Thousands in Hong Kong protest China patriotism classes

[IBRIS]

HONG KONG (AP) — Thousands including teachers and parents pushing strollers took to Hong Kong streets Sunday to protest the upcoming introduction of Chinese patriotism classes they fear will lead to brainwashing, the latest sign of growing discomfort over Beijing's influence on the semiautonomous territory.

Students and pro-democracy activists were among those who marched to the Hong Kong government's headquarters to protest the new curriculum, which authorities are encouraging schools to begin using when classes resume in September.

They fear the classes will be used to brainwash children into supporting China's Communist Party. The government has denied that and says they are aimed at building Chinese national pride.

The controversy flared up after reports emerged that pro-Beijing groups published a booklet for use in classes that extolled the virtues of one-party rule.

"China wants Hong Kong's next generation to know how great it is and not know the bad stuff," said Chan Yip-Long, a nine-year-old primary school student. "The booklet is very biased, so I am opposing it."

The protest is the latest sign of growing discontent in Hong Kong over mainland China's increasing influence 15 years after the freewheeling financial center was returned to China by Britain after more than a century of colonial rule. Tensions have also been stoked by growing economic inequality and as well as an influx of free-spending wealthy Chinese, who are seen as driving up property prices and shop rents.

Hong Kongers are also angry about stunted democratic development. Beijing has pledged that Hong Kong can elect its own leader in 2017 and all legislators by 2020, though no roadmap has been laid out. On July 1, tens of thousands of people protested over the city's new leader, Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying, who was chosen by an elite pro-Beijing committee and is widely suspected of having close ties to the Communist Party.

Sunday's demonstrators carried placards and banners and shouted slogans calling for the government to withdraw its plan to introduce the Moral and National Education curriculum.

The government has stood firm and plans to make the subject compulsory in primary schools starting in 2015 and in secondary schools the year after, although schools are encouraged to start using it earlier.

According to the curriculum guidelines, students will learn about China's political leaders, the efforts and contributions they have made and the difficulties and challenges they face, as well as how to "speak cautiously," practice self-discipline and get along well with others in a rational and respectful manner.

Police estimated 19,000 people turned out. Despite blazing heat, many parents were there, pushing infants and young children in strollers. A group of young girls chanted, "We want the truth, we don't want brainwashing."
Thousands in Hong Kong protest China patriotism classes - Home » Other Sections » Breaking News

 

[KRAIT]

Posted....

 

[Tshering22]

I just hope that the PLA doesn't roll down tanks on these innocent Hong Kongers.

 

[IBRIS]

Hong Kong Says ‘No’ to Mainland Education, Chinese Reactions

Hong Kong People Reject Brainwashing Education: On July 23rd, over a thousand parents in Hong Kong published a statement in newspapers demanding that the government put a stop to the “Moral and National Education” program originally scheduled to be implemented in [Hong Kong] primary schools this September. The Concern Group [Concern Group for Hong Kong Science Education] criticized the National Education concept in the curriculum guide as “brainwashing education” for conflating “loving the country” with “loving the [Chinese Communist] Party”. The Hong Kong Teachers’ Union yesterday [July 22] announced they would join the protest, the president Feng Weihua claims the union will ask teachers to sign a conscience charter, promising not to be a tool in brainwashing their students.

Hong Kong Says ‘No’ to Mainland Education, Chinese Reactions – chinaSMACK

Posted....

It was deleted by some chinese MOD, had to repost it in world affair. I guess you can delete the thread but you can't control google.

 

[northeast]

these western worshipers need to be deported to their master's country.Their existent itself is a sickness of china.

 

[IBRIS]

I just hope that the PLA doesn't roll down tanks on these innocent Hong Kongers.

Let's hope not Check this out recently Hong Kong had been voicing in hundreds and thousands took to streets last month.
150,000 Commemorate Tiananmen Victims in Hong Kong

 

[Hasbara Buster]

Hong Kong belongs to China.

 

[HongWu]

Thousands of people is nothing in Hong Kong. You can see thousands of Filipina hanging around Central every weekend.

 

[kawaraj]

since when patriotism is something disgraceful.

these Hong Kongers are crazy.

 

[jbond197]

Send them to labor camps.. They will probably help in making Halloween masks/costumes and bathroom slippers..

 

[Damadji]

After middle east now its Hong Kong which gonna liberate from dictatorship

 

[SQ8]

Come up with better sources.. or this thread gets closed..
Philstar.. ChinaSmack.. pathetic.

 

[IBRIS]

Come up with better sources.. or this thread gets closed..
Philstar.. ChinaSmack.. pathetic.

here it is sir It's all over media now.

Big Hong Kong protest assails Communist Party ‘brainwashing’

HONG KONG — Tens of thousands of protesters paraded through Hong Kong on Sunday, waving placards denouncing “brainwashing” by China’s Communist Party and calling for the scrapping of plans for “national education” courses in local schools.

The protest, organized by teachers, parents and student groups as well as local political organizations hostile to Beijing’s one-party system, demonstrated deep opposition to the introduction of classes that aim to boost knowledge of and attachment to China in this freewheeling former British colony of 7.2 million.

China recovered sovereignty over Hong Kong 15 year ago in a blaze of fireworks and patriotic fervor. It granted the metropolis a high degree of autonomy as a Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China, but Beijing has grown frustrated that many in Hong Kong, though ethnically Chinese, don’t identify much with the rest of the country, under communist rule since 1949.

Although increasingly dependent economically on mainland China, Hong Kong, according to a recent opinion poll by Hong Kong University, now has less trust in the central government in Beijing than at any time since the 1997 handover. Separate polls show that bonds of shared identity with the rest of China have grown weaker, not stronger.

In an effort to narrow the gap, which has led to ugly outbursts of insulting rhetoric and occasional clashes, the Hong Kong government wants students to learn more about their mainland Chinese brethren. It has proposed courses to instruct pupils about China’s political system, geography and history, along with the correct etiquette for raising the national flag.

Protesters on Sunday decried this as brainwashing. Protest placards borrowed lyrics from “Another Brick in the Wall,” a song by the British rock group Pink Floyd: “We don’t need no thought control. Leave them kids alone.” A group of parents and their children waved a poster reading: “Our previous generations came here to escape the Communist Party, don’t let the next generation return to the grip of the demon.”

“I’m Chinese, but China is not the Communist Party,” said Cyrus Chan, a 16-year-old student in a local Roman Catholic high school. He said he joined Sunday’s protest because he thinks national education will be a form of political indoctrination focused on the party’s achievements and blind to catastrophes that claimed tens of millions of Chinese lives in the 1950s and 60s. “Germans are taught about Nazi crimes, they know what happened. In China, students only learn how to praise the party,” he said.

Hong Kong officials deny that the new courses — due to start in primary schools later this year and secondary schools in 2013 — will mimic “patriotic education” teaching on the mainland, which, mostly silent on the Party’s bloody past and centered instead on the misdeeds of foreigners, instills fervent nationalism rooted in a deep sense of victimhood.

"Brainwashing is against Hong Kong's core values, we would not support or accept that," Hong Kong’s Education Secretary Eddie Ng said Saturday.

National education was first proposed for Hong Kong in 2010 and prompted a storm of protest. Anger calmed after a lengthy period of public consultation and assurances by the government that it would not dictate content and leave this up to teachers. But fury flared again recently after the publication of a new government-funded textbook, “The China Model.” The text, prepared by a pro-Beijing organization, describes the Communist Party as “selfless and united” and presents it as an indispensable agent for stability and success.

The chairman of the China Civic Education Promotion Association of Hong Kong, a pro-China group lobbying in favor of the new courses, stirred further outrage Saturday by suggesting that Hong Kongers need some “brainwashing.” “If there are problems with the brain, then it needs to be washed, just as clothes need washing if they are dirty and kidneys need dialysis if they are sick,” said Jiang Yudui.

After marching Sunday in blistering sun from Victoria Park in Causeway Bay to the Hong Kong government’s main office complex, protesters chanted “down with brainwashing” and called for Ng’s resignation. Police said some 19,000 people took part, but the crowd appeared much larger. Organizers said more than 90,000 joined the march.

Beijing-controlled newspapers and pro-China political groups in Hong Kong have campaigned hard in favor of national education, accusing critics of hysteria and ulterior political motives. Only a handful of people, however, showed up Sunday to try and argue the case that Hong Kong, separated from China during 156 years of British colonial rule, needs to learn more about the country to which it now belongs. “Don’t be British devils, support national education,” screamed a lone pro-China activist through a bullhorn.
Big Hong Kong protest assails Communist Party ‘brainwashing’ - The Washington Post

Hong Kong 'brainwashing' of children resented

Parents and activists protest against plan to introduce Chinese national education lessons, labelling it propaganda.

Thousands of Hong Kong parents and activists have protested against a plan to introduce national education lessons, labelling it as a bid to brainwash children with Chinese propaganda.

Organisers said Sunday's protest, which attracted stroller-pushing parents, involved 90,000 demonstrators, but police estimates gave a lower figure of 32,000.

"As a parent, I'm very angry, this is a blatant brainwashing," mother-of-three Sandra Wong said as she marched in the sweltering heat accompanied by her husband and pushing her two-year-old daughter in a stroller.

"The curriculum only paints a rosy picture about the Communist Party ... This is just an attempt to introduce the mainland agenda in Hong Kong schools."

The government has said national education lessons, to be introduced in September and made compulsory in 2015, are important to foster a sense of national pride and belonging.

The protest underscored rising anti-Beijing sentiments, coming weeks after the city's biggest demonstration in nearly a decade, as new leader Leung Chun-ying, also called chief executive, was sworn in before Hu Jintao, the Chinese president.

Hong Kong, which gained independence from the United Kingdom in July 1997 after more than 150 years of British rule, remains a semi-autonomous part of mainland China.

It has its own political and legal system that guarantees civil liberties not seen in China, including freedom of speech and association, but its chief executive is elected through a "small-circle" election that excludes many would-be voters.

Citizenship rejected

A poll released by the University of Hong Kong last month showed the number of people in Hong Kong identifying themselves as citizens of China had plunged to a 13-year-low. More identified themselves as Hong Kongers.

Rejecting the brainwashing claims, the government has vowed to push ahead with the plan, although it announced the formation of a special committee to monitor the implementation of the subject following the mass protest.

The committee will ensure the subject is taught in a way "to educate our students to have independent thinking, to be able to analyse situations and come to an objective judgement", Carrie Lam, the chief secretary, told reporters.

Under the proposal, students would take 50 hours of lessons a year focusing on "building national harmony, identity and unity among individuals". There would be no exams.

"There is nothing wrong with national education but it shouldn't be done in a biased way," Shirley Cheung, a high school student, said at the protest.

"Currently the curriculum makes no mention about issues like the Tiananmen Square crackdown or who is (Chinese dissident) Ai Weiwei, so we are not convinced it can encourage independent thinking," the 17-year-old added.

The protest came after a teaching booklet called "The China Model", which heavily praised China's one-party system, was sent to local schools in recent weeks, further fuelling debates over the lessons.

The plan to introduce national education has been on the government's agenda for years but the renewed push came weeks after the new government led by Leung, seen as pro-Beijing, took office.
Hong Kong 'brainwashing' of children resented - Asia-Pacific - Al Jazeera English

 

[SQ8]

Then these sources should open threads..
Not PhilStar or Chillaxingnews..

NOTE TO ALL MEMBERS.

 

[jbond197]

Then these sources should open threads..
Not PhilStar or Chillaxingnews..

NOTE TO ALL MEMBERS.

And the same standards will be applied for Chinese and Pakistanis opening threads from blogs and stupid sources.