"I thought there were some bad people in the audience. "down with You Xiaoli! Down with You Xiaoli!" "I had many feelings at that struggle session," recalls You Xiaoli. From the audience came repeated, rhythmic chants. Workers from local factories and peasants from nearby communes had been bussed in for the spectacle. In the audience were You Xiaoli's students and colleagues and former friends. The scene was taking place at the university, too, in a sports field at one of China's most prestigious institutions of higher learning. On both sides of the blackboard were chalked her name and the myriad crimes she was alleged to have committed.
GET READY FOR THE STRUGGLE SESSION FULL
It was the position known as "doing the airplane." Around her neck was a heavy chain, and attached to the chain was a blackboard, a real blackboard, one that had been removed from a classroom at the university where You Xiaoli, for more than ten years, had served as a full professor. Her body was bent over from the waist into a right angle, and her arms, elbows stiff and straight, were behind her back, one hand grasping the other at the wrist. They also took place at universities, like the struggle session for the professor You Xiaoli, as recounted by Anne Thurston, in Enemies of the People: You Xiaoli was standing, precariously balanced, on a stool. These struggle sessions often took place in busy areas. It was a way to punish anyone who so much as disagreed with Communist Party dogma. If you don't bend your knee to communism, you will be destroyed. It was also a warning to everyone watching: If you don't bend your knee to communism, you will be destroyed. Their focus is on the elimination of the power base and/or class position of enemy classes or groups. The point was to publicly degrade the person until they swore allegiance to the Communist Party. One specific kind of public humiliation is what's called "The Struggle Session." It was a punishment reserved for people who committed wrong-think. This included public humiliation and public executions. These became more and more advanced over time. During the Cultural Revolution, the Chinese Communist Party used a variety of torture techniques.
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