Hong Kong Rebellion a Big Boost for Chinese Nationalism
Color revolution attempt rallies the mainland behind the Communist Party government
This summer of protests and unrest has been a disaster. But I wonder if there is something to be gained for everyone, after all. For some Hong Kong people, it’s to make their city so inhospitable to mainlanders as to deter many from coming. In Taiwan, it has been a big boost to separatism. On the mainland, it actually helps strengthen Chinese nationalism and the prestige of the communist state. Of course, all these just make the three Chinese places drift further apart, which is itself a disaster if you are committed to national unification.
Let me first examine the impact of the protests on the mainland, leaving Hong Kong and Taiwan for later columns.
The city’s unrest has often been described as the toughest domestic challenge Beijing has faced since Tiananmen. But is it? Here’s a typical example from the Financial Times, describing it as “the worst political crisis in decades, represent[ing] the biggest insurrection on Chinese soil since the pro-democracy movement in 1989, which eventually led to the Tiananmen Square massacre”.
Actually, Hong Kong’s latest crisis is nothing like Tiananmen 30 years ago, though many people, both here and overseas, especially some politicians in the United States, have been baying for a Tiananmen-like crackdown. Beijing, wisely, has declined to oblige.
It can afford to play the long game because Hong Kong is almost 2,000km away whereas Tiananmen Square is, and has long been, the symbolic core of the capital, not just for the nation and the state, but for Chinese civilisation itself.
The danger has always been that rebellion in Hong Kong could spread northward to the rest of the country. But there is no chance of that: we Hongkongers openly fight against mainland incursion, not just political interference from Beijing, but against incoming mainlanders. The most visible sign is that many rioters pick on Mandarin-speaking people to beat up and have campaigned against “big mothers”, street performers from the mainland.
Mainlanders once considered Hong Kong like the return of the prodigal son. Now, many believe that nothing could placate this spoiled, rotten child who hates and despises its northern siblings.
They also believe that allowing Hong Kong so much freedom has undermined its stability and prosperity.
Both stability and prosperity have been hard won for many mainland Chinese; they would not risk them for anything. And the communist state, rightly or wrongly, is seen as their guarantor.
Source: South China Morning Post
like puppies on a leash.
and just like puppies, they shit in their own beds.
great for the ego.
and not for much else.
The Hong Kong issue for China is like a flea, annoying and itchy, but nothing a good shampoo at night cannot fix
The rioters are extremely unconscious and well yes, their consciousness is far from wisdom and very spoiled by the “me-myself-I”-conditioning all souls are exposed to in capitalism. Money and influence are used to suppress the world. All this is a symptom a very deep father- as well as mother-wound.
Hongkong people always looking down to mainland people arrogantly…. not really much loved nowadays in Mainland China
Shenzhen has already overtaken and leads in all categories….. Hongkong is history….. their economy is deteriorating fast…. China can wait…..
Yes China should wait. Hongkong will try everything to spoil its relationship with China and the West will do everything to use it as a Trojan horse to destabilize the mainland.
“baying for a Tiananmen-like crackdown.”
When, of course, there was no crackdown. Under the watchful eye of future Nobelist Liu Xiabo, the kids left the square and were home in bed by 8:00 am.
Yes, this is very much an issue.
We do have hints of another truth, such as the rather silly “tank man” video not having been done until the square was being emptied. The tanks were leaving.
I call it silly because the tank driver repeatedly avoided the man, but the man repeatedly tried to get in the way again. It became almost silly, not threatening.
The video has never been what the corporate press claimed it to be, an example of brute force against one unarmed person on the street.
But I think it safe to say that in the West, on the whole, the crackdown remains what happened, reinforced by corporate news sources a thousand times.
We learned from Syria how easy it is for Western governments to sustain frauds, the phony “gas attacks” being prime examples.
Quite unlikely we’ll never be given the truth.
I think so, too. Many false flags being planted by foreign governments to forward their agendas of trying to hold back progress by someone who is gaining momentum at their expense.
I also am quite suspicious about Tiananmen Square. Lots of money coming from the US to sow seeds of disruption in other economies.
False-Flags seem to be absolutely common meanwhile. Only 200 m away from my flat there was a so-called “Nazi”-murder against muslim people happening while the man of the secret-service was present in the Internet-cafe while the owner got killed. No, he did not notice the murder, layed one Euro onto the desk while the other man was dying behind it and went away without noticing. The court did not find that weird. Hope that these things come to light. What a crazy reality, rotten and without any future.
According to the Chinese physician Jiang Yanyong, the PLA used expanding bullets (banned by The Hague Conventions) on their own people during this incident. Sounds like a crackdown to me.