so afraid of "ideology?" It is because the evil CCP has attached a background of extreme violence and terror to this word. Thus whenever people hear it, they immediately think that they may be persecuted by the CCP, and immediately feel an ineffable fear. For their safety, people would rather not mention the word "ideology."

Actually, the word "ideology" is a very ordinary word. The first part of the word "ideo-" means "consciousness" and it is something that everyone has. Every life has consciousness, otherwise it is not a human being nor any form of life. The second part "-logy" simply implies "a form of knowledge." It means nothing but the different forms of every individual's consciousness and characteristics. Isn't this then a very ordinary word?

Every person has their own ideas and personality, thus each person's ideology is different from those of others. One ethnic group may have a different ideology from another. The ideology of people in the past could also differ from people today. Aren't these all quite normal phenomena?

Why should we be afraid of talking about ideology? For a human being, the physical part and the mindful part make up an entire entity. For a person, besides this physical body, it is actually important to have thoughts, ideas, morals, knowledge, and consciousness. This is the richest aspect of human beings, it is the most worthwhile aspect to talk about, and it is the biggest difference between humans and animals. Thus what people should really talk about is spiritual life instead of materialistic life. This is to say, what people should think and talk about the most is ideology.

Why did the CCP put "ideology" into a forbidden zone? Why does the CCP brutally persecute the people who dare to talk about "ideology?" From the situation of the word "ideology" in China, one can see clearly the CCP's dominant influence over words. The CCP only allows itself, and not the common people, to talk about ideology, it only allows itself to talk about politics, and it only allows itself to hold power, forbidding the common people the right to think freely. "Ideology" is a word originally from the areas of minds and ideas. However, in society under the CCP, it has changed to imply controlling people's ideas and persecution under despotic rule.

The CCP's purpose is to suppress the Chinese people's minds. Thus as times goes by, people don't have real thoughts and ideas anymore. They can find space to live only if they follow the CCP's "Party spirit." By connecting the word "ideology" to violence and terror, the CCP has reached its goal of destroying people's ability to think independently using their real consciousness and true personality, therefore yielding to the "Party consciousness" that the CCP tries to force into people's minds.

There is an old saying: "There is nothing sadder than if one's mind is dead." Actually, under the CCP's many years of persecution and terror, many Chinese people have lost most of their thinking minds. As a Chinese person, there are many things that one cannot think about or does not dare to think about, because it will lead to misfortunes and persecution. Thus as time passes, many Chinese people are used to not using their true minds and ideas to think about things, but only use the ways introduced by the Party to think and live. Many people are on the edge of becoming the CCP's tools.

The sad thing is that many people do not even realize this themselves and think that they are quite strong-minded. They don't know that the way they think is all based on what the Party has carefully planted in people's minds. Song Dynasty poet Su Dongpo's lines "One cannot see Lu Mountain's true appearance, because he is standing on the mountain" applies here. Not until Chinese people move overseas for quite some time, do they realize that Chinese people's ideology is so much different from the ideology of people living in the rest of the world; not until then do they realize that they have been deeply poisoned by the CCP.

If Chinese people continue to be like this, they probably will completely lose their ability to think independently. In order to show that Chinese people have "freedom," the CCP "revitalized the economy" and "opened up the markets;" it indulged people's materialistic and pornographic desires. In these areas, Chinese people have much more "freedom" than the rest of the world. Chinese people say themselves, "revitalize men and open up women," "when men become rich, they will turn bad; when women turn bad, they will become rich," and so on. Those Chinese people who think that they are strong-minded, and who think that China is very free and Chinese people are very happy, mostly think so because indeed, in the aspect of indulging people's desires, Chinese people have greater "freedom" than the rest of the world and have more "space" to develop.

Actually, this has all been carefully planned by the CCP. The Party wants to kill individual personalities and nurture people's demonic nature, thus it has set a "forbidden zone" on talking about ideology. It only allows people to talk about eating, drinking, playing, and enjoying themselves, as well as things such as romance and how to earn money to get rich. At the same time, it "opened up" people's moral lines, allowing people to be able to do whatever, as long as they don't talk about "ideology" or "politics," and as long as they don't talk about who's right and who's wrong.

As Chinese people, we really should think carefully about why such a common word has been put into the forbidden zone of people's minds and conversations.

What is each of our real selves like? How can we live our lives so that we can find our "true elegant demeanor?" When there are things we are afraid to talk about and think about, aren't we suppressing our own minds? Isn't this what the dictator wants to see most?

The restrain and apathy of spiritual lives is just like committing suicide on one's mind and abandoning one's life.

If Chinese people want to live new lives, they must first bring alive their suppressed minds and ideas.