Opinion | How the western media deliberately hypes HK's downfall

By Tom Fowdy

It has been a predictable outcome of Hong Kong's implementation of the Article 23 legislation that the western media have responded by proclaiming the end of the city as an international financial centre and business hub. As an editorial by the pro-US establishment Wall Street Journal is titled: "Hong Kong's Great Leap backwards" and as the leading story on the BBC world service on Monday morning states: "Security law brings Hong Kong's future as business hub into question." According to both of these, amongst numerous other reports, Article 23 somehow makes Hong Kong "uninvestible" simply because it caters for the issue of national security and guards against "foreign influence."

For me personally, it is a huge irony and reminiscent of the rank hypocrisy behind such charges that on Monday, the UK will accuse China again of "interference" in its domestic politics and use this accusation as a ruse to pass a sweeping national security bill of which will strengthen intelligence agencies abilities to collect and intercept data from communications and force technology laws into compliance. Yet none of that clear sense of double standard deflects from the narrative that the consideration of national security in Hong Kong is somehow "bad for business". Are we going to pretend that chaos, riots and foreign backed insurrection are in fact, good for business?

Each and every time, it appears that there is a pre-determined conclusion and narrative concerning Hong Kong by the media that "wishes" it will fail. In other words, the outcome they are gambling for, the demise of the city as a financial centre, is something they do not simply "fear" will happen but for a matter of fact,wantto happen. It is intentional; hence the BBC even goes to the absurdity in its report to claim international companies have an "anywhere but China" investment policy. In reality, the mainstream media, in conjunction with governments such as the US, have sought to deliberately and intentionally undermine China as a prospective market by a number of means.

A recent Reuters report even detailed inasmuch how Donald Trump commanded the CIA to wage a negative publicity war against the country, proving this is not really a conspiracy or speculation, but is actually happening. Thus, every single development or thing that is done in China or Hong Kong, is subsequently used by the mainstream media to push the respective argument 1) this is why businesses shouldn't invest 2) this is why supply chains should leave 3) this is why Hong Kong in particular is finished as a financial centre. Because the agenda and conclusions are already pre-determined there is minimal pretence of objectivity in such works, because the aim is to comprehensively undermine confidence in China.

Therefore, when discussing Hong Kong, the question is not "has the national security law achieved peace and stability in the city?" "Was the status quo really tenable with the scale of the riots?" "is normal life back on track?" instead the narrative is skewered exclusively to negatively framing the city as an oppressive dystopia whereby the imposition of these laws are detrimental to its role as an "international financial centre" and framing the future as pessimistic as possible. In doing so, there is a tendency to deliberately exaggerate the scope and penalties of such laws, the purposes behind them, and to claim that they are "bad for business" in the sense they will randomly, indiscriminately, and arbitrarily target anyone for even the smallest of offenses. Thus, as the Wall Street Journal ludicrously claims, "enter at your own risk."

In doing so, it is then claimed that Hong Kong's legal system no longer adheres to the rule of law, is  no longer autonomous and the necessary context of the city being rocked by extremely violent riots is completely ignored. In reality, these laws are focused on this extremely violent, foreign backed ideology which reduced the city to chaos, and for a good reason. I've said it numerous times, would this behaviour be tolerated by authorities anywhere else in the world? And are we going to pretend that other countries do not have national security, anti-terrorism, subversion and treason laws? Why is there such a double standard in respect to this? It's as if the west all along only see Hong Kong as an ideological playground to undermine China and in framing the events in the city this way, they don't have its best interests at heart.

The author is a well-seasoned writer and analyst with a large portfolio related to China topics, especially in the field of politics, international relations and more. He graduated with an Msc. in Chinese Studies from Oxford University in 2018.

The views do not necessarily reflect those of DotDotNews.

Read more articles by Tom Fowdy:

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