Struggle session
| Struggle session | |||||||||
Mao-era propaganda for struggle sessions
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| Chinese name | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Simplified Chinese | 批斗大会 | ||||||||
| Traditional Chinese | 批鬥大會 | ||||||||
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| Tibetan name | |||||||||
| Tibetan | thamzing | ||||||||
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| Transcriptions | |
|---|---|
| Standard Mandarin | |
| Hanyu Pinyin | Pīdòu dàhuì |
| Wade–Giles | P'i1-tou4 ta4-hui4 |
| Transcriptions | |
|---|---|
| Wylie | ‘thab-‘dzing |
| Lhasa IPA | tʰʌ́msiŋ |
A struggle session (simplified Chinese: 批斗会; traditional Chinese: 批鬥會; pinyin: Pī Dòu Huì) was a form of public humiliation and torture used by the Communist Party of China in the Mao Zedong era, particularly during the Cultural Revolution, to shape public opinion and to humiliate, persecute, or execute political rivals and class enemies.
In general, the victim of a struggle session was forced to admit to various crimes before a crowd of people who would verbally and physically abuse the victim until he or she confessed. Struggle sessions were often held at the workplace of the accused, but were sometimes conducted in sports stadiums where large crowds would gather if the target was famous enough.
During Mao's leadership, the Chinese people attended many different types of struggle sessions, sometimes consisting of 100,000 people. During the 1950s when Mao's Government began the Land Reform movement, poorer peasants seized the land from their landlords, who were given the title of exploiting class (simplified Chinese: 剥削阶级; traditional Chinese: 剝削階級; pinyin: bōxuē jiējí), and an estimated 2 million landlords were swiftly executed after being subjected to a struggle session.
According to Lin Yutang, the expression comes from "批判" (pinyin: pīpàn; literally: "to judge") and "鬥爭" (pinyin: dòuzhēng; literally: "to fight"), so the whole expression conveys the message of inciting the spirit of judgment and fighting. Instead of saying the full phrase "批判鬥爭" (pinyin: pīpàn dòuzhēng), it was shortened to "批鬥" (pinyin: pīdòu).
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