As I get older it becomes more obvious that the whole "moral arc of history" line is complete nonsense. Evil usually wins. Goodness is a strange outlier in all of history. It has to be fought for relentlessly, and is fleeting at best. The world as a whole now seems to be reverting to the mean.
What do you make of the fall of the Soviet Union and the Iron Curtain in Europe? In the last thirty years, lots of countries have gotten more democratic.
>What do you make of the fall of the Soviet Union and the Iron Curtain in Europe?
As bad as the Soviet Union was, what came next for Russia was far far worse. The Soviets at least had party rule; Russia is now an absolute autocracy ruled with an iron grip of one man who is now liquidating 30,000 people a month in a pointless war. Orders of magnitude more people have died in the last four years of Ukraine than in every direct Soviet military action combined post-WW2. Remember that Afghanistan was their most infamous blunder, leading directly to the dissolution, and only killed half of what they are losing monthly now.
It always had. The problem for them is that Trump is a bad ally. Their strategy is/was provide economic benefits to USA in return for a looming presence.
the implication being, don't try it china, its not possible, you'll lose too many people.
However thats not so much of a threat, partly because china has better anti-aircraft carrier weapons and partly because the US military has forgotten (well more accurately has fired the people who know) how to do logistics.
Hongkong was built by the British and a symbol of foreign aggression and imperialism for all Chinese (including in Taiwan, actually at least if you are more on the KMT side). It was never "free" under the British, and in fact the LegCo was only created when the British knew that they would hand HK over to China.
Why should "Hong Kong of old" remain? Why should Chinese territory not under full Chinese control?
There has been a lot of noise about "decolonising the curriculum" in recent years, which some have criticised as "woke", but it is striking that the narrative on HK is still fully colonial-centric with little opposing voices.
What happened in HK? Stupid nativist kids got disciplined for being pieces of shit, the treasonous ones jailed, and now post spanking they're partying it up on the mainland. TW should take note they're so so lucky to have that option, the alternative is Gaza.
At this point there is really no Hong Kong of old. China now fully controls that area, breaking a treaty with the UK.
For much of Hong Kong's history under British rule, there was no freedom. It was whatever a single British man said. Let's take off the rose tinted glasses.
A lot of Hong Kong people have fond memories of the "old HK" because their living standards and socioeconomics were well above Mainland Chinese. Today, this gap is much closer which doesn't sit right in many HKers minds. It wasn't because they had "freedom" under British rule.
What makes you characterise Hong Kong independence movements as naive economic nostalgia and not a desire for political freedom or independent legal systems?
Do you think individuals experienced more freedom under the British monarch and Parliament or under communist rule?
nice rephrase of the story; the extradition bill was written in a very convenient way that somehow included completely unrelated to the case PRC that normal people would have rightful doubts about
sounds like the whole op was a setup from the very beginning, very convenient indeed and i wouldn't put it past them to even plan a murder
> Millions of Hong Kongers were determined to keep the freedom they had enjoyed. The CCP has won, at least for now.
Fundamentally, I just don't see this frame as being a path to long term success for HK. If it is them v. the CCP: the CCP is alert to the political risk of HK, outnumbers them, controls the local military, has better propaganda and has more of a claim to success given that the British Empire has failed, the US Not-An-Empire seems to be struggling and morally bankrupt. At least the CCP has been delivering visible improvements in prosperity over the last few decades.
It is a tragedy to lose the jewel of Asia that was old school Hong Kong. But they really need a frame that acknowledges a bit of the present political realities - there'll need to be cooperation with major factions in mainland China. Probably within the CCP. I assume there is a liberalising faction of some sort.
USA propaganda. They try to weaken any democracy so they seems the least worst option.
(Of course there is other "worst option" countries, who wants to live in Saudi Arabia, UAE, Oman, Rwanda, Uganda, Etc.? [allies of usa]).
This is bad American propaganda.
I’m sorry but what Hong Kong are we talking about?
And what advantages of democracy are we talking about? Unbridled inequalities fostered by a crooked ruling class with absolutely zero respect for international laws and diplomatic order?
This narrative could work when the US were still disguising their true nature. Nowadays… not so much
> We should not let Hong Kong fade away. We should not let Joshua Wong fade away. Or Jimmy Lai, or others
Who are we? is it the people living in HK? then it make sense. Otherwise why would anyone else (someone else living on the other side of the world) care? People have their own countries to fix let alone worry about other peoples problems.
> Otherwise why would anyone else (someone else living on the other side of the world) care? People have their own countries to fix let alone worry about other peoples problems.
Do you care about your neighbours? How about people in the next town over? Why should that concern stop at the border of your particular nation state?
I was living in Hong Kong when the protests first started and stayed through the entire 2019.
First, the vast majority of the locals hated the protests and didn't support them. This isn't reported by the western media. The media reported it as all HK people were being wronged.
Second, most of the protests were done by young people who lost hope in Hong Kong's ultra expensive housing and ultra stressful life. They live in tiny studio sized apartments with the entire family. Buying a home was out of reach for most young HK people unless they have financial help from parents. This was a key trigger in why the youth were protesting. [0][1][2] Again, this was never reported or mentioned by western media.
Third, Joshua Wong went to foreign governments and invited them to help him against China. Hong Kong belongs to China if you forgot. This is considered treason in just about any country. Imagine if BLM protestors physically went to China's CIA equivalent to ask them for help.
A lot of Chinese do have a policy of "as long as we're comfortable (economically, etc), we'll let the government do whatever they want.", some justifying it by saying "society needs their government to be a strict parent".
It does seem most widespread revolutions only happen when the discomfort grows big enough (as the saying (1) goes, "civilisation is n missed meals away from anarchy" (n = a number below 10, I thought 3, but it's 9)).
It's interesting though, the CCP does chicken out. The last time that I remember this happening is when enough citizens in Beijing protested against their prison-like Covid restrictions, that they relaxed it within a day or two.
Same thing with Russians and the war: 2). Heck, Americans are anguishing but most are too comfortable/don't want to go through the discomfort to actually do anything against the rising fascism in their country.
A lot of Americans do have a policy of "as long as we're comfortable (economically, etc), we'll let the government do whatever they want.", some justifying it by saying "they're doing it for the Middle Eastern people's freedom!"
Well, sorry but not really sorry for that. We all know that literature aka the art of conveying something regardless of what that thing is is an art. We all need to take responsibility for not only what we say but also how we say it.
> A lot of Chinese do have a policy of "as long as we're comfortable (economically, etc), we'll let the government do whatever they want.", some justifying it by saying "society needs their government to be a strict parent".
On a spectrum from like Appalachians at one end to the CCP on the other, most societies in the world are closer to the Chinese end of the spectrum. Appalachians will forgo civilization to avoid government. But most people in the world do want government to be a strict parent and maintain order and a well-functioning society. This is something that Americans completely do not understand.
> First, the vast majority of the locals hated the protests and didn't support them. This isn't reported by the western media. The media reported it as all HK people were being wronged.
Not everyone is an American, and that's fine. Asians--on average--just care more that things "just work" than having more freedom to faff around. It's like Apple users versus Linux users. The Chinese government is a good government for the things that most Chinese people actually care about: economic development, building infrastructure, keeping trains running, etc. At the end of the day, most Chinese people in Hong Kong aren't missing the political freedoms that Americans would miss in their shoes, and value the things they do have that the government is good at.
The way you've talked about the average Asian it seems like you're describing a cultural predisposition but representing it as a racial one.
And it's easy to see why HK citizens would have cultural preferences towards independent legal systems and political freedom. Their 'being Asian' is independent of this.
It's just absolutely false that "a vast majority of the locals hated the protests". See for example the contemporaneous polling done by Reuters below - 59% of the population supported the protests at the end of 2019 and 30% had participated [1]. There was also a District Council election in November 2019 in which the establishment (pro-government) parties were utterly wiped out [2].
To your second point, HK's housing situation is an unmitigated disaster that undoubtedly contributed to the overall atmosphere of discontent with the government, but it was not a proximate cause of the protests.
To your third point, merely going to a foreign government and asking them to put pressure on your home government would not remotely reach the bar for a treason conviction in the U.S. This idea that what Joshua Wong and Jimmy Lai did would be considered sedition or treason in Western democracies is something that everyone in China seems to "know" that just isn't so.
See for example the contemporaneous polling done by Reuters below - 59% of the population supported the protests at the end of 2019 and 30% had participated [1].
I looked into this source.
First, it was commissioned by Reuters, a news agency based in UK.
polled in a survey conducted for Reuters by the Hong Kong Public Opinion Research Institute
Second, Hong Kong Public Opinion Research Institute had a CEO who was pro-succession, anti-Beijing views and has since been exiled to UK.
The housing prices are sky high in HK because of artificial zoning and regulations, not because of geographical limitations. There are vast empty spaces that can be used for housing in HK, but the elites/politicians wouldn’t allow buildings in those areas because that would result in a collapse of real estate values and ultimately the wealth of elites.
What HK need is politicians that works for people and have a spine to go against the elites
People aren't property. Hong Kong belongs to Hong Kong people. If you ask a typical Chinese people to explain why Hong Kong or Taiwan belong to China, they will never at any point consider the will of the born and raised there. They will instead blabber on about history how they used to belong to "them", where the delusion of identity leads them to believe something of the past once belonging to someone else, now belongs to them because of this arbitrary "us" and "china".
They have no capacity to consider the living breathing humans alive in the current era and attempt to derive from first principles what is best for everyone.
No one said people are property. Hong Kong people still enjoy disproportionally high quality of life compared to Mainland Chinese people. In fact, they are ranked #14 world wide in GDP PPP per capita.[0]
The biggest reason for this is because of China. Hong Kong acts as a financial hub for business between China and the outside world.
Can we stop pretending like Hong Kong people are oppressed?
Land/soil is in fact, property, and HK land belongs to PRC not HKers. HK belongs to all Chinese of which HKers are <1%. HKers simply got privileged arrangement / exclusive access enforced by CCP via limited freedom of movement from mainland and got wealthy off it, but they went full retarded and fucked it up by being treasonous.
> used to belong to "them"
Not "used" to, legally belongs to PRC/China, under Westphalia / UN law, HK belongs to PRC, TW belongs to One China territory. Liberal World Order idiots have no conception that international law matters when it favors PRC. There is no need to reach for muh history copium when it's plain literal current legal international order is built around HK (and Tibet and XJ) legally belonging to PRC, and TW/PRC part of One China both at UN and PRC/ROC constitutional level.
And it is in fact pieces of paper that determines ownership not living breathing humans who come and go. Ultimately self determination doesn't (and shouldn't) factor into sovereignty, but if it just so happens in China's case, the mandate overwhelming favors PRC who has 98% of consensus. What is best for everyone is 1400m mainlanders vs 40m greater China.
It's well reported matter public record that hundreds of thousands people protested, daily. And it's trivial to find polling that showed that about two thirds of Hong Kongers supported the protests, while only a third took your point of view.
Just because it is convenient for the CCP to coerce "confessions" about CIA involvement, and it's convenient for willing accomplices to their dishonest and cruel misrule to pretend that this is relevant, no one else needs to take this seriously.
Saying a vast majority hated the protests seems like a too strong of a statement. Here are some sources which reports 57% supported [1] and 58.3% supported [2]. It has also been estimated that 36.4% had attended a demonstration against it in August 2019, and a year later 45.6% [3].
This paper directly contradicts your claim it was mainly due to housing [4].
> Our empirical findings suggested that the systematic threat concerning the erosion of the city's values and institutions imposed by the extradition bill was a primary cause of the unprecedented mobilization.
We don’t have to rely on polling as the 2019 district elections happened in HK that November and the message was extremely clear that the bulk of the population was pro-protestors and anti-the HK government: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019_Hong_Kong_local_elections
> Nearly three million people voted, equivalent to 71 per cent of registered voters, an unprecedented turnout in the electoral history of Hong Kong. The election was widely viewed as a de facto referendum on the concurrent anti-extradition protests.[3]
> All pro-Beijing parties suffered major setbacks and losses, including the flagship pro-Beijing party Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong (DAB), which received its largest defeat in history, losing 96 seats. Executive Councillor Regina Ip's New People's Party failed to obtain a single seat, and was ousted from all District Councils as a result.[4][5] Dozens of prominent pro-Beijing heavyweights lost their campaigns for re-election, including Junius Ho, a controversial anti-protest figure who had expressed support for the triads behind the mob attack in Yuen Long on 21 July.[4][5]
> In contrast, the pro-democracy camp in conjunction with the localist camp achieved its biggest landslide victory in the history of Hong Kong, gaining absolute majority in votes and electoral seats in all of the 18 District Councils and tripling their seats from around 124 to about 388.
The return of Hong Kong to China is the first global news item I really remember from my childhood (the death of Princess Dianna shortly thereafter being the second). One really felt a shift in england that day: this then is the final nail in the coffin of the british empire.
I wish the whole thing had gone better for the folks on the receiving end. I was at university with a crowd who had grown up there seeing themselves as british, suddenly thrust into a strange nationality they didn't match their internal identity, and with no say in the matter.
One good thing is that we've extended UK residency and a path to citizenship to anyone who was born in Hong Kong before the handover (so everyone over about 30 y.o). It's pretty much the extent of what the UK could do under the circumstances - not much chance of changing the CCP to respect human rights.
Through my hong kongese friends, I got pretty active in the 2019 umbrella protest. To me, one of the most impressive image of that era is the Kai Lan Egg japanese-styke manga use to show the world and the CCP what was going on.
They really fucked up when they started wearing Maga hats and making signs asking Donald Trump to save them. Personal feelings aside, it was a strategic mistake and completely turned China and probably a majority of HK itself against them. And obviously they did not get the intervention they were looking for.
If you ask a foreign power to intervene in your protest movement, then fail, you should probably consider fleeing if you don't want to go to prison. Just calling balls and strikes here.
Storming the LegCo and install a British HK flag [1] has to be one of the most idiotic and self-harmful thing one could do. That really made me wonder what those guys were thinking.
HK topics seems to active disproportionate amount of almonds in western discourse. 10-15 years from now, new HK gen under decolonized patrioitc education going to be thoroughly Sinicized and wonder why west still can't take the L.
I found that (like many things) it's impossible to talk about the HK protest (and somewhat HK future) on the internet. Aside from the obvious trolls, the misinformed and those with a vested interest in pushing a narrative, the protest in themselves regrouped a lot of people, had a lot of things going on, and make you able to push whatever narrative you want.
They were some prodemocratic demonstrators. Laudable but sadly they had no chance of winning that fight. There were some genuinely weird people with weird demands too (like some far-right ultranationalist HKer). The attacks on some politician, journalist and medias, and extradition law passed at all cost, was a clear authoritarian push. But from a chinese perspective, it is just putting HK in line with the rest of the country. There was some weird disappearance of some protestor, the clear usage of the triad to inflict violence on some protestor, and some protestors turn violent too.
One could say, every country would react the same to a part of a country trying to secede. But if we look at, for example, Spain and Catalonia, will independence is firmly denied, there was way less violence and authoritarianism (Catalonia still have some special status).
All in all, the sad part is that some well-meaning idealistic kids might never be able to go back to HK. And with the integration with china, HK will slowly lose its identify and distinct culture. Now that it's no different than most other chinese territory, there is no real interest for foreign investor to invest there specifically, which was a part of what made HK rich. Its landscape will probably change a lot as the land value is not as prized anymore (which, tbf, might be a win for a lot of HKer). A lot of HKer now move to the bigger and richer Shenzhen for work, as more mandarin-speaking chinese move to HK. There are too many speakers for Cantonese to disappear overnight, but it might become a secondary language for most over time. The one you use to talk with you grandparent and feel slightly unique.
55 comments
[ 2.4 ms ] story [ 12.7 ms ] threadTaiwan should take note and always remember what happened to Hong Kong because everyone knows they are next on the list.
As bad as the Soviet Union was, what came next for Russia was far far worse. The Soviets at least had party rule; Russia is now an absolute autocracy ruled with an iron grip of one man who is now liquidating 30,000 people a month in a pointless war. Orders of magnitude more people have died in the last four years of Ukraine than in every direct Soviet military action combined post-WW2. Remember that Afghanistan was their most infamous blunder, leading directly to the dissolution, and only killed half of what they are losing monthly now.
It always had. The problem for them is that Trump is a bad ally. Their strategy is/was provide economic benefits to USA in return for a looming presence.
the implication being, don't try it china, its not possible, you'll lose too many people.
However thats not so much of a threat, partly because china has better anti-aircraft carrier weapons and partly because the US military has forgotten (well more accurately has fired the people who know) how to do logistics.
Hongkong was built by the British and a symbol of foreign aggression and imperialism for all Chinese (including in Taiwan, actually at least if you are more on the KMT side). It was never "free" under the British, and in fact the LegCo was only created when the British knew that they would hand HK over to China.
Why should "Hong Kong of old" remain? Why should Chinese territory not under full Chinese control?
There has been a lot of noise about "decolonising the curriculum" in recent years, which some have criticised as "woke", but it is striking that the narrative on HK is still fully colonial-centric with little opposing voices.
A lot of Hong Kong people have fond memories of the "old HK" because their living standards and socioeconomics were well above Mainland Chinese. Today, this gap is much closer which doesn't sit right in many HKers minds. It wasn't because they had "freedom" under British rule.
Do you think individuals experienced more freedom under the British monarch and Parliament or under communist rule?
Joshua Wong went to the streets for the murderer, not against him, by the way.
sounds like the whole op was a setup from the very beginning, very convenient indeed and i wouldn't put it past them to even plan a murder
Fundamentally, I just don't see this frame as being a path to long term success for HK. If it is them v. the CCP: the CCP is alert to the political risk of HK, outnumbers them, controls the local military, has better propaganda and has more of a claim to success given that the British Empire has failed, the US Not-An-Empire seems to be struggling and morally bankrupt. At least the CCP has been delivering visible improvements in prosperity over the last few decades.
It is a tragedy to lose the jewel of Asia that was old school Hong Kong. But they really need a frame that acknowledges a bit of the present political realities - there'll need to be cooperation with major factions in mainland China. Probably within the CCP. I assume there is a liberalising faction of some sort.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder_of_Poon_Hiu-wing
A guy commited homicide and walks free after 19 months in jail.
Who are we? is it the people living in HK? then it make sense. Otherwise why would anyone else (someone else living on the other side of the world) care? People have their own countries to fix let alone worry about other peoples problems.
Do you care about your neighbours? How about people in the next town over? Why should that concern stop at the border of your particular nation state?
First, the vast majority of the locals hated the protests and didn't support them. This isn't reported by the western media. The media reported it as all HK people were being wronged.
Second, most of the protests were done by young people who lost hope in Hong Kong's ultra expensive housing and ultra stressful life. They live in tiny studio sized apartments with the entire family. Buying a home was out of reach for most young HK people unless they have financial help from parents. This was a key trigger in why the youth were protesting. [0][1][2] Again, this was never reported or mentioned by western media.
Third, Joshua Wong went to foreign governments and invited them to help him against China. Hong Kong belongs to China if you forgot. This is considered treason in just about any country. Imagine if BLM protestors physically went to China's CIA equivalent to ask them for help.
[0]https://johnmenadue.com/post/2021/04/hong-kongs-housing-cris...
[1]https://www.aljazeera.com/economy/2019/8/11/a-lack-of-afford...
[2]https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/ejsp.70001
It does seem most widespread revolutions only happen when the discomfort grows big enough (as the saying (1) goes, "civilisation is n missed meals away from anarchy" (n = a number below 10, I thought 3, but it's 9)).
It's interesting though, the CCP does chicken out. The last time that I remember this happening is when enough citizens in Beijing protested against their prison-like Covid restrictions, that they relaxed it within a day or two.
Same thing with Russians and the war: 2). Heck, Americans are anguishing but most are too comfortable/don't want to go through the discomfort to actually do anything against the rising fascism in their country.
1) https://quoteinvestigator.com/2022/05/02/nine-meals/
2) https://www.rand.org/pubs/commentary/2022/06/war-of-the-worl...
(Not actually sorry)
On a spectrum from like Appalachians at one end to the CCP on the other, most societies in the world are closer to the Chinese end of the spectrum. Appalachians will forgo civilization to avoid government. But most people in the world do want government to be a strict parent and maintain order and a well-functioning society. This is something that Americans completely do not understand.
Not everyone is an American, and that's fine. Asians--on average--just care more that things "just work" than having more freedom to faff around. It's like Apple users versus Linux users. The Chinese government is a good government for the things that most Chinese people actually care about: economic development, building infrastructure, keeping trains running, etc. At the end of the day, most Chinese people in Hong Kong aren't missing the political freedoms that Americans would miss in their shoes, and value the things they do have that the government is good at.
And it's easy to see why HK citizens would have cultural preferences towards independent legal systems and political freedom. Their 'being Asian' is independent of this.
Totally false
It's just absolutely false that "a vast majority of the locals hated the protests". See for example the contemporaneous polling done by Reuters below - 59% of the population supported the protests at the end of 2019 and 30% had participated [1]. There was also a District Council election in November 2019 in which the establishment (pro-government) parties were utterly wiped out [2].
To your second point, HK's housing situation is an unmitigated disaster that undoubtedly contributed to the overall atmosphere of discontent with the government, but it was not a proximate cause of the protests.
To your third point, merely going to a foreign government and asking them to put pressure on your home government would not remotely reach the bar for a treason conviction in the U.S. This idea that what Joshua Wong and Jimmy Lai did would be considered sedition or treason in Western democracies is something that everyone in China seems to "know" that just isn't so.
[1] https://www.reuters.com/article/world/exclusive-hong-kongers... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019_Hong_Kong_local_elections
First, it was commissioned by Reuters, a news agency based in UK.
Second, Hong Kong Public Opinion Research Institute had a CEO who was pro-succession, anti-Beijing views and has since been exiled to UK.Personally, I wouldn't call this survey unbiased.
What HK need is politicians that works for people and have a spine to go against the elites
The biggest reason for this is because of China. Hong Kong acts as a financial hub for business between China and the outside world.
Can we stop pretending like Hong Kong people are oppressed?
[0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(PPP)...
> used to belong to "them"
Not "used" to, legally belongs to PRC/China, under Westphalia / UN law, HK belongs to PRC, TW belongs to One China territory. Liberal World Order idiots have no conception that international law matters when it favors PRC. There is no need to reach for muh history copium when it's plain literal current legal international order is built around HK (and Tibet and XJ) legally belonging to PRC, and TW/PRC part of One China both at UN and PRC/ROC constitutional level.
And it is in fact pieces of paper that determines ownership not living breathing humans who come and go. Ultimately self determination doesn't (and shouldn't) factor into sovereignty, but if it just so happens in China's case, the mandate overwhelming favors PRC who has 98% of consensus. What is best for everyone is 1400m mainlanders vs 40m greater China.
Just because it is convenient for the CCP to coerce "confessions" about CIA involvement, and it's convenient for willing accomplices to their dishonest and cruel misrule to pretend that this is relevant, no one else needs to take this seriously.
There were large participation in non-violent protests in the beginning.
By the time it got violent, it was almost all just students and the youth protesting. It lasted for almost an entire year.
This paper directly contradicts your claim it was mainly due to housing [4].
> Our empirical findings suggested that the systematic threat concerning the erosion of the city's values and institutions imposed by the extradition bill was a primary cause of the unprecedented mobilization.
[1]https://www.investing.com/news/world-news/exclusive-hong-kon...
[2]https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/journal-of-east-asia...
[3]https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/china-quarterly/arti...
[4]https://www.proquest.com/docview/2714819043
(On my phone, so some sources are secondary sources).
> Nearly three million people voted, equivalent to 71 per cent of registered voters, an unprecedented turnout in the electoral history of Hong Kong. The election was widely viewed as a de facto referendum on the concurrent anti-extradition protests.[3]
> All pro-Beijing parties suffered major setbacks and losses, including the flagship pro-Beijing party Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong (DAB), which received its largest defeat in history, losing 96 seats. Executive Councillor Regina Ip's New People's Party failed to obtain a single seat, and was ousted from all District Councils as a result.[4][5] Dozens of prominent pro-Beijing heavyweights lost their campaigns for re-election, including Junius Ho, a controversial anti-protest figure who had expressed support for the triads behind the mob attack in Yuen Long on 21 July.[4][5]
> In contrast, the pro-democracy camp in conjunction with the localist camp achieved its biggest landslide victory in the history of Hong Kong, gaining absolute majority in votes and electoral seats in all of the 18 District Councils and tripling their seats from around 124 to about 388.
I wish the whole thing had gone better for the folks on the receiving end. I was at university with a crowd who had grown up there seeing themselves as british, suddenly thrust into a strange nationality they didn't match their internal identity, and with no say in the matter.
https://china-underground.com/2019/10/28/hong-kong-protests-...
https://youtu.be/RXAHywPLaD8 "Say No to China Extradition!"
If you ask a foreign power to intervene in your protest movement, then fail, you should probably consider fleeing if you don't want to go to prison. Just calling balls and strikes here.
[1] https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-china-48832910
They were some prodemocratic demonstrators. Laudable but sadly they had no chance of winning that fight. There were some genuinely weird people with weird demands too (like some far-right ultranationalist HKer). The attacks on some politician, journalist and medias, and extradition law passed at all cost, was a clear authoritarian push. But from a chinese perspective, it is just putting HK in line with the rest of the country. There was some weird disappearance of some protestor, the clear usage of the triad to inflict violence on some protestor, and some protestors turn violent too. One could say, every country would react the same to a part of a country trying to secede. But if we look at, for example, Spain and Catalonia, will independence is firmly denied, there was way less violence and authoritarianism (Catalonia still have some special status).
All in all, the sad part is that some well-meaning idealistic kids might never be able to go back to HK. And with the integration with china, HK will slowly lose its identify and distinct culture. Now that it's no different than most other chinese territory, there is no real interest for foreign investor to invest there specifically, which was a part of what made HK rich. Its landscape will probably change a lot as the land value is not as prized anymore (which, tbf, might be a win for a lot of HKer). A lot of HKer now move to the bigger and richer Shenzhen for work, as more mandarin-speaking chinese move to HK. There are too many speakers for Cantonese to disappear overnight, but it might become a secondary language for most over time. The one you use to talk with you grandparent and feel slightly unique.