Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Why Hong Kong Is Still Marching

nytimes.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

211–220 of 238 posts

Re: Why Hong Kong Is Still Marching

#211

Post by confusedhnguy »

kumosawa wrote: post #39

I’m from china mainland, and I stand for these protesters. At least, I don’t want them lose the right of fighting for their rights. And btw, even such huge protest happening, there is no report, no discussion in China, even message left on SNS also get censored or vanished. Terrifying. Edit: apologize for uncertain words, it needs add a time limitation. The first protest was happening at 9th June and all Chinese medi…

Are you sure there are no discussions about this in mainland? I don't go to a lot of forums but at least I have seen lots of discussions on NGA and tieba. I am sure that there are even more discussions happened in Hupu, douban, KDS, and the countless QQ group chats. Even the threads got removed after a while, it still counts because people knows about the event and exchanged ideas.

False statements like this appeals to the Westerners but it worsens the misunderstanding between us, which is counterproductive if you want a more open and free China.

Proof: https://imgur.com/a/FbofCOK

Re: Why Hong Kong Is Still Marching

#212

Post by eropple »

NotSammyHagar wrote: post #146
chantelles wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lack of competition and criticism is the foundation of Western democracy too. Polemics is not a space where actual meaning has ever sprung from; yet try to find anywhere here or in media or in real life discussions that are not that shape. Binaries shape all we are. I do not feel I have enough knowledge to judge life anywhere but where I live. I live in the West; I experience extreme censorship of my ideas due to my…

Where do you live in the west? I'm in the us, I just don't see extreme censorship except for racist pandering comments. Don't like the president, or cell phones, or capitalism, all good. Don't like poor people, no one will try to stop you. Only if you make racist, sexist, or gay bashing comments will people try to stop you from speaking. I haven't lived in China but I see the value in people being free to ask questio…

> Only if you make racist, sexist, or gay bashing comments will people try to stop you from speaking.

Beware of conflating "the ideas you express suck and we want nothing to do with you" (on either a social or an economic basis) with "you can't speak". There's a very large difference and the people who are speaking in the way you describe are absolutely begging (shout outs to Laura Loomer) to be thought of as "persecuted by the normies".

Re: Why Hong Kong Is Still Marching

#213

Post by toyg »

afarrell wrote: post #195
toyg wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“I don’t think so” is not an argument. Texas is a well-defined territory with a well-defined set of cultural characteristics. Its population has as much of a right to self-determination as Catalunya, Scotland, Croatia, Slovakia or Kosovo, should a consensus emerge in the region. This is hardly controversial.

> This is hardly controversial > Catalunya > Kosovo I'm a bit confused. Are you saying that it is non-controversial that Catalunya or Kosovo can secede and then using that to argue that it is non-controversial that Texas can secede?

In one of those cases, the US themselves deployed weaponry to protect the population's own right to self-determination, so at least to US audiences it should read as uncontroversial, surely.

Catalunya is still a bit fresh, but I think it is uncontroversial to say that quashing such demands has historically resulted in bad things happening that we probably wouldn't want to see happening again. In the age of the internet, you don't increase legitimacy by deploying batons.

I say this as a natural anti-independentist - I think the real challenge of our time is scaling government up, not down; and when one starts dividing and drawing lines, one is playing an extremely dangerous game that might well end up in Balkanization, ethnic cleansing included. But it is a fact that not all nation-states are as cohesive as France, and self-determination demands are legitimate when they reach certain numbers. The nation-state itself is a concept borne of very different times, which might be nearing its sell-by date. It shouldn't be scandalous to concede that a line on a map could be thicker in one place and thinner elsewhere, if that means a more peaceful existence and better cooperation at a higher level.

Re: Why Hong Kong Is Still Marching

#214

Post by toyg »

afarrell wrote: post #198
toyg wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I understand the technicalities, but Wilson’s Doctrine clearly applies to the citizens of Texas in 2019 as much as to the citizens of Austria-Hungary a century earlier. If it became absolutely certain that an overwhelming majority of Texans wanted to secede, the right answer would be to draw up ways to allow them to do so in the smoothest and most legal way, not to send the US Army to quash it. I understand the Civil…

Austria-Hungary was not a state with a functional and loyal military in 1919. The reason why Wilson's Doctrine applied to it was that there were French, Romanian, Italian, and Serbian troops occupying parts of its territory.

It was as much for that as to avoid a repeat of the squabbling over territories that had caused the war in the first place. The main point was that territories should not be assigned just because this or that army controls it (which would have inevitably degenerated again, as it did), but because the population wishes to be so.

The failure of Versailles to fairly apply that rule (and later, of Germany and USSR to respect it, before and after WWII) resulted in tragic events that I hope nobody wants to see repeated. The model for a modern approach should be the Chzech/Slovakia divorce, surely, rather than e.g. Chechenya?

Re: Why Hong Kong Is Still Marching

#215

Post by educationdata »

simonh wrote: post #155
educationdata wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Being lack of information, most citizens support gov’s standpoint. NO, because of the censorship, we do not know how many people actually support gov’s standpoint. Your statement is pure speculation and does not have any factual basis. The Chinese government will not allow any professional organization to conduct and publish a survey like: "Do you support the censorship?", or "Do you support protest in HK?", or "Do…

I suspect you're being downvoted for the big shouty capital NO, and the fact you're trying to refute someone's opinion, when they were explicitly asked what their opinion was. This came across as being negative and confrontational. Reading your post more carefully I can see your heart is in the right place and are mainly just trying to provide context and comment but the initial confrontational tone drowns that out.…

OK. I didn't know the "NO" is that a big deal.

Re: Why Hong Kong Is Still Marching

#216

Post by chantelles »

NotSammyHagar wrote: post #146
chantelles wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lack of competition and criticism is the foundation of Western democracy too. Polemics is not a space where actual meaning has ever sprung from; yet try to find anywhere here or in media or in real life discussions that are not that shape. Binaries shape all we are. I do not feel I have enough knowledge to judge life anywhere but where I live. I live in the West; I experience extreme censorship of my ideas due to my…

Where do you live in the west? I'm in the us, I just don't see extreme censorship except for racist pandering comments. Don't like the president, or cell phones, or capitalism, all good. Don't like poor people, no one will try to stop you. Only if you make racist, sexist, or gay bashing comments will people try to stop you from speaking. I haven't lived in China but I see the value in people being free to ask questio…

I live in Canada. I have a graduate degree in Equity stuides and have spent my life writing and working to fight racism, sexism and homophobia. It's death by a thousand cuts in the West. I am currently in St. Petersburg Russia on an art project and it is so much more open and nuturing to new ideas than Toronto ever was. On the contrary, not liking capitalism and supporting poor people comes with a very high social cost.

Re: Why Hong Kong Is Still Marching

#217

Post by my_username_is_ »

dragonwriter wrote: post #181
ngcc_hk wrote: post #180

Being one of the protestor out of 2m and feet still hurt after 8 hour walking and stopping among children but mostly young man, let me try to supplement that article why especially those not mentioned in the article. This related to two most common slogans shouted by the 2m. (The 3rd most common one is “Hong Kong Add Oil” not an issue per sec. ) (a) Withdrawn not suspension In 2003 the first million protest after han…

> I do not know why prof chan used the phrase indefinitely. That is not in chinese. In fact the message that this is suspicion only temporary is clear. “Indefinitely” in this context does not mean “infinitely”, it means “without a predefined end time” if it is merely suspected that the suspension will be lifted at so uncertain future time, “indefinitely” appears correct.

The criticism isn't that the translation was a lie, but rather it didn't capture the spirit of what she was saying (possibly with the intention to mislead international media). Indefinitely is frequently understood to mean infinitely, so by using this English word it is certainly misleading.

Re: Why Hong Kong Is Still Marching

#218

Post by my_username_is_ »

ngcc_hk wrote: post #205
smnrchrds wrote: post #12

Could someone please explain what the long-term goal of the protesters is? Best case scenario, HK and Chinese government postpone the integration until 2047. What then? When the borders come down, what will happen to all those who openly talked against Beijing government, held candlelight vigils for Tienanmen Square victims, and rallied and protested against a government who does not like people protesting and does n…

Please read my comment below for the article. For your question you must have to see not through the lens of a unified Hong Kong. Hong Kong is really international. Firstly, there are four - June 9 1m+ then jun 9 evening; June 12 with some conflict but mostly the young one trying to stop the bill without this the bill would not have even suspended; jun 16 the 2m+. their composition are very different. The target is a…

>One of my friend trying to help found out first time it hurt a lot when tear gas residue touch your skin. And she is just helping. But whilst crying and painful our kids just wash their eyes and skins. And go back.

My favorite line that I heard from one protester was "tear gas isn't so bad, it's sort of just like chopping onions. I eat spicy food worse than it all the time". You can't help but smile at that kind of attitude.

Re: Why Hong Kong Is Still Marching

#219

Post by rayiner »

steve19 wrote: post #93
aiyodev wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Texas secession movement doesn't claim a right to secede. Texas retains the right to split into five states. They plan to use the threat of adding 8 right-leaning senators to the US senate to convince democrats to let them leave.

Texas demographics are changing. I don't know if they would be able to add eight right senators now, and definitely not in the future. Of course that may depend on a definion of right (right of center or right of Bernie) .

It depends very heavily on your definition of "right." Hispanic people in general are pretty conservative, and Hispanic people in Texas are particularly so. For example, Hispanic registered voters are less likely than white registered voters to support marijuana legalization, and more likely to support restrictions or bans on abortion: https://www.pewhispanic.org/2014/10/16/chapter-2-latinos-vie.... On the criminal justice front, hispanics are more likely than whites to view the elimination of mandatory minimums for drug crimes as a bad thing, and twice as likely to support jail time for minor drug possession: https://www.people-press.org/2014/04/02/section-2-views-of-m....

Hispanic people are more likely to attend religious services at least once week and to pray daily: https://www.pewforum.org/religious-landscape-study/racial-an.... Hispanic people strongly support school choice: https://www.nationalreview.com/2018/11/school-choice-strong-.... Hispanic people list preventing terrorism as a top priority, alongside education and higher than healthcare or immigration: https://www.pewhispanic.org/2017/02/23/latino-priorities-for.... Among Democrats, Hispanic people are much more likely than whites to list the economy as the issue that "matters most" and much less likely to list the environment: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/06/business/economy/black-de....

Another key issue is aging. The median age for Hispanic people is 28 (squarely millennial), versus 42 (later side of Gen X) for non-Hispanic whites. That means, to a significant degree, the more liberal attitudes you see for Hispanic people as a group are a function of age and generational membership. Everyone gets more conservative with age, and you will see that same trend among Hispanic people.

Trump managed to get 28% of the Hispanic vote, despite running on an aggressively anti-Hispanic and anti-immigrant platform: https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2019/02/24/2020-hisp.... His approval rating among Hispanics is now 35-45% depending on the poll. Greg Abbott won re-election in Texas with 42% of the Hispanic vote. Due to the various factors discussed above, I think the increasing Hispanic representation in the Texas vote is going to have much less of an impact than people assume.

Re: Why Hong Kong Is Still Marching

#220

Post by afarrell »

toyg wrote: post #213
afarrell wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is hardly controversial > Catalunya > Kosovo I'm a bit confused. Are you saying that it is non-controversial that Catalunya or Kosovo can secede and then using that to argue that it is non-controversial that Texas can secede?

In one of those cases, the US themselves deployed weaponry to protect the population's own right to self-determination, so at least to US audiences it should read as uncontroversial, surely. Catalunya is still a bit fresh, but I think it is uncontroversial to say that quashing such demands has historically resulted in bad things happening that we probably wouldn't want to see happening again. In the age of the intern…

I’m not necessarily disagreeing with you. I’m disagreeing with your belief in the non-controversial nature of your statement.

> The US deployed weaponry to...

Is an admission that an position is controversial enough that a major world power thought it prudent to enforce that opinion with violent force or the active threat of force. "Kosovo je Srbija" is still an opinion you’ll find expressed in earnest.

Would it be controversial for Texas to have the right to secede? Given internal (racial, economic) divisions within Texas, I’d say yes. Secession can also cause violence by removing a hegemon who enforces peace among different groups.

Post reply on HN