Transcript generated automatically by AI and may contain errors.
Chapter 1: What is Shen Yun and why is it controversial?
Hello. Hello. And welcome to another episode of Shorthand, where we're going to talk about something that I just randomly say to people now, and then I want to watch their response to it. Because if you live anywhere but under a rock... Wish I did. No pedos under my rock. You will no doubt, like me, have been bombarded...
Buy billboards and posters everywhere you go of leaping Chinese dancers dressed in colourful silks set against epic ancient Chinese backdrops advertising the theatrical show Shen Yun. Complete, of course, with words of praise from the likes of Cate Blanchett, who took our kids and apparently they fucking loved it. If you don't know what I'm talking about...
Shen Yun is a show that promises a, quote, sublime evening of classical Chinese dance that takes you on a journey of folklore and myths spanning a millennia of Chinese history.
Chapter 2: What is the history and purpose of Falun Gong?
All with an impressive live orchestra and the tagline, China before communism. I discovered that that tagline wasn't always a tagline. It was the tagline that got put in place after COVID. So then they were like, okay, everybody's a little bit like, yo, China, what the fuck you doing? So we're like, now we can go with this tagline. So what's not to like? Sounds good, right?
If that was the pitch I gave to you, that sounds fantastic. I'd love to go watch that. As it turns out, there's quite a lot wrong with it.
Chapter 3: How does Shen Yun operate and market its shows?
Shen Yun is a part of a pretty grim cult, as it turns out. And that cult have had accusations of everything from money laundering to child slavery and human trafficking levelled at them. All while they spread their agenda and make millions with their bizarre stage show very much hiding their sinister doings in plain sight. But what is the history of this cult? What are they trying to achieve?
How do they sell out shows across the world and operate with such shiny legitimacy? This is The Shorthand.
So I have to start this off by saying that in January this year, January 2026, after months and months and months of curiosity, I did actually go and see a Shen Yun show here in London at the Eventium Apollo. If you are a patron, you listened under the duvet, you already know that I did this. I have to say that it was a very, very strange experience, right?
Chapter 4: What are the allegations against Shen Yun and Falun Gong?
Don't get me wrong. When you go to watch it, if you go to watch it, the one thing you have to say is that the dancers are incredibly talented. Not just like, oh, they're good at dancing. I mean, like you feel like you are watching unbelievable feats performed by like gold level medal gymnasts, acrobats and dancers. There is no doubt about that. But would I recommend it as a show?
not really I don't think and not just because of all the weird cult shit and everything we're going to tell you in this episode about how they treat the dancers and all the things that they believe but also just because it's weird it's a fucking weird show Everyone who's performing has on this sort of like weird, frozen, culty smile.
And it's obviously hard to tell with the dancers because they're in the performance, they're in the act. But in particular, the two people that really stood out to me is they have like a couple of emcees, right?
Chapter 5: How do dancers experience life within Shen Yun?
And the show that I went to go watch, it was a Chinese lady and an American man, like a white American man. And they give the sort of majority of the like Uncanny Valley vibes.
They're the ones up there before each dance or each performance who would come on and explain to you what you're about to see, how it's relevant to the history of China, and also give you little tidbits about what the organization stands for.
that was okay like the first time they come on stage you're a bit like well that's weird you kind of get used to it and that isn't like the worst thing the worst part was when they got to a song called the truth reveals itself And this is where I couldn't really take it seriously anymore. Because look, if you go and watch it and you're like, they've got some weird and wacky beliefs, that's fine.
That's their business. But it was when they jumped to this song and there's literally a line in it where they say how evolution and atheism are the work of Satan himself. But we'll get to it. I'm jumping ahead.
Chapter 6: What financial practices are associated with Shen Yun?
Let's start nice and easy with Shen Yun. What does that actually mean? Shen means divine beings and yin is the inner beauty of one when they are dancing.
Very specific.
Very specific. Apparently there's, you have to ask Sam this, there's a Welsh word for the feeling of the type of love that you have for something uniquely because you know it will end. Oh, wow.
I love words. Words, great.
next I love words with Saruti Bala and it's just you reading the dictionary oh but like a Welsh dictionary or a Mandarin Cantonese one they seem to have good words so Shen Yun translates to divine dancing beings kind of and the show does deliver on that but as it turns out Shen Yun is not the name of the actual cult itself
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Chapter 7: What legal issues is Shen Yun currently facing?
Shen Yun Performing Arts was started in August 2006 by Falun Gong, or Falun Dafa, a group set up in 1992 in China by a man named Li Huangshi. And Shen Yun is like the cult's theatrical arm.
Yeah, I think that's where like some people get a bit confused. I think a lot of people know that Shen Yun has like culty vibes. And when I went to go watch the show, there was a woman who was like standing in the queue for the toilets. The toilet situation at Ventium Apollo was a fucking nightmare. But yeah, she's standing in the toilet queue ahead of me and she's texting on her phone.
And she's got the font set very large so I can read what she's saying. And she's like, I'm at the cult show. And she is at the cult show.
Chapter 8: What should potential audiences know before attending Shen Yun?
But like you said, Shen Yun itself is not the cult. It's like the all-dancing, all-singing, though they don't actually sing, the all-dancing branch of the cult. And it's very, very interesting how they use them.
Straight off the bat, when you look into Falun Gong, it does feel very Scientology-esque. Xi claims to be magical. He says that he can levitate, tell the future, and see through walls. He even suggests that he might be an alien. Weird stuff, and things that certainly should ring some culty alarm bells. But other than this, at first glance, the system of Falun Gong does seem pretty harmless.
It prescribes a series of gentle exercise stretches and meditation to help people feel better, both physically and psychologically.
Though he does say, and this again feels very Scientology-ish, as you work through the system, he does suggest that strict adherence may also be able to achieve the levels of otherworldly talents that he has. You've got to work through the system. Do the splits again. No seeing through walls for you.
Now I've seen some videos of people doing the gentle exercises, the stretches that Falun Gong prescribes. And it honestly does come across very like beginner yoga at your local leisure center run by some lady named Crystal. Like it doesn't seem like that big a deal. And I was comparing it all the way to yoga. I was always like, oh, she looks like yoga.
But it does actually, to set the record straight, come from an ancient Chinese practice called Qigong, which like yoga, combines meditation, breathing and movement, but did develop in a completely different part of the world and is its own thing. And when she first appeared on the scene in the 90s in China, Falun Gong blew up almost immediately.
And this, like many a cult we have come across before, Hannah, is because he timed it perfectly. He emerged in the midst of the Chinese Qigong fever in the 90s.
Because following the death of Mao Zedong, who had spent the previous decades absolutely stomping out all of China's historical, spiritual and religious practices, in the 90s, there was a massive resurgence in interest around things like Qigong. Much like in Japan, Aum Shinrikyo, they come to power after there is a challenge on whether their emperor really is this divine being.
And the people are like, shit, well, if he's not divine, there's a sort of vacuum and period of flux where people are looking for spirituality and religion. And this is when cults can sneak their little sneaky fingers in. And that's exactly what she does here. She capitalized on this vacuum of meaning, and he combined Qigong with Buddhism and repackaged it and sold it back to the people.
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