Hong Kong fights for independence from China

Huh??

 

I was actually hoping for real footage and not anime.

 

Lin could stop all this madness.

 

I support HK.

 

Well, the "Hong Kong Independence Movement" thinking is not the mainstream political thought in Hong Kong society. Hongkongers want stability and prosperity and they know HK's economy relies heavily on China. That said, the animosity towards China is unprecedented.

It can be attributed for several reasons. First, HKers had been very anti-communist since the 1967 riots and the Tiananmen Incident in 1989. Hong Kong had been a liberal society since the British rule and the locals were fearful that the freedom they're enjoying would be taken away by Beijing. Therefore, many locals are suspicious of Beijing and the recent interventions of Beijing in HK affairs have irritated many locals.

the Hong Kong government allowed some travelers from China to visit Hong Kong without any visa several years ago. It did boost Hong Kong's tourism but also led to clashes between the locals and the mainlanders. For instance, they flocked to Hong Kong to seize milk powders after the Chinese milk scandal in 2008 and caused the shortage of milk powders in HK. Some of the locals claimed that they've looted the town. Apart from that, the locals are very upset over the uncivilized manners of the Chinese tourists(e.g.peeing in the subway). Hong Kong and China was separated for over 150 years and has developed different cultures in the sense that they speak and write in different languages and hold different values.

The third reason is Beijing's refusal to grant Hong Kong democracy. The legislature is dominated by the functional constituencies which were elected by a small group of people and most of them are pro-Beijing. It has undermined the power of the legislators who are directly elected by the people of Hong Kong. The Chief Executive(leader of HK) was elected by a committee of 1200. HKers question his legitimacy and are demanding for more democracy, namely, to have a genuine universal suffrage for the CE in 2017 under the context of the Basic Law(HK's constitution). The pro-democrats now have threatened to occupy Central(the Manhattan in Hong Kong) indefinitely if Beijing plans to violate the Sino-British Joint Declaration and the Basic Law by doing any pre-screening in the nomination of the CE candidates.

Although the idea of independence is not popular among Hongkongers at the moment, I can foresee more and more people to join the bandwagon if Beijing does not exercise her promise to grant Hong Kong a genuine universal suffrage in 2017. Hong Kong is the only society in the world I can think of that is liberal but not democratic. We have every ingredient needed for democracy: freedom of speech, independent courts and an outstanding civil service. All we lack is the ability of choosing our own government! We've had enough of the lies from Beijing! This time we'll not surrender and fight for our democracy!

 

Some HKers need to change the attitude of anti-communist, twisted racism and anti-Beijing, stuffs inherited from British colonization and cold war mindsets.

"fight for our democracy" -- that's pure kiddie crap.

 

I agree some of the behaviors by the radicals are inappropriate, for example calling the mainlanders the "locusts" and calling China "cina". But I understand why they're upset. Mainlanders flocked to Hong Kong to seize milk powder, beds for pregnant women and school places, not to mention the influx of mainlanders has aggravated the undersupply of properties. They have caused so many social problems and I am not mad at those people being radical.

And how is fighting for democracy a "kiddie crap"? Democracy is a universal right and what we want is very simple:a genuine universal suffrage and the abolition of the functional constituency. Like I said, Hong Kong is more than ready for democracy and a universal suffrage is in the best interests of HK.

 

The good side of HK I want to see is its positive influence over mainland, but I also want to see less of the bad side - the disdain and arrogance . To be fair, HK was separated from China for so long and the sense of Nationality is not there yet in every HKer. OTOH, I think the culture and value of HK are still imprinted with strong Chinese heritages, more than what you realize. Spats like baby formulas frenzy, peeing in the subway, and other not so good behaviors by the mainland tourists are probably not sufficient reasons for HK to be independent. True, HK isn't getting the democracy the people, but it's not like Beijing is running an oppressive regime in HK either.

That said, I am fully behind HK's quest for democracy, more transparent electoral process, and I hope HK will be (and to some extent it is) a shining beacon for the future of China.

 

Do I detect self-hatred here?

 

Some cold war rhetoric can't be taken literally, but calling "fight for our democracy" kiddie crap is oversimplified kiddie crap IMHO.

 

More like sadistic yearning for some Gulags soup.

 

Team HK and Team Taiwan.

 

First of all, I am not an advocate for independence. I believe Hong Kong would not be able to survive without China. We're so dependent on China and China could easily ruin Hong Kong by cutting off the water supply if things get out of Beijing's control.

Speaking of arrogance, I actually found mainlanders are much more arrogant than us. Now that their economy has taken off, many mainlanders look down on Hong Kong. I've talked to many mainlanders, one thing they often say is that mainland cities have surpassed Hong Kong and claim Hong Kong is not comparable to those cities anymore. It is paradox that the mainlanders still flock to Hong Kong while they claim that Hong Kong is not better than the mainland.

The thing I hate the most about the mainlanders is their blind patriotism. Whenever we say "we're Hongkongers" or "we're from Hong Kong", they would accuse us of being "traitors" or "British dog". For example a Hong Kong athlete won a medal in last year's Olympic and an famous local singer tweeted that she was proud of Hong Kong. From our point of view, what she said was entirely normal but it provoked strong response by the Chinese netizens, claiming that she refused to call herself a "Chinese". The point I want to make is we have never denied that we're ethnic Chinese. The term "Hongkonger" does not contradict the term "Chinese". We have our rights to call ourselves "Hongkongers"! Anyone who have spent time in Hong Kong knows we are different from Mainland China and we are widely recognized by the world that we are a separate entity.

That said, i've met some sensible mainlanders who really understood our thoughts, but the attitudes of most of the mainlanders are unbearable.

One of the interesting in Hong Kong is that the older generation who were born and raised during the British rule was generally more patriotic than the new generation who grew up in the post-colonial era. The youngsters in Hong Kong are committed to oppose any kind of Chinese propaganda. Take the national educational proposal last year as a example, 120,000 teenagers besieged the government headquarter to protest against the proposal. It shows that even after 16 years of the so-called "reunification", the rift between Hong Kong and China is still getting deeper and deeper.

To be fair, the situation of Hong Kong now is much better than most people thought before 1997. Hong Kong remains one of the freest society in Asia. But there have been signs that Hong Kong is gradually losing her autonomy. The National People's Congress has overrule the judgement of the Court of Final Appeal in Hong Kong four times. Not only did it violate the Basic Law and the Sino-British Joint Declaration, but also undermined the power of the judiciary. The liaison office of the Chinese government in Hong Kong has became more active lately. It has openly intervened the constitutional reforms and hindered the democratization of Hong Kong.