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Pro-democracy HK tycoon Jimmy Lai convicted in national security trial

437 points by onemoresoop

by JumpCrisscross

20 subcomments

One of the dark consequences of America losing its city-upon-a-hill aspirations is we're less able to effectively call out evil abroad. Jimmy Lai should not have been allowed to this quietly.

by lvl155

9 subcomments

Democracy that we knew from 60s to 00s is effectively dead everywhere. I would like to think that social media and surveillance technology both played roles in accomplishing that so quickly and without public outcry/protests. All that blood spilled in 1900s to spread democracy wiped out in a matter of couple of years.

by demarq

8 subcomments

> The law was enacted without consulting the Hong Kong legislature and gave authorities broad powers to charge and jail people they deemed a threat to the city's law and order, or the government's stability.
The UK throwing a very big rock at a thin glass house.
I don’t agree with any such laws in any country, but I think it’s important to point out the hypocrisy here

by mothballed

3 subcomments

Mr. Lai is the real deal. He started out as a child laborer and worked his way up from nothing to owning a clothing brand and then Apple Daily pro-democracy publisher. He had the option to leave Hong Kong, but stayed and kept up the fight.
He's facing life in prison right now, so this conviction puts everything on the line.
Glad to see this hitting the front page. I posted an article earlier with not much movement which was really worrying for the HK free thought movement; happy that this turned out to not be the case.

by dh2022

1 subcomments

If anything, these actions will make Taiwan even more opposed to unification with China and will strengthen their resolve to oppose China.
For China it would have made more sense long term to first "incorporate" Taiwan into their country and only after that start turning the screws on both Taiwan and Hong Kong.

by dfee

1 subcomments

Would love to see X's "account based in" for this thread to assess bias.

by azinman2

9 subcomments

What happened to one country, two systems?

by Simulacra

4 subcomments

Is it possible to get a fair and just trial in China? I have trouble accepting this or any verdict from a Chinese court and would appreciate examples that counter this.

by GenerocUsername

0 subcomment

Imagine a major city in America that were politically dominated y China for 50+ years and it is hard to imagine this type of blowback not occuring eventually.

by AnimalMuppet

5 subcomments

Hong Kong is dead.
Yeah, sure, there's still a city there with that name. But the Hong Kong we knew is dead. What made Hong Kong what it was is dead.

by NoGravitas

0 subcomment

Dictatorship of the proletariat jails a member of the bourgeoisie notable for calling for the restoration of the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie and conspiring with agents of bourgeois states to that end. This doesn't seem surprising? A revolutionary state working to prevent counterrevolution?

by yieldcrv

2 subcomments

> The law was enacted without consulting the Hong Kong legislature
And a plain reading of the Basic Law (Hong Kong's constitution) permits everything that's happened, and expecting the contrary seems like a coping mechanism. There are massive exemptions for Hong Kong's autonomy and deferrence to Beijing at Beijing's discretion, or by the Head of Hong Kong who is appointed by Beijing
I wasn't around for the handover so I'm largely exempt from the emotional marriage to an ideal Hong Kong residents and people affirming Hong Kong resident's feelings seem to have
The legislature wouldn't have to be consulted for the National Security Law to have been enacted, the article and seemingly all of the west seems to think that is a controversy when it isn't necessary
And then there is another layer where the structure of the legislature doesn't even match western ideals and wouldn't have made a difference. The legislature is 50% popular vote and 50% corporations. So even if 100% of the population voted for the same thing, they would only have 50% of the vote, and the corporations are all pro-Beijing by nature of being able to economically exist in that environment.
(Notably, the ancient City of London within London functions nearly the same way. Actually in an even more egregious way with the non-natural persons having a more extreme weighting of votes)
People act like a different founding document governs Hong Kong (Sino British joint declaration? Some comments by representatives), when it doesn't. People act like the governing document of Hong Kong was supposed to be ignored for 50 years, when something way different and way more integrated is supposed to happen at the end of the handover period.
I think there is zero path to the goals Hong Kong residents espouse and are used to. They’re imagining a different governing system than the one they live in, thats incompatible.

by Aqua0

0 subcomment

What are U.S. citizens thinking when they are confronted with violent movements on Capitol Hill?
The same applies to Hong Kong.

by tehjoker

3 subcomments

Just remember when the press reports on foreign affairs, “pro democracy” means “pro capitalism, pro west” we don’t gaf about democracy or self determination. That’s why we ally with saudi arabia, israel, and invaded iraq.

by bArray

4 subcomments

Remember, Hong Kong was supposed to be in a 50 year transition period from 1997 where there were supposed to be one country, two systems [1]. The national security legislation is just one in a long line of failures [2]. If nothing else was learned, it was this: China, specifically the CCP, cannot be trusted.
It makes me sick that the UK sends billions to Ukraine to interfere in a war we have no fundamental right to involve ourselves in, meanwhile, Hong Kong was allowed to fall with only light media coverage. It is outrageous. The politicians that oversaw it should be ashamed.
Not to mention that Carrie Lam, former leader of Hong Kong, sold her people up the river by allowing the national security law in [3]. She was even hiding out in the UK with her husband from her own countrymen.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One_country,_two_systems#Imple...
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One_country,_two_systems#2020_...
[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carrie_Lam

by woopwoop

2 subcomments

In 2019, NPR's planet money did a segment on the Hong Kong protests that heavily featured Jimmy Lai. This segment from the end has always stuck with me.
GOLDSTEIN: China has not allowed more freedom of speech. Publications can still be shut down for criticizing the government. And yet, China has gotten richer. It started to develop its own financial center in Shanghai. Foreign money can now flow into China without going through Hong Kong, so the Chinese Communist Party doesn't need Hong Kong as much as it used to.
This has led to more and more tension between people in Hong Kong and the Chinese Communist Party, the Chinese government. In 2014, there was a fight over how to choose the government official who runs Hong Kong, and a million people in Hong Kong took to the streets to protest. Just last month, the government official who runs Hong Kong wanted to pass a new law that would allow people in Hong Kong to be extradited to China to stand trial. The people in Hong Kong said, we don't trust your mainland courts. Two million people protested in the streets, including, by the way, Jimmy Lai, who is now in his 70s.
What was it like? What was it like walking that day?
LAI: I was very excited - when you see so many people, you know, is fighting for a moral issue. We don't have guns. We don't have tanks. We don't have anything. The only thing we have the Chinese government don't is the moral authority we have, the moral courage we have.
GOLDSTEIN: The moral authority and courage, yeah.
LAI: Yes.
GOLDSTEIN: A few weeks later, on July 1, on the anniversary of Hong Kong's return to Chinese rule, protesters broke into the Hong Kong legislature buildings, smashed glass walls and spray-painted graffiti. Chinese leaders see these protesters and Jimmy Lai, for that matter, as agents for foreign influence - as, you know, basically latter-day colonialists. His house has been firebombed, and there was an assassination plot against him.
LAI: I stopped thinking about this because if I let the fear frighten me, I cannot go on, you know, because with what I have taken up, I have to sustain it. I will be the last to leave. That is like a captain who cannot jump the ship.
GOLDSTEIN: I mean, you're rich. You could leave if you wanted.
LAI: Yeah. If I'm rich but an a*hole...
GOLDSTEIN: (Laughter).
LAI: ...What my kids will think about me?
GOLDSTEIN: Yeah.
LAI: You know, being rich, you can be very poor...
GOLDSTEIN: Go on. Say more.
LAI: ...Because if you only have money, you lost the meaning, you lost the dignity, you lost everything as a human being. What else do you have?

by beefbombaystyle

2 subcomments

[flagged]

by dzonga

0 subcomment

this guy was sold a false idea of "democracy" - however his sponsors no longer have powers to they used to think they have. hence his sponsors have thrown "democracy" in the trash.
previously, these well funded democracy - regime agents would win in many places, but now the tables have turned - america now has a demagogue as president.