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  A major turning point in a person’s life often comes when they are forced to evaluate their beliefs: the purpose, goal, and truth behind what they may claim to stand for. Often the creed that one follows isn’t really their own, but a guise to be accepted, popular, or one of the majority. In cases like these, when a crisis comes about that tests their credence, the façade will fail them and they wonder if they’ve been cheated, or if they’ve cheated themselves. In the short story "The Fall of Autumn Leaves", an excerpt from an autobiography by Anchee Min, the protagonist finds herself in conditions that challenge the very beliefs she claimed so proudly to be her own.
Communism is a system that takes all its power and stability from its people working collectively. Under such a government, co-operation and conformity is required from all the citizens in order to keep the system simple, regimented and united. Therefore individuality and personal accomplishment that do not support the Party wholly are a threat to the system; such as the rebellion, enlightenment, and individual thought that are nearly inevitable in human development anyway. In order to keep the people from thinking too liberally, communist officials will not only create an enemy for the people to believe they are defeating (in this case, America) but also spies, partially to make the cause real as well as present to the people an example of what will happen to them if they try to rebel.
Conforming a whole society to this ideology is naturally a difficult and rather impossible task, as the adults during the time of Anchee Min's story would have grown up under a different set of rules and different lifestyle. Therefore much of the government's prime focus in its campaign would be the children. At a young age, the child's world is still forming, therefore becoming an integrated part of that world is the best way to affect the outcome. The Communist Party does just that; it integrates itself so deeply into a community that it has an overwhelming effect on the children. Children are taught that the communist way is the right way, being rewarded and such by being "good citizens" and having strong political and social leaders. And so it was with Anchee. In search of approval, Anchee grew up writing slogans and speeches, becoming a head of the Little Red Guards, (a children’s political group at school) and speaking about cultural revolutions to committees. She was rewarded by certificates and praise, called ‘noble’ and ‘honoured’, spoken about as ‘Mao’s Good Child’ and the ‘Student of excellences’ (734). In her world’s eyes, what she was doing was good.
Such praise had she received, however, that Anchee had never paused to wonder if she really believed everything she was saying, or whether she supported the Party because she felt it was right. "Not a day did I not feel heroic", she says, expressing her own pride, "I felt like an adult"(734). Yet what she was proud of still had no personal meaning: "We wanted to donate pennies"; "We were proud of what we did"; "We were fighting for the final peace"(734). She quotes all the idealised slogans of a brainwashed child of the communist system, based on such unity and lack of individual achievement. She was saying what they wanted her to say, without really understanding what it meant.
The first time Anchee stops to consider what she has been fighting for, however, is unfortunately when it begins to affect her personally. So far she had never truly had any personal reasons for supporting the Party other than the approval she received from doing so. Therefore when she is called into the office by Secretary Chain and presented with the controversial activist duty that forces her to consider her motives, it surprises her. No longer was it simply a fun "opera", an entertaining stage of a life in which she was a star. It had become "serious".
Secretary Chain was a man who had personal reasons to support the Party. "I owe our Party a great deal and I haven’t worked hard enough to show my appreciation", he said, as it was the party who had turned his life around and created for him a fulfilling and promising position in society(737). He wasn’t trying to manipulate her negatively; he truly believed in the system he was promoting. He didn’t stop to think about whether the Party was right or wrong. In his eyes it was an omniscient utopia that gave the people what it felt was deserved; thus after his hardships he received admiration and respect. To the children at the school he was a leader because of this strength and assurance. He had set out her dilemma: "to see whether you are a real revolutionary or an armchair revolutionary" (736).
To Anchee, however, as to many children, her teacher was as much of a world-shaping factor as the communist activism was. Autumn Leaves had devoted her whole life and effort into creating a broad, exciting interest in learning, encouraging Anchee especially to be "serious about learning"(735). She loved the children, they "were her spring", her creation, her chance to pass on the love of knowledge to another generation (735). Described as "unique" and "energetic", a teacher or any individual that children see express such sincere love on a daily basis is just as influential if not moreso than a thousand slogans and respectable political figures (735). Secretary Chain’s request was as distressing as being asked to betray a parent.
Anchee had been influenced by the Party and their model of right and wrong for thirteen years: her whole life. She was still young and not yet experienced enough to recognise the right of personal moral and self-discovery. When she decided to accept, she said she had felt "guilt and anger" towards the thought of being used, and though she realised the feeling, she didn’t recognise which direction it was coming from: the teacher in the past or the Party at the moment. She had been "touched" by Secretary Chain’s devotion and the sincerity with which he explained to her the need to break free from the capitalist teachings of the "wolf in sheep’s clothing" (736). In addition to that, she had no real time to think about her decision. Yes, she knew she loved and trusted her teacher. But at the moment of doubt, there was no time to think and she was not only guilt-stricken and taunted as "careless", but immediately whisked away to a group of her comrades to write the speech immediately: without consulting her parents, who had not grown up in the communist reign, and in whom she might have trusted and been persuaded by to decline the controversial assignment.
From this story it can be seen that this is the first time in her life that the communism has failed her. Her pride and confidence are lost, both in herself and the world she believed in. She believed her teacher was a good person and in "no way… an American spy" (735), but the communist world told her otherwise. Yet her confidence in the Party was shattered inside, and even during the rally with 2,000 supporters she "forgot what she was supposed to do", "felt dizzy" and "was terrified" (738-9). It was only after constant encouragement from Secretary Chain, the chanting overwhelming rush of support from the crowd and the momentary illusion of power that Anchee was able to complete her duty and denounce her beloved teacher.
Despite it all, her pride was doused once again. The support of the Party that she had been so honoured for before was now shameful. The only other intimate connections she had – her family – spoke of disowning her and shut her out of the house for a long time. She thought she was doing the right thing. In the book Anchee Min describes her lesson as "I was too young then, yet one is never too young to have vanity" (741). She recognised her own follies of being unable to see past the glamour of her role in the world to the truth of what she was really doing. Perhaps it was truly her pride that condemned her in the end, or the need to feel powerful, or ‘like an adult’, as she had described the feeling once. Or maybe it was her environment; as she was never discouraged from anything she had ever done and had never been taught otherwise.
Whatever the case, a lot of things had ended up changing for Anchee. Her confidence in her beloved Party, her relationships with her family and teacher ("I was never forgiven", she says), and especially her self-image (741). She was no longer the family idol or the teacher’s pet, and she was no longer the confident activist. She had no identity then. It is this loss of identity and security in oneself that encourages a person to decide for themselves what they must keep as their own and throw away in order to define themselves in the world. A person can’t always please everyone, and the turning point from the naïve child to the established individual isn’t an overnight process. But it can take crises like the one that Anchee had experienced to begin the realisation of personal truth and morale.
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