Posted by Most people don’t know this quote well because it was not reported much in the Western media, but the statement was from Nancy Pelosi, Democratic speaker of the House of Representatives on 4 June 2019. It has become infamous in Hong Kong and China as a stark reminder of American double standards. The full context can be found here on her official webpage. “It is a beautiful sight to behold and I commend the courage of the people there for speaking out in light of China’s actions in Hong Kong these days and thank you again, Mr. Chairman.”
Apologists like to say that this statement was about testimony regarding the 30 anniversary of Tiananmen Square and about the “peaceful” protests occurring in Hong Kong on the anniversary vigil of that date. But less than a month later on 1 July 2019, Establishment Day (which marks the 1997 handover of sovereignty of Hong Kong back to China from the United Kingdom), the “peaceful” protests took a turn for the worse with the decidedly non-peaceful storming the Hong Kong legislature by an angry mob of rioters.
CNN reported on that day, “Hong Kong protesters storm government building over China extradition bill.” “Protesters stormed and vandalized the legislative building in Hong Kong. These protesters broke away from the annual July 1 march that marks the anniversary of when Hong Kong was given to China. There were other demonstrations that remained peaceful.” If you listen to the video of Nic Robertson, he says, “This is – and again you can’t emphasize this too much – a government building. It would be the equivalent in Washington of course of the White House.” Just to be clear, this was the Hong Kong Legislative Council (LEGCO) building, which in Washington would be the equivalent of the Capitol Building, not the White House which is where the executive branch (president) resides. But I don’t expect the brain trust reporters and journalists at CNN to know this simple distinction.
Which brings us to events of today with pro-Trump rioters storming the Capitol Building in Washington D.C. to disrupt the formal counting of the electoral ballots in the recent election that would confirm Joe Biden as the winner. This is what CNN reported, “Police clearing pro-Trump mob from US Capitol after rioters stormed halls of Congress” Language is important and as CNN illustrates, in the case of Hong Kong, they are “protestors” and in the case of America, they are a “mob”.
And of course, there was the constant refrain in the Western media about the excessive force and police brutality in Hong Kong. So much so that, “US lawmakers introduce bill to stop tear gas sales to Hong Kong“. Then there was the constant rumours on social media and speculation by regular media that China was going to send in the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) to squash the rioters. The fact that they never did and the PLA garrison stayed in their barracks except to help clean streets of rubble and detritus left by rioters from the night before didn’t stop the conspiracy theories like this one on Reuters that posits that, “China’s internal security force on frontlines of Hong Kong protests“.
So after a year of riots (which I personally think bordered on terrorism as defined by the United Nations) where black-clad masked rioters set people on fire, randomly beat people, threw petro-bombs like they were tic-tacs, and even shot police officers with arrows (I think many of these misguided youths have watched too much Hunger Games – as a complete digression, I only recently, upon rewatching the Hunger Games with my daughter found out that the “if we burn, you burn with us” slogan that the Hong Kong rioters kept saying is directly lifted from the Hunger Games); how many of these hooligans and thugs did the police actually kill? Despite conspiracy theories to the contrary, the answer is zero. Not only did the army stay in their barracks, the “excessively brutal” Hong Kong police did not cause one single death (although there were a few shot with live ammunition) despite six months of nearly constant street riots and pitched battles.
Now back to the rioters storming the US Capitol Building which didn’t last even one day let alone one year. NBC reports, “1 shot dead, Congress evacuated, National Guard activated after pro-Trump rioters storm Capitol“. So in a year of massive violence, the Hong Kong police didn’t kill anyone and the PLA stayed in their barracks. In America, in less than a day, one person was shot and killed by the police and one policemen beaten and killed by rioters (five died in total during the incident) and the National Guard was been called in. One does not have to look very hard or long to figure out why the rest of the world increasingly looks on American pontification about human rights, freedom and democracy as a bunch of hypocritical double standards.
House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif, confirming on Fox News that shots had been fired inside the Capitol, called the mayhem “un-American” and said: “We can disagree, but we should not take it to this level… You do not do what is happening right now. People are being hurt. This is unacceptable.” Sorry Kevin, this behavior is decidedly very American and the rest of us see through the holier-than-thou virtuous speech for the empty words that they really are.
