And that's a perfectly defensible position, as long you apply it equally.
Many of the protests in Hong Kong have been anything but peaceful. They are throwing Molotov cocktails, destroying buildings, smashing and flipping cars, setting fires, breaking into the Legislative Council building, taking over the airport, physically attacking the police.
In Hong Kong, the protests began over an extradition bill which would have subjected Hong Kongers to Mainland China's opaque justice system. That's a pretty good cause for protest, but it doesn't strike me as significantly more noble than wanting the police in the US to stop shooting young black men, for instance.
Here's my weird position: I support the Hong Kong protesters and their goals, and even their methods. At the same time, I think it's weird that Western media consistently portrays the police in Hong Kong as aggressive. To my mind, they've been significantly _more restrained_ than the police in most Western countries would be.
If people are rioting, it's perfectly natural the police would take aggressive actions to stop that. No one gets to decide that it's okay to riot without repercussion.
At the same time, some of the fastest positive change that has happened in society came as a result of rioting. Only history gets to decide if it was justified.
Many of the protests in Hong Kong have been anything but peaceful. They are throwing Molotov cocktails, destroying buildings, smashing and flipping cars, setting fires, breaking into the Legislative Council building, taking over the airport, physically attacking the police.
In Hong Kong, the protests began over an extradition bill which would have subjected Hong Kongers to Mainland China's opaque justice system. That's a pretty good cause for protest, but it doesn't strike me as significantly more noble than wanting the police in the US to stop shooting young black men, for instance.
Here's my weird position: I support the Hong Kong protesters and their goals, and even their methods. At the same time, I think it's weird that Western media consistently portrays the police in Hong Kong as aggressive. To my mind, they've been significantly _more restrained_ than the police in most Western countries would be.
If people are rioting, it's perfectly natural the police would take aggressive actions to stop that. No one gets to decide that it's okay to riot without repercussion.
At the same time, some of the fastest positive change that has happened in society came as a result of rioting. Only history gets to decide if it was justified.