Thread by @TheDailyMao

I've said this again and again: the road to 'Hong Kong democracy' runs through earning Beijing's trust, not international sympathy. Only when China's core constituents view Hong Kong democrats as a loyal advocates of their perspectives will HK dems ever have relevance

1/

https://twitter.com/holmeschan_/status/1346673983375040519

Unfortunately, HK dems adopted a xenophobic and Anti-China stance from day 1. They bound, gagged, and tortured a Global Times reporter, burned a man alive, and killed another with a brick, while looting businesses perceived as pro-China. They dug their own graves

2/

Now, international sympathy is all that they have. They had protectors in the Chinese system, but those protectors have all abandoned them. By exiling themselves from China's political scene, they've consigned themselves to being eliminated as a political force...

3/

... because power in Hong Kong resides with the people of China as a whole.

For someone who, as recently as 2017, was trying to help the HK dems find a path forward in China's political matrix, this is a tragic outcome.

4/

Time will tell if a new generation of HK politicians can rise to the challenge of making HK's views relevant to the rest of China. Thankfully, the arrest or exile of Lai, Sham, Law, Chow, Wong, and others opens the field to voices who can lead Hong Kong out of the wilderness.

5/

It's time to be bold and move Hong Kong forward - as proud contributors to a greater Chinese whole - instead of letting it stay mired in nostalgia for a past that never truly existed.

@timeswang @kinlinglo
@TheRealJoshYe
@Nemesis_Alert

/end