‘Non-violent’ Hong Kong

In a recent column, Washington Post columnist George Will tried to draw a parallel between the Hong Kong protest and the American Revolution: “Lam and Beijing should, however, remember that events can generate their own logic: in the early 1770, restive American colonists, chafing under some annoyances impose by London, insisted that they sought only the restoration of status quo — enjoyment of their traditional British rights.”

But he fails to realize that the situation was used by some political hacks to contrive the so-called American Revolution.

It may be recalled that when 1770, the

British Parliament revoked the Stamp Act, some Americans were not happy.

In the leading urban area, obscure political hacks such as Sam Adams of Boston had achieved political success and public renown by denouncing the threat of the British tyranny from the moment of the Stamp Act. No new dish of outrage from Britain meant lean days or bad home-cooking for them. As time passed, the popularity of politicians that dependent on British tyranny, diminished inexorably.

Then in 1772, the Parliament made some rules with American implications.

While re-structuring the affairs of the East India Company, they lowered duties on the British tea that made it cheaper and more competitive with that smuggled into the colonies from Holland. So-called patriots like Sam Adams saw in this a British design to seduce the Sons of Liberty into subjugation.

They saw in it a British attempt to undermine American liberty.

So Adams and his followers decided to put a stop to all this and in December 1772, hundred Sons of Liberty, disguised as Indians, boarded three ships in Boston Harbor and “in no time,” according to Adams, “all the teas inside were immersed in the sea, without the least damage to private property.”

Of course, the East India Company considered their tea as private property and by their account 3,000 pounds of private property were wantonly destroyed, triggering a process leading to the so-called American War of Independence.

So the Hong Kong protesters and Beijing should not look to the American Revolution as a model. They should look to the non-violent political movement led by Mahatma Gandhi to bring freedom in India.

Gandhi totally opposed any violence in the name of independence.

Here are his own words: “If India makes violence her creed, I will not care to live in India. She will fail to evoke any pride in me.” Hong Kong democracy activists should reject the violent American Revolution and follow Gandhian non-violent political struggle.