Opinion | Patriotism is proving hard to define
Frank Ching says the definition of patriotism in relation to candidates in the 2017 chief executive election is open to interpretation
The controversy over whether pan-democrats are patriotic and hence qualified to become candidates in the chief executive election in 2017 turns on different definitions of patriotism.
In the 1970s, Szeto Wah, who later emerged as a key leader of the democracy movement, successfully led a campaign to have Chinese recognised as an official language, clearly a patriotic act.
Democrats led the movement to claim the Diaoyu Islands as Chinese territory, and they were early supporters of the return of Hong Kong to China.
Ironically businessmen, who feared a Communist takeover, are now called "patriots" while democrats are "unpatriotic".
Deng Xiaoping's "one country, two systems" was both creative and simple. It meant that the capitalistic lifestyle would continue in Hong Kong while the mainland would practise "socialism with Chinese characteristics".
After the Tiananmen Square crackdown, a million people took to the streets in Hong Kong in protest.
Jiang Zemin, who succeeded the purged Zhao Ziyang as party leader, then famously said, "Well water should not pollute river water", meaning that Hong Kong and the mainland should not interfere in each other's affairs.