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Anthem bill sparks new clashes in Hong Kong legislature

17 Comments
By Anthony WALLACE

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17 Comments
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China. Does anything good come out of this country?

They keep no promises. They're often the epicenters of nasty diseases. They jail, kidnap, and make disappear those who have anything slightly neg to say about the govt. They politicize everything. Hack and steal info from all over the world. Unilaterally take over land and seaways. So on and so on and so on.... this list is endless.

13 ( +14 / -1 )

Disgusting. Communist China have no right to expect Hong Kong Citizens - most of whom are freedom and democracy loving - to respect the so called "anthem" of a Communist totalitarian state. No wonder the democratic lawmakers were enraged enough to fight.

Wherever, whenever this "anthem" is played - be it parliament, schools, ceremonies etc - those who support freedom should instantly stand up, turn around and walk out. Show no respect. The free world has your back.

14 ( +14 / -0 )

Democracy, freedom from oppression is always a hard and long battle. Even moreso when it is to be accomplished without a war. And the opposition happens to be the most militarily and economically powerful dictatorship in the history of mankind. Good luck to all those people in Hong Kong!

9 ( +10 / -1 )

Can't force people to love something thru laws - it has to come from the heart

7 ( +7 / -0 )

So, no freedom of speech. Got it.

9 ( +9 / -0 )

Next, Mandarin will be made the sole official language and the primary language of instruction in all Chinese-medium schools (that's if they allow English-medium schools to stay) and all Chinese will be written in b*stardized simplified characters. Mark my words. Could be in 5 years time, 10 years time. But it's coming.

1 ( +1 / -0 )

None should be obliged learn or to pay any kind of respect to any anthem.

This is military-religious stuff.

2 ( +3 / -1 )

Beijing has made clear it wants new security legislation passed after last year's unrest, including an anti-sedition law, the national anthem bill -- and more patriotic education in schools.

Read "patriotic education" as "CCP indoctrination". It is sad to see HK go down the drain, on the positive side, watching this makes many people wake up to the evil of the CCP.

4 ( +4 / -0 )

Pukey2Today 08:01 pm JST

Next, Mandarin will be made the sole official language and the primary language of instruction in all Chinese-medium schools (that's if they allow English-medium schools to stay) and all Chinese will be written in b*stardized simplified characters. Mark my words. Could be in 5 years time, 10 years time. But it's coming

It actually started a while ago with money intensive, now 70% of primary schools are in Mandarin and Hong Kongers who wants their kids to learn in Cantonese are having a very hard time to find spots for their children.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

Question from an American English user...scupper=scuttle? Thanks in advance.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

After infecting the world with their Wuhan virus and killing over 300,000 in the process, the Chinese have continued to violate the agreement that the Chinese signed allowing Hong Kong to have its own system.

4 ( +4 / -0 )

For better or worse these sorts of laws are actually quite common around the world. Most European countries have similar laws protecting their national symbols. Just this week there was a controversial law passed in Germany criminalising the burning of the EU flag or desecrating the EU anthem (Beethoven's Ode to Joy). In Japan, the desecration of any foreign flag or symbol is a crime, but you are free to burn the Japanese flag.

-2 ( +0 / -2 )

and more patriotic education in schools.

AKA brain washing.

1 ( +1 / -0 )

A flag is just a piece of cloth and an anthem a song (bad in general).

I have the chance to come from a country where the anthem is not tough at school and less than 10% of the population can even sing the first verset without a script.

You can burn the flag and do jerking during an anthem play. Cool.

And "surprisingly" this country does pretty well internally and on the international scene.

0 ( +1 / -1 )

Most European countries have similar laws protecting their national symbols. 

Do they? Honest question as it seems hard to find information. I'm aware that Germany and Finland have such laws. Not sure about other countries. (I've read the current US president has voiced support for such a law.)

I know some have laws against desecrating other countries' flags. In some ways that is understandable - the recently passed German law was a result of people burning Israeli flags.

1 ( +1 / -0 )

@albaleo

Do they? Honest question as it seems hard to find information.

There's a fairly good (but incomplete) list in the 'Flag desecration' article on Wikipedia and a few other sources. Google translate also produces good results when you search 'Flag burning law [country]). The European countries that do have some form of law punishing the desecration or disrespect of either their flag or anthem or other symbols seem to be Germany, Austria, France, Spain, Portugal, Italy, Switzerland, Czech Rep, Poland, Hungary, Greece, Croatia, Finland, Ukraine & Russia. The countries that do not seem to be the UK, Ireland, Netherlands, Belgium, Sweden, Norway & Romania. I haven't confirmed any others but that's already a majority of the EU at least.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flag_desecration

https://www.euronews.com/2017/11/09/which-country-has-the-harshest-punishments-for-disrespecting-flags-and-national

0 ( +0 / -0 )

@M3M3M3

Thanks for the information.

but that's already a majority of the EU at least.

Not quite. If we were to assume countries not mentioned in the Wikipedia article have no such laws (big assumption perhaps), I think it would be a minority. But there are more countries that do have such laws than I realised.

1 ( +1 / -0 )

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