Opinion | Refuse Hong Kong’s protesters everything, and they will fight to the bitter end

This is not a storm that Carrie Lam’s administration can sit out. Deny the protesters everything and we force them to fight the current political order to the death, in nihilistic destruction, convinced they have nothing to lose

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Anti-extradition bill protesters set fire to objects to obstruct Nathan Road in Mong Kok on August 3. Dousing all hope for protesters will only fire up their desperation in a nihilistic battle to the end. Photo: Felix Wong

Published: 11:00am, 13 Aug 2019Updated: 11:09am, 13 Aug 2019

“One interpretation of the world collapses,” a young Nietzsche had observed, watching the great sea of faith recede into the distance. “But because it was considered the interpretation, it now seems as if there were no meaning at all in existence, as if everything were now in vain. The untenability of one interpretation of the world awakens the suspicion that all interpretations of the world are false.”

In Nietzsche’s time, the denial of meaning drew breath from the denial of faith. Today, it comes from being denied tomorrow.

Today’s protesters have umbrellas, helmets and masks. They have LIHKG and Telegram and traffic cones, and they have medical workers and journalists and lawyers. But should the flame of their ideas go out – they will end up with exactly nothing.

Today, this chant is heard everywhere on the streets: “Liberate Hong Kong, the revolution of our times.” When Edward Leung invented this rallying cry three years ago, the cause of “revolution” – whatever he meant it to mean – did not resonate. It gains traction now, not because the likelihood of its success is any greater or any less unrealistic, but because recent responses by our government have made it clear that what protesters (and I believe the rest of Hong Kong) have demanded, namely democracy, autonomy, and above all, good government, will never come to be unless and until the current political order is turned on its head.

Nothing at all promises us a future beyond 2047. Our licence to live as Hongkongers will expire in a mere 28 years. In any normal, healthy or functioning society, you would expect much lively discussion – most of it ultimately fruitless, true, but people would at least talk about it.

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