Opinion | Time to dig Hong Kong out of the pit of political polarisation
Alice Wu says the current polarisation shows that all those involved have forgotten that politics is about the art of compromise
When Dr Robert Chung Ting-yiu, director of the University of Hong Kong's public opinion programme, released the latest results of its regular survey on public perception of our social indicators, there was little surprise at the drop in numbers across the board. After all, we haven't been having the best of months.
Chung left open the question of who is responsible. But our politicians were quick to blame political polarisation, seemingly unaware that they themselves contributed to that very polarisation.
But let's take things one step further. Instead of looking for heads to hang for our apparent collective depression: let's reflect on why we've arrived at this state of despair.
Our political debates appear to have taken a course of their own. They are framed in a binary language that makes clear "either you're with us or against us". That perhaps played a role in setting us up for a downward psychological spiral. When people are forced to take sides, it leaves a lot of room for insecurity and anxiety.
But we must also, at the very least, examine whether we're also complicit in this state of affairs.
If we look back at the way the electoral reform conversation has been shaped so far, we've been called to act - respond, pick a side, take a stand, sign a petition - more so than we've been asked to think. We've been reduced to numbers in a continuous numbers games, which must have contributed greatly in making people feel socially and politically displaced.