# Hong Kong; the End **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [May 22, 2020, 2:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hong-kong-the-end/854276 "2020-05-22T02:29:07Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Melbourne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b5e925/32.png) [@Melbourne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Melbourne)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2020, 12:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hong-kong-the-end/854276/41 "2020-05-27T12:01:43Z")
> [@Riemann](#): > > It’s bad news if you are a Chinese resident of HK, but I don’t understand the “chilling warning to rest of the world” part of that article. Is somebody under the impression that the Chinese have plans to impose the same system on Hawaii? I’m in Australia. There is a legitimate fear that the Chinese have plans to impose the same system on Australia. Their ambassador gives us a slap every time we say anything out of line: their coal buying seems to depend on geopolitics as much as market abuse, and they’ve just put an 80% tariff on Australian barley for what could charitably be described as imaginary reasons. As a matter of interest, “China” as traditionally conceived is the whole world. The Middle Kingdom. Everything between Heaven and Hell. Tibet is, of course, not part of Heaven or Hell: it is part of the Middle Kingdom. Some parts of the known world (Tibet) didn’t pay any attention, and some parts (Japan) were in active division, but the Chinese government didn’t have anything like a “Foreign Office” until the treaty of 1842 – which, naturally, they still bitterly resent. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2020, 1:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hong-kong-the-end/854276/42 "2020-05-27T13:28:14Z")
> [@Loach](#): > > So a democracy is only when a popular vote selects the executive? That leaves out a whole lot of countries that think they have a form of democracy. In those countries, do their systems frequently put a minority party in power? Just asking. Because when the forms of democracy are regularly used to thwart the will of the majority, then it’s questionable whether that country has an actual democracy. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2020, 4:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hong-kong-the-end/854276/43 "2020-05-27T16:39:59Z")
> [@RTFirefly](#): > > In those countries, do their systems frequently put a minority party in power? Just asking. Because when the forms of democracy are regularly used to thwart the will of the majority, then it’s questionable whether that country has an actual democracy. The USA is a federalist system, which means that the states as individual states have an irreducible representation regardless of population. Not having Delaware and Rhode Island perpetually outvoted by Virginia was the price of having a single country. Occasionally this means that 49.5% of the population outvotes the other 50.5%. Comparing this to an unelected oligarchy that was founded as a totalitarian one-party state is disingenuous. ---
**Author:** ![Riemann](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/riemann/32/3133_2.png) [@Riemann](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Riemann)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2020, 5:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hong-kong-the-end/854276/44 "2020-05-27T17:22:01Z")
> [@Melbourne](#): > > As a matter of interest, “China” as traditionally conceived is the whole world. The Middle Kingdom. Everything between Heaven and Hell. Tibet is, of course, not part of Heaven or Hell: it is part of the Middle Kingdom. Some parts of the known world (Tibet) didn’t pay any attention, and some parts (Japan) were in active division, but the Chinese government didn’t have anything like a “Foreign Office” until the treaty of 1842 – which, naturally, they still bitterly resent. Whatever the problems with Chinese ambitions in the region and their horrible treatment of places like Tibet and Xinjiang, your first few sentences are a silly irrelevance. And also a non sequitur, since “middle” does not mean “whole”. The last part of what you wrote is also barely relevant today, but reflects a long period of Chinese _isolationism_, when you seem to be citing it as evidence of the opposite. Historically, it was always natural to think of your own civilization as the center of things, and perhaps all that is civilized when little is known about what lies beyond, and the immediate neighborhood seems relatively primitive. It’s like suggesting that modern European policy toward the U.S. is shaped by the fact that this part of the map was labeled _[Hic Sunt Dracones](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Here_be_dragons)_ on an ancient globe. ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2020, 8:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hong-kong-the-end/854276/45 "2020-05-27T20:23:57Z")
> [@Riemann](#): > > True enough, but this comment would be far more apt in one of the umpteen “what the fuck has Trump done now” threads than a thread about Xi. It says something that we have umpteen threads about Trump and the US, while threads about China, or criticism of China or Xi are pretty thin on the ground and generally not well attended wrt posters posting. We get a few $.50 Army types who are the usual suspects, and a few 'dopers who obviously don’t know much about what goes on in China, and the majority of posters in such a thread want to just talk about…yup, Trump and the US and how bad things are here. Look at THIS thread, which should be pretty much exclusively about Hong Kong and China and really has zero to do with the US or Trump. I’ve grown to expect that there can be no real serious criticism of China or XI or the CCP on this board without digressions about the US and Trump. It’s just not possible. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2020, 8:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hong-kong-the-end/854276/46 "2020-05-27T20:36:35Z")
> [@Lumpy](#): > > Not having Delaware and Rhode Island perpetually outvoted by Virginia was the price of having a single country. Delaware doesn’t have a vote. Rhode Island doesn’t have a vote. Virginia doesn’t have a vote. Delawareans, Rhode Islanders, and Virginians have votes. And they should all have the same votes. There’s no good reason why a Delawarean’s vote should be bigger than a Virginian’s vote or why an Alaskan’s vote should be bigger than a Californian’s. This is not the price of having a single country. I do not believe for one second that any state would secede if we passed an amendment saying all votes are equal. > [@Lumpy](#): > > Occasionally this means that 49.5% of the population outvotes the other 50.5%. Democracy is when the side that gets more votes wins. 49.5% can’t outvote 50.5%. When 50.5% outvotes 49.5% but 49.5% is declared the winner, then it isn’t democracy. ---
**Author:** ![Melbourne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b5e925/32.png) [@Melbourne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Melbourne)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2020, 11:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hong-kong-the-end/854276/47 "2020-05-27T23:30:09Z")
> [@Riemann](#): > > .your first few sentences are a silly irrelevance. And also a non sequitur, since “middle” does not mean “whole”. The last part of what you wrote is also barely relevant today, but reflects a long period of Chinese _isolationism_, when you seem to be citing it as evidence of the opposite. That is an interesting opinion which I wholly reject. ---
**Author:** ![Riemann](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/riemann/32/3133_2.png) [@Riemann](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Riemann)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2020, 11:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hong-kong-the-end/854276/48 "2020-05-27T23:39:20Z")
> [@XT](#): > > Look at THIS thread, which should be pretty much exclusively about Hong Kong and China and really has zero to do with the US or Trump. I’ve grown to expect that there can be no real serious criticism of China or XI or the CCP on this board without digressions about the US and Trump. It’s just not possible. Maybe that’s because there’s a _reason_ for it - Trump is ethically far worse, far more incompetent and far more dangerous than the Chinese leadership. Of course nobody’s saying the Chinese government is great and we should give up on freedom and democracy, but it’s pretty hard to be an enthusiastic cheerleader for the West right now, and it’s difficult not to respond to claims that the Chinese are so terrible without asking - relative to what? Especially when Trump seems determined to make beating on China a distraction from his own evil incompetence in an election year. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2020, 12:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hong-kong-the-end/854276/49 "2020-05-28T00:53:06Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > Delaware doesn’t have a vote. Rhode Island doesn’t have a vote. Virginia doesn’t have a vote. Yes, they _ **DO** _. That’s the whole point of federalism: to some extent- not as much as in the past but still some- the states are semi-sovereign signatories to the national government. > [@](#): > > There’s no good reason why a Delawarean’s vote should be bigger than a Virginian’s vote or why an Alaskan’s vote should be bigger than a Californian’s. Because people living in sparsely populated rural areas might have different concerns, needs and desires than people living in the megalopolis’s of the east and west coasts, and might not want to have to live under rules crafted for urban conglomerates of tens of millions of people. > [@](#): > > This is not the price of having a single country. It literally was back in 1787. The people of the smaller states would have had exactly zero reason to join the United States if their votes would have amounted to nothing more than drops in the bucket, ignorable at the national level. > [@](#): > > I do not believe for one second that any state would secede if we passed an amendment saying all votes are equal. They are all equal, but they’re bundled in groups by state, because (I’ll say it again) we have a federalist system. To put it another way: should the World Series pennant go to whichever team scores the most runs overall in seven games, or to the team that wins the most games? “Federalism” is when you think that runs should be bundled by game. > [@](#): > > Democracy is when the side that gets more votes wins. 49.5% can’t outvote 50.5%. When 50.5% outvotes 49.5% but 49.5% is declared the winner, then it isn’t democracy. That’s the fourth-graders’ version of democracy, which is not how it’s ever actually worked in the entire history of our country. Certainly it can be asked if a new system should be put in place that reflects how modern technology has shrunk and merged our nation to a degree unthinkable before the industrial revolution, although that would probably require a Constitutional Convention that dissolved the states, which realistically isn’t going to happen. ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2020, 1:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hong-kong-the-end/854276/50 "2020-05-28T01:00:03Z")
> [@Riemann](#): > > Maybe that’s because there’s a _reason_ for it - Trump is ethically far worse, far more incompetent and far more dangerous than the Chinese leadership. Of course nobody’s saying the Chinese government is great and we should give up on freedom and democracy, but it’s pretty hard to be an enthusiastic cheerleader for the West right now, and it’s difficult not to respond to claims that the Chinese are so terrible without asking - relative to what? Especially when Trump seems determined to make beating on China a distraction from his own evil incompetence in an election year. Unless you are making the case that the only reason, or a primary reason…or even any reason…the CCP is doing this is because of Trump and the US, I’m not seeing how ranting about Trump or the US is relevant here. There are tons of other threads, or you could start a new one that will certainly get more response than this has (even WITH all the Trump/US digression) if you want to discuss either Trump or the US. Hell, just you and I digressing about this detracts from the actual subject of the thread. Again. 😛 I’ll just leave it there. The US and Trump are, at best, peripheral to what’s going on in Hong Kong. And that’s being generous. This is about the CCP and their ongoing attempt (since before Trump was president) to lock down Hong Kong and get rid of the One Country, Two Systems, um, system, which has always grated on the CCP and, frankly, destabilizes things on the mainland, since the Chinese people are certainly aware of how much different it is on the mainland compared to in Hong Kong. The only part the US plays in this is more as a spoiler, aggravating the CCP and putting their backs up. But the same could be said about every country that the CCP thinks is interfering in their ‘internal affairs’, which goes for every country that has an issue with their slow motion attempt at Taiwan as well. And their already finished take over and integration of Macau. Oh, and Tibet. And their South China Sea and 9 dash line assertions. Oh, and… ---
**Author:** ![Velocity](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/velocity/32/18006_2.png) [@Velocity](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Velocity)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2020, 1:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hong-kong-the-end/854276/51 "2020-05-28T01:21:38Z")
> [@Riemann](#): > > Maybe that’s because there’s a _reason_ for it - Trump is ethically far worse, far more incompetent and far more dangerous than the Chinese leadership. Is Trump locking up a million Muslims, subjecting them to rape and torture, harvesting organs from prisoners, sending out riot police to assault protesters, installing a social credit system akin to Black Mirror’s Nosedive, executing a thousand people per year? You might say Trump is detaining migrants, etc. - but the term here was “far worse.” ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2020, 1:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hong-kong-the-end/854276/52 "2020-05-28T01:23:12Z")
> [@Lumpy](#): > > Yes, they _ **DO** _. Hmmm, bolding, capital letters, and italics. Those are persuasive arguments and I’m almost convinced. Maybe if you underlined it and increased the font size. Or used some red. But for now, I’ll stick with the real world. States don’t vote. People vote. ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2020, 1:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hong-kong-the-end/854276/53 "2020-05-28T01:24:08Z")
> [@Velocity](#): > > Is Trump locking up a million Muslims, subjecting them to rape and torture, harvesting organs from prisoners, sending out riot police to assault protesters, installing a social credit system akin to Black Mirror’s Nosedive, executing a thousand people per year? > > You might say Trump is detaining migrants, etc. - but the term here was “far worse.” That thousand is only the official number of course. The Chinese do…officially…over 10k organ transplants a year, and there is speculation it could be 5 or more times that. The Chinese people aren’t really keen on organ donation either. Plus, amazingly, when people (with money) need a transplant, one can be found in days, if not hours. Chinese medicine is truly something to behold… ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2020, 1:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hong-kong-the-end/854276/54 "2020-05-28T01:28:24Z")
> [@Lumpy](#): > > It literally was back in 1787. And we are literally living in the year 2020. So an argument based on it being 1787 isn’t going to go very far. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2020, 1:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hong-kong-the-end/854276/55 "2020-05-28T01:34:13Z")
> [@Lumpy](#): > > Because people living in sparsely populated rural areas might have different concerns, needs and desires than people living in the megalopolis’s of the east and west coasts, and might not want to have to live under rules crafted for urban conglomerates of tens of millions of people. There are lots of small groups that have different concerns, needs, and desires than the majority. Should we be giving them extra votes? ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2020, 1:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hong-kong-the-end/854276/56 "2020-05-28T01:37:36Z")
nm ---
**Author:** ![China\_Guy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/779978/32.png) [@China\_Guy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/China_Guy)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2020, 3:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hong-kong-the-end/854276/57 "2020-05-28T03:32:15Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > There are lots of small groups that have different concerns, needs, and desires than the majority. Should we be giving them extra votes? The US system effectively does give the rural minority “extra” votes on a per capita basis. ---
**Author:** ![Mangosteen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Mangosteen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangosteen)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2020, 4:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hong-kong-the-end/854276/58 "2020-05-28T04:06:26Z")
> [@China\_Guy](#): > > Fighting ignorance correction. > > Hong Kong was not “annexed” by China. Hong Kong was “ceded” by China during the Opium Wars to the British. Under gunboat diplomacy, Hong Kong island was given to the British under a 99 year lease (with Kowloon and the New Territories ambiguously outside those 99 year terms). At the end of 99 year, specifically 1997, control of HK passed from being an unequal part of the UK back to China. The British colonial period began with the occupation of Hong Kong Island in 1841 during the First Opium War. The island was ceded by Qing dynasty in the aftermath of the war in 1842 and established as a Crown colony in 1843. The colony expanded to the Kowloon Peninsula in 1860 after the Second Opium War and was further extended when Britain obtained a 99-year lease of the New Territories in 1898. In other words, Britain owned Hong Kong Island and the Kowloon peninsula outright as spoils of war. It was only the New Territories that were leased for 99 years. Technically, Britain was only obligated to return the New Territories, but as a practical matter decided to throw in both HK Island and Kowloon in 1997. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2020, 4:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hong-kong-the-end/854276/59 "2020-05-28T04:09:08Z")
> [@China\_Guy](#): > > The US system effectively does give the rural minority “extra” votes on a per capita basis. I agree. I think it’s a bad idea and I think we should stop doing it. Everyone’s vote should have equal weight. ---
**Author:** ![octopus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/octopus/32/3716_2.png) [@octopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/octopus)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2020, 6:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hong-kong-the-end/854276/60 "2020-05-28T06:22:40Z")
> [@Riemann](#): > > Maybe that’s because there’s a _reason_ for it - Trump is ethically far worse, far more incompetent and far more dangerous than the Chinese leadership. Of course nobody’s saying the Chinese government is great and we should give up on freedom and democracy, but it’s pretty hard to be an enthusiastic cheerleader for the West right now, and it’s difficult not to respond to claims that the Chinese are so terrible without asking - relative to what? Especially when Trump seems determined to make beating on China a distraction from his own evil incompetence in an election year. That’s just not true. The fact that you can post that. Or the fact that another poster on this site can call Trump a pigfucker, with absolutely zero sanction or fear from either the moderators of this site or the government is proof that Trump’s power is nothing to fear compared to what the Chinese leadership could do. Furthermore, China’s leadership and citizenry are acutely aware that we are a world of competing nation states and they aren’t acting counterproductively out of a combination of petulance, arrogance and complacency. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hong-kong-the-end/854276.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hong-kong-the-end/854276.md?page=4)