Re:Hong Kong Airport shuts down as protesters take over
by nimrod0 on Monday August 12, 2019 @08:15AM
(#20674663)
Two possibilities present themselves.
Either the protestors don't know any history, or have learned such a skewed version of history that they internalize the perspective of the 19th century British victors in an ultimately self-defeating way, or;
They know very well the potency of the symbolism and are deliberately declaring themselves aligned with the Western camp out of political expediency, and elevating the conflict to the level of a battle of spheres of influence.
Neither possibility will be looked upon kindly by mainland Chinese firmly rooted in their own historical and political understanding, because it is against their interest.
This very much depends on a country's history and it is impossible to generalise, although I would suspect that burning an American flag in the US (for example) would not go well with many Americans (and probably same for other countries).
China's current regime is partly a reaction to foreign aggression and humiliation.
An enduring symbol of this aggression and humiliation was Hong Kong itself.
This what makes attacking state symbols (or waving the British/American flags as I have seen some protesters do on TV) in Hong Kong so potent.
I think that for many Chinese seeing people protesting against the extradition bill and for more democracy is one thing (which they may be somewhat sympathetic to, actually) but attacking national integrity is quite another, which is guaranteed to produce general anger.