Profiles in Freedom
They burned books, beheaded statues, and smashed priceless antiques wherever they found them.
They broke into the homes of those who had been declared by the Party to have a “bad class background.”
In the midst of this terror, you were either with Mao or you were a counterrevolutionary “People turned against each other in search of enemies and in defense of Mao,” Xi writes. “Friends turned against friends, neighbors against neighbors, coworkers against coworkers, and family members.”
Competing Red Guard factions soon graduated from shouting quotations from Chairman to each other to open warfare and mass killing.
The United States is not the first country to develop a Diversity,Equity and Inclusion (DEI) program. The Chinese were pioneers in this process.
Those who did not mindlessly follow the D.I.E. movement were punished, Mandatory training sessions followed at which she was told that some of her colleagues were benefiting from White Privilege, while others were somehow being oppressed by ill-defined “structural racism.”
Xi Vanfleet
Xi Van Fleet is a Chinese-American author and speaker who gained attention for her outspoken critiques of social and cultural changes in the United States, which she perceives as echoing the ideological forces she experienced during Mao Zedong's Cultural Revolution in China. Born in China, Van Fleet lived through this period of intense political and social upheaval, which began in 1966 and aimed to root out “bourgeois” influences and instill communist ideology. She vividly recalls the chaos, violence, and forced conformity, particularly the use of youth brigades (known as Red Guards) to enforce ideological purity. Van Fleet was sent to work in rural fields as part of the regime’s re-education programs, an experience she describes as deeply traumatic yet formative. After Mao’s death, China opened up under Deng Xiaoping, allowing her to attend college before she eventually emigrated to the United States in 1986
Watch the video interview with Profiles in Freedom.
When Xi Van Fleet, a Loudoun County mother, pushed back against Critical Race Theory at a heated Loudoun County School Board meeting last summer, her words carried special weight.
An immigrant from China, who as a child had lived through Mao’s Marxist Cultural Revolution, Xi described CRT as the indoctrination of children. What she was seeing in Loudoun County, she said, reminded her of what she witnessed growing up in Mao’s China.Her activism in the U.S. emerged around 2021, when her speech at a Loudoun County, Virginia, school board meeting went viral. In that speech, she criticized Critical Race Theory (CRT), arguing that it functions as a form of cultural Marxism that divides people by race much as Mao’s regime used class divisions. Van Fleet warns that CRT and “woke” ideologies are reshaping American institutions, culture, and public discourse in ways that recall the divisive and authoritarian tactics she witnessed in China
In her book Mao’s America: A Survivor’s Warning, Van Fleet delves into these concerns, asserting that cancel culture, identity politics, and violent protests by groups like BLM and Antifa bear disturbing similarities to Mao’s mobilization of the youth to dismantle traditional values and instill communist ideals. She interprets the American cultural and political shifts of recent years—especially following the social unrest in 2020—as indicative of an “American Cultural Revolution” aimed at eroding democratic norms and individual freedoms. Van Fleet calls on Americans to recognize these patterns and remain vigilant, emphasizing the fragility of freedom and the potential consequences of ideological extremism
Her outspoken stance has made her a frequent guest on conservative media outlets, where she continues to share her personal history as a cautionary tale for her adopted country, highlighting what she sees as the potential dangers of unchecked ideological conformity and cultural division.
4oIn 1986, after years of trying, Xi was able to leave this horror and study in the US.
She details reveling in the freedoms she found here, embracing the idea that all men are created equal, and that individual effort and merit mattered.
She worked hard to get a degree in library science, married the love of her life, bought a house, and started a family.
But as she details, Xi had escaped the nightmare that was Mao’s China, only to find that it had followed her to her new home. She was living her own American dream. The dream evolved into a nightmare. Does this sound familiar ?
As she explains in the pages of her first book, Xi saw it in the overreach during COVID, when the government labeled anyone who disobeyed the Made-in-China lockdowns, masking, and social distancing a threat to others. Sound familiar ?
In America’s public schools where, just as in Mao’s China, students were being dumbed down. Now more easy to manipulate and control, they were then brainwashed into believing that their country was systemically and irredeemably racist.
Xi’s history sent signals to her that America is following in China’s footsteps down a path of fascism and correct think.
My sister-in-law is native Chinese and we have been connected with many who lived during those times. As related in the story: not good for many millions, but a reflection of the impact of ideology driven from the top and indoctrinating the mass of people. No society is far from a similar position, with the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany prime recent examples as well. The risk to us is apparent, with the political discourse, always harsh and bitter towards one's opponents, a constant in nearly every election except that of George Washington. What has sustained us is the freedom to have opposing ideas, despite the friction. Unfortunately some are taking real steps to remove that right from the open forums we use.