The new protests happened because a new round of violence from the HK Police, towards both protesters and people unrelated to protests.<p>e.g.
Firing less-lethal rounds directly at head level, causing permanent blindness<p><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/HongKong/comments/cowgje/a_female_protestor_was_head_shot_and_shot_in_the/" rel="nofollow">https://www.reddit.com/r/HongKong/comments/cowgje/a_female_p...</a><p>e.g.
Planting evidence into protester's backpack<p><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/HongKong/comments/coypg7/police_put_weapon_in_the_backpack_of_captured/" rel="nofollow">https://www.reddit.com/r/HongKong/comments/coypg7/police_put...</a><p>e.g.
Firing tear gas in subway station, which was being used by the general public<p><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/HongKong/comments/cp8qyy/hong_kong_police_firing_tear_gas_indoors_not/" rel="nofollow">https://www.reddit.com/r/HongKong/comments/cp8qyy/hong_kong_...</a>
I am a mainland-born Chinese who studied in the US and have been living in HK for over a decade. Just want to share what I saw recently: an overwhelming majority of Chinese people who grew up in mainland, regardless of where they live and work now, disapprove of the HK protesters' activities. Many mainland Chinese living in HK, who were largely not interested in politics in the past, have started donating money to pro-government causes. Supportive comments of the mainland government have risen dramatically among private chatters. It seems to me that the HK protesters' messages do not resonate well with most Chinese people.
Complicating the nature of these protests is that the 5 overt demands put forth by protestors (all related to the Extradition Bill) do not reflect a large cause of the latent / tacit discontent: the inability of youngsters to buy a home and raise a family due to collusion between property developers and government to restrict land supply. This author has stated the problem better than I can:<p><a href="https://www.scmp.com/comment/opinion/article/3022107/midst-hong-kongs-turmoil-carrie-lam-must-prioritise-housing-crisis" rel="nofollow">https://www.scmp.com/comment/opinion/article/3022107/midst-h...</a><p>Decades of this squeeze have placed youngsters in a position where they have nothing to lose: Hong Kong has so many shiny buildings and not a square foot to their name. I was once getting flowers for my wife and ended up talking to a couple planning for their wedding reception at the florist. I was shocked to learn that they had discussed it and will not be having children because it is unaffordable. In my opinion, the Extradition Bill is just the final straw that broke that camel's back.
I don't think this will end well, the more this drags on, the more violent it will probably become. At some point the state will probably have a pretty good excuse to declare martial law and enforce order by military means, ultimately it might fasten the integration of Hong Kong into the PRC instead of delaying it.
I don't understand why HK hasn't done anything about this? I mean, the protests.<p>This doesn't look like your average worker strike and people seem genuinely determined to get a change of direction.<p>Anyone who has been involved with this, can you comment on the latest government response to the "demands" from people?
"Not sure what the HK protesters endgame is here."
People are fed up about how the system works and about their life and the life of people they know. They want things to be "better" without having to clearly define and write a 167 page law that will probably not benefit them.<p>People are expressing their dissatisfaction and IMHO that's a valid justification for protesters and good enough for me.
Not sure what the government is trying to achieve by shutting down the airport and sending in the police to clear the scene. AFAIK the protesters are not causing any trouble there, no flights are affected.<p>There are many who chose to sit-in at the airport since they do not agree with the escalation of the protests in other districts. Also there are elderlies and parents who have to carry and look after their children, who just cannot bear tear gas and rubber pullets.<p>This act by the government will only catch more foreign attention, and put more pages on the pile of recent police brutality.
PLA was doing innuendo charged manoeuvres for the past 2 months all over the province.<p>Today, they were finally moved to the HK bridge terminus.<p>They even plastered banners with something like "you got it" on their APCs
New to Hacker News - Is there a reason why this has disappeared from the front page within minutes? It was on the top of the front page as of 9:02pm AEST (4:02AM PDT).
This is intensely interesting because everything points towards China never backing down, and protesters having nothing to win. The default assumption is continuity of the party and the system.<p>Yet, looking at history, systems are not that stable. The Berlin wall and Sowjet union seemed like they would not end.<p>I assume 3-letter agencies have vast amounts of resources dedicated to analyzing how to create the instabilities that may ultimately make such systems collapse.<p>Bottom line, historically speaking, we should not be surprised if China collapses. We should also not be surprised if the party keeps its tight grip for another 100 years.
HKIA is the critical lifeline of Hong Kong, the economy is already suffering, i think its matter of time before PLA gets involved. I'm very concerned for Hong Kong and its people.
Not sure what the HK protesters endgame is here. It's unthinkable that China would step down. If anything, they are forcing China to take direct action, because if they let HK do its own thing, it won't end there for China.
Perhaps slightly unrelated, but do people believe a dictatorship like China can thrive as a first world economy by suppressing people's basic fundamental human rights?
So far China has been extremely calm and restrained itself from doing anything premature and yet they are being portrayed as the absolute worst people.<p>On the other hand there are governments like the US which immediately respond with military action even in countries where people protest which have nothing to do with the US and they are being portrayed as the heroes.<p>It's funny how the HK protests and the immense media coverage coincide with the trade war escalations between the US and China.<p>Even this forum is being gamed by people who come here and specifically post and upvote a narrative which they want to push on us. Anyone who doesn't see through this bs is naive.
Word on the street is that the airport is being cleared of passengers so police can violently crack down on the peaceful protesters who have been staging a sit-in inside for three days now.
Unfortunately Hong Kong can't be saved. Government officials are puppets of Beijing and they are all afraid of their future. They want to avoid hard labour and re-education camps...