Hacker News Reader

Comment by techntoke | Hacker News Reader

I'm from Portland, not the US!

Look Portland, if you join the United States you can continue running your city as a democracy, we won’t mess with you, we just want you to join our country.

20 years later: Just kidding! Haha!

Hong Kong wasn't a democracy under British rule. It's become more democratic since the handover - not less.

A lot of Chinese people are touchy when you tell them that part of their country - a part that was taken away from China at the point of a gun in the 1800s - isn't part of China. They're proud that Hong Kong was returned to China, because it's a symbol of China overcoming colonialism, after all the damage and humiliation colonial powers inflicted on China. The Chinese central government is mostly happy to let Hong Kong run itself, as long as they don't try to secede from China, and secession is the primary goal of many of the "pro-democracy" activists.

There isn't really any analogous situation in the United States. Any attempt to make some sort of hypothetical analogy - involving Portland, for example - will sound forced, because the United States doesn't have the same history of foreign powers invading it and carving it up.

The Chinese central government is not happy to let Hong Kong run itself. That's why Article 23 was pushed numerous times, as well the National Anthem Bill and the extradition law. They put their customs officials on Hong Kong territory, to the dismay of many locals. They also conduct extra-judicial behavior such as kidnapping HK citizens.

In 1997, HKers were afraid their freedoms would erode under Chinese rule. We were left alone for a while, but the spectre was always there. Now, the Central Government has made it more of a priority.

That said, there are many HKers who consider HK part of China and many others who don't.

The central government's red line is separatism. For most issues, they're not interested in intervening in Hong Kong's politics. I think most of the current tension is fundamentally over the issue of separatism.

I've given you examples which have nothing to do with "separatism", such as extradition and kidnapping, and you choose to ignore it. In another instance, a journalist was refused a visa because he chaired a panel. That's about freedom of speech, which HKers have long enjoyed.

I'm a Hong Konger and always will be. I'm aware of what the CCP is doing and they're not at all as hands-off as you make them seem. Xi Jin Ping especially does not tolerate differences.

Article 23 and the National Anthem Bill were both directly related to the issue of separatism. If by customs officials you're referring to the high-speed rail station, then that's an overblown issue.

The pressuring of the book sellers to go to China was indeed a very troubling incident. But the general, widespread control of Hong Kong politics by the central government that many people imagine is not there, and almost all of these issues are about the central government not allowing separatists to gain power in Hong Kong (e.g., the entire fight over who can run for the Chief Executive position). Something that is often ignored in these discussions is that under British rule, Hong Kongers has almost no say in their government, and that they now actually have much more say.

> the United States doesn't have the same history of foreign powers invading it and carving it up.

True. The foreign powers in the Americas went for genocide and carving it up.

That wasn't done to the United States. It was done to the native people before the United States was founded, and by the United States to the native people afterwards.

Geographically and politically it may be true but an identity is something that is hard to shake off, especially given the differences in dialect and customs. Portland and the US just doesn't have that difference.

Many mainlanders believe that Hong Kongers are just haughty elites that think that they are higher than the mainlanders.

Taiwanese have never been part of the People's Republic. Deal with that.

The PRC is just the current government of China, and Taiwan does claim to be part of a single China including the mainland.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com