CULT OF PERSONALITY: Beijing youths display their
fervent allegiance to Mao
Aug. 5, 1966
A Call for Mass Insanity
By Hannah Beech
The summer
heat lay oppressively low on Shanghai, and Zheng Mingyi, 14, turned to
the radio hoping for a diversion from the soaring mercury. What he heard
that day changed his life and the lives of every citizen in the most
populous nation on earth. In urgent tones, a news reader announced that
Mao Zedong was exhorting citizens to rise up and "bombard the
headquarters" to rid the party of his rivals and enemies. That day the
Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, announced two months before, took
hold.
Schools were shuttered and swarms of youths dubbed Red Guards
began rampaging through the streets persecuting and sometimes killing
anyone who was rich or educated or just plain outspoken. The madness
lasted for a decade, during which millions were thrown into labor camps
or forcibly relocated from cities to farms. The simplest things became
crimes: wearing Western clothing, hoarding a slice of meat, forgetting a
line from Mao's Little Red Book.
For Zheng, the crackly radio message
that day meant the dissolution of his family. He and his four siblings
were dispersed across the country to remote villages as punishment for
having a teacher as a father. By the time Zheng returned home seven
years later, his father had been tortured by Red Guards and was dead.
It was a tale repeated exponentially across the nation. Even now when
Zheng hears the radio start up, he shivers at what message the
newscaster might bring.
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