Idealistic dreams could become real nightmares for young Hongkongers
We should never underestimate the intoxication of crowds united for a cause. For many young people, the mass protests of recent days must feel like the intensity of first love.
We should never underestimate the intoxication of crowds united for a cause. For many young people, the mass protests of recent days must feel like the intensity of first love. Perhaps that is already the whole purpose of the exercise for many of them.
There is no argument against young people who fight for "freedom and democracy". It's the kind of words that set young souls on fire and the kind of struggle of good vs evil that makes great headlines for the foreign media; that is, if you ignore all the local details and nuances.
But what now - when many places across the city have been brought to a standstill? How do you turn "people power" into a viable political agenda for real change? How do you give real contents to vacuous forms like freedom and democracy in terms of effecting real changes to the political institutions of Hong Kong?
The problem is that the student leaders, Occupy Central organisers and pan-dem lawmakers let the genie out of the bottle, only to be completely caught by surprise, and have no idea how to take it forward. In 2003 and 2012, there were clear goals and clean victories - halting Article 23 security laws and national education respectively. Now it's not clear what the endgame is. Permanent protest? Many say they want two things: 1) Leung to quit and 2) the central government to reformulate the whole reform package to achieve real democracy.
First, getting Leung to quit would not achieve real democracy, except to trigger the hated 1,200-strong election committee to select another C.Y., Donald Tsang Yam-kuen or Tung Chee-hwa; and then we can eviscerate the new "Beijing stooge" all over again. The pan-dems find it lots of fun to play this blood sport again and again, but it hardly advances the city's political development.
As for getting a different reform package from Beijing, there is nothing else on offer. It is in our power, or rather that of the 27 pan-dem lawmakers, to veto the package. That automatically takes us back to the old, despised election system, last exercised in 2012. Well, we don't need all the "Occupy" fireworks to do that! The tragic irony is that as rewards for all the youthful idealism and political awakening, our children could be, politically, stuck forever in 2012. That's a dismal prospect.
