The Hong Kong Gestapo’s Snitch Line officially opens and is – the SCMP says – flooded with thousands of tips from patriotic citizens eager to inform on ‘yellow’ judges and people who eat at ‘yellow’ restaurants.
I myself am planning to grass on the HK Sports Institute, which lists local associations as ‘national’ on its splittist CIA-funded website. This is obviously incitement to conspire incitement to incite conspiracy, or at least to utter secessionist words. Other possibilities: organizations you don’t like displaying maps of China that miss out Taiwan and the South China Sea nine-dashed line, or supermarkets labelling goods as made in ‘Taiwan’ rather than ‘Chinese Taiwan Province of China’. And then there’s the grumpy neighbour downstairs who complains if your drying laundry dangles too far down from your washing line and can be seen from his window. The one you suspect is doing money-laundering for Joshua Wong.
To take part, you ideally need a single-use disposable email address, access to a coffee shop or other public PC during a busy time of day, and – to be safe – a face mask.
On a not unrelated note, Ming Pao (in Chinese) on up-market schools losing students due to the NatSec regime. There are also various stories on apartment prices and rents falling in Tung Chung and other districts, though owing to airline layoffs as much as emigration. Haven’t been to any going-away parties yet (back in the 1990s they were every week). RTHK3’s plan to play the national anthem every morning might help change that. And a German think tank (never heard of it) leaves Hong Kong for Taiwan.
Some reading…
An introduction to Prof Michael Davies’ book Making Hong Kong China…
Imagine you live in a freewheeling city like New York or London—one of the world’s leading financial, educational, and cultural centers. Then imagine that one of the most infamous authoritarian regimes takes direct control over your city, introducing secret police, warrantless surveillance and searches, massive repression and the arrest of protesters, and aggressive prosecutions…
Transit Jam reports that district councils are proposing to link Hong Kong Island’s coastline paths to create a 65km walkable route around the island, so you can walk from Central to Admiralty via Stanley. Though it sounds like the new route might take all the fun out of such a hike…
Under the existing segmented trail, several sections are not easily accessible: a few broken links require crawling on all fours along a pig track or bouldering along rocky streams.
An interesting explanation of how China has no idea how to run a Twitter network.
And Willy Wo-lap Lam with all you need to know about the Fifth Plenary Session of the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) Central Committee.
Guy sets booth up in the street
Gives another guy a mike
Ain’t no sound but marching feet
Police come ready to strike
Are you ready, hey, are you ready for this
Sedition, crime complete
Out of the air the batons hit
To the sound of the beat, yeah
Another one bites the dust
Another one bites the dust
And another one gone, and another one gone
Another one bites the dust
Hey, they’re gonna get you too
Another one bites the dust
What are they doing in Yuen Long
Where have the white shirts gone
Cars come, carry them safe off
Back to their village home
Look up numbers in the list
Did you expect this heat
Out of the night the handcuffs click
To the sound of the beat
Another one bites the dust . . .
There are plenty of ways that you can catch a guy
And throw him to the floor
He got the votes, you don’t care why
You arrest him, then arrest him more
He’s ready, yeah, in Legco chamber
Standing on his own two feet
Knock him down, the elected member
Drag him to the sound of the beat, yeah
Another one bites the dust . . .
– – – – –
‘Another One Bites the Dust’ recorded by Queen
The HK Island circumnavigation trail will be rejected for no other reason than that yellow district councils came up with the idea. If your question is “would the government be this petty and malicious over something totally apolitical?”, the answer is always “yes”.
Other things to report your coworkers and neighbours for:
Wearing a black t-shirt
Carrying an umbrella
Reading the Apple Daily
Raising their hands with one, five or three fingers in a cha chaan teng. Two or four fingers are acceptable.
Owning an Akita or Shiba Inu
Disliking Jackie Chan movies
Liking Winnie the Pooh
Knowing the lyrics to Les Miserables
Drinking bubble tea
Being Canadian
If I snitch on those snitching will it cause a logical paradox and a consequent rupturing of the space-time continuum?
@Knownot: Brilliant!
Knownot in particularly good style today.
Ive reported that cia stooge Jewely-anus Ho several times and now Ive got a bunch od guys in White T-shirts asking odd questions…….
@Cassowary – especially a yellow umbrella.
Also:
Carrying a pocketful of Post-It notes
Not knowing the words of the National Anthem
Not installing WeChat on your phone
One could speculate that our Police Commissioner is not in command of his subordinates.
Media reports that “on Friday he spoke of the force’s need to gather “popular support” after intense criticism of its handling of last year’s social unrest.”
Meanwhile officers are scratching every scab on their bruised ego, later in the day they launched their latest salvo, an attack on the vice-chancellor of Chinese University, Rocky Tuan for a statement he made …………. more than one year ago.
So was the commissioner speaking with a forked tongue, or are his efforts at papering over the cracks in society being thwarted from inside the force?
@ Mary Melville
I think it may be a case of the chief constable’s speechwriters (presumably from the Pinnochio Branch) are not being on the same wavelength as the rest of the force. After all that team demonstrated an extensive gap between themselves and real life both during Occupy and last year’s upsets – and as for Tang’s capabilities…
Carrying a blank piece of paper
Possessing one of the laser pens handed out by China Mobile at its results briefing last year
Loitering near the US Embassy
Searching online for property and schools in the UK
Giggling when you read some of the comments in Big Lychee
Following Joshua Wong on Twitter
Drinking champagne after hearing the news that Carrie Lam got sanctioned
Mary, you are correct. Last year, during the demos I heard talk from inside the force that commanding officers at all levels were receiving ‘talk back’ and verbal abuse from the ranks. Even 5 years ago, during the Umbrella Revolution, that was inconceivable.
Joe Blow says:
“I heard talk from inside the force that commanding officers at all levels were receiving ‘talk back’ and verbal abuse from the ranks.”
I wonder, is it because of the uselessness of the commanding officers or because of the ignorant and abusive nature of the uniformed thugs recruited into the ranks? Or both?
Today was a beautiful sunny November Sunday in Hong Kong. Yet there were half a dozen police vans parked in front of Sogo in CWB and swarms of blue-shirt popo were busy harassing kids in black T-shirts. Today is also Lok-tsai’s death anniversary. Why don’t you get your CCP-fascist popo off our streets, Carrie Lam, you bloody nasty piece of woman?
From RTHK:
“In posts on social media on Thursday morning, the force said people can send tips anonymously by email or SMS, as well as one communication app, WeChat.”
In that case, pranksters and the Yellow camp could use it to make phony reports on members of the Blue camp to tie up the police, no? (Just as long as they take the usual precautions.)
This snitch line could be more trouble than it’s worth.