The New York Times was the subject of an exposé this week.
The paper’s vested interests in communist China were scrutinized in an investigation by The Epoch Times. Meanwhile, The New York Times’s coverage of Falun Gong, a spiritual practice brutally persecuted in China, has been declared “shameful” in a new analysis by a nonprofit that monitors the repression.
The Epoch Times also learned that the paper is working on a hit piece on Shen Yun Performing Arts, a world-class classical Chinese dance company that aims to present “China Before Communism.”
The hit piece on Shen Yun, yet to be published, comes into yet clearer light given that the arts company was started by Falun Gong practitioners.
The New York Times’s record on covering the Chinese regime has been abysmal to begin with, according to multiple experts consulted by The Epoch Times, including Bradley Thayer, a senior fellow at the Center for Security Policy and expert on strategic assessment of China, and James Fannell, former naval intelligence officer and China expert.
Aside from infamously covering up the Soviet-caused famine in the 1930s via Walter Duranty, the paper once called Mao Zedong a “democratic agrarian reformer,” and the nascent Fidel Castro “democratic.”
Last year, the paper pushed for the failed policy of “engagement” with China, demonstrating “ideological obtuseness where they refuse to see the nature of communist regimes as they are,” Mr. Thayer said.
In the Falun Gong case, the paper has routinely regurgitated Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) propaganda, according to a March 21 report by the Falun Dafa Information Center (FDIC), which analyzed the paper’s coverage on the issue since 1999, when the regime launched the persecution.
“Not only are the victims’ plights typically treated with silence and indifference, but even more damaging—when they are reported—articles are riddled with misrepresentations, inaccuracies, and outright hostility, displaying a shocking degree of unprofessionalism and bias,” the report said.
The New York Times dismissed the report’s conclusions as “categorically false,” calling its coverage on the issue “extensive.”
But FDIC brought receipts. It found negative bias and inaccuracies in majority of the paper’s articles on Falun Gong. Many articles called the practice common CCP propaganda terms such as a “sect” or a “cult,” even when alerted that such labels were unwarranted.
As for breadth, from 2009 through 2023, The New York Times ran more than 200 articles on the Uyghur ethnic minority in China, more than 300 on Tibetans, and only 17 on Falun Gong.
That is “far from what might reasonably be called ‘extensive,’” the FDIC said.
Larry Liu, an FDIC deputy director, was appalled to learn the paper’s next target was Shen Yun, a New York-based arts company which performs every year for about million people—to rave reviews.
The CCP has tried to sabotage Shen Yun for years, pressing theaters and government officials to cancel the show under the threat of endangering relations with China.
A New York Times’s expected hit piece on Shen Yun “will likely be the CCP’s dream come true,” commented Mr. Liu.
The New York Times put two reporters on the story, Nicole Hong and Michael Rothfeld, who had previously made their names by pursuing the story around the alleged 2006 affair between Donald Trump and adult performer Stephanie Clifford. The reporters have been working on the hit piece for about half a year, going after a small group of former Shen Yun artists who left the company with a grudge, The Epoch Times learned.
The reporters have apparently been trying to cobble together a narrative that Shen Yun artists don’t receive sufficient health care.
The Epoch Times spoke to dozens of Shen Yun artists, their parents, and other people familiar with the company, but none of them mentioned such an issue.
“It’s absolute rubbish,” said Kay Rubacek, whose son and daughter both perform with Shen Yun.
Ms. Rubacek is a filmmaker whose portfolio includes award-winning documentaries and the program “Life & Times” on NTD, a sister outlet of The Epoch Times.
Her children started attending Fei Tian Academy of the Arts, a grade 5–12 private art school, when they were 13 and 14. The dance track at the school gives students the possibility of auditioning for Shen Yun and continuing their training at the Fei Tian College on the same campus, which is what her children did—with great success, she noted.
Ms. Rubacek said that before sending her children to the school, she was very particular about becoming familiar with the campus and the teachers.
“I’m very careful with where I send my kids. I’m very protective of them,” she said. “So for me to feel comfortable for them to go to a boarding school, I have to check everything, and I checked everything.”
She was appalled to learn that The New York Times would try to smear her children as being part of some opprobrious organization.
“Everyone who watches the show, sees Shen Yun, they can see that these dancers love it,” she said. “They really love what they do.”
