Just like plenty of religions and cults, the day-to-day stuff that individual practitioners do is usually very innocent, positive, hard to criticize. On its surface, Falun Gong is just a group that encourages spirituality, meditation exercises, and some basic philosophical ideas of morality.

It's the Leadership/Organization that's usually the problem, using the power and support they've gathered to further to spread their shitty politics. In this case, what started as just some pseudo-intellectual wanting to spread his ramblings evolved into a group with millions of followers at one point.

The group did garner a lot of worldwide sympathy after the Chinese government cracked down on them HARD in the 90s... being victims of religious persecution surely helped their image in the eyes of the public. But in the end, they're just another damn religious cult.