It's called propaganda. Go back 4 or 5 years ago. The NYTimes, Bloomberg, WSJ, etc all ran the same stories back then. The comments were the same. Usually some "expat" living there giving his "expert" propaganda or some "expat" talking about had he had to leave hong kong because it was so bad. Back then, there was a lot of "ghost cities" scare mongering. A lot less of it today. You notice the same patterns. The "britain tried to give democracy to hong kong" propaganda. The "people of hong kong" prefer britain propaganda. China is about to collapse.

Once the trade war nonsense ends, you'll see these stories and comments disappear. Just like all the "I hate facebook" stories and comments. Just like the "Russia controls everything in the US" stories and comments.

Until it's time for "We've always been at war with eurasia". If only these people cared about freedom here at home as much as they "care" about freedom in china. You'll notice that most of the people ( journalists and commenters ) crying about censorship, privacy, freedom etc in china are the same ones demanding more censorship, less privacy and less freedom here and on social media.