Have You Seen the Drone Footage of Hong Kong's Protests? It's Epic.

Epic is a word that gets thrown around way too often, but in the case of Hong Kong's pro-democracy protests it is justified.

Yesterday, Facebook user "Nero Chan" captured on camera 100,000 people standing up against China for their right to a representative government. His edited footage on Facebook already has over 800,000 views, and a longer, music-free version on Youtube has more than 225,000 views.

Watch the latter below:

 

The video speaks for itself, but for more information about the peaceful "umbrella protesters," the cops tear-gassing them, and the momentum this movement is rapidly gaining, read in-depth coverage by Reason's Anthony Fisher here.

Also, check out Reason's new landing page on television, politics, and the transformation of media here.

Comments

[Pro Libertate]

Chinese oppression is no joke, and it's one of the reasons talk about them being the next big thing are misguided. They have massive political problems that are going to explode at some point.

[Idle Hands]

Paper Tiger.

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

Just the other day, I had someone tell me that we were just like China. Because KOCH BROTHERS!!!!

[Rusty 5hackleford]

Thank The Young Turks for that.

[John]

I am a bit torn about this. One the one hand, the Chinese government is a horrible force of evil and it would be a great thing to see the people of China rise up and dispose of it. On the other hand, that happening could very well result in all kinds of chaos and death. China following its historical pattern and falling apart into chaos would be a massive disaster.

I think, however, something big is going to happen there sooner rather than later. I just don't see how it goes on forever like it is.

[Pro Libertate]

It's possible to have a tyranny overthrown without mass death. It sort of happened in the Soviet Union, though, of course, they're hitting that reset button that Clinton foolishly gave them.

[John]

It did happen in the Soviet Union. That remains to this day the most miraculous and amazing thing that has occurred in my lifetime. I would love to believe it could happen again in China. I am, however, not optimistic, given China's history, that it will.

[Idle Hands]

Well their was wide spread theft after the collapse.

[UnCivilServant]

I predict another era or warlordism. You would also see strong independence movements in Kashgar (Xinjiang) and Tibet, possibly other conquered regions as well.

[John]

There is an enormous difference between the big international cities like Hong Kong and Shang Hi and the rest of the country. I could totally see those places becoming city states connected to the world economy while the rest of the country sinks back into some kind of modern feudalism.

[Idle Hands]

Isn't that how the country pretty much functions as is?

[UnCivilServant]

The local princelings don't typically go to war with each other because their ovelords in Beijing still have control. Post-revolution continental China would have internal warfare between fiefs.

[Restoras]

So, same China as before the ChiComs?

[EDG reppin' LBC]

As a bit of a Sinophile myself, I think China could peacefully slough off the communist bullshit. Yeah, historically the country has devolved into violence when there is a regime change. But something feels different this time. It's a modern world, and much of the Chinese population has a modern mindset, and understands the broader world. In the past, violence could be justified because the peasantry simply didn't know any better. But with cellphones, the internet, etc. it just seems like the citizenry wouldn't be duped/controlled by warlords, the military, charismatic communist cadre or whatever. At least, I hope I'm right.

[MegaloMonocle]

I'm not worried about the Chinese population getting all violent.

I'm worried about the ChiComs getting all violent, at which point the population either gets all violent right back, or goes into another few generations of quasi-slavery.

[EDG reppin' LBC]

I think at this point, most of the ChiComs upper echelon have adopted capitalism. They use their status in the party/government to gain an advantage over the citizens. If push comes to shove, they may non-violently give up that status, if only to preserve the capitalism.

[Hyperion]

They've adopted cronyism. They learned that from us, and we're now striving to out crony them.

[Restoras]

The upper echelon ChiComs may have adopted capitalism, but what they haven't adopted is the idea of being voted out of power.

They will do everything in there power to remain in power, up to and including rolling the tanks.

[The Last American Hero]

They are more like mob bosses than rich capitalists.

[Heroic Mulatto]

it just seems like the citizenry wouldn't be duped/controlled by warlords, the military, charismatic communist cadre or whatever

What about charismatic religious leader? Based on historical precedent, I can totally see Falun Gong or some other group lead another rebellion, be it Yellow Turban, Red Turban, White Lotus, Taiping, or Boxer.

With any luck, this time it will be the White Tigress Rebellion.

[Aloysious]

I've never heard a woman talk quite like that. I love her, in my own feeble way.

[John]

I hope you are right. The other problem is that every Chinese person I have met has an inferiority and persecution complex a mile wide and 20 feet deep. They remind me a lot of how the Germans in the late 19th Century are described. By any objective measure they are a powerful and should be a rich and secure country. But they have a long list of historic grudges they think needed settling and experienced so much collective failure over the centuries, they are incredibly insecure and overcompensate for it by extreme arrogance and sense of entitlement.

I worry about them panicking and starting big wars the way Germany did in the 20th Century. The Chinese are an insecure and dangerous people.

[kinnath]

The Chinese are focused on stealing intellectual property from the West and then jumping to the head of the line. Unless there is a profit to be made from internal conflict, I don't think there will be major warfare within China as it rolls over to brutal crony capitalism.

[Restoras]

People in power do everything they can to remain in power. While I hope the ChiComs don't roll the tanks in I wouldn't be surprised.

Back in 1989 it seemed like China was on the cusp of something amazing - and it was - until the people in power got scared of not being in power anymore. The world was shocked at the time - and doesn't seem to be any wiser.

[Sam Haysom]

Exactly. Except the Germans had really been kicked around beginning with the Thirty Years War right up to the War of National Liberation against Napoleon. This isnt a grudge this is an inferiority complex, as you correctly state, and it resembles nothing so much as the early stages of Russian communism when the Russian people where genuinely enthusiastic about trying to settle the score with the hated West. And Germans didn't have the added humiliation of seeing their women out-marry at an astonishing rate in the West which undoubtedly filters back to China. How does overthrowing the PRC get one access to a wife? One only has to look at Russia to see that surrendering communist power means an exodus of eligible women looking for greener pastures.

[gaoxiaen]

Everyone here in Taiwan is watching with interest. Surprisingly, very few teenagers here know about the Tiananmen Square protest and its consequences.

[Paul.]

I think if there's any country right now that can go through major political reform peacefully, I'd say it's China.

[Idle Hands]

I think you are selling Syria short here.

[UnCivilServant]

We short sold Syria around the Arab spring and made a mint.

[Idle Hands]

I think we oversold the Arab spring and look liked retards.

[Paul.]

Who's 'we' white man?

[Idle Hands]

The royal we.

[MegaloMonocle]

Technically, Idle, I think we overbought the Arab Spring.

Except, of course, in Iran, where we shorted the fuck out of it.

[Paul.]

Except, of course, in Iran, where we shorted the fuck out of it.

I shorted the fuck out of all of it. Egypt did surprise me in that it got further than I thought with its elections (results not surprising, though), but then had a laugh when the original Mubarak establishment swept back into power with the quiet nod from the West.

[Juice]

Well, Iran isn't Arab so...

[Idle Hands]

And Egypt had a relatively peaceful coup for what it is worth, though there wasn't to much reform.

[UnCivilServant]

It was the post coup bloodletting and show trials for both the coup and counter-coup that disqualified it.

[Idle Hands]

your such a glass half empty guy.

[UnCivilServant]

Not really more of a "you made the glass too tall" kind of guy.

[Paul.]

Relatively peaceful coup that ended with the same people in charge when the new, popular democratically elected government was re-overthrown by the Mubarak establishment.

[John]

I would be curious to hear your reasons for thinking that.

[Paul.]

China and its people have too much to lose economically. Historically, violent reform tends to take place when a people have very little to lose, and everything to gain. China is not the same country it was during the Cultural Revolution.

[John]

Most of China is still massively poor. There are by raw numbers a lot of people who have a lot to lose. But the population of China is so large, those numbers are by comparison pretty small. The majority of Chinese, meaning like 700 million or more people, have very little to lose economically. And that is just staggering to consider.

[Paul.]

This is true, but I'm not versed in what the poor rural chinese want from their government? My impression is that this is largely a movement of relatively affluent, younger Chinese who are interested in adopting a more Western-style democratic process.

If the Chinese can displace massive numbers of rural poor* to build the Three Gorges damn, and we hardly hear a peep of protest, I'm not entirely convinced the rural poor are will support or influence major political reform.

I see political reform coming mostly from the very people who'd most likely enter politics.

*rural poor who were living in villages many hundreds of years old, and still lived same way as their ancestors. The history lost by that project is staggering.

[Pulseguy]

Honk Kong Chinese are not the same people as Mainland Chinese. Different culture entirely, or almost entirely.

However, more and more Mainland Chinese will be and are wanting to live like Hong Kong, and not as they do under the jackboots in the PRC. That group, the wealthy, will be watching this uprising with more than interest. It could become a trigger for flight, capital and people.

[straffinrun]

Been living in East Asia for 2 decades. The Chinese people are despised by the South Koreans, Japanese, Vietnamese, Phillipinos, Indonesians etc. At least that was what I took out of it. Personally, I don't mind them, but if all their neighbors hate the people themselves, well, I see a war a brewin'.

[Juice]

And the Chinese despise those people right back, especially the Japanese.

[Restoras]

I am sure the Chinese would not turn their back on some good old fashioned payback for Manchuria if the opportunity presented itself.

But hey, what do I know. The POTUS says that we are long past fighting over lines on a map, blah blah blah.

[UnCivilServant]

100,000 protestors. That's what? 1% of the city's population?

(1.38% actually)

*insert snark about majority rule here*

[Brandon]

Mandate!

[Pulseguy]

My thought, too. However, it really, really goes against the grain for Han peoples to speak out against authority. Not to mention it is actually dangerous, for real, to protest in China. 100,000 is a big number in this circumstance.

However, compare it to 400,000 revelers in NYC for the Climate Fest. That is a small number considering.

I would think 100,000 in HK, is a bigger number by some magnitude than 400,000 in NYC.

[UnCivilServant]

Especially since those 400,000 were bussed in, not local.

[Hyperion]

I'm sure if the Chinese asked, Obama would be more than willing to murder drone these protesters. For the children, of course.

[db]

The HK protesters have been very pointedly vocal about keeping peaceful, which is a very good idea. Giving any excuse at all for China to apply the "terrorist" label to them would be very bad.

[Hyperion]

While here in the states, all it takes to be labeled a terrorist group is for you to be someone the current administration doesn't like.

[Restoras]

I think the ChiComs could affix whatever label to the protesters that suited them, and would also motivate the lowly Chinese army grunt to plow his tank right through them, regardless if they arm themselves or not.

[gaoxiaen]

They have to be careful or Beijing might go Ferguson in HK.

[Ron]

thats what real protester looks like it seams peace full and I haven't heard of any looting like would occur in America

[UnCivilServant]

They also clean up their own trash and keep of the grass (seriously, look at the green patches in the video)

[Restoras]

They love rules.

[Hyperion]

You probably are not going to see looting like you would in Murika. Asians seem to have a lot of restraint and ability to behave themselves in crisis situation. Take for instance, the tsunami and Fukushima disaster in Japan. Literally no looting at all. Imagine if something like that happened in Detroit or Philadelphia?

But according to popular lefty culture today, Asians are almost as evil as whitey and if both would just disappear off the planet right now, utopia would appear and all the worlds problems would be gone.

[Paul.]

Imagine if something like that happened in Detroit or Philadelphia?

There's nothing left to loot in those places... the government already took it all.

[Hyperion]

The mobs would find something to loot or smash I'm sure, no matter how worthless it might be.

[Heroic Mulatto]

Asians seem to have a lot of restraint and ability to behave themselves in crisis situation.

Really? Could you kindly explain then what the fuck happened to the neighborhood I resided in circa 2008 when two entire shopping complexes were burnt to the ground and some kid got his brains blow out in an alleyway near Sam Liam Din Daeng?

[Hyperion]

Well, I'm sure there are exceptions HM. I didn't claim that Asians never get violent, we all know better than that. I could just bring up Pol Pot and Cambodia or Vietnam if I wanted a good example.

What I was trying to say is that overall, put in the same situation, Asians tend to be better behaved than some other races, including whites for the most part.

[Heroic Mulatto]

What I was trying to say is that overall, put in the same situation, Asians tend to be better behaved than some other races, including whites for the most part.

And what I'm saying, from personal eyewitness experience, is that's horsepucky.

It has nothing to do with race, or even in this instance, culture, but with socioeconomic class. Were the upper middle class of NOLA running amok during Katrina? As mentioned above, when people have nothing to lose is when they resort to mob violence. And Chinese History 101 is a timeline of violent mob after violent mob.

[Hyperion]

Yes, you have a valid point, but I'm not trying to say that violence has nothing do with poverty, of course it does, it's like that everywhere.

Most of the Asians I know are quite well off, so maybe that's why my experience with them has been so good. But I know of quite a few rich white Americans who are crude and obnoxious assholes, not so much with Asians.

[Brandon]

I could just bring up Pol Pot and Cambodia or Vietnam if I wanted a good example.

Or, closer to the subject at hand, Mao. You really have no point. Other than the examples of the Japanese, who are a mostly homogeneous culture but are distinct from other Asian cultures, you're just talking out your ass.

[Hyperion]

Pizz off, Braindead.

[Paul.]

Asians are not a singular culture, so Hyperion's use of the term is... unfortunate.

[Hyperion]

I know they are not a singular culture, damnit! No one race is a singular culture. Let's just put it this way, all of the Asians I've ever been around seem to be overall more polite and civilized than most folks. A generalization for sure, but I've in general had very good experiences around Asians, Japanese, Chinese, Korean, Vietnamese, all of them seem to be very well mannered and polite. And I don't ever remember being a little afraid for my safety when driving through an all Asian neighborhood. Just sayin, make what you want of it.

[Pro Libertate]

Americans don't have a singular culture, either, but no one worries about upsetting us.

[Hyperion]

That's because we're debils. Except the liberals, they're ok.

[Heroic Mulatto]

all of the Asians I've ever been around seem to be overall more polite and civilized than most folks

One day spent with my brothers-in-law will disabuse you of that notion. 🙂

[Hyperion]

Heh, I do have a Korean co-worker who is quite crazy. Violent? I don't think so, but pretty damn crazy.

[Kure'i]

Or my ex.

[Paul.]

All I'm trying to say is hearing the Vietnamese language is like the sexiest thing ever.

[Hyperion]

Isn't Vietnamese the only Asian language that is somewhat based on the Latin character set?

[Paul.]

Isn't Vietnamese the only Asian language that is somewhat based on the Latin character set?

I don't know... never thought about it. It may be another case of a culture not having a written language so they adopted it.

[gaoxiaen]

The Vietnamese used to use Chinese characters (with some characters specific to the Vietnamese language), like several other East Asian countries until a Jesuit priest, Alexandre de Rhodes, invented a Romanized script for Vietnam in the 17th century. Functional literacy is near universal in Vietnam, whereas it's rather spotty in China due to 60,000 + characters/logograms (estimates vary widely).

[Restoras]

Me so horny!

Yep, that works for me...

[Brandon]

Good thing nothing like this could happen here in America...because the person flying that drone would've been choked out and arrested within minutes. Land of the free!

[Hyperion]

If it did, unless it was a crazed mob of leftest lunatics trashing up the streets or a park, the news headlines would read like this:

Crazed gang of violent teabaggers, numbering around 100 have to be restrained by the authorities to protect the public.

[Aloysious]

Suggested soundtrack.

[Pulseguy]

I think I'd go short on HK real estate right about now. China won't put up with this.

Should be good for Canadian real estate.

Just thinking like a developer right now.

[solders21]

This is huge!! Why are cops so cruel? Doesn't they have anything better to do ;O

[Haritis]

This is huge :O