4 ms·

Okay, maybe you're more reasonable than it seemed at first. I understand some paranoia about foreign opinions. But, how often does the news need to talk about

by atr_gz 7y ago

Okay, maybe you're more reasonable than it seemed at first. I understand some paranoia about foreign opinions. But, how often does the news need to talk about the Opium Wars? I would say there are plenty of long-form articles talking about it, but does every article about Hong Kong need to give century-old context? It's brought up in Chinese media far more often because it's useful for the CCP to remind people. It helps keep them in power and feeds their narrative that China must never be seen as weak again. And while I personally don't think excessive nationalistic propaganda is a good thing, it's at least understandable. However, my point is that this part of history being brought up more often in Chinese media doesn't mean it's the natural state of things, or that it should be brought up more often in Western media. No one reasonable thinks the British or other foreign powers involved did the right thing there. You claimed straw-man really easily before. Don't you think saying that HKers think this one bill will turn HK into a 1984-like society is a bit of a straw-man? I think most of them might say that the problem is not one bill, but more of a slippery slope type thing. Give an inch, give a mile. What beliefs do I have about why parts of the world are unstable? I don't think I've expressed any, so you must be making an assumption there. And actually, if you ask around, I don't think you'll find many westerners who think colonialism was a good thing, although I'm sure there are some. Finally, about the British wanting Hong Kong to be democratic. After further reading, 60 years might not be right. There was a plan in the 40s and 50s for democracy, but it sounds like it was the British governor of the time who blocked it for unclear reasons. I don't know if there were other attempts before the negotiations for the handover began. The 1980s are more accurate, so maybe about 20 years before Chinese rule. That said, I still think it can be assumed that the CCP opposed democracy in Hong Kong. If you want me to say Britain messed up with Hong Kong by not allowing democracy, then I can agree with that. And I'll certainly agree that Western colonialism was for the most part a terrible thing that made the world a worse place.

NeedMoreTea 7y ago
60 years is right. Governors were repeatedly seeking democracy and proper elections, but pressure from Beijing forced them to back down. The papers are now publicly available at the National Archive, and linked in this NYT piece: "Chinese leaders were so opposed to the prospect of a democratic Hong Kong that they threatened to invade should London attempt to change the status quo" https://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/28/world/asia/china-began-push-against-hong-kong-elections-in-50s.html https://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/28/world/asia/china-began-pu...
- confusedhnguy 7y ago
  "Positive actions" is equivalent to "invasion"? Also is the West stronger than China or not? I am confused. If it is, then this threat means nothing. If the China is stronger, then why bother to create the one country two systems policy? Also, if China was strong enough to threaten the West, why is Taiwan still an issue till today? The reference in the article you posted says: > not hesitate to take positive action to have Hong Kong, Kowloon and the New Territories liberated” if the Brits allowed self-governance. So the Chinese government doesn't want HK do declare independence instead of returning to China, and will take positive actions if that is about to happen. Again, you and I don't agree on what the word "return" means.
  - NeedMoreTea 7y ago
    Let's look at this logically. "We shall not hesitate to take positive action to have Hong Kong, Kowloon and the New Territories liberated..." liberated - freed from enemy occupation. OK What could China do to achieve that? Break diplomatic ties? Economic sanctions as a huge importer of HK goods and services whilst 50s China's economy was a broken mess? Close the already mostly closed border? Write an angry letter? What's left? Invasion. What possible alternative interpretation can you suggest? Military blockade and starve them out? That's effectively war too, but with a much greater chance of escalating if you militarily prevent other nation's shipping... "However, the present status of Hong Kong is to our benefit" ... "Through Hong Kong we can trade..." Clearly the Chinese benefited from the huge economic success of Hong Kong so preferred not to invade or bomb the place to oblivion. They'd already backed off destabilising the Hang Seng as they got far more benefit from that decadent Western capitalism. The whole Chinese propaganda around the democracy of Hong Kong is exposed as blatant lie. "is the West stronger than China or not? I am confused. If it is, then this threat means nothing." Having had two of them nations generally seem to prefer avoiding a third world war. That one can doesn't always mean one wants to, even if one is as strong as the USA. Allies may not want to join to protect a territory being handed back in 50 years. Taiwan has no such time limit. "Chinese government doesn't want HK do declare independence instead of returning to China" Democratic elections are not declaring independence. The people of Hong Kong could have elected their own government whilst still being a British territory until 1997. The elected body would give local powers and the state would retain others. Just as California elects a government whilst remaining part of the USA. The fact that California and other US states have a state government does not make them independent nations. There is no Californian foreign policy, diplomatic service or military, that's for the nation - the USA. Hong Kong would still have returned to China as agreed in the treaty, whilst retaining a local, democratic government. I imagine even cities in China have some form of city government - just they are entirely non-democratic. Of course it should be noted Hong Kong itself was granted in perpetuity. As it turned out, China threw out many of the limited democratic changes Chris Patten made in 1994, as last Governor and put in place a much less democratic regime. Giving HKers the absurd "show elections" of the Chief Executive. Patten, who was hugely unpopular with Beijing for the reforms he did put through, did so in the hope that some might stick after handover.
confusedhnguy 7y ago
The history of the opium wars need to be as well know as the history of slavery in the US, until then, leaving this important context out of the discussion makes people think that the UK is the victim. What I was trying to say is that media in the West pay far less attentions to the wrong doings of their allies. For example, the anniversary of the Tiananmen square incident made it to the front page of HN, but I have never seen anything on HN when it's the anniversary of the Nanjing massacre. These two are comparable because the Japanese leaders are still visiting the Yasukuni Shrine. Also, I have personally almost never see news about bad things that happened in Taiwan on Western media, does this mean that Taiwan is heaven on earth? You may have freedom of speech, but I don't think your people are well-informed when they are flooded by cherry-picked facts, and this leads to bias against your non-allies. About what HKers think, here is an image of the flyers they distributed during the protest: https://twitter.com/liuyun2018/status/1133227121713659904 https://twitter.com/liuyun2018/status/1133227121713659904 Translation for the main bullet points: > You don't get to have a lawyer: they will be unavailable or disappear before court. > Imprison without trail: you will spend one or two years in prison at minimum. > "Disappear": no one will hear from you when you are in prison, not even your families. > Judges follow CCP's instructions: the CCP decides what happens on court. > Super-high conviction rate: 99.94% nation wide conviction rate. > Lighting-fast trails: No lawyers no family members, 5 minutes and it's done. > Secret trails: When your family knows you are already in prison. > Collective punishment： your family members are equally guilty. Even in mainland China the situation is no where near this bad. These false accusations makes me question their motives. If you don't believe me and think we have North Korea levels of speech control, then I would ask you to please update your views or better, visit China if you get a chance. Listing several individuals arrested for their political actions doesn't justify this baseless conjecture about the future of HK. > Give an inch, give a mile. Yes I know you don't trust the CCP, the CCP doesn't trust the West either. Today we implement democracy (as you defined) in HK, tomorrow you want HK to declare independence. Who's next? Shenzhen? Shanghai? We are aware of how the West has been "liberating" people in the Middle East and we are afraid of it. Which brings me to my final point: we share completely different views of the world, and some words You have been using the word democracy like it's some kind of panacea and refusing it is unacceptable. I (and the CCP) don't agree. Democracy is guaranteed to never be the worst, but it doesn't necessarily be the best, in all situations. Besides, based on the actions of the US after WWII, we have every reason to believe that the US doesn't want other parts of the world to stay in peace, or at least, does not have the ability to resolve the problem it created. Despite what the Western media has been saying, the CCP is actually bad at media manipulation, not nearly as good as the West. CCP thinks that if we implement democracy defined by the West, then the people will fall to Western values extremely fast and the whole country will become a huge mess. Yes, we are thinking about the Brexit drama and the likes, only more bloody.

by atr_gz 7y ago

NeedMoreTea 7y ago

60 years is right. Governors were repeatedly seeking democracy and proper elections, but pressure from Beijing forced them to back down. The papers are now publicly available at the National Archive, and linked in this NYT piece: "Chinese leaders were so opposed to the prospect of a democratic Hong Kong that they threatened to invade should London attempt to change the status quo" https://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/28/world/asia/china-began-push-against-hong-kong-elections-in-50s.html https://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/28/world/asia/china-began-pu...

confusedhnguy 7y ago
"Positive actions" is equivalent to "invasion"? Also is the West stronger than China or not? I am confused. If it is, then this threat means nothing. If the China is stronger, then why bother to create the one country two systems policy? Also, if China was strong enough to threaten the West, why is Taiwan still an issue till today? The reference in the article you posted says: > not hesitate to take positive action to have Hong Kong, Kowloon and the New Territories liberated” if the Brits allowed self-governance. So the Chinese government doesn't want HK do declare independence instead of returning to China, and will take positive actions if that is about to happen. Again, you and I don't agree on what the word "return" means.
- NeedMoreTea 7y ago
  Let's look at this logically. "We shall not hesitate to take positive action to have Hong Kong, Kowloon and the New Territories liberated..." liberated - freed from enemy occupation. OK What could China do to achieve that? Break diplomatic ties? Economic sanctions as a huge importer of HK goods and services whilst 50s China's economy was a broken mess? Close the already mostly closed border? Write an angry letter? What's left? Invasion. What possible alternative interpretation can you suggest? Military blockade and starve them out? That's effectively war too, but with a much greater chance of escalating if you militarily prevent other nation's shipping... "However, the present status of Hong Kong is to our benefit" ... "Through Hong Kong we can trade..." Clearly the Chinese benefited from the huge economic success of Hong Kong so preferred not to invade or bomb the place to oblivion. They'd already backed off destabilising the Hang Seng as they got far more benefit from that decadent Western capitalism. The whole Chinese propaganda around the democracy of Hong Kong is exposed as blatant lie. "is the West stronger than China or not? I am confused. If it is, then this threat means nothing." Having had two of them nations generally seem to prefer avoiding a third world war. That one can doesn't always mean one wants to, even if one is as strong as the USA. Allies may not want to join to protect a territory being handed back in 50 years. Taiwan has no such time limit. "Chinese government doesn't want HK do declare independence instead of returning to China" Democratic elections are not declaring independence. The people of Hong Kong could have elected their own government whilst still being a British territory until 1997. The elected body would give local powers and the state would retain others. Just as California elects a government whilst remaining part of the USA. The fact that California and other US states have a state government does not make them independent nations. There is no Californian foreign policy, diplomatic service or military, that's for the nation - the USA. Hong Kong would still have returned to China as agreed in the treaty, whilst retaining a local, democratic government. I imagine even cities in China have some form of city government - just they are entirely non-democratic. Of course it should be noted Hong Kong itself was granted in perpetuity. As it turned out, China threw out many of the limited democratic changes Chris Patten made in 1994, as last Governor and put in place a much less democratic regime. Giving HKers the absurd "show elections" of the Chief Executive. Patten, who was hugely unpopular with Beijing for the reforms he did put through, did so in the hope that some might stick after handover.

confusedhnguy 7y ago

The history of the opium wars need to be as well know as the history of slavery in the US, until then, leaving this important context out of the discussion makes people think that the UK is the victim. What I was trying to say is that media in the West pay far less attentions to the wrong doings of their allies. For example, the anniversary of the Tiananmen square incident made it to the front page of HN, but I have never seen anything on HN when it's the anniversary of the Nanjing massacre. These two are comparable because the Japanese leaders are still visiting the Yasukuni Shrine. Also, I have personally almost never see news about bad things that happened in Taiwan on Western media, does this mean that Taiwan is heaven on earth? You may have freedom of speech, but I don't think your people are well-informed when they are flooded by cherry-picked facts, and this leads to bias against your non-allies. About what HKers think, here is an image of the flyers they distributed during the protest: https://twitter.com/liuyun2018/status/1133227121713659904 https://twitter.com/liuyun2018/status/1133227121713659904 Translation for the main bullet points: > You don't get to have a lawyer: they will be unavailable or disappear before court. > Imprison without trail: you will spend one or two years in prison at minimum. > "Disappear": no one will hear from you when you are in prison, not even your families. > Judges follow CCP's instructions: the CCP decides what happens on court. > Super-high conviction rate: 99.94% nation wide conviction rate. > Lighting-fast trails: No lawyers no family members, 5 minutes and it's done. > Secret trails: When your family knows you are already in prison. > Collective punishment： your family members are equally guilty. Even in mainland China the situation is no where near this bad. These false accusations makes me question their motives. If you don't believe me and think we have North Korea levels of speech control, then I would ask you to please update your views or better, visit China if you get a chance. Listing several individuals arrested for their political actions doesn't justify this baseless conjecture about the future of HK. > Give an inch, give a mile. Yes I know you don't trust the CCP, the CCP doesn't trust the West either. Today we implement democracy (as you defined) in HK, tomorrow you want HK to declare independence. Who's next? Shenzhen? Shanghai? We are aware of how the West has been "liberating" people in the Middle East and we are afraid of it. Which brings me to my final point: we share completely different views of the world, and some words You have been using the word democracy like it's some kind of panacea and refusing it is unacceptable. I (and the CCP) don't agree. Democracy is guaranteed to never be the worst, but it doesn't necessarily be the best, in all situations. Besides, based on the actions of the US after WWII, we have every reason to believe that the US doesn't want other parts of the world to stay in peace, or at least, does not have the ability to resolve the problem it created. Despite what the Western media has been saying, the CCP is actually bad at media manipulation, not nearly as good as the West. CCP thinks that if we implement democracy defined by the West, then the people will fall to Western values extremely fast and the whole country will become a huge mess. Yes, we are thinking about the Brexit drama and the likes, only more bloody.