HK media erase their archives amid rising arrests • Hacker News Board

Re: HK media erase their archives amid rising arrests

#81

Post by ceilingcorner » Wed, Jun 30, 2021, 5:27 AM UTC

guerrilla wrote: post #76

TeeMassive wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are many fundamental difference between standing armies and/or organized militias and violent mobs in terms of scale, martial effectiveness, negotiations, treaties and post-conflict continuation. Mobs don't win wars, they merely destroy and the rest is left to fate, often with disastrous results(see Libya as an example). Mobs can't sit at the negotiation table Mobs can't agree to treaties and enforce them Mobs…

> Mobs don't win wars, they merely destroy and the rest is left to fate You seriously can't think of any counterexamples to that? Like maybe some French (contemporary and historical), German or Russian counterexamples?

In all three of your examples, mobs didn’t win any wars. Organized political factions won wars, which usually came after a period of chaos.

People always forget that the Russian Revolution was followed by war between the Whites and the Reds.

Re: HK media erase their archives amid rising arrests

#82

Post by baybal2 » Wed, Jun 30, 2021, 5:29 AM UTC

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #14

an_opabinia wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the idea that peaceful protesting or rule-abiding political opposition is generally effective. I understand you are making a stylized appeal for liberal political change via violence. China's leadership has peaks and troughs of liberalism, and violence there, in the Soviet Union, Venezuela, Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Iran and in many other places around the world was followed more often by a hardening, not a softeni…

> Eventually, Xi will die, and it's more likely than not that his successors will liberalize It is more likely there will be a contest for power. It could become violent, though that is unlikely. In that event, I see no reason to ensure like-minded Chinese are sufficiently armed, or at the very least informed. China's path changed when Xi installed himself as dictator for life. It's foolish to ignore that seismic shi…

> China's path changed when Xi installed himself as dictator for life. It's foolish to ignore that seismic shift.

It didn't change. It's foolish to not to acknowledge that communists been in power in China all along.

Hu, and Wen were just very convenient fronts the party let the West, and its populace see, while it was pulling strings from behind, and bidding time for the comeback in force.

The West, its politicians, its generals, its intelligence analysts, and its civil society, have been completely bought into that laughably trivial deception.

Re: HK media erase their archives amid rising arrests

#83

Post by nine_k » Wed, Jun 30, 2021, 5:34 AM UTC

The most interesting idea I heard about the hand-over of HK is that UK should have offered a UK permanent resident (or even a citizen) status to all HK residents, once China started the pressure.

Of course, HK's population is 11% of UK, not a small deal, likely such a bill won't pass anyway. But I also see it as a missed opportunity to bring in some world-class human capital.

Re: HK media erase their archives amid rising arrests

#84

Post by dismantlethesun » Wed, Jun 30, 2021, 5:44 AM UTC

guerrilla wrote: post #79

dismantlethesun wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you implying that the current Chinese government should be forgiven for abusing its citizens because the British did something similar 35 years ago? I don’t mean to offend, but your comment is so short that I can tell what kind of context you are trying to add.

No, they are criticizing the UK.

Ah, got it. I had thought they were relying on moral relativism to downplay the actions of the Chinese government.

Re: HK media erase their archives amid rising arrests

#85

Post by mr_toad » Wed, Jun 30, 2021, 5:50 AM UTC

someperson wrote: post #22

tablespoon wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The best way to put pressure on the Chinese Communist Party and help pro-democracy voices in Hong Kong (and the reduce Uygher genocide) is to avoid buying Made in China goods where possible. Decoupling could be helpful on several fronts, but it's not going to happen via individualist boycotts. Those are useless, and just too many things are made in China without realistic alternatives. If it's going to happen, it'l…

Yes, individual boycotts are not the only way. Government policy is certainly required too. Both punitive (increasing tariffs), requiring made outside China sourcing, and also investing in supply chains outside of China. Also there actually aren't that many things made in China that don't have some kind of alternative. Production is moving out of China across all sectors, not because of politics but due to increasing…

Sanctions don’t work on hardline autocratic governments. If anything, they just double down on their oppression and use the sanctions as an excuse and something to blame all problems on.

Re: HK media erase their archives amid rising arrests

#86

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Jun 30, 2021, 5:53 AM UTC

wyager wrote: post #5

I lived in HK 2018-2020, leaving around the passage of the “national security law”. I think HK is a perfect case study of a line of fallacious thinking popular among westerners: the idea that peaceful protesting or rule-abiding political opposition is generally effective. This is wrong for at least two reasons. The first mistake is failing to recognize that many governments (case in point) are not nearly as vulnerabl…

[deleted]

Re: HK media erase their archives amid rising arrests

#87

Post by baybal2 » Wed, Jun 30, 2021, 5:56 AM UTC

xxpor wrote: post #19

wyager wrote: post #5

I lived in HK 2018-2020, leaving around the passage of the “national security law”. I think HK is a perfect case study of a line of fallacious thinking popular among westerners: the idea that peaceful protesting or rule-abiding political opposition is generally effective. This is wrong for at least two reasons. The first mistake is failing to recognize that many governments (case in point) are not nearly as vulnerabl…

>The first mistake is failing to recognize that many governments (case in point) are not nearly as vulnerable to bad PR, I mean we're talking about the same government on the bad side of the Tank Man photo. I think that's kind of obvious. The difference is in HK I don't think people were anticipating China to completely break the Basic Law and the handover agreement. They were protesting the elected HK government, no…

> They were protesting the elected HK government, not Beijing directly.

HK government was never elected. Beijing was always pulling strings from behind

Re: HK media erase their archives amid rising arrests

#88

Post by calcifer » Wed, Jun 30, 2021, 5:57 AM UTC

nine_k wrote: post #83

The most interesting idea I heard about the hand-over of HK is that UK should have offered a UK permanent resident (or even a citizen) status to all HK residents, once China started the pressure. Of course, HK's population is 11% of UK, not a small deal, likely such a bill won't pass anyway. But I also see it as a missed opportunity to bring in some world-class human capital.

BNO citizens (i.e most HK people born before the handover) can get a UK visa [1] with a direct route to citizenship.

[1] https://www.gov.uk/british-national-overseas-bno-visa

Re: HK media erase their archives amid rising arrests

#89

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Jun 30, 2021, 5:57 AM UTC

nine_k wrote: post #83

The most interesting idea I heard about the hand-over of HK is that UK should have offered a UK permanent resident (or even a citizen) status to all HK residents, once China started the pressure. Of course, HK's population is 11% of UK, not a small deal, likely such a bill won't pass anyway. But I also see it as a missed opportunity to bring in some world-class human capital.

[deleted]

Re: HK media erase their archives amid rising arrests

#90

Post by garmaine » Wed, Jun 30, 2021, 5:58 AM UTC

nine_k wrote: post #83

The most interesting idea I heard about the hand-over of HK is that UK should have offered a UK permanent resident (or even a citizen) status to all HK residents, once China started the pressure. Of course, HK's population is 11% of UK, not a small deal, likely such a bill won't pass anyway. But I also see it as a missed opportunity to bring in some world-class human capital.

They have. At least for the HK residents which predate the '97 handover and therefore have British Overseas National status. This is about 1/3 of the HK population which is now allowed to settle and work in the UK on a track towards permanent residency. If they can get the permission to leave, that is.