(Clearwisdom.net) Recently my family members and friends kept urging me to place the highest priority on my own family. One family member told me, "A person has to be responsible to his own family first and foremost. Individual beliefs come after that." He was implying that when I refused to give ground and held fast to my individual beliefs as the evil used the happiness of my family to threaten me, I was bringing pain, suffering and anxiety to my family members and being too selfish. A friend also advised me, "A smart man does not simply face the situation head-on when he is outmatched. A real man can bend himself or stand up straight at will. Why don't you admit you were wrong and get yourself out first?"

According to notions of the contemporary Chinese people, the type of action that my family and friends are urging me to take is called "suffering the loss of one's personal ideals for the sake of others importance." For the sake of one's own family, for the sake of one's own survival, a person is supposed to endure temporary mistreatment, go along with those who force their own wills upon others, sacrifice correct stances that he should have insisted on taking, sacrifice the self-interest and benefits of other people, and even sacrifice one's own beliefs. This is now considered a positive character trait that should be praised and encouraged in the eyes of contemporary Chinese people.

In reality, this is a warped notion. What lies behind the splendid and upright exterior are extreme care for one's own self-interest and extreme selfishness.

Throughout the countless waves of political movements, the Party has been forcing people to write the despicable "statements of remorse" or "pledges." One can imagine how much suffering that a person who was forced to write such things felt inside, because what he betrayed was his own conscience.

It is true that some people managed to stay alive this way, were able to go on with their lives, and in the end achieved certain things. But has anyone thought of the fact that because of what they did, many other people might have lost their future, health and even lives, and many other families might have lost their own happiness? What is even more frightening is that these kind of people became role models. People think that only those who abandon their own principles and betray their own consciences can manage to stay alive and become accomplished later on in life, and only those who "endure mistreatment for the sake of what is important" can survive.

During the last 50 plus years, in order to ensure that the citizens stay obedient to the wills of their rulers, the Party has been continuously encouraging the spread of this kind of behavior. Using the welfare of their families and their own lives as threats, it forces people to abandon their own correct stances, admit responsibilities to crimes that were arbitrarily made up, and betray their friends, colleagues, and even family members. After enduring and being tempered in so many political movements, the Chinese people deeply know that the only way for them to survive and have a comfortable life for the time being is to follow the ruling class without any principle by lying, making wildly exaggerated statements, and verbally and physically attacking others. To put it simply, the motive of the ruling class is satisfying their own desires and preserving their own power. They do whatever they want and get away with everything no matter how evil it is, shocking and frightening people everywhere.

If a person is willing to give up his belief in Falun Dafa for the sake of his family today, he might cut all ties with his family for the sake of his own life tomorrow. To those Dafa practitioners' family members who have been deceived by the evil, have you thought of this and its consequences?

As to the notion of "enduring mistreatment for the sake of what is important" that the contemporary people have in their mind, on the surface, "what is important" seems to refer to their own families, relatives or friends. In reality, "what is important" are themselves. When the true nature of such a mentality is revealed, it is in fact sacrificing one's own morality and conscience to preserve one's dirty, selfish desires. Isn't this an extreme manifestation of one's own selfishness?

Then, how can people abandon their beliefs, morality and conscience for the sake of their own selfish desires? That is because they think that beliefs, morality and conscience are spiritual things and as fleeting as the wind, and these things cannot be compared with the actual benefits that the physical, materialistic things bring them. Under the atheist education in China during the last 50 years, people no longer believe that "good is rewarded with good, and evil is met with evil." Therefore, they dare to do whatever they want to do using all kinds of methods imaginable.

As a matter of fact, the genuine "enduring mistreatment for the sake of what is important" is to sacrifice one's own benefits and endure one's own mistreatment out of concern for other people and the people of the future. In the midst of the vicious persecution by the evil, Dafa practitioners are enduring a great deal of mistreatment and pain. Yet they are still clarifying the truth to the people of the world. And that is the genuine "enduring mistreatment for the sake of what is important."