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Comment by RavlaAlvar | Hacker News Reader

Random HKer flying by. Dear Brits, please don't let China buy up your country.

To those who thought this has nothing to do with China political agenda, please check the background of current CEO and president. Also, note that HK gov appoint half of the board member.

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Yes it seems the tide is turning on China. If they want to play ball with the rest of the world they need to reform into a modern democracy and the CPC needs to go away. Otherwise, we need to limit the authoritarian contagion. China is pretty much exploiting Capitalist greed to get the Western world to sell them the rope to hang them with.

That was the neocon dream of the 90's -- let China into the world economy and the PRC will either fall or be forced to accept democracy. 30 years later it's pretty clear that was foolish.

Is 30 years a lot of time for social change?

It took the British over 70 years to fully pacify the Hong Kong people, culminating in the ‘67 protests that ended with over 50 dead protesters. Heck, it took well over a hundred years after the Civil War before true civil rights.

Maybe we just need more time before the Chinese change?

30 years might not be enough for fundamental social change as you describe, but it’s more than enough for China to become a major economical player.

While I of course admire the idea of the west standing up to China, the reality is that the free market is large, and doesn’t necessarily care.

In the end I think it’s mostly important to get rid of our “addiction” to cheap factories and production in China, as it proves problematic long-term.

China still hasn’t apologized to the world for lying about WMDs in Iraq, dropping nuclear bombs on Japan or mounting right-wing coups around the globe. When will it start behaving more like the US?

I can tolerate the empire that I am a part of because at least I know I can criticize its evil deeds without having them censor every little thing about them... which can potentially convince them to change, not so for the CPC.

So, you prefer the tactics of a Brave New World over 1984.

The outcome is still the same though is it not? You’re not really in control of anything.

Whataboutism is just plain dumb. One country doing bad things in no way justifies any other country doing bad things. Especially when there is broad agreement amongst most people that both things are bad.

I think geogra4's tone was of a kind with the post to which he was responding, which seemed to be asserting that only "modern democracies" (which there appear to be a scant few of these days) could "play ball," and that therefore China is, I guess, disqualified from participating in the world economy?

This is deeply subjective obviously: It didn't strike me as "whataboutism," but more a refutation of what seemed like a moral-political superiority complex. Devopyl's comment expressed this old-fashioned view; very reminiscent of the 80s and 90s, for me, and I think geogra4's balloon-popping was well in order.

We may have different definitions of "whataboutism" as well :)

The GP is calling for consistency. Calling out “whataboutism” does not make that an invalid point.

One of those three doesn't really seem like a thing to apologize for. Do we expect the man being attacked with a sword to apologize for shooting the attacker in response?

I am often frustrated how CCP infiltration is not on the political radar of most Western society.

We in HK witness on first hand the determination and capability of CCP to slowly gobble up our society. If CCP would be allowed to sliently infiltrate Western society and political sphere, in 20yrs........

Case in point: Kiwis have just found out their leader of opposition loves the CCP:

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/sep/11/new-zealand-op...

Since when is it alarming to complement another country's progress, especially when you're not enemies? I'm no fan of the CCP (and no Kiwi) but this sounds ridiculous.

It's alarming to compliment a dictatorship that keeps its people in chains, has millions of minorities in "re-education camps" and kills anyone who becomes too vocal against the party.

Just because Trump has tried to normalise just that (ref: Russia and North Korea) doesn't make it acceptable.

> that keeps its people in chains

The US has the highest incarceration rate in the world, by a large margin, almost 7 times that of China.

That's definitely a huge problem for the USA, on many levels. However, people in the USA don't regularly self-immolate to express how badly their compatriots are treated, and this happens regularly in Tibet. One would think this would give the Western world a good idea of how oppressive the Chinese regime can be.

Without evoking Godwin's law, just think about it: China is a dictatorship oppressing free speech and many of their citizens that don't share the official views, torturing them, closing them in concentration camps etc. As a politician, you should know better how to express your admiration for progress.

In Australia we just elected a former CCP rep: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-09-11/gladys-liu-chinese-fo...

It's happened on both sides of politics: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-12-12/sam-dastyari-resigns-...

And even state politics get $100,000 cash donations in aldi bags: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-09-06/huang-xiangmo-denies-...

By buying a stock market ? Let's not over exagerate the evil CCP rhetoric, as it distract from the point.

The more HK is economically hard to kill,the more it can bribe its way out of chinese integration. This is a good move.

Having your country owned by foreigners is rarely a good idea, even if they are a democracy. They put their own interests first.

Yeah, that's not going to happen and the West doesn't really have leverage against China anymore. On the contrary, China has leverage against the West. Some countries like New Zealand are straight up heading to become a Chinese colony in 50 years.

It's so depressing. I just read news today about politicians from New Zealand and Australia being exposed to have tied with CCP.

On this rate, within 20 years, CCP would have major political grip on most major Western societies from within those countries. What a horrifying thought.

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