[Politics] Hong Kong

[Swansman]

Here we go again.

Guessing the Chinese will be more prepared this time, using (your beloved, definitely unproblematic) modern technology to quench ways for HK protesters to organize themselves and directly kill off any protest taken to the streets. Cant see Xi & his buddies allowing it to escalate like last time.

And its not like NATO will come fight for their freedom & democracy, since they cant rob HK of all its natural resources.

So, what do you think will happen?

 

[jamie (not that one)]

Nothing will happen. There will be some faux outrage from a few governments and China will absorb HK properly. The likes of Taiwan, Singapore etc will pick up all the business from HK and it'll just become another Chinese city.

 

[Is it PotG?]

Hong Kong is up for grabs

 

[Goldstone1976]

... China will absorb HK properly. The likes of Taiwan, Singapore etc will pick up all the business from HK and it'll just become another Chinese city.

Depressingly, I think this is the most likely outcome. Mainland China's intention to achieve this has been clear for 40 years and they're absolute masters of playing the long game.

 

[Swansman]

I cant see this turning out in any other way than a pretty massive thing. Especially for the UK. If there would be a few million refugees from HK.

Cant first colonialise it, make it British, then throw it away give it away under certain preconditions, just to ignore when China breach the agreement, and then not give room for the HK population. Its not like you could ask EU for help either, there must be some ****ing level of dignity.

Problem is that if handling a few million immigrants would not be difficult enough, you also got to keep China happy as they are the locomotive in the global economy.

Going to be interesting to see how this develops. I have a feeling the whole 2020s is going to be a pretty wild ride.

 

[jamie (not that one)]

Depressingly, I think this is the most likely outcome. Mainland China's intention to achieve this has been clear for 40 years and they're absolute masters of playing the long game.

Absolutely, and for what? Some more land and humans to own? They're willing to destroy Hong Kong as a financial powerhouse just to control it. Absolutely baffling.

The UK needs to do the right thing here considering we essentially made Hong Kong and then gave it away without asking the people of HK what they wanted. Will this government "do the right thing" and step in to help the people we abandoned in 1997? Doubt it.

 

[Swansman]

Nothing will happen. There will be some faux outrage from a few governments and China will absorb HK properly. The likes of Taiwan, Singapore etc will pick up all the business from HK and it'll just become another Chinese city.

Of course. HK will be absorbed. Its not up for debate really, nothing could prevent that.

What I'm mainly curious about is what this will mean to the x million people (or at least several hundred thousands of people) in HK who are fairly likely to say "**** this shit, I'm out". Will China allow them to leave (as its quite a brain drain)? Will anyone be willing to accept them when the global economy is what is (a speculative bubble)?

My first thought was that "well a lot will probably move to Taiwan" but I think people in HK are pretty well aware of China's unofficial but increasing influence in Taiwan. Singapore couldnt deal with it. The next logical option would be the UK.

 

[middletoenail]

This law is very welcome in my opinion. Hong Kong has been chaos for sometime now, and the protestors have gone way over the top. This has included creating bomb factories, setting people on fire/attacking those who voice different opinions.

Every country has national security laws and closing this loophole will hopefully repair the economy and allow HK to prosper once again. It will have little impact to law abiding citizens.

 

[Lethargic]

Absolutely, and for what? Some more land and humans to own? They're willing to destroy Hong Kong as a financial powerhouse just to control it. Absolutely baffling.

The UK needs to do the right thing here considering we essentially made Hong Kong and then gave it away without asking the people of HK what they wanted. Will this government "do the right thing" and step in to help the people we abandoned in 1997? Doubt it.

I not sure this is how they see it with the current pandemic and the whole globe going into economic meltdown all financial centres will have some role to play China how have a larger controlling share of the eastern financial estate, the Chinese are on a mission to become the number 1 superpower and with the various domestic issues within the USA they see this as their opportunity and they know the rest of the world will do nothing more that reprimand them as very naughty boys.

We only ever had HK on loan from the Chinese it was never ours bit like renting a house, yes we could have offered the whole HK population the right to migrate to the UK but that would not have been a very popular move for the government.

 

[highflyer]

Cant first colonialise it, make it British, then throw it away give it away under certain preconditions, just to ignore when China breach the agreement, and then not give room for the HK population. Its not like you could ask EU for help either, there must be some ****ing level of dignity.

Hmmm. Are you familiar with our Colonial history?
If we are not able to exploit somewhere, it's of no further interest to us.

Hong Kong has been set up as a major tax haven. It is useful to China as such. I suspect it will indeed be absorbed, but that not very much will change in practice for the average person living in Hong Kong.

 

[nicko31]

Nothing will happen. There will be some faux outrage from a few governments and China will absorb HK properly. The likes of Taiwan, Singapore etc will pick up all the business from HK and it'll just become another Chinese city.

Taiwan absorb all the business from HK? Please explain...

 

[Swansman]

This law is very welcome in my opinion. Hong Kong has been chaos for sometime now, and the protestors have gone way over the top. This has included creating bomb factories, setting people on fire/attacking those who voice different opinions.

Every country has national security laws and closing this loophole will hopefully repair the economy and allow HK to prosper once again. It will have little impact to law abiding citizens.

Does not surprise me. People all over the world are once again brainwashed to accept and even welcome harsher laws, oppressive regimes and more authoritarian rule, for the umpteenth time in history. It rarely ends up being that stable and fair solution they've got fooled into believing in.

You are probably right that it wont harm law abiding citizens, the question is more so "what is the law going to look like?"

People who fancy strict laws are often the kind of people who say "its not a problem if you got nothing to hide" about surveillance, often failing to finish that quoted sentence: "its not a problem if you got nothing to hide for the fascist tyrannic power trying to enslave the people".

 

[Pretty Plnk Fairy]

What about other countrys to dont they matter.?

Regards
DF

 

[Greg Bobkin]

Hong Kong is up for grabs

Can he play left back?

 

[Starry]

we are just weeks away from moving to hong kong from singapore. don't think for now much is going to change, but is obviously a concern. most are looking to transfer their desks to sg but a sneaky political game needs to be played behind the scenes first. looking forward to our move though, be more interesting than sterile singapore at least.

 

[Harry Wilson's tackle]

Hong Kong is up for grabs

Not all your posts are dogshit. You can take that as a compliment.

 

[Harry Wilson's tackle]

Does not surprise me. People all over the world are once again brainwashed to accept and even welcome harsher laws, oppressive regimes and more authoritarian rule, for the umpteenth time in history. It rarely ends up being that stable and fair solution they've got fooled into believing in.

You are probably right that it wont harm law abiding citizens, the question is more so "what is the law going to look like?"

People who fancy strict laws are often the kind of people who say "its not a problem if you got nothing to hide" about surveillance, often failing to finish that quoted sentence: "its not a problem if you got nothing to hide for the fascist tyrannic power trying to enslave the people".

A mate of mine, whose wife is Chinese (most of her family were wiped out by Mao) just rolls his eyes when we white folk start emoting about freedom. In his view the Chinese care about food in the belly, family and, all that in place, making money. As long as they can do that, if the leadership expects them to send one another red envelopes, line the streets to venerate the leadership, and parrot nonsense, that's not a problem.

The issue is simply the extent to which a sufficient number of HK folk feel they are not Chinese, and want nothing to do with China. My guess is nowhere near enough, and China will prevail.

My old pal also says to me 'don't judge others by your own standards'. I must admit, I do have difficulty with that. Who knew?

 

[sydney]

Absolutely, and for what? Some more land and humans to own? They're willing to destroy Hong Kong as a financial powerhouse just to control it. Absolutely baffling.

The UK needs to do the right thing here considering we essentially made Hong Kong and then gave it away without asking the people of HK what they wanted. Will this government "do the right thing" and step in to help the people we abandoned in 1997? Doubt it.

chinese have a completely different thought pattern to us , particularly at political level......they are hardcore control merchants and their view is that the white mans time as the king of the heap is over , another hundred years or so and they will be in complete control , Chinese people in Australia love it here , they love the vote, they love the freedom , they can't understand the apathy and general disinterest in politics of your average Aussie....but hey , that's cool huh..

 

[Gwylan]

There are a couple of interesting aspects to this. First of all, Chinese money is behind two nuclear power stations; if we antagonise the Chinese government to such a state that they pull out, that will lead to a big hole in our energy policy. Second, we're about to leave the EU (and without any trade deal by the looks of things), the last thing we'd want to do is to antagonise one of the two economic superpowers.

And that's before we consider Huawei and the UK's 5G infrastructure.

 

[portlock seagull]

Am I missing something or didn’t our lease expire nearly 25 years ago? I’ve I bought a house and was now the leaseholder, I’d be a bit pissed off of a former resident came round a quarter of a century later and started telling me what wall paper I could use etc.

Let it go, it’s none of our business anymore not least because the worlds biggest superpower owns it. In their back yard. On the other side of the planet. And our navy’s been reduced to a couple of dinghies...and they’re probably dry docked.