People are expressing their dissatisfaction and IMHO that's a valid justification for protesters and good enough for me.
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...
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 numbers to each polling station. The only drawback is that they'd need to somehow record who already cast their vote, which could be abused by the government to crack down on participants if they decide to ignore the outcome.
History strongly begs to differ - assembly to address grievances is just as crucial a step in achieving democracy as a vote.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magna_Carta#Great_Charter_of_1...
My point is that although protests are a way to force a vote to occur, it's the actual act of voting that makes a democracy, and protests are neither necessary nor sufficient for that.
It seems to me that the protests in Hong Kong don't have to wait for the government to "allow" them to hold a vote, so long as they can manage the logistics.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voting_Rights_Act_of_1965
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1992_South_African_apartheid_r...
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.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jul/14/hong-kong-pro-...
Either China consolidates control over HK and it loses critical political freedoms, ceasing being a democracy even in the slight way that it already is; or, somehow, incredibly, the protestors win and HK gets to retain its quasi-independence while China claims to be sovereign but lacks practical ground control.
(I suppose a third ending is somehow they return to the status quo ante of nominal control with little practical interference, but that was never entirely stable from the British withdrawal onwards. Getting back there would require everyone forgetting the whole thing, disabling injuries and all.)
Think about this next time governments talk about taking away your guns and anti-tank mines for the public's own protection.
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.
Seriously can we not? Mines are such a horrendous lingering danger to the public that most militaries restrict them. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ottawa_Treaty
The problem is that movements without specific, clearly defined policy goals tend to fail.
It is easy to come together to oppose some bad thing, but it is really hard to find consensus on what to do after the bad thing has been defeated. So while movements without specific policy goals can win elections, the usually cannot bring effective change.
Is independence the goal here?
The first demand that originally sparked the protest was to have the extradition to China bill officially withdrawn, not simply referred to as dead yet left in legal suspension but still theoretically possible to push through as soon as the protesters went home.
The second demand is to have all of the people who were officially declared as rioters to be officially declared as peaceful protesters on a protest from early June because people who are declared rioters can face up to 10 years in prison. These protesters were once occupying the legislative house and even though they were graffitiing the walls with slogans, people went around and posted papers on refrigerators holding drinks and foods that said 'we are protesters not thieves' and no one took any of the food. Talk about being polite. Yet they were declared rioters (ok clearly I've come to a conclusion)
The third demand is for Hong Kong's chief executive Carrie Lam to resign.
The fourth demand is for an independent commission to be formed to investigate police brutality as alleged by the protesters during the protests over the last 10 weeks. Heavy use of tear gas and rubber bullets.
The fifth demand is for all protesters to be unconditionally freed.
I'd recommend reading https://www.hongkongfp.com to keep up with what's going on in HK. I've followed it since May and it has been quite insightful.
It seems to be developing organically as the people come to understand how much momentum they have and how much their peers agree with their frustrations.
I'd speculate that if they somehow gained enough momentum that it appeared to be within reach then independence would probably be the end goal, but who knows.
one, the bill must be withdrawn; two, the chief executive must resign; three, the government must retract its characterisation of the violent clashes as “riots”; four, there must be a full independent inquiry into the actions of the police and; five, everyone arrested in respect of the clashes must be unconditionally freed.
More here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019_Hong_Kong_anti-extraditio...
Everything else (extradition, the five demands, et cetera) is just a series of sub-plots leading to self governance.
And no - I don't have evidence of CIA involvement, except for the somewhat co-incidental timing of the unrest relative to the trade war and the long well-known history of CIA involvement in such events. I will nonetheless consider disbelief - as conspiracy - to be the height of naivety.
Ironically - despite it's flaws and incumbent president, I still would much prefer the U.S. to win this particular bout of dirty Realpolitik - over an authoritarian regime that truly deserves it's comeuppance.
It's just a shame that the U.S. does this shit to authoritarian states and democracies alike (while also aligning itself with authoritarian states as well)... if and only if such choices promote U.S. interests.
It's also a shame that the HK people are going to be made to suffer deeply for this. They can't win - China can only lose... a little status. I have friends there. I hope they will be ok. :(
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.
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.
Keep in mind also that Chinese state media has publicly accused the CIA of involvement in the HK protests. Haven't seen that reported much have you? You wouldn't.
The reader is expected to see that article and see that the CIA took some action in HK in the 90s and come to the conclusion that because they helped protesters to flee the country in the 90s they are behind the current protests by inference.
I personally see a coincidence or red herring.
This comment appears to support that general narrative, so I suspect people are seeing that and not wanting to see the standard government obfuscation line here are downvoting it.
Just ask yourself, if the CIA has such control over Hong Kong that it could cause 10 weeks of protests by large large amounts of the population, whether or not they wouldn't have already declared independence and declared themselves a mini United States state or something to that effect.
The Hong Kong government's accusation and Beijing's continual messaging that this is all just the United States messing with them is untrue, a bald faced lie and ridiculous on its face if you think about it, but they haven't come up with anything better just yet so they're just sort of holding onto that line for anyone who will listen.
I resent the claim tho that my comment supports the "general narrative" - I explicitly disavow the Chinese regime as authoritarian that "deserves comeuppance". I'll add here that I think the protesters have a genuine cause that deserves support.
I do, however, think that the CIA, the U.S. and the west generally - doesn't actually give a fuck about the interests of the HK people. It's just convenient to them currently to make China look bad.
I personally think the CIAs involvement is limited to none, completely without evidence and fueled by optimisim that the HK protesters are doing all this completely by and for their own people.