Hong Kongers are finding creative ways to voice dissent after Beijing blanketed the territory in new security legislation and police began arresting people displaying now-forbidden political slogans.
Faced with the sudden threat of prosecution for anything that might promote greater autonomy or independence for the restless territory, residents are using word play and even subverting Chinese Communist Party dogma to express their frustration.
On a bridge in the busy shopping district of Causeway Bay, a key spot for pro-democracy protests over the past year, traffic thundered past newly daubed graffiti that declared: “Arise, ye who refuse to be slaves.”
Photo: AFP
The phrase is taken from the first line of China’s national anthem. While the graffito could conceivably have been written by a patriotic nationalist, it is most likely a declaration of dissent.
Social media and chat forums have filled with suggestions for how to find safer ways to protest after Beijing on Tuesday imposed broad legislation banning subversion, secession, terrorism and foreign collusion.
In a semi-autonomous territory used to speaking its mind, people would find ways around the legislation, said Chan Kin-man (陳健民), a veteran democracy advocate who has previously been jailed for his advocacy.
“In a public space, one might either not say anything or use an ‘officially approved’ language to protect themselves,” he told reporters. “But hidden language is something that cannot be banned by laws.”
The Hong Kong government on Thursday said the popular protest slogan, “Liberate Hong Kong, revolution of our times,” would now be deemed illegal.
For some, the phrase represents genuine aspirations to split Hong Kong from China, a red line for Beijing, but for many others it is a more general cry for democracy and an expression of rising frustration with Chinese rule.
However, coded language is allowing people to keep the slogan alive.
One version — “GFHG, SDGM” — uses English letters from the transliterated phrase gwong fuk heung gong, si doi gak ming.
Another, more complex, example mimics the tone and rhythm of the slogan using the numbers “3219 0246” in Cantonese.
Chinese characters also provide ample room for linguistic subversion. One phrase people have started adopting online is “seize back banana,” a play on the similarity in Chinese of Hong Kong (香港) and banana (香蕉).
Others have gone for English slogans that appear positive, but are a clear dig at Beijing — for example the Trumpian phrase “Make Hong Kong great.”
The very first arrest made under the new security legislation involved a deliberate linguistic challenge. During protests a day after the legislation was enacted, police announced that they had arrested a man with a flag that read, “Hong Kong independence,” posting a picture.
However, eagle-eyed Web sleuths zoomed in on the flag and spotted that a man had written a small “No” before his much larger phrase. The same phrase has since gone viral online.
Multiple pro-democracy restaurants and shops across the territory have taken down their “Lennon wall” displays expressing support for the pro-democracy movement after some were warned by police that they might violate the national security legislation.
One cafe replaced its wall with blank memos.
“What is essential is invisible to the eyes,” the shop wrote on Facebook, citing popular children’s book Le Petit Prince.
Another symbol of defiance that has replaced some protest art across the territory is blank white pages.
The gesture represents the inability to speak out and also “white terror,” a Chinese phrase used to describe political persecution.
“Suppression catalyzes people to fight back,” said Chan, who is also a sociology professor.
He likened the situation with how people in mainland China reveal dissent or anger toward the government with a wink and a nod.
“Hong Kong people will definitely respond more actively, it’s just that it might happen in a gray area,” he said.
A slogan that went viral this week was a quote by Mao Zedong (毛澤東), which read: “Those who suppress the student movements will not come to a good end.”
Two medieval fortresses face each other across the Narva River separating Estonia from Russia on Europe’s eastern edge. Once a symbol of cooperation, the “Friendship Bridge” connecting the two snow-covered banks has been reinforced with rows of razor wire and “dragon’s teeth” anti-tank obstacles on the Estonian side. “The name is kind of ironic,” regional border chief Eerik Purgel said. Some fear the border town of more than 50,0000 people — a mixture of Estonians, Russians and people left stateless after the fall of the Soviet Union — could be Russian President Vladimir Putin’s next target. On the Estonian side of the bridge,
Jeremiah Kithinji had never touched a computer before he finished high school. A decade later, he is teaching robotics, and even took a team of rural Kenyans to the World Robotics Olympiad in Singapore. In a classroom in Laikipia County — a sparsely populated grasslands region of northern Kenya known for its rhinos and cheetahs — pupils are busy snapping together wheels, motors and sensors to assemble a robot. Guiding them is Kithinji, 27, who runs a string of robotics clubs in the area that have taken some of his pupils far beyond the rural landscapes outside. In November, he took a team
SHOW OF SUPPORT: The move showed that aggression toward Greenland is a question for Europe and Canada, and the consequences are global, not just Danish, experts said Canada and France, which adamantly oppose US President Donald Trump’s wish to control Greenland, were to open consulates in the Danish autonomous territory’s capital yesterday, in a strong show of support for the local government. Since returning to the White House last year, Trump has repeatedly insisted that Washington needs to control the strategic, mineral-rich Arctic island for security reasons. Trump last month backed off his threats to seize Greenland after saying he had struck a “framework” deal with NATO chief Mark Rutte to ensure greater US influence. A US-Denmark-Greenland working group has been established to discuss ways to meet Washington’s security concerns
Civil society leaders and members of a left-wing coalition yesterday filed impeachment complaints against Philippine Vice President Sara Duterte, restarting a process sidelined by the Supreme Court last year. Both cases accuse Duterte of misusing public funds during her term as education secretary, while one revives allegations that she threatened to assassinate former ally Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. The filings come on the same day that a committee in the House of Representatives was to begin hearings into impeachment complaints against Marcos, accused of corruption tied to a spiraling scandal over bogus flood control projects. Under the constitution, an impeachment by the
RSS