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throwaway1997

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I was born and raised in China. I sometimes use this account to speak freely about the regime I live in.

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Our biggest advantage is that we are a trilingual society with a deep understanding of both western and Chinese culture. Although there are many people in the mainland who have studied abroad, the ability to understand the needs of Chinese and Western business is definitely not as pervasive. But I agree that HK isn't anywhere as near valuable to China, especially in terms of finance.

The summary is that before the handover in 1997 everyone was offered a status called British National (Overseas). Anyone who accepted this offer retained their nationality after the handover, and anyone who didn't permanently lost their chance to be a BNO.

It may have made sense technically but China has a huge army and HK is dependent on water, electricity and food which comes from the mainland. The mainland government made very clear that if HK wasn't returned, they would cut off the water supply.

It will disproportionately take away the more wealthy and better educated. The majority of HKers live in public housing, pay no tax and are unlikely to have the means to live in the UK since there will be no recourse to public funds.

This level of brain drain, as in the other mass migration events away from HK, could trigger the government to loosen their grip.

My argument is nothing to do with political correctness or the current cancel culture, which I shall not express an opinion on.

I'm just saying that if I am arrested and at the trial it is stated that "xyz has an app called Riot which she used for coordinating illegal gatherings", some people in the jury may understand this as proof of intent. This is especially true in a multilingual society where the app name will be translated into Chinese for the benefit of the jury.

This is why I would not use an app called Riot in Hong Kong. If you are unable to understand or emphasize with our situation then you will indeed keep arguing against me and there's nothing I can say to convince you.

I guess you are lucky that you don't live here then. At the moment, just seeing the Telegram icon on the home screen will result in police scrutinising you more. Having something called "Riot" on your phone when people are currently being accused of Rioting for just being in the wrong place at the wrong time is just a liability. This is especially true with the new National Security Law which is being past imminently now.

This is welcome news. Some groups in Hong Kong have been considering it as an alternative to Telegram but the name has been discouraging as in this climate it could be used as evidence against anyone involved in protesting activity.

Hope the new name is either more abstract or closely aligned to what the software actually does.