February 14, 2025 • 49 mins
Carmen Lau is a former Hong Kong District Councillor who was forced to resign by the government and later fled Hong Kong to the UK where she lives in exile.
She is a pro-democracy and freedom advocate with the Hong Kong Democracy Council and a Freedom Fellow with the Human Rights Foundation and is wanted by the Hong Kong police with a $1 million Hong Kong dollar bounty being offered for information leading to her arrest.
We talk about freedom and self-determination and importantly what it means to lose freedoms that you once had.
We also touch on China and the propaganda of the Chinese Communist Party.
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Links:
Carmen on X - https://x.com/carmenkamanlau
Hong Kong Democracy Council - https://www.hkdc.us/
Human Rights Foundation - https://hrf.org
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Credits:
The Transformation of Value is produced by Cody Ellingham
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
The authorities, they see talking about self determination
as a form of advocating Hong Kong independency, which is, you
know, not something that, yeah, which is a crime.
Hello, I am Cody Allingham and this is the transformation of
Value, a place for thinkers and builders like you where we ask
(00:21):
questions about freedom, Bitcoinand creativity.
I'm joined by Carmen Lau, a former Hong Kong District
councillor who was forced to resign by the government and
later fled Hong Kong to the UK where she lives in exile.
She is a pro democracy and freedom advocate with the Hong
Kong Democracy Council and the Human Rights Foundation and is
(00:43):
wanted by the Hong Kong Police with a 1,000,000 Hong Kong
dollar bounty being offered. We talk about freedom and self
determination and importantly what it means to lose freedoms
that she once had. We also touch on China and the
propaganda of the Chinese Communist Party.
I would like to know what you think.
Send me an e-mail at hello at the transformation of value.com
(01:04):
and I will get back to you. Now.
If you enjoy this show, please consider sharing this episode
with a friend who you think might like it.
You can also support my work directly by streaming sets to
the show's wallet or donating through my website.
Otherwise, onto the show. Carmen, thank you for joining me
on the transformation of value. Thank you for having me.
(01:26):
You are a Hong Kong democracy advocate currently living in
exile in the United Kingdom. There is a 1,000,000 Hong Kong
dollar bounty for information leading to your arrest on some
very serious charges related to national security.
But before we get to that, I wanted to start off by learning
a little bit more about your story and what it was like
(01:48):
growing up in Hong Kong. So my one side of my family,
they were actually from a fish village called Taiyo on Lanta
Island. And I remember when I grew up,
everything in Hong Kong was beautiful and it was quiet and,
(02:15):
but is, you know, it's quite easy to get to anywhere.
Like you could just have a 15 minutes of drive, then you will
be in the countryside. And, and so there were a lot to
do as well. Although it's tiny, it's small,
but it's convenient. And we got to experience
(02:38):
everything in just this tiny city.
So so. One side of your family is from
Lantau Island and then the otherside of your family was New
Territories, or. Yeah, from the New Territories
and my grandparents, my father'sside of the grandparents, they
migrate from China to Hong Kong like many years ago.
(03:03):
So my father was actually born and raised in Hong Kong as well.
And I think it's typical, it's just a typical, you know, Hong
Kong family. And yeah, and they got to live
in the new territories. Yeah, that's interesting.
I think we will get to this a bit later on.
But that relationship between Hong Kong and mainland China is
(03:23):
something I certainly want to explore.
And you know, I was quite lucky.I went to Hong Kong in May last
year. I stayed in Homan Tin on the
dark side of Kowloon, and I had not actually been back since
2018, since prior to the the most recent protests.
And certainly I felt something had really changed just in those
(03:45):
few years. But for you, Carmen, what are
some of your memories of the wayHong Kong was before the 2019
protests in particular? Like do you feel like there's
been a major change since then and how would you characterize
that change? I think Hong Kong has changed
(04:07):
scenes. I was born.
So I, I witnessed the change from the sovereignty and also
the change from, you know, having more closer relationship
with the mainland China. And there were more and more,
you know, people from mainland China migrate to Hong Kong or,
(04:32):
you know, travel to Hong Kong. And that's why, well, it's it
got it, get it gradually got a lot, you know, crowded.
And the cultures were quite different between Hong Kongers
and mainland Chinese. So there were a lot of, you
(04:55):
know, cultural shock between between US and in terms of, you
know, political or, or freedom. I think the 2019 was at the peak
of, you know, we had, we have freedom the most.
(05:15):
I must have to say that this whole society or the political
situation in Hong Kong just gradually deteriorated after
2014, after the Umbrella Movement.
It's just it's never been the same after especially 2019.
And I left Hong Kong in 2021, somy imagination or, you know, my
(05:38):
memories about Hong Kong stopped20/21.
It wasn't at its best version aswell.
And I've heard people who would still travel back to Hong Kong,
they're seeing the businesses and also actually the whole
environment inside of Hong Kong isn't really great now.
(06:01):
And I was also told that a lot of like mainland Chinese
businesses, they, you know, cometo Hong Kong and start their
business in Hong Kong now. So it's it's like mainland
China, as people said for now. It's interesting you mentioned
it wasn't so crowded when you were growing up, and obviously
(06:22):
Hong Kong is an incredibly busy place, but what do you mean by
that in terms of that sense of like the amount of people?
Or was it a difference between sort of the mainland Chinese
coming to Hong Kong that had a different vibe?
Like what do you mean by that? I think is, is in terms of, you
know, like physical space because more and more mainland
(06:48):
Chinese moved to Hong Kong. And so because they, the
policies just allow, you know, 200 families daily to move to
Hong Kong for good from mainlandChina.
And so there are a lot of space in the new territory, which used
(07:09):
to be, you know, countryside or,you know, farms or, you know,
ponds. They just constructed them to,
to housing estates to, you know,huge tall buildings, but you
know, they, they are all just residential buildings and
leaving space getting smaller and smaller and in addition to a
(07:33):
lot of tourists from the mainland China.
So they are just, they were justeverywhere, not only in the
Kowloon side, like tourist side,but also in the New Territories
where they just visit Hong Kong and get their, you know, daily
goods or, you know, daily utensils from Hong Kong back to
(07:57):
China because they just simply believe that things from Hong
Kong are better. Yeah, that's interesting.
I want to dive into that just a little bit.
So you, you mentioned they and of course we're referring to
mainland Chinese. And I think it's an important
distinction between the Communist Party of China and
the, you know, the government and, and the people and in
(08:18):
particular neighboring regions, you know, Guangzhou area, you
know, it's similar, you know, shared language with Cantonese
and you know, there's a lot of overlap.
So this relationship of people coming over the border, these
kind of 200 families a day. Do do you feel like there's
something in that, though that is at odds with what Hong Kong
(08:40):
is like? How would you describe that?
So culturally we are very different from mainland Chinese,
you know, although like neighboring cities like
Guangzhou or Guangdong, they used to speak Cantonese as well,
but not after, you know, 10 or 10 or 15 years ago.
(09:02):
Also, they, they write in simplified Chinese instead of
traditional Chinese, not to mention the ideologies or, you
know, things that they learn from school during the formative
years. And so I think culturally we are
indeed very different, although perhaps some of them will still
(09:26):
speak Cantonese, but we have different dialects of Cantonese.
And I think, you know, the migration policy between
mainland China and Hong Kong, just a, you know, gradual
cultural simulation to Hong Kongers.
Like they wanted us to forget weare Hong Kongers and they want
(09:49):
us to have the identity of beingChinese.
Yeah. Well, I mean, sort of drilling
into that. And so again, this idea of the
handover 1997 and you and I werepretty much just little kids
when that happened. And so it was a historical
moment. And at that time, 1997, the
Basic Law was enshrined, which set up the famous One Country 2
(10:12):
systems arrangement, where Hong Kong retained much of its
democratic system that had been inherited from the British.
And then it was seen to be part of China, though as one country.
And I guess what what I see fromwhat you've said is the sense of
almost a sense of neo colonialism, I guess you could
say, with the way these familiesand these institutions are
(10:35):
coming over into Hong Kong and arguably affecting, diluting
perhaps is the word the the local culture.
I mean, tell me more about what that really means for you.
And especially given that we were both, you know, little kids
when that actually the handover happened.
I mean, how have you seen that? Play out.
So I, I was really a small kid during the transition of
(10:59):
sovereignty. And, but I still remember when
it was, you know, the 1st of July 1997, it's the midnight of
the 30th of June and my parents and I just, we, we sat on silver
(11:19):
and watch the watch the live streaming news.
And we, you know, I, although I was a young kid, I witnessed how
people felt, you know, sad when,you know, when the colonial
government left Hong Kong. But I think people were sad
(11:40):
because of the uncertainty, because we've been, at least
we've been practicing, you know,capitalism and also democracy to
a certain extent, democracy for years.
And, and now we by then, then we, we were in hand of a
(12:06):
communist government during, in you know, in 1997, people didn't
have so much of information. We, you know, Internet wasn't
really trendy by then. And only people with privilege
could have Internet and people could only receive information
(12:27):
from news or from books or, you know, from newspaper.
And I think people were really insecure by then.
And but at the same time, they also had the sense that China,
it's not a very established and welcoming nation in the
(12:49):
international community. And that's for a reason, because
of the history of the People's Republic of China.
And but what I experienced the most was actually from the
education. So when I was, it was during the
(13:13):
Beijing Olympic 2008, it, I was,you know, it was my first year
of secondary school. So my whole primary school
actually was, you know, before the Olympic, I think I saw the
change the most in 2008. And so before that, in my
(13:34):
primary school, it was still, you know, I think it still
encouraged the educational system during the British Hong
Kong government. So a lot of values, a lot of
common sense or you know, the syllabus, the whole thing was
set by the British government orthe British actually follows the
(13:58):
British educational system. After the Beijing Olympic in
2008, we started to have the, you know, liberal studies.
We started to learn, we started to have that national education.
We started to have a change in, you know, in the subject of
(14:20):
Chinese history. We had to learn Chinese history
when we were in secondary school.
And but they didn't talk about the June 4th even in liberal
study, learning about the news, learning about the society, you
know, setting up our critical thinking, as I said, in our
mind. And but we never learned about
(14:44):
these, you know, unfavour unfavourable, you know, history
bit of China. I've just I just learned it
from, you know, my parents and some of our teacher by then they
will still talk about things outside the box.
So apparently it is not allowed in Hong Kong right now.
(15:08):
People could just report, student could report the
teachers of, you know, teaching things that might deem as
endangering the national security.
So it is basically not allowed right now.
But in the past, when I was studying in schools, our teacher
(15:30):
will still talk about those things.
Yeah, absolutely. And as a young person as well,
I'm, I'm interested in talking about some of your work in
politics in Hong Kong and also sort of reflecting on the, the
youthfulness of the 2019 protests and this movement
that's happened lately. Because I've, I've just been
(15:50):
reading my friend's book City onFire, Anthony Daparan, who is a
Hong Kong based lawyer who's written extensively about the
2019 protests. And he sort of speculates this
idea that when the handover happened in 1997, there was
perhaps a vision that China would end up quite different in
(16:12):
the future. And that has changed massively,
as you say, 2008. We've seen the emergence of Xi
Jinping as this kind of monolithic leader.
There's been a lot of changes inin the way China has approached
things and this closing off of China.
But something I want to highlight is that certainly with
these protests, the Hong Kong government systematically
(16:33):
alienated Hong Kong's best and brightest, its youth and the
educated middle class, the people of Hong Kong's future
really were the ones who were there demonstrating during the
protests and yourself included. So how would you reflect on that
generational difference? People your age and younger and
the older people and their approaches to democracy and
freedom. So in the Chinese united
(16:55):
movements, I think people from all generations, we came
together and protest. But there's a huge gap between
my generation and the older and my generation and the younger
generation. And for with the older
(17:15):
generations, I think they have the sense of unity with the
mainland China. And many of them when they, you
know, when they promote democracy in Hong Kong or when
they advocate for democracy in Hong Kong, the very of change of
(17:39):
them would be, you know, China, the mainland China has to be
democratized in order for Hong Kong to democratize, to be
democratized. And but they would believe, you
know, they would believe and they would be happy for the
(18:00):
unity between mainland China andHong Kong.
So they will still embrace the transition of sovereignty.
And but partly some of them, they are, you know, they are
like they embrace the identity as British Hong Kong.
So a lot of them here for now inthe UK, they will still believe
(18:21):
that Hong Kong should be returned to the United Kingdom.
And in our generation, we have aslightly different theory of
change. We think that Hong Kong's rights
to self determination should be restored in order to be
(18:45):
democratized. And that said, because during
the negotiation between the British government and the
Chinese government, Hong Kong was once, as a, you know, colony
of the British government was once on the list of, you know,
(19:05):
self determination in the UnitedNations.
So there was a working group in the United Nation sorting out
the self determination process of a lot of colonies and Hong
Kong was actually one of them. But our name was removed by the
(19:26):
Chinese authority during the negotiation.
And so we think that some of us think that, you know, whichever
pathway future of Hong Kong we choose, Hong Kong should have
our voice in this, you know, transitional, this change of the
(19:50):
whole sovereignty thing. Yeah, Carmen, you were elected
to be a district councillor in Hong Kong, but you left in 2021.
Can you tell me a little bit about that foray into politics?
How did you end up in the position of becoming an elected
representative in Hong Kong? I think if I have to trace the
(20:12):
whole thing, it would be becauseof the student movements in
2012. It was about the national
education that the Hong Kong government tried to implement in
our educational system. And it was a year before my
(20:32):
public exam. So the public exam in Hong Kong
would simply determine which university you will be in or
you, whether you would be, you know, selected to, to in, in the
university. And the student movements
happened by then. And I think my teachers actually
(20:57):
led me to that way. So I basically before the public
exam, I've chosen to study political science in the
university and I got into political science when I was in
university, when I studied in university.
And yeah. And I think the whole thing
(21:20):
just, you know, simply move towards that side of thing.
And and then after I graduated, my only job was actually as a
legislative assistant for a lawmaker in Hong Kong, like a
pro democracy lawmaker in Hong Kong.
(21:40):
And it was 2, two years after I started working for him and it
was the 2019 movements. Yeah, yeah.
So you were elected 2000? 19. 2019 and you mentioned as
well you were deputy secretary general for the Civic Party,
(22:03):
which was the second largest proDemocratic Party, which has
since been forcibly dissolved bythe government.
Now that's interesting, but I dowant to sort of then reflect on
so 2021 though. So you left.
So you were elected, you know, you were very young at that time
getting elected to this very important position, but then
2021 came around and you left Hong Kong.
Can you talk a little bit about what led to that?
(22:25):
So the national security law wasenacted in 2020 and as I
mentioned, I used to work for some pro democracy lawmakers and
they were end up in jail, in prison because of the national
security law, just simply because they joined a pro
(22:49):
democracy primaries ahead of theLegislative Council election in
2020. And as the assistant and as the
councillor, I, you know, I was quite involved during the time.
And in addition that when in 2021 there was a off taking
(23:11):
process enforced by the Hong Kong government to the
councillors in the middle of ourterms as a, you know, elected
councillor, we, we had to, you know, we were forced to take the
patriotic oath towards the PRC government.
And this is not something that Ithink I could do.
(23:35):
I could not pledge, you know, tosupport a communist government,
at least for myself, for what I believe.
So I refused to take the oath and I was forced to resign from
my position. Even after I resigned, I was
heavily surveilled by I don't know who so regards with my
(24:00):
personal safety. I had to leave.
I see. And so you mentioned National
Security Law 2020. Is that just to clarify, is that
that's separate to Article 23 oris that the same thing?
No worries. Different.
OK, different. Thing.
Yeah, Article 73 was just implemented last year.
Yeah, that's right. And Article 23 also relates to
(24:23):
national security though. Yeah, doesn't it?
Because I know you just just earlier in this conversation, we
talked about this idea of self determination.
And this is something that has been levelled against you,
accusations that your your discussions of this idea of self
determination is actually representative of a very
(24:45):
dangerous idea potentially in the eyes of the government.
So tell me more about that, thisidea of conversations and free
speech and talking about the ideas of something like
democracy or independence for Hong Kong.
So the discussion on self determination, I am not the
first one to talk about it definitely is not the first time
that having Hong Kongers to discuss about it.
(25:08):
It was in I think a lot of political ideologies or theory
of change of democratizing Hong Kong.
We started again after the Umbrella Movement in 2014, a lot
of young, you know, young student leaders and scholars,
they started to try to set our femurs of how Hong Kong should
(25:35):
be democratized. And I think the discussion of
self determination started by then.
So it was our generation of people.
We, we had that idea in mind first as well.
And it's just now we are having a vibrant diaspora and next out
(25:58):
Hong Kong community and next outHong Kong civil society.
We just think that it's the right timing to talk about it
again because a lot of us are outside already and the deadline
of 2047 is getting closer day byday.
So we think that we must have topush our democracy movement
(26:23):
forward in this limited time. So we started the discussion
again for now. And I don't I don't think is,
you know, there's a lot of things around self
determination. There's a lot of imagination of
the theory of change and there'sa lot of possibilities as well
(26:46):
on how our destiny should be. So I'm just one of the of the
many in our generation to talk about it.
But it seems that the the authorities, they see talking
about self determination as a form of Hong Kong independency,
(27:06):
you know, as a form of advocating Hong Kong
independency, which is, you know, not something that, yeah,
which is a crime. Well, no, that's interesting to
me because my whole thing commonis conversation.
And you know, I'm very interested in ideas of the
state, the history of political science, ideology, these kinds
of things. And I like to ask questions that
(27:27):
are difficult. And I think this, I do want to
get to China in a moment, but this idea that we can't freely
talk about these ideas, or perhaps worse, we self censor.
And so in polite society, we don't bring it up and we don't
talk about the idea. I think that can lead to very
dangerous outcomes. And coming to China, though,
(27:48):
Carmen, you know, my own personal experience of China is
a little bit out of date now. I haven't been to China in eight
years. I was last in Shanghai.
And, you know, I mean, I had a good time, but this was before
COVID. This was before the Hong Kong
protests. And I have felt certainly
there's more and more of this pro China, pro CCP message
(28:12):
that's kind of coming through. It's kind of a influences, you
see it coming through on YouTube.
I think of it as a psychologicaloperation that's trying to
present the PRC very positively.I want to talk to you about that
because this idea of technology and the influence of media where
we have TikTok and YouTube, it'sall good fast trains, clean
(28:34):
streets, but it's like, it's like this psychological
operation to make it seem like it's OK.
Yeah, definitely. If you look closer into Chinese
news or really, you know, people's news inside of China,
you would know that the the whole society is not as good as
(28:55):
we perceive. And I think a lot of us already
know that there's a, you know, great firewall of the Chinese
Internet blocking people inside of China to receive new from
outside. But at the same time, actually
this fire or block blocking information inside of China.
(29:17):
So people outside couldn't really get, you know, precise
information about China. What we are seeing is a
propaganda, a, you know, a promotion by the authorities.
So often if we are interested inthe situation of China, we also
(29:37):
have to, you know, climb the Great Firewall over the other
side of the Internet inside of China to see what's really
happening inside. And I think one incident is
about the white paper movement. We see a lot of, you know,
things or the reality of the Chinese societies during the
(30:03):
white paper movement because a lot of underground activists
inside of China, they just, you know, try to export the reality
and the real, you know, information about them.
And that was the. White paper Movement.
OK. It was during the during the
pandemic and there the lockdown inside of China is different.
(30:30):
They literally locked it down. The authorities would lock the
people store from outside with alock that they cannot the
residents cannot be unlocked by themselves.
Only the, you know, pandemic control personnel would have the
key. And there was a fire broke out
(30:53):
in Urumuchi in the east Turkish time.
So the Xinjiang, what they're saying, but it's in fact the
east Turkish side and and because of the lockdown, because
of all these sorts of policies, people being locked up inside of
their house, that building, thatpeople in the building could not
(31:18):
make it to. You know they.
Couldn't get out. Yeah, yeah.
They couldn't just get out and people were concerned by then, a
lot of people inside of China were fed up by these, you know,
anti pandemic policies. And so there were a there was a
(31:38):
protest started inside of China and it soon sparked in different
city, different, you know, different places in China.
And so we call it the white paper movements because people
went out to the streets because they know they cannot, you know,
they cannot present any of the political slogans or any of
(32:03):
their, you know, slogans to read, you know, basically.
And. And so they just hold a white
paper out when they went down, went on the streets.
Yeah. And just try to, you know, show
their grievances and show their anger to the 40s.
(32:23):
I say that's very interesting. So we've got again, this this
presentation of China, especially as maybe the US
arguably goes through this decline.
The UK where you are at the moment, as you know, you see
stories as well. You know, it's kind of there's
turmoil, there's it's maybe not such a nice place right at this
(32:44):
moment, But then you see storiesof China, fast trains, clean
streets, you know, everything's convenient.
You can pay with everything on your phone.
There's a lot of these kind of narratives and they're very
technological. And I think this is part of this
idea of the techno state, the techno nationalism of China,
where technology is part of the political apparatus.
(33:06):
And so I find that very interesting that you see this
stuff come through on TikTok andand, and YouTube and just kind
of, you know, reaffirming that there is maybe some truth to
what's coming through, but there's also a whole lot that's
not making it actually out of China.
And that's what you don't get tosee.
(33:27):
But Carmen, I do also want to just talk briefly about the the
relationship between the United States and China and the
situation because there have been critiques, you know, about
the role of NGOs and organizations and kind of this
sort of the Cold War, this information war that's taking
place between the US and China. And I know you're currently
(33:49):
based with the Hong Kong Democracy Council.
You're currently working with the Hong Kong Democracy Council.
It's Washington based, nonpartisan, nonprofit
organization talking about democracy in Hong Kong.
But how would you situate that relationship between US
entities, Chinese entities, and that kind of propaganda war
that's taking place? I don't see people working in
(34:14):
the human rights field, you know, going against the
propaganda wall. We raise the awareness of human
rights issues and raise the awareness, try to push
democratic agenda of our homeland.
It's personal to us. It's not just about propaganda
and but I think that propaganda from, you know, exporting
(34:41):
propaganda from China is actually harming the
democracies. Yeah.
I, I, I don't, I don't quite agree with the state statement
that, you know, US organizationsare, you know, going against
propaganda of China. We were just trying to present
(35:02):
the reality and not no matter it's inside of Hong Kong or, you
know, inside of China. And it, the propaganda doesn't
only harm, you know, people likeus, like the dissidents or, you
know, the diaspora, but it also,you know, gradually harming the
(35:24):
democracies themselves. Like, you can see a lot of
people in the US, they are usingTikTok now and they're all, you
know, the little red book, whichactually, yeah.
Which? Yeah, which actually is a book
about Mao Zedong. That's right.
(35:45):
You know, is a is a commerce, you know, dialogue of the little
Red books, what it means. And these social media
platforms, you know, do not onlyprovide a social media
platforms, they have not to mention the back doors, right?
Just, you know, to see the contents itself.
(36:07):
A lot of them were actually, youknow, promoting or praising the
communists and, you know, praising it of a terror regime
as well. And I think it's very dangerous
for people in the democracy to receive this informations.
Yeah. Well, in particular, I think
this is what I was getting at the, the idea that maybe right
(36:31):
at this moment, the United States and the UK and and some
other parts of the world are going through a bit of a
decline. There's no idea of there's maybe
a recession. The economy is not so great.
China from the outside looks like it's doing great.
Streets are clean, trains work these kinds of things.
You know, there's, there's like the optics of it.
And I think that's, I guess whatI'm getting at that there is
(36:52):
this information war that most people aren't aware of.
There's a lot of nuance to it. And so when you start using a
little Red Book or TikTok, you are actually kind of consuming.
That directly. Their propaganda.
Yeah. Yeah.
And I guess just dwelling on that as well, the idea of the
(37:13):
framing of what you're doing as a native of Hong Kong, I think
it's very interesting. So just tell me briefly your
work with the Hong Kong Democracy Council.
What? Tell me more about your
organization. How did that form?
Like what are your, what are your, your goals?
So for now, we will say we, we were founded in Washington DC
(37:35):
and in 2019, for now, we won't say we are based in US because
we also extended our office in the UK.
That's why, you know, that's whyI joined HADC 1 character of
our, you know, one characteristic of our
organization that I am always proud of is that we are a team
(37:59):
of Hong Kongers. Everyone of us are Hong Kongers
and we are from all walks of life.
We had anonymous activist, we had elected official like
myself. We have student leaders in the
past and we also have like, American borns, Hong Kongers,
(38:22):
which, you know, most of his time, most of their time, they
and they weren't born and raisedin Hong Kong, but they still
inherit that Hong Kong identity and embrace it and try to
promote it. And so I think our work is not
just, you know, talking about Hong Kong or, you know, talking
(38:45):
about the situation in Hong Kong, but it's about us.
It's about how we shape our democracy movements, especially
now we are in exile. All of us are in exile and, and
it is quite important for us, you know, to, to, you know, to
pass on. No, we don't want to pass on the
(39:08):
democracy movements from generations.
We want, you know, to achieve our goals in our lifetime.
Yeah. And yeah.
I was just going to ask then, Sothis idea then, so the goals
here really quite clear. A Democratic, a Democrat, a
democracy in Hong Kong, that is,again, that isn't an illegal
(39:31):
thing to argue for currently under the national security
laws. But do you think, I mean, what,
what's the future for this? What's where's it going?
I mean, are you, are you seeing an opportunity for this idea to
come together? It's a very good question
because we are asking ourselves day by day as well, whether what
(39:52):
we are doing is really mean something, really, you know,
achieving something. And my answer, I would say for
now is yes. I think we are raising a lot of
awareness of Hong Kong in different places of the world.
(40:14):
Our visibility is, is definitely, you know.
You know, getting higher and, and I think most important is
that we, you know, apart from people who came from the civil
society back in Hong Kong, rejoining the diaspora, rejoin
(40:35):
the diaspora civil society. We have new people now.
We have a lot of younger generations.
They they are also dedicating their time to the movement and I
think passing on or you know, having people from the newer
(40:55):
generation is very important to a democracy movement.
And I think we are going into that saying we are gradually,
bit by bits, achieving a lot of things.
Well, that's been my experience as well with young Hong Kongers
that I've met. Certainly an interest, a great
interest in this idea of democracy.
And just one more thing, I know this is quite personal, but just
yesterday the police in Hong Kong have been questioning two
(41:20):
of your relatives and this is, Iguess, very concerning.
Is that something you can talk about in terms of these tactics
of the police to target familiesthat are back in Hong Kong?
Yeah. So as we talked about it a
little bit earlier there, there are now 2 laws regarding
(41:41):
national security inside of HongKong.
One is the national security lawenacted in 2020.
The other one is actually the Article 23 implemented last
year. And the Article 23 was actually
a 21 year discussion in Hong Kong 22, I think because the
(42:05):
plan for enacting the Article 23started in 2002 when I was seven
years old. But by then the governments
faced a lot of disagreements in the society and, and they they
paused, just paused the whole legislation.
But it came back just last year.And the legislation process came
(42:28):
with just 50 days in the Legislative Council from having
the blue paper to it became the law.
And the reason I talk about it is because before my family back
in Hong Kong got interrogated, Iwas actually wanted and by the
(42:51):
Hong Kong government in the lastChristmas Eve with 1,000,000
Hong Kong dollar bounties. And so the arrest warrants were
under the national security law.So the 2020 version and they the
(43:11):
tactics of, you know, going after our family back in Hong
Kong, the tactics of cancelling our passports, the tactics of
freezing our accounts, all thesepower were legislative power.
All these, you know, enforcementpower to be precise are come
(43:32):
from the Article 23. So they use the louder version
of national security law to to place bounty on peoples.
But these sort of, you know, enhuying tactics they are using
is actually under the Article 23.
So not only these national security related legislation
(43:55):
they would use to to go after activism in exile, but also
other legislation or other laws in Hong Kong they weaponize like
sedition, you know, like rioting, which is a the public
ordered law inside of Hong Kong and.
Yeah, now that's, that's interesting.
(44:15):
And I mean, also people may be aware of the stories in the
mainland China of people's families being invited to have a
have a cup of tea at a police station, which is kind of the
euphemism for coming and having a a serious talk and
interrogation at a police station.
One other thing I just wanted todwell on, just conscious of
time. Carmen, you are also a freedom
(44:38):
fellow at the Human Rights Foundation.
Is that right? Yeah.
Now the human, the HRF, Human Rights Foundation are big
proponents of Bitcoin and they see Bitcoin as freedom
technology where you can have money that isn't able to be
stopped or censored by the state.
Do you have any comments on whatBitcoin maybe means to you or
(45:00):
what you what you think about Bitcoin?
So as a Freedom Fellow for now, as a current cohort of the
Freedom Fellow, I'm still in thelearning process of a lot of
these new ideas. And, you know, to a human rights
activist, I think this is very important because just as I
said, my bank account was freeze, was frozen by the by the
(45:24):
authorities. And a lot of these, you know,
like national security tactics and, you know, transnational
repression efforts that the HongKong government is conducting
actually bar us from receiving more, you know, financial
support from donations or, you know, grants and the bitcoins
(45:47):
or, you know, these new ideas offinancial freedom sexually would
help, you know, the developmentsor, you know, simply just the
existence of, of our organization of our
organizational work. So I'm still new to the idea,
but I know that a lot of people in this space, they have been
(46:12):
utilizing the bitcoins or, you know, some other financial tools
to generate money or, you know, to generate grants to help with
the discourse. So yeah.
That's awesome. And just finally then, Carmen,
if if you had one thing you wantto share about overall the work
(46:36):
you're doing for democracy in Hong Kong 1 message you would
like to share, what would that be?
I think we have a lot of lot of discussion around fear and
around self censorship at the moment.
Because when the government goesafter us like the activists or
(46:57):
more more outspoken ones, a lot of hippo in the diaspora, they
may just be supporters or they have, you know, less involvement
in the movement. They would be very afraid of
continuously speaking up. And I, I'm seeing that becoming
(47:21):
a phenomenon which is unhealthy for our movements.
So I do really want to say that I sometimes would also be scared
by these transnational repression, by these repression,
by these, I don't know, nonsensetactics that the authorities are
(47:42):
using. But I think it would be safer
and it would be, you know, we would maximize our efforts if we
are all together. And I think moving forward, a
democracy movement is means thatit's essential to have people
(48:07):
going together for one goal. So I do hope that not only Hong
Kongers, but also us, our allies, our supporters,
especially people actually, we're born and raised in
democracies, should also continue to support different,
(48:27):
you know, discourse or differentmovements trying to shape
democracies better. Yes, it's a ongoing process and
conversation. And of course, freedom of speech
and the ability to ask questionsas critical to all of this.
Carmen, thank you so much for your time.
If people want to follow you, they want to learn more about
(48:48):
your story, what's the best place for them to to to to do
that? So I'm on every social media,
but I would, if people want to learn more about the situation
in Hong Kong, I would recommend everyone to follow our
organization's platforms, which is HADC, the Hong Kong Democracy
(49:10):
Council. Yeah.
Are you on Little Red Book? No I'm not on TikTok and it's
your book though. All right, Carmen, thank you so
much. Yeah.
Thank you so much. Thank you.
Thank you for listening, I am Cody Allingham.
And that was the transformation.Of value, if you would like to
support this show, please consider making a donation
(49:32):
either through my website or by directly tipping to the show's
Bitcoin wallet. Or just pass this episode on to
a friend who you think may enjoyit.
And you can always e-mail me at hello at
thetransformationofvalue com.
The authorities, they see talking about self determination
as a form of advocating Hong Kong independency, which is, you
know, not something that, yeah, which is a crime.
Hello, I am Cody Allingham and this is the transformation of
Value, a place for thinkers and builders like you where we ask
(00:21):
questions about freedom, Bitcoinand creativity.
I'm joined by Carmen Lau, a former Hong Kong District
councillor who was forced to resign by the government and
later fled Hong Kong to the UK where she lives in exile.
She is a pro democracy and freedom advocate with the Hong
Kong Democracy Council and the Human Rights Foundation and is
(00:43):
wanted by the Hong Kong Police with a 1,000,000 Hong Kong
dollar bounty being offered. We talk about freedom and self
determination and importantly what it means to lose freedoms
that she once had. We also touch on China and the
propaganda of the Chinese Communist Party.
I would like to know what you think.
Send me an e-mail at hello at the transformation of value.com
(01:04):
and I will get back to you. Now.
If you enjoy this show, please consider sharing this episode
with a friend who you think might like it.
You can also support my work directly by streaming sets to
the show's wallet or donating through my website.
Otherwise, onto the show. Carmen, thank you for joining me
on the transformation of value. Thank you for having me.
(01:26):
You are a Hong Kong democracy advocate currently living in
exile in the United Kingdom. There is a 1,000,000 Hong Kong
dollar bounty for information leading to your arrest on some
very serious charges related to national security.
But before we get to that, I wanted to start off by learning
a little bit more about your story and what it was like
(01:48):
growing up in Hong Kong. So my one side of my family,
they were actually from a fish village called Taiyo on Lanta
Island. And I remember when I grew up,
everything in Hong Kong was beautiful and it was quiet and,
(02:15):
but is, you know, it's quite easy to get to anywhere.
Like you could just have a 15 minutes of drive, then you will
be in the countryside. And, and so there were a lot to
do as well. Although it's tiny, it's small,
but it's convenient. And we got to experience
(02:38):
everything in just this tiny city.
So so. One side of your family is from
Lantau Island and then the otherside of your family was New
Territories, or. Yeah, from the New Territories
and my grandparents, my father'sside of the grandparents, they
migrate from China to Hong Kong like many years ago.
(03:03):
So my father was actually born and raised in Hong Kong as well.
And I think it's typical, it's just a typical, you know, Hong
Kong family. And yeah, and they got to live
in the new territories. Yeah, that's interesting.
I think we will get to this a bit later on.
But that relationship between Hong Kong and mainland China is
(03:23):
something I certainly want to explore.
And you know, I was quite lucky.I went to Hong Kong in May last
year. I stayed in Homan Tin on the
dark side of Kowloon, and I had not actually been back since
2018, since prior to the the most recent protests.
And certainly I felt something had really changed just in those
(03:45):
few years. But for you, Carmen, what are
some of your memories of the wayHong Kong was before the 2019
protests in particular? Like do you feel like there's
been a major change since then and how would you characterize
that change? I think Hong Kong has changed
(04:07):
scenes. I was born.
So I, I witnessed the change from the sovereignty and also
the change from, you know, having more closer relationship
with the mainland China. And there were more and more,
you know, people from mainland China migrate to Hong Kong or,
(04:32):
you know, travel to Hong Kong. And that's why, well, it's it
got it, get it gradually got a lot, you know, crowded.
And the cultures were quite different between Hong Kongers
and mainland Chinese. So there were a lot of, you
(04:55):
know, cultural shock between between US and in terms of, you
know, political or, or freedom. I think the 2019 was at the peak
of, you know, we had, we have freedom the most.
(05:15):
I must have to say that this whole society or the political
situation in Hong Kong just gradually deteriorated after
2014, after the Umbrella Movement.
It's just it's never been the same after especially 2019.
And I left Hong Kong in 2021, somy imagination or, you know, my
(05:38):
memories about Hong Kong stopped20/21.
It wasn't at its best version aswell.
And I've heard people who would still travel back to Hong Kong,
they're seeing the businesses and also actually the whole
environment inside of Hong Kong isn't really great now.
(06:01):
And I was also told that a lot of like mainland Chinese
businesses, they, you know, cometo Hong Kong and start their
business in Hong Kong now. So it's it's like mainland
China, as people said for now. It's interesting you mentioned
it wasn't so crowded when you were growing up, and obviously
(06:22):
Hong Kong is an incredibly busy place, but what do you mean by
that in terms of that sense of like the amount of people?
Or was it a difference between sort of the mainland Chinese
coming to Hong Kong that had a different vibe?
Like what do you mean by that? I think is, is in terms of, you
know, like physical space because more and more mainland
(06:48):
Chinese moved to Hong Kong. And so because they, the
policies just allow, you know, 200 families daily to move to
Hong Kong for good from mainlandChina.
And so there are a lot of space in the new territory, which used
(07:09):
to be, you know, countryside or,you know, farms or, you know,
ponds. They just constructed them to,
to housing estates to, you know,huge tall buildings, but you
know, they, they are all just residential buildings and
leaving space getting smaller and smaller and in addition to a
(07:33):
lot of tourists from the mainland China.
So they are just, they were justeverywhere, not only in the
Kowloon side, like tourist side,but also in the New Territories
where they just visit Hong Kong and get their, you know, daily
goods or, you know, daily utensils from Hong Kong back to
(07:57):
China because they just simply believe that things from Hong
Kong are better. Yeah, that's interesting.
I want to dive into that just a little bit.
So you, you mentioned they and of course we're referring to
mainland Chinese. And I think it's an important
distinction between the Communist Party of China and
the, you know, the government and, and the people and in
(08:18):
particular neighboring regions, you know, Guangzhou area, you
know, it's similar, you know, shared language with Cantonese
and you know, there's a lot of overlap.
So this relationship of people coming over the border, these
kind of 200 families a day. Do do you feel like there's
something in that, though that is at odds with what Hong Kong
(08:40):
is like? How would you describe that?
So culturally we are very different from mainland Chinese,
you know, although like neighboring cities like
Guangzhou or Guangdong, they used to speak Cantonese as well,
but not after, you know, 10 or 10 or 15 years ago.
(09:02):
Also, they, they write in simplified Chinese instead of
traditional Chinese, not to mention the ideologies or, you
know, things that they learn from school during the formative
years. And so I think culturally we are
indeed very different, although perhaps some of them will still
(09:26):
speak Cantonese, but we have different dialects of Cantonese.
And I think, you know, the migration policy between
mainland China and Hong Kong, just a, you know, gradual
cultural simulation to Hong Kongers.
Like they wanted us to forget weare Hong Kongers and they want
(09:49):
us to have the identity of beingChinese.
Yeah. Well, I mean, sort of drilling
into that. And so again, this idea of the
handover 1997 and you and I werepretty much just little kids
when that happened. And so it was a historical
moment. And at that time, 1997, the
Basic Law was enshrined, which set up the famous One Country 2
(10:12):
systems arrangement, where Hong Kong retained much of its
democratic system that had been inherited from the British.
And then it was seen to be part of China, though as one country.
And I guess what what I see fromwhat you've said is the sense of
almost a sense of neo colonialism, I guess you could
say, with the way these familiesand these institutions are
(10:35):
coming over into Hong Kong and arguably affecting, diluting
perhaps is the word the the local culture.
I mean, tell me more about what that really means for you.
And especially given that we were both, you know, little kids
when that actually the handover happened.
I mean, how have you seen that? Play out.
So I, I was really a small kid during the transition of
(10:59):
sovereignty. And, but I still remember when
it was, you know, the 1st of July 1997, it's the midnight of
the 30th of June and my parents and I just, we, we sat on silver
(11:19):
and watch the watch the live streaming news.
And we, you know, I, although I was a young kid, I witnessed how
people felt, you know, sad when,you know, when the colonial
government left Hong Kong. But I think people were sad
(11:40):
because of the uncertainty, because we've been, at least
we've been practicing, you know,capitalism and also democracy to
a certain extent, democracy for years.
And, and now we by then, then we, we were in hand of a
(12:06):
communist government during, in you know, in 1997, people didn't
have so much of information. We, you know, Internet wasn't
really trendy by then. And only people with privilege
could have Internet and people could only receive information
(12:27):
from news or from books or, you know, from newspaper.
And I think people were really insecure by then.
And but at the same time, they also had the sense that China,
it's not a very established and welcoming nation in the
(12:49):
international community. And that's for a reason, because
of the history of the People's Republic of China.
And but what I experienced the most was actually from the
education. So when I was, it was during the
(13:13):
Beijing Olympic 2008, it, I was,you know, it was my first year
of secondary school. So my whole primary school
actually was, you know, before the Olympic, I think I saw the
change the most in 2008. And so before that, in my
(13:34):
primary school, it was still, you know, I think it still
encouraged the educational system during the British Hong
Kong government. So a lot of values, a lot of
common sense or you know, the syllabus, the whole thing was
set by the British government orthe British actually follows the
(13:58):
British educational system. After the Beijing Olympic in
2008, we started to have the, you know, liberal studies.
We started to learn, we started to have that national education.
We started to have a change in, you know, in the subject of
(14:20):
Chinese history. We had to learn Chinese history
when we were in secondary school.
And but they didn't talk about the June 4th even in liberal
study, learning about the news, learning about the society, you
know, setting up our critical thinking, as I said, in our
mind. And but we never learned about
(14:44):
these, you know, unfavour unfavourable, you know, history
bit of China. I've just I just learned it
from, you know, my parents and some of our teacher by then they
will still talk about things outside the box.
So apparently it is not allowed in Hong Kong right now.
(15:08):
People could just report, student could report the
teachers of, you know, teaching things that might deem as
endangering the national security.
So it is basically not allowed right now.
But in the past, when I was studying in schools, our teacher
(15:30):
will still talk about those things.
Yeah, absolutely. And as a young person as well,
I'm, I'm interested in talking about some of your work in
politics in Hong Kong and also sort of reflecting on the, the
youthfulness of the 2019 protests and this movement
that's happened lately. Because I've, I've just been
(15:50):
reading my friend's book City onFire, Anthony Daparan, who is a
Hong Kong based lawyer who's written extensively about the
2019 protests. And he sort of speculates this
idea that when the handover happened in 1997, there was
perhaps a vision that China would end up quite different in
(16:12):
the future. And that has changed massively,
as you say, 2008. We've seen the emergence of Xi
Jinping as this kind of monolithic leader.
There's been a lot of changes inin the way China has approached
things and this closing off of China.
But something I want to highlight is that certainly with
these protests, the Hong Kong government systematically
(16:33):
alienated Hong Kong's best and brightest, its youth and the
educated middle class, the people of Hong Kong's future
really were the ones who were there demonstrating during the
protests and yourself included. So how would you reflect on that
generational difference? People your age and younger and
the older people and their approaches to democracy and
freedom. So in the Chinese united
(16:55):
movements, I think people from all generations, we came
together and protest. But there's a huge gap between
my generation and the older and my generation and the younger
generation. And for with the older
(17:15):
generations, I think they have the sense of unity with the
mainland China. And many of them when they, you
know, when they promote democracy in Hong Kong or when
they advocate for democracy in Hong Kong, the very of change of
(17:39):
them would be, you know, China, the mainland China has to be
democratized in order for Hong Kong to democratize, to be
democratized. And but they would believe, you
know, they would believe and they would be happy for the
(18:00):
unity between mainland China andHong Kong.
So they will still embrace the transition of sovereignty.
And but partly some of them, they are, you know, they are
like they embrace the identity as British Hong Kong.
So a lot of them here for now inthe UK, they will still believe
(18:21):
that Hong Kong should be returned to the United Kingdom.
And in our generation, we have aslightly different theory of
change. We think that Hong Kong's rights
to self determination should be restored in order to be
(18:45):
democratized. And that said, because during
the negotiation between the British government and the
Chinese government, Hong Kong was once, as a, you know, colony
of the British government was once on the list of, you know,
(19:05):
self determination in the UnitedNations.
So there was a working group in the United Nation sorting out
the self determination process of a lot of colonies and Hong
Kong was actually one of them. But our name was removed by the
(19:26):
Chinese authority during the negotiation.
And so we think that some of us think that, you know, whichever
pathway future of Hong Kong we choose, Hong Kong should have
our voice in this, you know, transitional, this change of the
(19:50):
whole sovereignty thing. Yeah, Carmen, you were elected
to be a district councillor in Hong Kong, but you left in 2021.
Can you tell me a little bit about that foray into politics?
How did you end up in the position of becoming an elected
representative in Hong Kong? I think if I have to trace the
(20:12):
whole thing, it would be becauseof the student movements in
2012. It was about the national
education that the Hong Kong government tried to implement in
our educational system. And it was a year before my
(20:32):
public exam. So the public exam in Hong Kong
would simply determine which university you will be in or
you, whether you would be, you know, selected to, to in, in the
university. And the student movements
happened by then. And I think my teachers actually
(20:57):
led me to that way. So I basically before the public
exam, I've chosen to study political science in the
university and I got into political science when I was in
university, when I studied in university.
And yeah. And I think the whole thing
(21:20):
just, you know, simply move towards that side of thing.
And and then after I graduated, my only job was actually as a
legislative assistant for a lawmaker in Hong Kong, like a
pro democracy lawmaker in Hong Kong.
(21:40):
And it was 2, two years after I started working for him and it
was the 2019 movements. Yeah, yeah.
So you were elected 2000? 19. 2019 and you mentioned as
well you were deputy secretary general for the Civic Party,
(22:03):
which was the second largest proDemocratic Party, which has
since been forcibly dissolved bythe government.
Now that's interesting, but I dowant to sort of then reflect on
so 2021 though. So you left.
So you were elected, you know, you were very young at that time
getting elected to this very important position, but then
2021 came around and you left Hong Kong.
Can you talk a little bit about what led to that?
(22:25):
So the national security law wasenacted in 2020 and as I
mentioned, I used to work for some pro democracy lawmakers and
they were end up in jail, in prison because of the national
security law, just simply because they joined a pro
(22:49):
democracy primaries ahead of theLegislative Council election in
2020. And as the assistant and as the
councillor, I, you know, I was quite involved during the time.
And in addition that when in 2021 there was a off taking
(23:11):
process enforced by the Hong Kong government to the
councillors in the middle of ourterms as a, you know, elected
councillor, we, we had to, you know, we were forced to take the
patriotic oath towards the PRC government.
And this is not something that Ithink I could do.
(23:35):
I could not pledge, you know, tosupport a communist government,
at least for myself, for what I believe.
So I refused to take the oath and I was forced to resign from
my position. Even after I resigned, I was
heavily surveilled by I don't know who so regards with my
(24:00):
personal safety. I had to leave.
I see. And so you mentioned National
Security Law 2020. Is that just to clarify, is that
that's separate to Article 23 oris that the same thing?
No worries. Different.
OK, different. Thing.
Yeah, Article 73 was just implemented last year.
Yeah, that's right. And Article 23 also relates to
(24:23):
national security though. Yeah, doesn't it?
Because I know you just just earlier in this conversation, we
talked about this idea of self determination.
And this is something that has been levelled against you,
accusations that your your discussions of this idea of self
determination is actually representative of a very
(24:45):
dangerous idea potentially in the eyes of the government.
So tell me more about that, thisidea of conversations and free
speech and talking about the ideas of something like
democracy or independence for Hong Kong.
So the discussion on self determination, I am not the
first one to talk about it definitely is not the first time
that having Hong Kongers to discuss about it.
(25:08):
It was in I think a lot of political ideologies or theory
of change of democratizing Hong Kong.
We started again after the Umbrella Movement in 2014, a lot
of young, you know, young student leaders and scholars,
they started to try to set our femurs of how Hong Kong should
(25:35):
be democratized. And I think the discussion of
self determination started by then.
So it was our generation of people.
We, we had that idea in mind first as well.
And it's just now we are having a vibrant diaspora and next out
(25:58):
Hong Kong community and next outHong Kong civil society.
We just think that it's the right timing to talk about it
again because a lot of us are outside already and the deadline
of 2047 is getting closer day byday.
So we think that we must have topush our democracy movement
(26:23):
forward in this limited time. So we started the discussion
again for now. And I don't I don't think is,
you know, there's a lot of things around self
determination. There's a lot of imagination of
the theory of change and there'sa lot of possibilities as well
(26:46):
on how our destiny should be. So I'm just one of the of the
many in our generation to talk about it.
But it seems that the the authorities, they see talking
about self determination as a form of Hong Kong independency,
(27:06):
you know, as a form of advocating Hong Kong
independency, which is, you know, not something that, yeah,
which is a crime. Well, no, that's interesting to
me because my whole thing commonis conversation.
And you know, I'm very interested in ideas of the
state, the history of political science, ideology, these kinds
of things. And I like to ask questions that
(27:27):
are difficult. And I think this, I do want to
get to China in a moment, but this idea that we can't freely
talk about these ideas, or perhaps worse, we self censor.
And so in polite society, we don't bring it up and we don't
talk about the idea. I think that can lead to very
dangerous outcomes. And coming to China, though,
(27:48):
Carmen, you know, my own personal experience of China is
a little bit out of date now. I haven't been to China in eight
years. I was last in Shanghai.
And, you know, I mean, I had a good time, but this was before
COVID. This was before the Hong Kong
protests. And I have felt certainly
there's more and more of this pro China, pro CCP message
(28:12):
that's kind of coming through. It's kind of a influences, you
see it coming through on YouTube.
I think of it as a psychologicaloperation that's trying to
present the PRC very positively.I want to talk to you about that
because this idea of technology and the influence of media where
we have TikTok and YouTube, it'sall good fast trains, clean
(28:34):
streets, but it's like, it's like this psychological
operation to make it seem like it's OK.
Yeah, definitely. If you look closer into Chinese
news or really, you know, people's news inside of China,
you would know that the the whole society is not as good as
(28:55):
we perceive. And I think a lot of us already
know that there's a, you know, great firewall of the Chinese
Internet blocking people inside of China to receive new from
outside. But at the same time, actually
this fire or block blocking information inside of China.
(29:17):
So people outside couldn't really get, you know, precise
information about China. What we are seeing is a
propaganda, a, you know, a promotion by the authorities.
So often if we are interested inthe situation of China, we also
(29:37):
have to, you know, climb the Great Firewall over the other
side of the Internet inside of China to see what's really
happening inside. And I think one incident is
about the white paper movement. We see a lot of, you know,
things or the reality of the Chinese societies during the
(30:03):
white paper movement because a lot of underground activists
inside of China, they just, you know, try to export the reality
and the real, you know, information about them.
And that was the. White paper Movement.
OK. It was during the during the
pandemic and there the lockdown inside of China is different.
(30:30):
They literally locked it down. The authorities would lock the
people store from outside with alock that they cannot the
residents cannot be unlocked by themselves.
Only the, you know, pandemic control personnel would have the
key. And there was a fire broke out
(30:53):
in Urumuchi in the east Turkish time.
So the Xinjiang, what they're saying, but it's in fact the
east Turkish side and and because of the lockdown, because
of all these sorts of policies, people being locked up inside of
their house, that building, thatpeople in the building could not
(31:18):
make it to. You know they.
Couldn't get out. Yeah, yeah.
They couldn't just get out and people were concerned by then, a
lot of people inside of China were fed up by these, you know,
anti pandemic policies. And so there were a there was a
(31:38):
protest started inside of China and it soon sparked in different
city, different, you know, different places in China.
And so we call it the white paper movements because people
went out to the streets because they know they cannot, you know,
they cannot present any of the political slogans or any of
(32:03):
their, you know, slogans to read, you know, basically.
And. And so they just hold a white
paper out when they went down, went on the streets.
Yeah. And just try to, you know, show
their grievances and show their anger to the 40s.
(32:23):
I say that's very interesting. So we've got again, this this
presentation of China, especially as maybe the US
arguably goes through this decline.
The UK where you are at the moment, as you know, you see
stories as well. You know, it's kind of there's
turmoil, there's it's maybe not such a nice place right at this
(32:44):
moment, But then you see storiesof China, fast trains, clean
streets, you know, everything's convenient.
You can pay with everything on your phone.
There's a lot of these kind of narratives and they're very
technological. And I think this is part of this
idea of the techno state, the techno nationalism of China,
where technology is part of the political apparatus.
(33:06):
And so I find that very interesting that you see this
stuff come through on TikTok andand, and YouTube and just kind
of, you know, reaffirming that there is maybe some truth to
what's coming through, but there's also a whole lot that's
not making it actually out of China.
And that's what you don't get tosee.
(33:27):
But Carmen, I do also want to just talk briefly about the the
relationship between the United States and China and the
situation because there have been critiques, you know, about
the role of NGOs and organizations and kind of this
sort of the Cold War, this information war that's taking
place between the US and China. And I know you're currently
(33:49):
based with the Hong Kong Democracy Council.
You're currently working with the Hong Kong Democracy Council.
It's Washington based, nonpartisan, nonprofit
organization talking about democracy in Hong Kong.
But how would you situate that relationship between US
entities, Chinese entities, and that kind of propaganda war
that's taking place? I don't see people working in
(34:14):
the human rights field, you know, going against the
propaganda wall. We raise the awareness of human
rights issues and raise the awareness, try to push
democratic agenda of our homeland.
It's personal to us. It's not just about propaganda
and but I think that propaganda from, you know, exporting
(34:41):
propaganda from China is actually harming the
democracies. Yeah.
I, I, I don't, I don't quite agree with the state statement
that, you know, US organizationsare, you know, going against
propaganda of China. We were just trying to present
(35:02):
the reality and not no matter it's inside of Hong Kong or, you
know, inside of China. And it, the propaganda doesn't
only harm, you know, people likeus, like the dissidents or, you
know, the diaspora, but it also,you know, gradually harming the
(35:24):
democracies themselves. Like, you can see a lot of
people in the US, they are usingTikTok now and they're all, you
know, the little red book, whichactually, yeah.
Which? Yeah, which actually is a book
about Mao Zedong. That's right.
(35:45):
You know, is a is a commerce, you know, dialogue of the little
Red books, what it means. And these social media
platforms, you know, do not onlyprovide a social media
platforms, they have not to mention the back doors, right?
Just, you know, to see the contents itself.
(36:07):
A lot of them were actually, youknow, promoting or praising the
communists and, you know, praising it of a terror regime
as well. And I think it's very dangerous
for people in the democracy to receive this informations.
Yeah. Well, in particular, I think
this is what I was getting at the, the idea that maybe right
(36:31):
at this moment, the United States and the UK and and some
other parts of the world are going through a bit of a
decline. There's no idea of there's maybe
a recession. The economy is not so great.
China from the outside looks like it's doing great.
Streets are clean, trains work these kinds of things.
You know, there's, there's like the optics of it.
And I think that's, I guess whatI'm getting at that there is
(36:52):
this information war that most people aren't aware of.
There's a lot of nuance to it. And so when you start using a
little Red Book or TikTok, you are actually kind of consuming.
That directly. Their propaganda.
Yeah. Yeah.
And I guess just dwelling on that as well, the idea of the
(37:13):
framing of what you're doing as a native of Hong Kong, I think
it's very interesting. So just tell me briefly your
work with the Hong Kong Democracy Council.
What? Tell me more about your
organization. How did that form?
Like what are your, what are your, your goals?
So for now, we will say we, we were founded in Washington DC
(37:35):
and in 2019, for now, we won't say we are based in US because
we also extended our office in the UK.
That's why, you know, that's whyI joined HADC 1 character of
our, you know, one characteristic of our
organization that I am always proud of is that we are a team
(37:59):
of Hong Kongers. Everyone of us are Hong Kongers
and we are from all walks of life.
We had anonymous activist, we had elected official like
myself. We have student leaders in the
past and we also have like, American borns, Hong Kongers,
(38:22):
which, you know, most of his time, most of their time, they
and they weren't born and raisedin Hong Kong, but they still
inherit that Hong Kong identity and embrace it and try to
promote it. And so I think our work is not
just, you know, talking about Hong Kong or, you know, talking
(38:45):
about the situation in Hong Kong, but it's about us.
It's about how we shape our democracy movements, especially
now we are in exile. All of us are in exile and, and
it is quite important for us, you know, to, to, you know, to
pass on. No, we don't want to pass on the
(39:08):
democracy movements from generations.
We want, you know, to achieve our goals in our lifetime.
Yeah. And yeah.
I was just going to ask then, Sothis idea then, so the goals
here really quite clear. A Democratic, a Democrat, a
democracy in Hong Kong, that is,again, that isn't an illegal
(39:31):
thing to argue for currently under the national security
laws. But do you think, I mean, what,
what's the future for this? What's where's it going?
I mean, are you, are you seeing an opportunity for this idea to
come together? It's a very good question
because we are asking ourselves day by day as well, whether what
(39:52):
we are doing is really mean something, really, you know,
achieving something. And my answer, I would say for
now is yes. I think we are raising a lot of
awareness of Hong Kong in different places of the world.
(40:14):
Our visibility is, is definitely, you know.
You know, getting higher and, and I think most important is
that we, you know, apart from people who came from the civil
society back in Hong Kong, rejoining the diaspora, rejoin
(40:35):
the diaspora civil society. We have new people now.
We have a lot of younger generations.
They they are also dedicating their time to the movement and I
think passing on or you know, having people from the newer
(40:55):
generation is very important to a democracy movement.
And I think we are going into that saying we are gradually,
bit by bits, achieving a lot of things.
Well, that's been my experience as well with young Hong Kongers
that I've met. Certainly an interest, a great
interest in this idea of democracy.
And just one more thing, I know this is quite personal, but just
yesterday the police in Hong Kong have been questioning two
(41:20):
of your relatives and this is, Iguess, very concerning.
Is that something you can talk about in terms of these tactics
of the police to target familiesthat are back in Hong Kong?
Yeah. So as we talked about it a
little bit earlier there, there are now 2 laws regarding
(41:41):
national security inside of HongKong.
One is the national security lawenacted in 2020.
The other one is actually the Article 23 implemented last
year. And the Article 23 was actually
a 21 year discussion in Hong Kong 22, I think because the
(42:05):
plan for enacting the Article 23started in 2002 when I was seven
years old. But by then the governments
faced a lot of disagreements in the society and, and they they
paused, just paused the whole legislation.
But it came back just last year.And the legislation process came
(42:28):
with just 50 days in the Legislative Council from having
the blue paper to it became the law.
And the reason I talk about it is because before my family back
in Hong Kong got interrogated, Iwas actually wanted and by the
(42:51):
Hong Kong government in the lastChristmas Eve with 1,000,000
Hong Kong dollar bounties. And so the arrest warrants were
under the national security law.So the 2020 version and they the
(43:11):
tactics of, you know, going after our family back in Hong
Kong, the tactics of cancelling our passports, the tactics of
freezing our accounts, all thesepower were legislative power.
All these, you know, enforcementpower to be precise are come
(43:32):
from the Article 23. So they use the louder version
of national security law to to place bounty on peoples.
But these sort of, you know, enhuying tactics they are using
is actually under the Article 23.
So not only these national security related legislation
(43:55):
they would use to to go after activism in exile, but also
other legislation or other laws in Hong Kong they weaponize like
sedition, you know, like rioting, which is a the public
ordered law inside of Hong Kong and.
Yeah, now that's, that's interesting.
(44:15):
And I mean, also people may be aware of the stories in the
mainland China of people's families being invited to have a
have a cup of tea at a police station, which is kind of the
euphemism for coming and having a a serious talk and
interrogation at a police station.
One other thing I just wanted todwell on, just conscious of
time. Carmen, you are also a freedom
(44:38):
fellow at the Human Rights Foundation.
Is that right? Yeah.
Now the human, the HRF, Human Rights Foundation are big
proponents of Bitcoin and they see Bitcoin as freedom
technology where you can have money that isn't able to be
stopped or censored by the state.
Do you have any comments on whatBitcoin maybe means to you or
(45:00):
what you what you think about Bitcoin?
So as a Freedom Fellow for now, as a current cohort of the
Freedom Fellow, I'm still in thelearning process of a lot of
these new ideas. And, you know, to a human rights
activist, I think this is very important because just as I
said, my bank account was freeze, was frozen by the by the
(45:24):
authorities. And a lot of these, you know,
like national security tactics and, you know, transnational
repression efforts that the HongKong government is conducting
actually bar us from receiving more, you know, financial
support from donations or, you know, grants and the bitcoins
(45:47):
or, you know, these new ideas offinancial freedom sexually would
help, you know, the developmentsor, you know, simply just the
existence of, of our organization of our
organizational work. So I'm still new to the idea,
but I know that a lot of people in this space, they have been
(46:12):
utilizing the bitcoins or, you know, some other financial tools
to generate money or, you know, to generate grants to help with
the discourse. So yeah.
That's awesome. And just finally then, Carmen,
if if you had one thing you wantto share about overall the work
(46:36):
you're doing for democracy in Hong Kong 1 message you would
like to share, what would that be?
I think we have a lot of lot of discussion around fear and
around self censorship at the moment.
Because when the government goesafter us like the activists or
(46:57):
more more outspoken ones, a lot of hippo in the diaspora, they
may just be supporters or they have, you know, less involvement
in the movement. They would be very afraid of
continuously speaking up. And I, I'm seeing that becoming
(47:21):
a phenomenon which is unhealthy for our movements.
So I do really want to say that I sometimes would also be scared
by these transnational repression, by these repression,
by these, I don't know, nonsensetactics that the authorities are
(47:42):
using. But I think it would be safer
and it would be, you know, we would maximize our efforts if we
are all together. And I think moving forward, a
democracy movement is means thatit's essential to have people
(48:07):
going together for one goal. So I do hope that not only Hong
Kongers, but also us, our allies, our supporters,
especially people actually, we're born and raised in
democracies, should also continue to support different,
(48:27):
you know, discourse or differentmovements trying to shape
democracies better. Yes, it's a ongoing process and
conversation. And of course, freedom of speech
and the ability to ask questionsas critical to all of this.
Carmen, thank you so much for your time.
If people want to follow you, they want to learn more about
(48:48):
your story, what's the best place for them to to to to do
that? So I'm on every social media,
but I would, if people want to learn more about the situation
in Hong Kong, I would recommend everyone to follow our
organization's platforms, which is HADC, the Hong Kong Democracy
(49:10):
Council. Yeah.
Are you on Little Red Book? No I'm not on TikTok and it's
your book though. All right, Carmen, thank you so
much. Yeah.
Thank you so much. Thank you.
Thank you for listening, I am Cody Allingham.
And that was the transformation.Of value, if you would like to
support this show, please consider making a donation
(49:32):
either through my website or by directly tipping to the show's
Bitcoin wallet. Or just pass this episode on to
a friend who you think may enjoyit.
And you can always e-mail me at hello at
thetransformationofvalue com.
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