I can’t remember the last time I watched an awards show. I tend to look at the red carpet photos and move on.
Suddenly, this year, V asked if I wanted to watch the Grammys and because I was nursing an upset tummy and skipping my run, I said ok. I’m glad I did.
In terms of music, I tend to be stuck in the late 80s and early 90s. I’ve been introduced to Sabrina Carpenter (whose voice I frankly find irritating) and Chappell Roan thanks to Mimi, but that’s about it. Occasionally, I’ll hear something I like and use Shazaam to add it to my Spotify. But I usually listen to the same ol’ same ol’.
I haven’t listened to a whole album, I can safely say, in a couple of decades. My late teens were the years of the music CD, but since the advent of the iPod, one could pick and choose. It’s rare for me to be into more than one song per artist which is why I had no interest in going to the Coldplay concert.
Of the more contemporary artists, Beyonce and Taylor Swift are the only two for whom I can say I like more than one song. I actually like several Taylor Swift songs. I guess I’m a Swiftie. What a cliche.
Anyway, the Grammys introduced me to a whole lot of new (to me) artists: Doechii, Charlie XCX, Raye. There was such a lot of girl power and camaraderie on display. I don’t know how I feel about Kendrick Lamar’s wins, but I loved Beyonce’s genre-bending win for best country music album (and I discovered a track I really liked).
Sometime last year I was in a car with Mimi and her friends and I was introduced to the “Thank You Beyonce” conspiracy theory. I bit my lips, but couldn’t stop myself from schooling these teenage girls on fact-checking what they see on social media. They said the whole thing was just fun, they didn’t really care about Beyonce, but I found the whole idea of this powerful Black woman being brought down by this stupid conspiracy theory too pissing off. And no matter what they say, I know these girls’ sentiments towards Beyonce have been affected by this nonsense, and it’s unfortunate.
I loved how almost the girls got political in their speeches, and the attention to the Los Angeles fires was touching, although when they were going on about how many people had lost their homes I couldn’t but help think of Gaza. No one went there in their speeches, I don’t think. It’s understandable that these artists would focus on LA which is essentially their home. But still.
To be honest, I can’t remember the first half of the year clearly at all, but luckily, I have this blog.
From what I can tell, the first half of the year was fairly angst-ridden with what I recognise is adjustment pains. To the academic demands on my children and their performance. To the slow and convoluted Indian bureaucracy. To my life in general.
Things calmed down in the second half. I’m more accustomed to my own life in this city, if not loving it.
I got glasses and one false tooth
We got a cat
I saw my sister twice in one year, and my parents three times
We went to the US on a trip entirely paid for by me
I got an Aadhaar card, a driver’s lisence, a voter ID, a marriage certificate (yeah I didn’t have a government one), my passport renewed with my spouse’s name and my new address, a GST registration
I bought a couple of pretty expensive paintings
I got a financial planner and started investing my own money systematically
I started therapy and this one seems pretty good
I started doing light weights
I chilled out about work, about my kids’ academic record, about V and his irritations
In the wider world, Israel continues to do horrible things in Gaza and we can only bear witness to them, the war in Ukraine is dragging on, Syria ousted its dictator but what’s going to happen is anyone’s guess, Bangladesh ousted its authoritarian leader and same, Japan’s prime minister changed again, Trump won and it wasn’t an utter shock, our own dear leader got a bit of a take-down and that was nice, the Olympics happened and there were some wonderful moments.
Last year, I said my word for 2024 would be “endure”. This year, with much trepidation, I’m thinking it might be “joy”, something I’m determined to (let myself) seek and sink into, however, small and shortlived.
The election outcome was not a complete shock, unlike last time. Harris and Trump were neck and neck, and given the last time, and given that the orange menace had come this far, yet again, there was every chance that he would win again, ridiculous as that is.
Because this the world we live in.
Sadly, I think that if the US wasn’t ready for a (white) female president in 2016, it isn’t ready for a female president (of colour) today. If anything, the country is even more deeply polarised than it was then.
I think a white man would have had a better chance, but there was no such person waiting in the wings. And as vice-president Harris had been kind of invisible, which is not unusual. The same happened to Biden too. Except he had a longer time to run his campaign when he stepped out of Obama’s shadow.
And yet, Harris gave Trump a good run for his money, a better run than I would have expected of someone, anyone, leave alone a person with Harris’ identity baggage.
Did I love Harris as a candidate? No. The US administration’s policy on Gaza has been disgusting, even as I recognise that it would take a very principled person to stare down the lobby that demands unconditional support of Israel and to disregard the country’s self-interest in the Middle East and to tell Israel to get a grip, if it were even possible to unilaterally make such a politically disastrous – if morally correct – decision. And to do this in an election year might be too much to ask. But still, some of the taint of that rubbed onto Harris for me.
Still, she was eminently qualified, and seemed to have all her marbles – and that is more than one can hope for these days.
What did surprise me was how into Trump Indians were. Indians in the US, Indians in India. Even a person of Indian descent was not good enough for these people who are normally quick to claim anyone with a sliver of an Indian connection, no matter whether they want to be or not. Why the excitement over Rishi Sunak but not Kamala Harris?
Apparently, the appeal of a strongman was too strong. Bigotry before blood.
Indians keep saying Trump will be good for India. Never mind that the Biden administration signed a very significant jet engine tech deal with India.
China also thinks Trump will be good for China. That I believe. Trump can’t be worse for China than Biden.
I had a very busy work day working weirdly on stuff other than the US election so I didn’t have the time to track it. And I don’t think everyone expected it to be a done deal so soon.
But here we are. Another four years. At least we know what to expect kinda.
To say I felt disconnected from this election is an understatement. I moved to India from Hong Kong where the democratic process had been decimated, but life was going on, and not badly either (freedom of speech wasn’t what it used to be, almost every politician from the democratic camp – and then some – was in jail but the government was still accountable to the people more or less. Most recently, the so-called authoritarian government had to pull a waste-charging scheme in the face of public opposition, rubber-stamp legislature or not).
In India, I was resigned to the BJP winning and continuing its transformation of the country into a Hindu rashtra. I couldn’t register to vote and so couldn’t get the endorphin hit that comes with an inked finger.
Ironically, the Indian election results were declared on June 4, the day 35 years ago that the Communist Party brutally cracked down on student protesters in Tiananmen Square in Beijing. It seemed a fitting day for another autocrat to consolidate his position.
And then India surprised me.
The BJP’s 370/400 target was a tall order, but who could have predicted the thumping in UP, the gains the India alliance made, the loss in Ayodhya?
Maybe the BJP had some inkling that it had talked too big a game, because some of Modi’s comments during this election campaign were truly shocking. The man is a two-term prime minister, convinced that he is directly descended from the divine no less, but he still felt the need to say: “When they (the Congress) were in power, they said Muslims have first right over resources. They will gather all your wealth and distribute it among those who have more children. They will distribute among infiltrators.”
It may be too much to hope that Nitish Kumar will jump ship once again, but after too long, we will have an opposition with some teeth.
Because I am a pessimist, I also have some feeling of foreboding. When the prime minister was seemingly in a position of strength, he didn’t hesitate to get down to the level of the street and appeal to the lowest common denominator, proving he will do what it takes to win, regardless of what befits the leader of a country.
Now that he has been dealt a stinging slap, what will he do? The verdict in UP seems to suggest that people care more about jobs than temples. But jobs, unlike temples and hate speech, are harder to produce out of thin air.
The easiest strategy for politicians in a corner is to lash out at an enemy within and without. The BJP doubled down on the former in this election, inaugurating the Ram Mandir a couple of months before the polls and making noises about temples under other mosques. In 2019, it seemed to have been more successful with a surgical strike on an external threat. Will it lean in that direction in the next four years?
Now that Modi-Shah have been shown not to be invincible, will this trigger a power struggle within the BJP that will result in someone even worse, willing to go even further, an actual, say, yogi, perhaps?
Mimi: “OMG Google is giving me the middle finger! Oh, wait, it’s the voting thing.”
V was gearing up to vote for what he claimed was the first time, although he had once told me that his dad had chased them out to vote, and even told them who to vote for. All these years, he’s said he doesn’t believe in voting because it doesn’t make any difference.
Although he’s one of the few people I know who actually saw benefits from voting for someone as his father had some connection to the local MLA, and I believe the horribly potholed road leading up to their house was actually finally tarred as a result, which is more than I can say happened for me despite years of exercising my franchise.
I’m pretty sure V’s desire to vote this time is due to all the discussion on the podcasts he watches. He was quite tickled by the whole process, and I’ll admit, there is something inspiring about the massive undertaking that is democracy in India.
Meanwhile, I, who has voted in every election I could since I was 18 – except the last legislative council election in Hong Kong because the system had become just too ridiculous by then – have becomes increasingly disillusioned by the process. Ironically, living in Hong Kong, where people have been complaining about the lack of democracy for as long as I can remember, I experienced a responsive government for the first time. Even when the political system was skewed so badly that it finally lived up to Western criticism of it, the government was more responsive than any (even at the municipal level) in India.
In India, the demographic I belong to is so small as to be insignificant. It’s why there’s not large-scale campaigning in our areas even for municipal elections. I realised this early on, when a sort of town hall had been organised in our school of the candidates for the municipal election. The Congress candidate didn’t bother to turn up until the event was almost over. She was unapologetic and went on to win.
Nevertheless, I remained enthusiastic about voting. Now, I don’t believe my vote makes any difference, especially in elections like this one, but I’d do it anyway.
I didn’t vote this time, because I didn’t have a voter ID. I don’t have a voter ID because of my Aadhaar card complication.
And (possibly sour grapes) I found all the people putting up photos their inked finger as if they personally saved the nation more than a tad irritating. One guy even sanctimoniously goes, “If you don’t vote, you can’t complain.” Which, sorry, but governments are paid to do a job, and whether one voted for them or not, one can complain if they aren’t doing that job.
On the one hand, it is great that voting has become fashionable. On the other, it’s one of those, yes, I did my bit, the end. After ticking that box, people aren’t involved in the democratic process at all. There’s almost no civic engagement because the system makes it so hard to participate.
Democratic systems are in the end rigged by the money behind them. And sometimes people are pissed enough to be able to overcome the forces of the various vested interests that make or break governments, and that’s why the vote is important to have. It’s a check and balance, but one whose importance has been overstated to make us feel like we have a say, when largely, we don’t.
Maybe because I’ve lived in and around places where democracy doesn’t exist or exists in a very unideal form, but whose governments seem to deliver equally or more than democratic governments do, that I’ve begun to wonder if it really matters whether I get to choose the people in charge? Is a glorified popularity contest really the best way to go about this? Why has majority wins become synonymous with the idea of not only fairness but everything that’s just and good?
Last week, I realised that the World Athletics Championships in Eugene, Oregon, was being livestreamed, and it was like Olympic fever all over again.
When I was younger, I thought that one had to pick between being a sporty girl and an arty girl, but for me sports and art are two sides of the same coin. Watching sports, I get the same transcendent feeling that I do when I look at art, the same sense of the sublime. This is particularly so with athletics, maybe because I trained as an athlete in school and have a personal understanding of what it takes to make the body move in the way that top athletes are able to.
There were so many awe-inspiring events, but my personal favourites were:
The women’s 100m final, which was essentially a competition between three Jamaican greats: Shelly-Ann Fraser Price, Elaine Thomson-Herrar and Shericka Jackson. Thomson-Herrar won the Olympic gold in the event. This time Fraser Price stormed to victory, 14 years after her first international title (Beijing 2008), and having had a child in the process, a testament to motherhood, age or both not necessarily being an impediment to athletic performance at the very highest level. And let’s give a shout-out to her hair swag – she had a different wig for every race.
2. Shericka Jackson is so often no.3 so it was awesome to see her winning the 200m final. As the commmentator said, “At last!”
3. Sydney McLaughlin giving a masterclass in how to run the 400m hurdles and breaking the world record in the process.
4. Tobi Amusan breaking the world record in her semifinal. Then breaking it again in the final.
6. Mondo Duplantis breaking a world record, business as usual. But still great to watch greatness in action, to see him raise the bar for the sport literally. Shout out to Renaud Lavillenie pacing about, giving Mondo gyan and ensuring that he attempted his jump when the wind was in his favour.
7. Speaking of legends, there’s Mutaz Barshim. Nuff said. As a bonus, there’s silver medallist Woo Sang-hyeok who breaks every stereotype in my head of stoic and serious Korean men.
8. Jianan Wang winning the men’s long jump in his final jump, proving that it’s not over till it’s over.
9. I’m a complete Athing Mu fangirl ever since I saw her loping around the track (to win gold in the 800m at the Olympics). I love her pre-race posing that reminds one that she is only 20. She had to work for this gold, and while I would have preferred to just watch her sail to victory, the battle to the finish with Keely Hodgkinson made it an exciting race.
10. The 4X400 mixed relay final. First of all, just the idea of a mixed relay (men and women running together) as a thing. Then, the Dominican Republic pulling in a victory in the last few seconds. The Netherland’s Femke Bol thundering down the track from way behind to fight for silver. USA had to settle for bronze, but it was a pleasure to see Allyson Felix run her final race aged 36. She is not only the most decorated US track and field athlete in history, but also a mother who called attention to how sports companies ditch their athletes when they are pregnant.
In the team figure skating competition, 15-year-old Kamila Valieva made history becoming the first woman to land a quad jump in the Olympics. Her final score of 90.18 was 15 points ahead of second-best competitor, and she helped the Russian Olympic Committee team (so called because Russia itself was banned from competing in the Olympics until the end of 2022 for running a state-sponsored doping programme) to take gold.
Watching Valieva’s programme, it was impossible not to be awestruck. Russia has increasingly gravitated towards female skaters who do lots of power jumps, but Valieva brings a lyricism to her performance.
However, later that day, the World Anti-Doping Agency was notified that a banned substance – later revealed to be trimetazidine, a heart medication known to increase endurance – and by rule she should have been banned. What was puzzling was that the sample had been submitted to a lab in Sweden – because Russia is not longer allowed to conduct its own tests – on December 25, and the results only came back six weeks later, when Valieva had already begun her Olympic campaign.
The Russian Anti-Doping Agency (Rusada) initially suspended Valieva. Because of this the medal ceremony for the team event was postponed. But Rusada lifted the suspension.
The International Olympic Committee (IOC), World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and International Skating Union (ISU) challenged this, and the case went to the Court of Arbitration for Sport which ruled that Valieva should be allowed to compete. Its reasoning was that because of her age, she might only receive a reprimand not a suspension if found guilty (which then begs the question if coaches might specifically prey on minors), and because the delay was not her fault (fair point).
Many skaters were upset that she was allowed to compete in the individual competition. She was expected to take gold, which meant that the other athletes on the podium wouldn’t get a medal ceremony at the games.
In the short programme, Valieva was impressive, and yet she was not herself. She fell during her triple axel and scored the lowest she has all season, though she was still way ahead of the pack. I had seen a flawless performance of this programme during the team event, and yet, she brought a pathos to this performance that moved me.
She came into the free skate competition as the favourite to win gold, with a storm brewing around her. And remember, this is a 15-year-old.
None of this is fair. You can be heartbroken for this 15 year old girl and at the same time be heartbroken that every other skater in this event will have to compete knowing that the competition is not clean.
The women’s competition was expected to be a clean sweep for the Russians, with Valieva, Alexandra Trusova and Anna Shcherbakova taking gold, silver and bronze. All three are young, and train at the same skating school run by Eteri Tutberidze, who has been criticised for pushing young skaters – younger female athletes are able to perform high-scoring feats quad jumps – who then bow out of the sport early (e.g. Evgenia Medvedeva and Alina Zagitova, who won silver and gold at the 2018 Winter Games. More on them later).
There were so many goosebump moments among the top 10 in the women’s free skate. Georgia’s Anastasiia Gubanova was balletic. Belgium’s Loena Hendrickx made some errors but her performance was the most memorable for me, with music and movements that were unusual. My favourite female performer of these games was Japan’s Higuchi Wakaba whose performance in the short programme in both the team and individual event was ethereal. Her free skate programme was set to the Lion King, and while I didn’t love it, I admired how she did something completely different from her short programme.
And then we came to the top four. Trusova had planned five quads, performing to Cruella (some have said the choice was music was in reference to her coach, who she split from and then returned to). I found her programme unpleasant to watch, the skating equivalent of ‘wham, bam, no thank you ma’am’. The choreography was entirely sacrificed to the high-scoring jumps, all of which she did not land but which earned her a huge score nevertheless.
She was followed by Japan’s Kaori Sakomoto skating to a feminist “No More Fight Left in Me”, offering a masterclass in how skating at the highest level can be more than the amazing feat of rotating more times in the air.
Then came the reigning world champion Anna Shcherbakova. Described as a fighter, Shcherbakova nailed two quads and six triples in her programme, and managed to retain some artistry in between. There was one unforgettable facial expression change when the music changes from pathos to joy, for example. Shcherbakova is super thin and it amazes me that she can perform some of the jumps that she does, until I realised that being thin is an advantage here.
And finally, there was Valieva, who was really putting on a brave face. Her entire programme was painful to watch and by the end I had tears in my eyes. It was heartbreaking to watch this girl fall on jumps she had landed with elan over and over again in the past. It was terrible to watch her fighting to finish as the soundtrack (appropriately?) of Bolero marched on. It was painful to watch her break down at the end. And to see her coach semi-berate her when she came off the rink (“why did you let it go, explain to me, why, why did you stop fighting?” she apparently asked. Honestly), because it was clear she would not even make bronze.
Trusova was distraught that she had not won gold – again – and Shcherbakova, who frankly deserved to win, cut a lonesome figure.
Very weird pictures from behind the scenes at the #FigureSkating. New Olympic champion Anna Shcherbakova standing awkwardly on her own, Alexandra Trusova crying what don't look like tears of silver medal joy.
The whole thing reminded me of the last Olympics (except in reverse) in which Medvedeva was expected to win but Zagitova pipped her to it by doing her jumps in the back end of her programme. Medvedeva, the more lyrical skater, sobbed on camera.
The debate between power versus artistry reminds me of a similar debate in gymnastics. Here, it is the Russians who criticise the Americans – amid Simone Biles’ dominance – of sacrificing grace to power, a critique some say is racist. So I guess I should just shut up about artistry in performance, since I clearly don’t have a problem with Biles’ style of gymnastics.
Both Medvedeva and Zagitova were in Beijing rooting for Valieva from the stands, and looked devastated by how her skate played out. Medvedeva had words of encouragement for all three Russian girls, which Valieva in particular should take to heart. This should not be the end for her.
***
The drama surrounding the women’s event should not take away from the spectacular showing that was the pairs event. In the short skate, every single of the last five teams was so on point that the judges would have to be quibbling in choosing between them.
The American pair of Ashley Cain-Gribble and Timothy LeDuc, the only out non-binary athlete in the Winter Olympics, skating to The White Crow, was basically art.
In the top three, world champions Anastasia Mishina and Aleksandr Galliamov delivered a flawless programme. Evgenia Tarasova and Vladimir Morozov basically embodied the myth of Galatea and Pygmalion. Sui Wenjing and Han Cong moved at such an exhilarating tempo that I basically held my breath throughout.
So the final podium was anyone’s guess. A single error could cost a team a medal because the standard was just that high. The free skate, a longer more tiring programme, did see some errors. I could see that the Russians really wanted it, but in the end, Sui and Han landed a well deserved win.
So, yeah, the Winter Olympics are not the summer Olympics, but when else do you get to watch figure skating?
I missed the opening ceremony, which was apparently very beautiful. I was kind of surprised that China had the kind of large-scale theatrics it did, seeing as it is battling Covid-19 outbreaks around the country.
But on to the sport.
I somehow managed to watch the entire team competition, as well as the men’s short and free skate programme.
Goosebump moments:
The whole world is obsessed with Yuzuru Hanyu, but I was completely wowed by another Japanese skater, 18-year-old Kagiyama Yuma. He was beaming at the end of his performance to When You’re Smiling and so were we. He exuberance through the whole contest has been endearing. I also loved Shoma Uno’s programme.
The two Japanese ended up with silver and bronze, while Nathan Chen took a well-deserved goal (a great redemption story after his 2018 debacle). Chen skated to Rocket Man and was technically brilliant but I wasn’t as moved by his performance as I was by Kagiyama and Shoma.
💕A big thanks goes out to all the figure skaters for their incredible performances over the past few days at the Beijing 2022. You all deserve a big round of applause!👏✨
And then there was Yuzuru Hanyu, who was clearly not in form, but one cannot help but love a legend who is so humble. Here’s a quote from his press conference after he placed fourth and failed to land the first-ever quadruple axle.
I wanted to land the 4A because the nine-year-old me would have wanted me to. When I was training for it, the final technique of my axel was one I used when I was nine. The nine-year-old me congratulated me after the one I did in the free skate. I was jumping with my nine-year-old self.
The other stand-out performance for me was the US’ Jason Brown to Sinnerman. The commentator said that Brown’s performance blurred the distinction between sports and art, and if I disagree it’s only because I think Brown’s performance is art.
In a field in which doing quads has come to seem essential, Brown shows that one can do without, and how. My reaction to Brown reminds me of my reaction Adam Rippon in the last Winter Olympics. He wasn’t on the podium but his performance was the one I remembered the most.
Similarly for me, the standout ice dance performance was the US’ Madison Chock and Evan Bates in which Chock played an extraterrestrial and Bates played an astronaut.
After the men’s programme, the commentator said we are witnessing a golden age, and I agree.
We also got into watching other sports, particularly short track speed skating. It’s a crazy sport on which people keep falling over. We started watching during a relay so it was really hard to figure out what was going on.
But in a week we were familiar with names like Arianna Fontana, Suzanne Schulting , Wu Dajing, and the Liu brothers. Nene in particular is obsessed with Wu.
I have thoughts about the women’s competition and the Kamila Valieva controversy, but that’s for another post.
Many people seemed optimistic at the start of 2021. The hope, it seemed, was that the pandemic would be wiped out at the stroke of midnight, or at least couldn’t continue for another entire year. I was pretty sure that things wouldn’t be very different at least for the first six months of 2021, and I was right.
For the rest of the world, Covid-19 restrictions began to ease up, or at least the fear of it began to ease, and when I look at the lives of friends and relatives around the world, they seemed to be carrying on as normal for most part at least in the latter half of the year.
In Hong Kong, though, we remained in a bubble. The international border was effectively shut, with a 14 to 21-day quarantine in place for incoming arrivals from most countries. For India, we had the added joy of flights being banned entirely for long stretches making planning travel a crazy lottery. Non-Chinese residents lament this state of affairs on a regular basis, but I don’t hear as much grumbling from Chinese residents. Personally, apart from the fear that my parents would need me in India, not being able to travel did not mess with my mind as much as it seemed to for other people. Maybe this is because Hong Kong is my home, my children have rooted me here.
In addition to travel, a mask mandate has remained in place as well as a four-person public gathering restriction (that seems motivated mainly by the desire to prevent public protests, seeing as the marathon was held), restrictions on how many people can be seated at a table in restaurants (this remains a mystery to me as there is a complicated scheme in place depending on the vaccination rate of staff of the restaurant) and mandatory use of a contract tracing app.
The flip side of this is that for the latter half of the year, Hong Kong has effectively been in a zero Covid situation. We followed the restrictions, but there was no sense of urgency, because there was no Covid in the community. Cases were essentially being screened out at the border. Our kids were back in school full day (sadly, not the case for kids in local schools), although they have to wear a mask all day and there are several social distancing regulations. We haven’t had to worry about our kids getting Covid for months.
Despite this, the government has continued to tighten restrictions, in an attempt to open the border with mainland China. Contrary to the belief of most expats, this is more than political pandering – there is huge demand for quarantine-free travel to the mainland from the business community, local people who have family or jobs across the border, and school children stuck across the border. Nevertheless, I believe that the border is not really going to be reopened till at least the Winter Olympics are over in February, so right now officials are just going through the motions of “doing something”. Unfortunately, this doing something involves tightening restrictions in Hong Kong to sync with mainland China’s even more rigorous controls, even though Hong Kong by the end of the year had been more successful in keeping out Covid than mainland China.
It has been slightly surreal to see friends and family in India and other countries where Covid outbreaks keep happening party and travel while we in Hong Kong where there has effectively been no cases for months seem much more attuned to the threat of the virus. I learnt my lesson in March though when, watching people go about their lives as if Covid was a bygone threat in India, I was wondering whether we should have moved to India after all and let our kids have a freer life. Then Delta struck India and I realised that living as if Covid was no longer a worry was different from Covid no longer being a worry.
Through this, I am grateful that my parents managed to come through unscathed, though my mum continued to battle with a chronic urinary tract infection. My in-laws were not so fortunate (but neither were they as careful as my parents about avoiding social situations), but again they came out okay. Fingers crossed this remains the same as Omicron becomes a threat.
***
Politically it has been a dreadful year for Hong Kong. The protests in the city in 2019 were a rude shock to the Chinese government, which is terrified of losing control over the nation’s periphery. Since 2020 when the national security law was passed we have woken up to bad news every other day, of arrests someone or other. We saw the closing down of an iconic Hong Kong newspaper, Apple Daily, and then in the final days of December, another news platform shut down after its senior staff were charged under the law.
Because the national security law is so vague, any criticism of the government could open up people to charges, so it’s become extremely risky for people to speak out.
The electoral system was overhauled, and instead of the greater democracy that the protests were asking for, we got a system more rigged than ever to favour “patriots”. I have voted every year in Hong Kong since I was eligible, but this new system was too much for even me to swallow.
Politicians are lining up to wear their patriotism on their sleeve, mouthing the most ridiculous defences of China’s position (and I’m far from being anti-China on every point, but do we have to bend over backward to defend everything?). Government officials have become bots mouthing the central government’s line. The government was shaken up so that the city’s number 2 position is now held by a former police officer, with the police chief also joining the government. The latter recently said that people giggling over a policeman gored by a wild boar might be in violation of the national security law.
I woke up yesterday to the news that a mob had stormed the US Capitol. My first thought was how the reactions (among my liberal circle at least) were likely to differ from the response to Hong Kong protesters’ storming of the Legislative Council on July 1, 2019, especially once I heard the Capitol police had fired shots.
Let me say here that I am supportive of the Hong Kong protesters’ aims and of the movement up to a point. I can stomach vandalising buildings, but my bottom line is beating up an innocent person or setting a man on fire.
The Hong Kong government has long maintained that no country would stand by and allow protesters to take over and vandalise the parliament building. The US has just proved its point, and China was quick to point this out.
Now, many of those in the US who supported the Hong Kong protesters seem incensed that the National Guard did not offer a more forceful response to the mob at the outset.
There was silence from the Hong Kong protest movement for a day, and then the think pieces started. An article in Quartz headlined “Why you can’t compare the storming of the US Capitol and Hong Kong’s legislature”, arguing that while the former was conducting by a mob trying to subvert democracy, the latter was by protesters calling for it and resisting the Communist Party.
This is true, but essentially this argument can be summarised as “the ends justify the means”. And that is basically the crux of the moral ambiguity (for me, at least) at the heart of the Hong Kong movement – do the ends justify any means? Is “the ends justify the means” even a morally valid argument? I tend to think it is, but there is (for me) then a lot of debate possible on which ends justify which means.
If we accept that the ends justify the means without qualification, can the same be said for the much-maligned Hong Kong police, if their ends are the maintenance of law and order, as per their job description? Should they stand by and allow the legislature to be vandalised (which they actually did, and were roundly criticised by all sides, including by the protest movement. They never made that mistake, if it was one, again).
Another article “Why comparisons between the US Capital turmoil and Hong Kong’s protests amount to perverse propaganda” argues that the difference lies in the quality of mob – one entitled, smirking and without legitimate grievances, the other deadly serious and the result of a long struggle. Much as I dislike Trump supporters, and acknowledge that white entitlement is part of their problem, they too have (some) legitimate grievances (not that the election was ‘stolen’, but if one looks further back into the history of the MAGA movement). In terms of the dissatisfaction that brought the two movements to a head, there are similarities, even if I sympathise greatly with the Hong Kong movement and almost not at all with the MAGAs.
The article makes a legitimate point in arguing that the Hong Kong chamber was empty when protesters stormed it (having surrounded it and prevented lawmakers from entering, it must be mentioned). One wonders what the reaction to this would have been in other democracies, but apparently we must not ask these questions because – see above – their ultimate purpose was noble). If the US mob stormed an empty chamber would the reaction have been less furious? If the Hong Kong protesters had stormed a chamber full of lawmakers would it then be okay to point out they had gone too far?
To dismiss all comparisons between the two as propoganda smacks of, well, propoganda.
And that is why I have become disillusioned with the usual left-learning academic circles I move in. The positions are so fixed that the responses are predictable. If you believe in social justice, then your responses to any event are a priori determined. And God forbid, you venture to think, wait a minute, sometimes our side might be wrong, or even, the other side might not be. Hence this blog.
Finally, this is not to say that I am not outraged by the recent actions of the Hong Kong government/Beijing in basically using the law as a tool of harassment (unfortunately something India, world’s largest democracy and all that, is quite good at, and Singapore perfected) and basically decimating the democratic opposition. Just that I don’t think support of a larger cause means one cannot criticise or rethink any of its actions.
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Edited to add:
Last night, in bed, Mimi asked me what I was thinking about and I told her about this. I asked her if it made sense to compare the two events. “Of course,” she said.
Then, she added, “They sound the same. But maybe why they did it was different.”
“Exactly,” I said.
“So, you can just say, the actions look like the same, but the reasons are different.”
“But do you think, given these reasons, it’s okay to attack a building?”
“Not very okay. I think it’s violence.”
“But what if there were no people in the building?”
She was still not very comfortable with the idea of storming the building. “Couldn’t they just make a speech and tell the people, hey, guys, we asked nicely, and you’re not listening?”
“In Hong Kong’s case, they did that and it didn’t work. So then do you think, it’s ok to break into a building?” (and the US Trump supporters might argue the same, although I agree they have less of a case).
I can’t remember what she said. Overall, she wasn’t super okay with the idea of people storming buildings (remember, these kids have actually seen the street violence in action. They watched as protesters stormed an education institution near where we live. It goes against everything they’ve been taught about good behaviour. So it takes some discussion for them to overcome their almost visceral dislike of the means, to consider the ends).
What she found harder to understand was why I was thinking about all this. She thought I wanted to write it up as a newspaper article. When she realised it was “just” for this blog, or worse my own thoughts, her reaction was: “What!?!”
for whom the bell tolls 
