Occupy movement has never been about opposition to Beijing

How amusing it is to hear our chief executive bemoaning the radicalisation of the protests in Mong Kok.

The government thought playing it cute and delaying talks with the students would cause the protests to die of attrition. Instead, they fomented the ire of the frustrated masses.

At the same time we hear constant complaints about inconveniences caused by the Occupy Central movement and income lost. No doubt most of these grievances are real. However, I have never heard anyone from the government admit that having to wait 15 minutes to board the MTR to go to or from work represents a huge loss of productivity to the economy. It might be harder to quantify, but this loss of productivity caused by overcrowding certainly dwarfs other losses due to the sheer number of people impacted each day.

Our chief executive has also now alleged that foreign forces are instigating the Occupy movement, without offering any evidence. This shows disdain for the Hong Kong people who are making real sacrifices to try to bring about a more inclusive and representative government. When mainland tourists were paid money to march in anti-Occupy parades and sign anti-Occupy petitions, the government raised no objections to these outside influences.

The Chinese government also regularly warns about the pernicious influence of Western culture and ideas.

This is rather strange for a party founded by a bunch of comrades studying in France the teachings of a German philosopher and then applying a Leninist organisational structure to create the Chinese Communist Party. The current leaders would no doubt counter that their communism is different because it has Chinese characteristics. In practice in Hong Kong, this seems to mean allying with running dog property tycoons to drive the masses into overpriced 165 sq ft cells.