Hong Kong Protests #OccupyCentral

True most rich HK people probably don't support this movement but as I noted Hong Kong has long had a stratified society.

Anyway I highly doubt that longing for the British is playing much of a role in these protests. I also think too many of y'all are reducing this down to a native Hong Kong versus Mainlander issue. While that is a big issue there is a genuine desire for democracy among many in Hong Kong.

 

I don't know what mainland movies you've been watching but movies from the mainland are as violent as HK movies.
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HKT 23:25: Thousands of protesters gathered outside CY Leung's office as the deadline for CY Leung to resign approaches. Protesters threatened to occupy the CE's office if CY Leung does not quit by 00:00. Hong Kong police warned of serious consequences if pro-democracy protesters try to occupy the government complex. CY Leung will hold a press conference in 5 minutes.

 

HKT 23:45: Govt just announced Chief Secretary Carrie Lam will meet with student leaders.

 

I think people forget that in polls, close to 70% of people in Hong Kong supported universal suffrage before the handover from the British to the Chinese. It is true that Chris Patten threw gas on the fire when he expanded functional constituencies to include virtually everyone in HK but the sentiment for democracy predates that.

The Chinese totally miscalculated with HK. Deng incorrectly assumed that by the time the 50 year period of one country two systems was up, China would be inching towards some of the freedoms and assumed democratic governance that HK would already have.

Then the economy boomed and the freedoms guaranteed in the HK basic law and any sort of democratic vote were all put on hold. So now China is stuck with this city-state that is playing by a different set of rules and its clear that the CCP has no intention of ever introducing those rules to the mainland any time soon. So now, the CCP is trapped and isn't sure what to do. HK is a powderkeg and a big problem.

 

Completely off-topic. But Tinman if you like HK movies, check out Johnnie To - he's an old family-friend of my Uncle's and his movies are really good.

 

I've seen election, that was pretty good.

 

It's not really Mandarin that's the point. Having a common language, Putonghua, is a given for a large nation. It gives you to more mobility and more unified commerce.

I see the matter more like Texans feeling more like Texans than Americans, or rather if measures were taken to reduce the Texan identity in the name of national cohesion, then there will be people who will get offended and angered by it.

Cantonese people have always felt stronger regional identity within. Their state radio and television are generally in Cantonese. They feel their status is different. They are among the most prosperous, if not the most prosperous, region in China. Officially Mandarin, English, and Cantonese are supported though the policy of tri-lingualism in Hong Kong, yet it seems like Cantonese is in name only as it receives a pittance of relative funds to support it.

Sure you can argue that other regions face the same situation, like the decline of Shanghainese in Shanghai to Mandarin, but that was never the point wrt Cantonese people. I'm sure more Californians consider themselves Americans rather than enshrine their identity as the most prosperous state and culture.

This guy hits my original points (language wars and how 1/3 of Guagdong Province are immigrant workers) in more detail:

http://chinamusictech.blogspot.com/2010/08/is-cantonese-in-danger-of-extinction.html

Suppressing a language will always create a reaction among natives. There's resentment among "native" Taiwanese against the Kuomingtang for their strict enforcement of Mandarin across all levels of government and culture during the years of martial law. No **** everyone speaks it today. Except people still remember and categorize themselves as foreigners and natives from that period three-four generations ago.

 

That's probably his best. He make a ton of films. His earlier films are hit or miss.

And the whole mainland propaganda cinema is so true. One need look no further than that cinematic garbage pile Transformers: Age of Extinction.

 

This is a total mixup of language and culture and offers a terrible argument. Guang Dong is not the only city with massive number migrant workers and erosion of local culture, and it isn't losing its culture just because mandarin is taught as the main language at school or a few TV stations is playing mandarin. How many percent of the population is Shanghai are not natives, what about Beijing, Those numbers are likely much much higher than just 1/3, in fact in those city migrant workers most likely are multiple times more than the local population. These are just by product of the economic boom, industrialization and urban migrations.

local cultures in every big city is being lost, because of the melting pot effect and there's little you can do about it. Even if you stopped teaching mandarin all together in schools non mandarin speaking provinces, this erosion will still happen, and parents will still have to teach their kids how to speak mandarin because of how inconvenient it would be living in a major city in China without fluently speaking it in the social realm. I mean what other examples are there of cultural suppression other than requiring kids to learn the official language at school, which would benefit most of them when they grow up in these big melting pot cities. If anything, standardizing the language help to alleviate the regional discrimination that are rampant in these large industrial cities all over China.

It's also an exaggeration to say that kids growing up in these areas won't even know how to speak their local dialect, every single person I've met from GuangDong have very broken mandarin, and the locals all speak to eachother in Cantonese, same can be said with most Shanghai families that I know in Canada and China. It's not hard for the kids to be bilingual, like most of them are growing up that only speaks mandarin in a school setting, and goes right back to cantonese at home and with friends outside of school.

The anecdote about Chinese people in Vancouver all speak Cantonese doesn't really prove a point. Chinese people in Vancouver up until much recently, have all been immigrants from Hong Kong who has had no formal education in mandarin, of course you would hear mostly Cantonese in Vancouver. The funny thing is, growing up in Vancouver as a kid, 90% of my friends have been of Hong Kong decent, and every single one of them at some point was put into Mandarin classes by their parents. I literally just had a conversation with my girlfriends parents, they were both early immigrants from Hong Kong about how they regret not teaching my girlfriend mandarin when she was growing up.

And lastly, what area of China doesn't have a strong regional identity, Beijing and Shanghai people are notorious for discrimination against outsiders and extremely prideful and protective of their local culture. And as far as funds going towards Cantonese in Hong Kong, why do you need that, very few Hong Kong people knows how to speak mandarin at a high level anyway.

 

So peaceful protesters got teargassed and pepper sprayed, and Pro-Beijing mobs got free pass?

 

They learned these advanced techniques from democratic goverment of america.

 

Wilson Wong is such a vag. How much street cred did he lose when middle aged men made him cry?


http://www.cnn.com/2014/10/03/world/asia/china-hong-kong-protests/index.html?hpt=hp_t2

According to CNN staff on the ground, scuffles ensued as crowds of people opposed to the protest -- numbering in their thousands, and mostly male and middle-aged -- confronted the camp of hundreds of demonstrators, many of whom are students.

Among the pro-democracy protesters, some of whom were crying, 24-year-old Wilson Wong said the crowds were intimidating.
"We just want a peaceful dialogue but we're scared because they're using violence," he said. "We're very nervous and our hands are shaking even as we hold on to each other."
Siu Hay, a 33-year-old musician, said the anti-Occupy crowds were "very angry and very noisy." "They (the Occupy Central protesters) just want peace and democracy."

 

whoo, intelligent dialogue about power structures in China.

whoda thunk it.

 

Largely self-taught, they, the CCP regime, have learned how to dupe large segments of their population, oppress those who disagree with regime policy, and steal Western technology. We, the United States, can scarcely claim credit for that.

 

violence broke out in key business districts occupied by the protesters. places like Mong Kok and Causeway Bay have pro-establishment groups fighting the protesters. those places depend on mainland business for almost all of their income and known to be triad areas.

 

The language issue is probably one element but I'm not sure how much it matters to younger HK residents. When I first went to Hong Kong in the 90's few people spoke Mandarin and among people like street vendors, security guards and even cab drivers many didn't speak much English. Some of my own family in Hong Kong I couldn't communicate with because I don't speak Cantonese and they didn't speak Mandarin or English. From my last few trips I've had no problems getting around Hong Kong speaking Mandarin and while Cantonese is still widely heard there seem to be very few HK residents that can't at least understand Mandarin.

Mandarin has even made it into most HK media and while most HK produced movies are primarily in Cantonese they frequently feature characters speaking Mandarin even while other characters answer back in Cantonese.

One other issue regarding the squeeze on Cantonese is that the transliteration to English of the language also makes a difference. The main system for transliteration of Mandarin is the Pinyin system. That system not only makes it possible to render Mandarin words in the Roman alphabet but also makes it easier to input Mandarin using Qwerty keyboards and for shorthand for things like texting. There is no such system for Cantonese which handicaps Cantonese. .

Another aspect of the language issue that those who don't know Chinese might not realize is that there are two forms of written Chinese, and I'm not talking about caligraphic styles or fonts but actually two different systems of characters. There are the traditional characters which are used in Taiwan, many overseas Chinese, Macua and still in Hong Kong. Then there are simplified characters that are used by the PRC and Singapore. This is a big political issue between Taiwan and the PRC to the extent that Taiwanese Chinese language schools in the US won't teach the simplified characters.

One side note I've noticed is that the amount of English speakers seems to have gone up also and English fluency seems higher.

 

So the regime plan appears to be to create violence by targeting peaceful protesters with crowds of regime supporters encouraged to use violence. Violence ensues, caused not by pro-democracy people, but by the regime, and the Chinese government has the "excuse" they have manufactured to crack down on the protests. How typical.

 

Protest busting by proxy, Pinkertons or Triad is SOP.
Then of course there is no solution to the 'violence' but official suppression by the military and police.

 

Hong Kong police are not CCP police.

The real CCP police force work completely different from western police. They hardly ever carry guns or use any brutal force. They will continue to try to use reason until the very end, instead of shot you dead right away.

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