The knock came in the night, the knock she knew was coming but couldn’t figure out how to avoid, the knock that would change her life and take her only child’s life as well. In comparison, the expensive, irreplaceable, museum quality pieces that were smashed beyond repair were minor. They took everything she had worked for and they destroyed most of it- the books, the music, the china, her home. It was a sin to own things of beauty from past times. It was a sin to have so much when so many have so little. It was a sin to live in such a large house that her grandfather had worked his whole life to pay for. It was a sin to be a thinker, a rational human being who knew that people had different gifts and talents and that you needed to study to be a good doctor. You needed to study to even administer first aid safely, but all logic was gone- a thing of the past, like her priceless belongings and her only child- murdered in a disciplining action for the wealth of her mother that went too far. They took Nien Cheng to be shamed and imprisoned for her wealth, for her comfort, for her work history. She was evil and a sinner, and she never knew when they’d quit playing with her and kill her like they did so many before her. “I’m innocent,” she proclaimed repeatedly. “I have taken care of the poor all my life. I have fed those around me who were hungry. I have treated everyone with respect.”

But they didn’t care. She had more than they did and that was wrong. She must have done something wrong to accumulate so much. Nien Cheng tells of her imprisonment, of how they took her to see a doctor when she was sick, but he was a peasant boy playing doctor, because everyone was equal- with peasants being more equal than others. Everyone can do anyone else’s job, Mao preached, and the untrained peasant trembled as he pretended to treat her. He knew that he wasn’t a doctor and he made up a treatment based on illnesses he’d seen in his village as a boy. But he couldn’t study the medical books he needed to be a real doctor. They were gone, burned. You didn’t need knowledge in his world. You just needed to be a poor peasant from a poor village.

The Cultural War didn’t begin as a movement to destroy knowledge, learning, talent, or beauty. Its roots go much deeper than that. Before the communists took power in China, corruption and inflation ran rampant as the country was plundered by a leadership who wanted things their own way. The needs of the people and the country were secondary at all times, and the people fell deeper in debt, deeper in sorrow until they became to believe the promises made by those who said things had to change- and things changed. Their world was turned upside down. Right was wrong, wrong was right, smart was stupid, stupid was smart, beauty was ugly, ugly was beautiful, and rich were poor and the poor stayed poor- because some things never change. The new leadership, however, became wealthy, proving again that some things never change.

The causes of a devastating movement like The Cultural Revolution weren’t obvious and simplistic while the consequences were far reaching and crippling. I see some of those roots in the anger burning in America today-  dividing us by class, rhetoric, things, and knowledge. We can reject the experiences of a civil rights leader who lead confrontations where he was fire hosed, attacked by police dogs, and beaten until even the men doing the beating became ashamed of themselves, because he isn’t one of us. He can teach us nothing. We can gather on someone else’s private property without their permission because they shouldn’t own it, they shouldn’t be allowed to have more than four rooms in their house, they are evil because they have worked all their life for the things they have. We can’t feed the homeless, though, because they are taking from us without giving something in return- they aren’t part of us.

I hear the anger and I worry. We talk about the 1%, but when the 1% is gone- their businesses destroyed, their families ruined, and they’ve fled for safer place, who’s next? The man who has an RV in his driveway or the woman driving a Hummer? They both use more than their share of our valuable resources. They are evil too. And then… who? Where do you draw the lines when the mob is being ruled by mob think? When it’s more important to take a stand even when it means that innocent people can’t work and won’t have a needed paycheck with money they counted on to pay their bills? When the real issues of poverty and joblessness aren’t dealt with since it is easier to point fingers at people we think have more than their fair share, and it’s cool to take a leave of absence from school and go protest. Protest what, I ask? What do you stand for? What do you want to accomplish? Where is your heart and your belief system? What do you want? And I fear the answer is… we want what you have so give it to me. I have a right to it and you don’t. And there is the root of the class warfare that is beginning in our own land. We are becoming a nation of people who feel entitled, not a country of people in charge of their own destiny. There is a lot wrong here, and a ton of things need fixing, but we have a method that kind of works. How about we use that? Otherwise, the knock on the door will come to all who own anything of value and we will find ourselves lost in our own cultural revolution.

And if you think I’m overstating it, it’s time to read the story of one woman who survived the cultural war with very little of importance- except an important reminder to all of us… read Nien Cheng’s story, “Life and Death in Shanghai”. We have to learn from the recent history around us or we may lose it all.