I don’t know what to say about this. I’m not smart enough to know what it means. I’ve never lived in a communist or totalitarian or one-party state so don’t know how it is for people in such a place.
I admire what China. has achieved and how it managed to care for a billion people even when it was relatively undeveloped. I admire that it cultivated literacy and educated its population. I am saddened by the lack of recognition given by western countries to the part it played towards the eventual allied victory in WWII and the apparent disregard for the death of millions more of its citizens than any other country, even Russia, which itself lost more than. 3 times as many as Jews who murdered by the Nazis.
I don’t like the way its name is blackened by many in the west who should know better, nor that western citizens in democracies are conditioned to mistrust the Chinese.
At the same time, I live in a democracy that, whilst allowing much freedom, pretends much more and is increasingly curbing social liberty and ignoring, curbing or abusing human rights. I see the continuing move towards the harder end of the right-wing political spectrum and the entrenchment of elitist, privilege and wealth protective policies as well as continual misuse of public funds and disdain shown towards ever larger sections of the population who live in disadvantage.
I don’t like that those in disadvantage in our democracy are the ones most often blamed for their plight, which is very clearly not of their making. I don’t like that the privleged elites have managed to continue sycophantic adherence to a hereditary monarchy as well as develop a similarly sycophantic worship and coat-tail hugging of North American values, policies and perfidies.
I see many similarities in the arrogance of elites and the treating of the mass of the populace as pawns, valued only for their use as consumers and drones in building the wealth of the privileged.
So, I wonder about Hong Kong and its people and how they feel and what. lies ahead for them. The cautionary admonition to “Be careful what you wish for.” haunts my mind when I think about this situation. I also feel shame because I’m British by birth and Hong Kong’s situtation is, in my view, a result of Britains empire building and exploitation of countries across the World, particularly in the Victorian era.
Although I wasn’ t a part of it, my ancestors must have been and therefore, despite the ability to deny past history in the way of right-wing accolytes such as John Howard who would see my view derogaroritly as a “black armband” view of history, I feel shame and a responsibility to understand and appraise the current situation as objectively as possible in the hope that I can avoid being party to yet another travesty of history.
I am not smart enough to. know what should be happening now. Perhaps someone can explain to me.
Background Reading
Blakemore, Erin “How Hong Kong’s History Explains Its Current Crisis with China.” National Gographic. Aug. 7. 2019.
Cole, Nicki Lisa, Ph.D. “Conflict Theory Case Study: The Occupy Central Protests in Hong Kong.” ThoughtCo, Feb. 11, 2020, thoughtco.com/conflict-theory-case-study-3026193.
Custer, Charles. “Hong Kong vs. China: What’s All the Fighting About?” ThoughtCo, Feb. 11, 2020, thoughtco.com/china-vs-hong-kong-687344.
Szczepanski, Kallie. “Why Did China Lease Hong Kong to Britain?” ThoughtCo, Feb. 11, 2020, thoughtco.com/china-lease-hong-kong-to-britain-195153.
