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Hong Kong protest: Why are pro-democracy supporters staging a sit-in?

independent.co.uk

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Re: Hong Kong protest: Why are pro-democracy supporters staging a sit-in?

#11

Post by ivanw237 »

refurb wrote: post #9
seanmcdirmid wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know and I don't even have a VPN. I'm sure its getting around among those who care. I don't think China will involve the PLA in this; that would cause a huge scare internationally. Instead, they'll just let the HK police deal with it (and they seem to be hard enough). The HK elite basically run the territory and are incredibly friendly to the central government.

I think the outcome of this will be super interesting. HK is now a part of China and I'm sure that the CCP is concerned that these protests will spread to the mainland. My guess is that they will handle this in a very non-public way (no surprise there!) working through the HK authorities. It will be brutal, but the CCP knows what a heavy hand will get them (Tiananmen Square).

Unfortunately it's very unlikely this will spread to the mainland. Much different from 1989, 100% of mainstream media in the mainland is heavily censored. They have been brainwashing the last two generations for tens of years. If you go weibo (Chinese version of Twitter) you will see the majority of mainland Chinese think the unarmed students were extremely violent and the police should shoot them.

The CCP has been doing very good at creating class conflicts and isolating enemies.

Re: Hong Kong protest: Why are pro-democracy supporters staging a sit-in?

#12

Post by tszming »

Hongkonger here also (now going to out to see the latest situation)

For those who want a TLDR: http://www.vox.com/2014/9/28/6856663/hong-kong-democracy-pro...

Lot of protesters are just TEENAGERS/STUDENTS who want a peaceful protest , and the crazy police are fully armed and used countless tear gas on them.

This is going to be one of the largest events in HK history.

Re: Hong Kong protest: Why are pro-democracy supporters staging a sit-in?

#13

Post by Wogef »

I'm in Shenzhen and we're getting a little news trickling in since there is a lot of back and forth daily traffic. They seem to be making some use of mesh-network (FireChat) for communication: http://www.pingwest.com/firechat-hongkong/?from=timeline&isa...

This would also be an ideal scenario for PirateBox. I roll the LibraryBox version on a regular basis for under $20.

Re: Hong Kong protest: Why are pro-democracy supporters staging a sit-in?

#14

Post by asdfologist »

Honest question: how effective are these sorts of protests in achieving their intended goals?

Maybe I'm suffering from confirmation bias, but it seems all the major demonstrations in the last few decades (Tiananmen Square, Iraq War, Occupy Wall Street, post-Iranian election, etc) have sizzled out and failed. The one exception I can think of is the anti-Proposition 8 protests, but Prop 8 was defeated in the courts through routine legal channels (ultimately culminating in the Supreme Court decision on Hollingsworth v. Perry) and it's unclear whether the protests held any sway over the rulings.

Re: Hong Kong protest: Why are pro-democracy supporters staging a sit-in?

#15

Post by wyuenho »

asdfologist wrote: post #14

Honest question: how effective are these sorts of protests in achieving their intended goals? Maybe I'm suffering from confirmation bias, but it seems all the major demonstrations in the last few decades (Tiananmen Square, Iraq War, Occupy Wall Street, post-Iranian election, etc) have sizzled out and failed. The one exception I can think of is the anti-Proposition 8 protests, but Prop 8 was defeated in the courts thr…

Nobody can predict the future. What I can tell is, this is unprecedented in terms of persistence, organization and scale. All of the resistance just self-organized into multiple areas now. We are very very very upset with the government in Hong Kong right now. More and more people are joining the strike today. There's reason to expect the situation will escalate peacefully, and hope will shine thru. Honestly, justice is on our side, this is the most civilized resistance I've personally participated. We even pick up our own trash after sit-ins!

Re: Hong Kong protest: Why are pro-democracy supporters staging a sit-in?

#16

Post by lotsofmangos »

asdfologist wrote: post #14

Honest question: how effective are these sorts of protests in achieving their intended goals? Maybe I'm suffering from confirmation bias, but it seems all the major demonstrations in the last few decades (Tiananmen Square, Iraq War, Occupy Wall Street, post-Iranian election, etc) have sizzled out and failed. The one exception I can think of is the anti-Proposition 8 protests, but Prop 8 was defeated in the courts thr…

There have been loads of popular demonstrations that have toppled governments recently, from Egypt to Ukraine. Tunisia is one of the few where you could say they have achieved their intended goals though, toppling the government is the easy part.

Re: Hong Kong protest: Why are pro-democracy supporters staging a sit-in?

#17

Post by JDShu »

asdfologist wrote: post #14

Honest question: how effective are these sorts of protests in achieving their intended goals? Maybe I'm suffering from confirmation bias, but it seems all the major demonstrations in the last few decades (Tiananmen Square, Iraq War, Occupy Wall Street, post-Iranian election, etc) have sizzled out and failed. The one exception I can think of is the anti-Proposition 8 protests, but Prop 8 was defeated in the courts thr…

In my opinion, that's a very good question and one that demonstrators rarely think about. Frankly, and until somebody convinces me otherwise, I think that Occupy Central was and is a strategic failure if the end goal is gain a better form of democracy in Hong Kong. China has shown time and again that it will not back down when things get physical, and in for example, the case of Tiananmen square, the government got more paranoid.

So rationally, I don't think it's a good move by the pan-democrats, as it essentially shuts down any possibilities of negotiation - the pan-democrats have very little leverage now that they've already "done their worst".

On the other hand, protests are not about strategy and rationality. People strongly believe in their ideals and they want to do something rather than sit around waiting for negotiations that may or may not happen. I can understand that which is why I'm not as quick to criticize the protesters as many in HK would.

Re: Hong Kong protest: Why are pro-democracy supporters staging a sit-in?

#18

Post by wyuenho »

JDShu wrote: post #17
asdfologist wrote: post #14

Honest question: how effective are these sorts of protests in achieving their intended goals? Maybe I'm suffering from confirmation bias, but it seems all the major demonstrations in the last few decades (Tiananmen Square, Iraq War, Occupy Wall Street, post-Iranian election, etc) have sizzled out and failed. The one exception I can think of is the anti-Proposition 8 protests, but Prop 8 was defeated in the courts thr…

In my opinion, that's a very good question and one that demonstrators rarely think about. Frankly, and until somebody convinces me otherwise, I think that Occupy Central was and is a strategic failure if the end goal is gain a better form of democracy in Hong Kong. China has shown time and again that it will not back down when things get physical, and in for example, the case of Tiananmen square, the government got m…

What other alternatives do you have to suggest to fight for a true democracy?

Re: Hong Kong protest: Why are pro-democracy supporters staging a sit-in?

#20

Post by cgio »

asdfologist wrote: post #14

Honest question: how effective are these sorts of protests in achieving their intended goals? Maybe I'm suffering from confirmation bias, but it seems all the major demonstrations in the last few decades (Tiananmen Square, Iraq War, Occupy Wall Street, post-Iranian election, etc) have sizzled out and failed. The one exception I can think of is the anti-Proposition 8 protests, but Prop 8 was defeated in the courts thr…

There is the Arab Spring which started as demonstrations and ended up as full fledged revolutions which overpowered long standing regimes. Different dynamics, admittedly, but who can claim they can predict the dynamics of a society in turmoil.

The most worrying phenomenon, which I think you allure to, is protests with no clear intended goals which act as a massively confused way to defuse anger. It's like if we need volume for our fundamentally egocentric revolutions and this is why ideology is less of a bonding element in a range of protests lately. Or like crowdsourcing loud proclamations of the least common denominator.

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