Video by Raul Gallego Abellan
Hong Kongās not-yet-named protest movement began with mass demonstrations in June against a proposed change to the cityās extradition law, which would have given China more power to crack down on dissent in the autonomous region. Residents of the city, having just commemorated the 30th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre, took to the streets in the millions to stop the extradition bill from becoming law.
Five years after the failure of the peaceful pro-democracy protests known as the Umbrella Movement, a huge swath of Hong Kongās citizens were determined to stop the central government in Beijing from further eroding the āone country, two systemsā promise it made in 1997. Thatās when the former British colony was returned to China on the understanding that it would be permitted to run its own affairs in a democratic fashion.
One of the leaders of the Tiananmen protests, Chaohua Wang, pointed out last week in the London Review of Books that attempts to quell the latest protests by force have backfired dramatically, swelling support for the movement and encouraging protesters, many of them very young, to pick up rocks in self-defense. When protestersĀ blockedĀ the cityās legislature onĀ JuneĀ 12, to prevent local lawmakers from voting to approve the extradition bill, the riot police enraged the public by firing tear gas, bean bags, and rubber bullets. On July 1 ā the date Hong Kongās sovereignty was transferred from Britain to China in 1997 ā emboldened protesters broke through the glass wall surrounding the legislature building and even scrawled the defiant message on its walls: āHong Kong is not China.ā
Three weeks later, when the police failed to intervene as suspected members of local triad gangs beat protesters, images of the attackĀ spread on social networks and fed the outrage. As the protesters have begun to fight back, they have adopted the Hong Kong actor Bruce Leeās motto: āWater can flow or it can crush. Be water my friend.ā
This week, the video journalist Raul Gallego Abellan captured remarkable scenes of what the protest movement looks like now. On Sunday, he was filming after a march in the cityās Tseung Kwan O district when a group of protesters hurled eggs and fragments of bricks torn from the pavement at the local police station.
Gallego Abellan says that the willingness of some protesters to fight back in the face of police violence is a marked contrast to the āextremely well-behaved, peacefulā Umbrella Movement of 2014, when students occupied public spaces and streets outside regional government offices for 79 days.
āThis time there are no leaders. Just anonymous people, groups of friends, civil society and an army of volunteers organizing everything: medics, food and drinks, all kind of anti-riot protective gear, volunteers to drive protesters late at night,ā Gallego Abellan writes from Hong Kong. āPeople leave money in the machines that sell subway tickets for those that canāt pay, volunteers bring clothes so people can change after the demonstration and not be identified as protestors. Thereās even a group of mothers that help those youth involved in the protest that need any kind of assistance.ā
āUsually the forefront of the movement and those in the front line are university students, even some high school students that canāt hide their youth, even under all the protective gear,ā he adds. āBut as with the Umbrella movement, the majority of Hong Kongers support the protesters and join in.ā
While he found older people among the protesters, Gallego Abellan says that he has seen evidence that many of the teenage protesters are just learning to fight. āThe majority of those confronting the police, trying to resist their charges or even attacking police stations, are young people more used to studying or playing with their phones or computers,ā he reports. āDespite all the protective gear ā the masks, the balaclavas, the dark outfits ā they canāt hide their inexperience in violence or the art of fighting with the police.ā
āLots of them, itās obvious, donāt know how to throw stones, and they even have a very nerdy look despite the protective gear. But it looks like they are learning fast.ā
More evidence of the youth of the protesters can be glimpsed in the partially covered faces and voices of three members of the movement who gave a news conference on Tuesday, as seen in video posted online by the South China Morning Post.
The protesters, who have used social networks and encrypted messaging apps like Telegram to organize their decentralized, leaderless movement, are also being creative, Gallego Abellan says, in their efforts to āresist or protect themselves from the surveillance security apparatusā of the authorities. On the streets, he notes, many of them not only use masks but also cover their eyes with goggles or sunglasses āto avoid facial recognition programs.ā
In addition to the existential concern for their unique way of life, and the threat of China revoking their āone country, two systemsā status, Gallego Abellan observes, āthe pressure of living in one of the most expensive cities in the world and the prospect of that not becoming better in the future because of Chinaās intervention in Hong Kong has also increased the frustration and anger.ā The city is now so expensive for young people, historian Hans van de Ven said on a āTalking Politicsā podcast last month, that many young people canāt even afford one of the cityās notorious ācoffin apartments,ā which are subdivided into units of 15 square feet, just big enough to fit a single bed inside.
With more protests already planned for every weekend in August and on into September, and calls to āliberate Hong Kongā being scrawled on the walls of government buildings, the pro-democracy movement looks set to continue.
āMy experience as a journalist covering civil unrest and revolutions in so many countries,ā Gallego Abellan says, āis that when people lose their fear of tear gas and confront the riot police and are out in the streets in huge numbers, the riot police canāt do much.ā
Although the protesters are āvery aware of the consequences of getting detained, like spending long years in prison,ā he adds, āHong Kongers are losing their fear.ā
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