250,000 people in HK protest for democracy

[Tingkai]

Lucked out and managed to get today off so I joined the pro-democracy march in Hong Kong. Pretty amazing to see. Organizers said there were 250,000 people protesting. Cops said there were about 60,000, but that's just political BS.

The crowd was shoulder to shoulder across three lanes of a street and the march was about four kilometers long. The march began at about 3 p.m. and ended at about 8 p.m.

And no violence. The protesters even stopped at intersections to let traffic through.

After the first big march about four years ago (estimated one million people), the government backed off from passing a draconian national security bill. The next two marchs helped push out Hong Kong's first post-colonial leader.

It'll be interesting to see what happens after this march. The government has refused to allow full elections for the city's chief executive (basically our mayor) and instead proposed minor changes to the election system.

There's simply no reason not to have full democracy in Hong Kong. The city has an established judicial system that can act as a balance on the power of the executive, unlike the mainland. People here are generally well educated. And there's relatively low levels of corruption.

Wonder if UR was in the march.

[DinoDoc]

If he was, it was to inform on the leaders of the march.

[Tingkai]

Most of the pics I took with my camera phone didn't turn out that great, but here's one of them.

[Kuciwalker]

[Sava]

the lady in the bottom of the pic is giving you a dirty look... like "GET THE **** OUTTA MY WAY!!!"

[Dr Strangelove]

............more like "Oh great, he's sending my picture to the police. We're all dead now."

[Pekka]

Strangelove, haha my thoughts exactly!!!!

It's still not safe to promote democracy all over China. There are many political prisons.

[Mao]

Originally posted by Dr Strangelove
............more like "Oh great, he's sending my picture to the police. We're all dead now."

Silly Strangelove, they just get sent to the "Super Happy Fantastic Camps!"

arbeit macht frei after all... (I can't speak Germany...is it obvious?)

[Urban Ranger]

Re: 250,000 people in HK protest for democracy

Originally posted by Tingkai
Lucked out and managed to get today off so I joined the pro-democracy march in Hong Kong. Pretty amazing to see. Organizers said there were 250,000 people protesting. Cops said there were about 60,000, but that's just political BS.

Last time the organisers said there were 500,000 people marched on 7/1 too. More academic researches that were done later showed a figure somewhere between a bit less than 70,000 to a bit more than 120,000.

This time before the march the demostrators loosely filled up a bit more than 5 football fields in Victoria Park. Each football field, officially, can be as big as 100 yards by 130 yards.

If you can fill 250,000 people in that space, more power to you. Most likely you can't squeeze in more than 60,000 - 70,000 with reasonable spaces in between.

[C0ckney]

democracy

[Tingkai]

Re: Re: 250,000 people in HK protest for democracy

Originally posted by Urban Ranger


Last time the organisers said there were 500,000 people marched on 7/1 too. More academic researches that were done later showed a figure somewhere between a bit less than 70,000 to a bit more than 120,000.

This time before the march the demostrators loosely filled up a bit more than 5 football fields in Victoria Park. Each football field, officially, can be as big as 100 yards by 130 yards.

If you can fill 250,000 people in that space, more power to you. Most likely you can't squeeze in more than 60,000 - 70,000 with reasonable spaces in between.

For previous marches, the accepted number is 500,000 people, and that is backed by well-researched calculations.

There are six football pitches in Victoria Park and the pitches were packed with people when I was there at the start of the march.

As people started marching, more people were going into Victoria Park. It was a steady flow of people over four and a half hours.

You can't judge the turn out by how many people were in Victoria Park at a given time. You have to look at how many people were on the march route and how long the march lasted.

Definitely more than 200,000. The 250,000 is probably accurate.

[mindseye]

At least UR agrees that the march existed.

I call that progress.

UR, for the record, how do you feel about HK voters choosing their chief executive (as opposed to HK businessmen validating Beijing's choice)?

[alva]

And no violence. The protesters even stopped at intersections to let traffic through.

Y'all don't have this 'protesting' concept down, do you.


Seriously: