Live data from Hacker News

Hong Kong Airport shuts down as protesters take over

news.rthk.hk

141–150 of 169 posts

Re: Hong Kong Airport shuts down as protesters take over

#141
post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I will add that there is now suspicion of police infiltrating protest to start violent clash: https://news.rthk.hk/rthk/en/component/k2/1474213-20190812.h... I wouldn't be very surprise if it was the case as it is often a tactic use, even in our western democracies, to justify stronger and more violent police operation and also tarnish the image of the protest.

Hong Kong is a matter of national security to China. Something countries go to wars till the last man over. So what you mentioned is nothing, China has a lot more goodies in the bag. Here's one: Granting pardons or giving immunity to top criminal gangs as a long as they kill xxx revolt leaders.

Just a friendly reminder that "matter of national security" refers to the security of those currently in a position of power, the people here is incidental.

Re: Hong Kong Airport shuts down as protesters take over

#142
post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I will add that there is now suspicion of police infiltrating protest to start violent clash: https://news.rthk.hk/rthk/en/component/k2/1474213-20190812.h... I wouldn't be very surprise if it was the case as it is often a tactic use, even in our western democracies, to justify stronger and more violent police operation and also tarnish the image of the protest.

Hong Kong is a matter of national security to China. Something countries go to wars till the last man over. So what you mentioned is nothing, China has a lot more goodies in the bag. Here's one: Granting pardons or giving immunity to top criminal gangs as a long as they kill xxx revolt leaders.

Hong Kong is viewed as a matter of national security to China. The only way it threatens the "national security" of China is by opening the door for people to question the goodness and wisdom of the Communist Party.

Re: Hong Kong Airport shuts down as protesters take over

#143
post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Hong Kong protests are about democratic values, which were instilled in Hong Kong by the British for 150 years. Ideas like the Magna Carta (everyone has inherent rights and no one is above the law), freedom of the press, Common Law. People who grew up in mainland china do not have that cultural context. Opposite values were taught (no 'inherent rights' outside of government policy, censorship of press to maintain…

> everyone has inherent rights and no one is above the law I don't see how these are "democratic values". They're extremely important things to have obviously, but they're orthogonal to whether the system is democratic or not.

How many non-democratic systems have you seen, which upheld this and the other principles GP referred to?

Re: Hong Kong Airport shuts down as protesters take over

#144
post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They have very specific "5 demands" 1. no extradition to china 2. retract characterization of protests as riots 3. exonerate arrested protestors 4. investigate police misconduct 5. resignation of the PRC-appointed executive and... democracy they are literally protesting for democracy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019_Hong_Kong_anti-extraditio...

> they are literally protesting for democracy Protests don't achieve democracy, voting does. If all participants in the recent protests were willing to volunteer, printing a few million ballots and distributing them to improvised polling stations wouldn't be insurmountable. The Hong Kong Identity Card means that voter ID can be implemented without access to government records, simply by assigning a range of ID number…

Without the protests, when and how are the residents of Hong Kong going to be allowed to vote for democracy?

Re: Hong Kong Airport shuts down as protesters take over

#145

You gotta ask with a critical mind, why is it that things are going just fine in Macau with the same One Country Two Systems setup?

Macau is small.. like real small. Macau is more akin to a neighborhood in some American cities. And it’s not really working fine in Macau. Take a look at it’s leader, clearly corrupt and put in place as a puppet.

Re: Hong Kong Airport shuts down as protesters take over

#146
post #133

Perhaps slightly unrelated, but do people believe a dictatorship like China can thrive as a first world economy by suppressing people's basic fundamental human rights?

Yes. I actually do. People have been saying communist can’t survive, but look what China has achieved and continues to achieve. It’s scary but saying dictatorships can’t survive dismisses any possible understanding that it might.

Re: Hong Kong Airport shuts down as protesters take over

#147
post #133

Perhaps slightly unrelated, but do people believe a dictatorship like China can thrive as a first world economy by suppressing people's basic fundamental human rights?

Maybe? It's too early to tell. So far they've survived that way, but they haven't been a first-world economy for very long.

Re: Hong Kong Airport shuts down as protesters take over

#148
post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> they are literally protesting for democracy Protests don't achieve democracy, voting does. If all participants in the recent protests were willing to volunteer, printing a few million ballots and distributing them to improvised polling stations wouldn't be insurmountable. The Hong Kong Identity Card means that voter ID can be implemented without access to government records, simply by assigning a range of ID number…

Without the protests, when and how are the residents of Hong Kong going to be allowed to vote for democracy?

Have they tried doing an improvised vote? Even just among protesters, too see what the level of support for certain positions is? I genuinely don't know.

Regarding being allowed to vote, the Hong Kong government is certainly taking a hardliner stance, but I'm not sure whether they could justify it to themselves to criminalize stuffing a piece of paper into a ballot box.

Re: Hong Kong Airport shuts down as protesters take over

#149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Without guns it's hard to see how Hong Kong ends up free as Taiwan is. Like, seriously, what sequence of events gets us from here to there? Think about this next time governments talk about taking away your guns and anti-tank mines for the public's own protection.

As an American who has lived in Hong Kong for many years, I can comfortably say that if every Hong Kong citizen were armed with an AR-15 and 1,000 rounds of ammo they still wouldn't be able to hold off the PLA for any meaningful length of time. An armed populace is not now nor will it ever again be the answer to this or any other geopolitical debate involving an advanced, militarily powerful national adversary.

A small segment of well-armed and determined citizens can still win a war of attrition against any foe. See Afghanistan.

Re: Hong Kong Airport shuts down as protesters take over

#150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The protesters may not clearly understand their own endgame, but the CIA certainly understands its own... which is to precipitate an armed crackdown that diminishes Chinese prestige - giving the U.S. further leverage in the current battle for global pre-eminence that is occurring between the two powers. And no - I don't have evidence of CIA involvement, except for the somewhat co-incidental timing of the unrest relat…

The extradition law, which was proposed by CE Carrie Lam, was indeed proposed and supposed to be passed by the legislature, at around the time frame as the Trump-Xi meeting. If you infer the cause of the protests is the CIA, then CE Carrie Lam would be a CIA agent. The much more likely explanation to all these is incompetence, rather than conspiracy.

>The much more likely explanation to all these is incompetence, rather than conspiracy.

Given the sensitive nature of the bill, and its timing, and She has shown her understanding in how US / China / HK operate in both Financial and political levels.

And it was clear the bill wasn't put forward by CCP either, it was someone else ( or Carrie Lam )'s idea.

I find it hard to believe all of these are incompetence and coincidence. Not saying Carrie Lam is a CIA agent, but something is definitely not right.

Post reply on HN