Myth? Legend? Folklore? History? Fiction? This is The Story of Russia, as the title of Orlando Figes’s 2022 book puts it.

Every nation, every country, and, indeed, every empire has a founding myth: some event or figure that is meant to embody the values and origins of the state and unify the people with an overarching narrative of where they came from and where they are going. Figes shows, however, that Russia is a peculiar exception to this norm. For many reasons, when it comes to Russia’s history and origins, there is no true consensus or understanding. Rather, Russia’s history and origins are so deeply intertwined with myths, narratives, legends, politics, folklore, and religion that you must first be willing to dive deeply into all these intricate components and then sift through them to discover even a morsel of truth.

As Figes demonstrates in his work, despotism is one constant truth of Russia over 800 years, from the authoritarianism of Kievan Rus’ (the progenitor of modern Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus) to Putinism. The systems and titles may have changed several times, but the brutal and violent methods of securing and maintaining centralised power in Russia have remained largely unaltered—because, circularly, the belief that Russia can only be ruled by brutality and violence has remained largely unaltered as well.

Russian industrialisation did not even begin until the late 19^th century, partially because of Russia’s reliance on serf labour. Because serfs had no social or economic mobility, and even their physical mobility was restricted to the confines of their village, there was no space for innovators, investors, and entrepreneurs who could revolutionise the system. The natural emergence of capitalism, inextricably connected to industrialisation (like an axle to a wheel), was impossible for a long time in Russia. In Russia, unlike the rest of Europe, the state, in the form of the Tsar, was the sole financier of industrialisation.

During the first half of the 18^th century, the skill of history writing was still emerging in Russia. A German scholar named Gerhard Friedrich Müller outraged the Russian academics at the newly established St Petersburg Academy of Sciences by daring to conclude, based on his research of the Primary Chronicle, that Russia’s origins could be traced back to the Vikings. To say that Scandinavians created Russia was not something to be lightly asserted at a time when Russia had just emerged from victory in one of its many wars with Sweden!

Müller was accused by Mikhail Lomonosov, his rival in the academy, of degrading the Slavs by presenting them as savages who couldn’t organise their state without outside help. The Russians, according to Lomonosov, were not Vikings, but Baltic Slavs, descendants of the Iranian Roxolani people, whose history dates back into the mists of antiquity.

Another fascinating aspect of Russian history that Figes delves into is the notion of Moscow as the ‘Third Rome’, the bearer of the Orthodox Christian flame after the fall of the ‘Second Rome’, Byzantium. This succession—or natural inheritance, as it is viewed by many Russians—means that Russia has a God-given mission in the world, a view that derives in part from the medieval theology it inherited from the Byzantines. The idea that the West is in a state of degeneration and collapse and that Russia is a superior civilisation thanks to its unbending devotion to Orthodoxy is an idea that has recurred again and again in Russian history. Holy Russia, in short, is the true source of humanity’s salvation. This view of Russia as saviour fundamentally influenced both the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union. The sacralisation of power was deeply linked to this because it portrayed the Tsar (or the Party) as the direct manifestation of God’s will on Earth (or the embodiment of the dialectic of history).

This messianic streak is still apparent. Putin’s ongoing war with Ukraine can be understood through this framework: divine right places Putin above human laws, human rights, and earthly realities, and Ukraine, due to its exposure to the degenerate societies of the West, is in need of cleansing by holy war.

Figes skilfully examines the reasons behind Russia’s failure to establish a democratic government over the centuries (contrast with Ukraine) by compellingly illustrating how democratic reforms were consistently hindered by pivotal historical events. These events include the impact of the French Revolution during Catherine the Great’s reign, Napoleon’s invasion of Russia during Alexander I’s rule, the assassination of Alexander II in 1881 (which halted his transformative reforms), the suppression of democratic ideals by the Bolsheviks after the 1917 revolution, and the perpetuation of autocratic tendencies following the fall of the Soviet Union. While Western thinkers have debated, discussed, and theorised about the abstract notions of the state and the people, the role of religion, and the role and structure of the state for hundreds of years, there has been no similar wide-ranging, long-term enquiry in Russia.

Yet another fascinating and critical topic explored in The Story of Russia is Russia’s eastward expansion. As Figes notes, between 1500 and 1917, the territories controlled by the Russian state grew, on average, by a staggering 1,300 square kilometres per day. This expansion, of course, was not merely of land; it also included expansion of control over the indigenous populations the Russians encountered. Russian expansion was, in essence, Russian colonialism. However, unlike in many Western countries, Russia has not reflected on or reckoned with its colonial past. Russian expansion is viewed as a kind of ‘self-discovery’—or, as Figes describes it, as the story of a country colonising itself.

It is certainly not shocking that no such reckoning has occurred or even begun in Russia given that the official narrative on all matters Russian has been crafted by authoritarian regimes, from the Tsars and the Soviets to Putin. But where, then, is the international community? Where are the protests against the bloody past, so common in the West? Where is the holding to account for the cultural genocide, forced assimilation, brutal treatment, and forced imprisonment of indigenous peoples in and along the eastern portion of Eurasia?

Perhaps the only apt comparison is that of the plight of the Uyghur Muslims, a Turkic-speaking ethnic group who live in the northwestern region of Xinjiang, China. Over one million Uyghur Muslims have been imprisoned by the Chinese government since 2017, and those not imprisoned are subjected to intense surveillance, religious restrictions, forced labour, and forced sterilisation. The outcry, protests, and condemnation from the international community on this issue have also been lacking, albeit not totally absent. Similarly, but to a worse extent, the silence on the ongoing plight of the indigenous peoples of Russia is stunning.

Figes’s assessment of the Putin regime’s endorsement of the doctrine called the ‘Russian World’ is particularly valuable. According to this doctrine, Russia is a civilisation characterised by its spiritual values, in contrast to what is perceived as the liberalism and materialism of the West. The ‘Russian World’ includes not merely Russia, but also Ukraine and Belarus, a view supported by Patriarch Kirill, head of the Russian Orthodox Church, who believes that all Orthodox believers, whether in Russia, Ukraine, or Belarus, have a common origin and deep connection stemming from the coming of Christianity to Kievan Rus’ in 988. Kirill’s shocking inability to denounce Russia’s war on—not to mention his declaration of holy war against—Ukraine is a direct consequence of this view of history.

Among the many important themes discussed by Figes, one stands out to me as a necessary reminder of the malign uses to which prejudiced historical narratives can be put. That is, in true Orwellian fashion, control over how the past is understood grants control over the present and the future. The current unnecessary and unprovoked war with Ukraine is the result of Russia being detached from its history and at the mercy of an ever-changing narrative that benefits the ruling class and buttresses that class’s hold on power. This war is not just a crime against Ukraine, but also one against the best of Russia, whose literature and art have enriched Europe for centuries, and the people of Russia, whose desire for liberty has, tragically, never been fully realised. This war, in all its aspects, will only continue until and unless Russia is free to understand its own history—and learn from it.

Related reading

A view from Kyiv: Ordinary life during Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, interview by Emma Park

Can the ‘New Theists’ save the West? by Matt Johnson

Against the ‘New Theism’, by Daniel James Sharp

What has Christianity to do with Western values? by Nick Cohen

Two types of ‘assimilation’: the US and China, by Grayson Slover

The post Russian history, Russian myths: review of ‘The Story of Russia’ by Orlando Figes appeared first on The Freethinker.

Lately, there has been much talk of a Christian revival and the rise of a so-called ‘New Theism’, whose chief tenets seem to be that Christianity underpins everything good and fluffy in the world and that we need it to combat ‘wokeism’, China, Russia, and sundry other threats. New Theism is epitomised by the likes of Jordan Peterson and Tom Holland and was most dramatically illustrated by the conversion of former New Atheist Ayaan Hirsi Ali to Christianity last year.

I am, to understate matters, unconvinced by all this, as are many of this magazine’s contributors. I imagine that we shall be hearing a lot more about the New Theism in the future, so I thought it would be worthwhile to compile a list of Freethinker articles which deal with, or are in some way relevant to, the subject. When and if we publish new pieces about New Theism, this list will be updated.

I would also like to take this opportunity to echo G.W. Foote’s offer to debate his opponents. As he wrote in 1881, in the first edition of the Freethinker:

‘Any competent Christian will be allowed reasonable space in which to contest our views; and if fuller opportunity is desired, the editor will always be ready to hold a public debate with any clergyman, minister, or accredited representative of the other side.’

Similarly, I would be happy to discuss or debate New Theism and all related questions with anyone, whether from ‘the other side’ or not. Just get in touch via our contact form. (More generally, I am open to discussion and debate on all matters that I have written about, in the Freethinker and elsewhere, both as the editor of this magazine and as an individual. In the latter capacity, you can contact me through my website.)

For now, and in chronological order, a reading list against the New Theism:

• ‘The Greek mind was something special’: interview with Charles Freeman, by Daniel James Sharp (17 November 2023)

• Consciousness, free will and meaning in a Darwinian universe: interview with Daniel C. Dennett, by Daniel James Sharp (18 December 2023)

• ‘We are at a threshold right now’: Lawrence Krauss on science, atheism, religion, and the crisis of ‘wokeism’ in science, by Daniel James Sharp (10 January 2024)

• What has Christianity to do with Western values? by Nick Cohen (12 January 2024)

• Do we need God to defend civilisation? by Adam Wakeling (30 January 2024)

• The Enlightenment and the making of modernity, by Piers Benn (23 February 2024)

• The case of Richard Dawkins: cultural affiliation with a religious community does not contradict atheism, by Kunwar Khuldune Shahid (8 April 2024)

• ‘Nature is super enough, thank you very much!’: interview with Frank Turner, by Daniel James Sharp (9 April 2024)

• New Atheism, New Theism, and a defence of cultural Christianity, by Jack Stacey (16 April 2024)

• Against the ‘New Theism’ by Daniel James Sharp (19 April 2024)

• The need for a new Enlightenment, by Christopher Hitchens (26 April 2024)

• Can the ‘New Theists’ save the West? by Matt Johnson (30 April 2024)

• White Christian Nationalism is rising in America. Separation of church and state is the antidote. By Rachel Laser (6 May 2024)

• Donald Trump, political violence, and the future of America, by Daniel James Sharp (15 July 2024)

• Can Religion Save Humanity? Part One, by Brian Victoria (19 July 2024)

• How the Roman Empire became Christian: Catherine Nixey’s ‘The Darkening Age’ and ‘Heresy’ reviewed, by Charles Freeman (22 July 2024)

• The Enlightenment paradox: review of ‘Dark Brilliance’ by Paul Strathern, by Adam Wakeling (30 July 2024)

• Can Religion Save Humanity? Part Two: Killing Commies for Christ, by Brian Victoria (2 August 2024)

• ‘Project 2025 is about accelerating the demise of a functioning democracy’: interview with US Representative Jared Huffman, by Daniel James Sharp (3 August 2024)

• Russian history, Russian myths: review of ‘The Story of Russia’ by Orlando Figes, by Mathew Giagnorio (13 August 2024)

• Why I am a ‘cultural non-Christian’, by Thorsten Botz-Bornstein (18 September 2024)

List last updated 18 September 2024.

The post A reading list against the ‘New Theism’ (and an offer to debate) appeared first on The Freethinker.

There is a pattern that usually occurs when a senior politician resigns or is chucked out of their job. First comes the emotion-laden speech, during which they will wax lyrical about the privilege of serving in public office. Second, the much-needed sabbatical, where they can spend time with the spouses and families they have barely seen since they were elected. And lastly, the lucrative deal with a publisher to write and publish the memoir of their time in office. 

The political memoir is the most sordid literary genre out there. Disgraced and failed politicians are given exorbitant advances by publishers to write, or have written for them, mediocre and self-serving memoirs that few within the public will read—or have even the faintest desire to read. The memoir is the ultimate payday for the disgraced politician who has to put themselves out there in the market again to secure their professional future. A memoir ought to be fascinating, insightful, even moving. It should give readers an insight into the character and personality of the person behind the public persona, as well as just telling the author’s side of the story. And, of course, political memoirs should reveal the inner workings of politics: the backroom deals, the sandbagging, and the scandals. Except, most of the time, such memoirs are public relations exercises in which insight is scarce and cheap score-settling is rife. Their authors usually care only about downplaying their failures and claiming they were misunderstood and undervalued all along.

‘This book is not a traditional political memoir,’ opens Liz Truss in her recently released contribution to the genre, Ten Years to Save the West. In one way, she is correct: this isn’t a typical political memoir, since Truss received a paltry £1,500 advance compared to the £500,000 and £1,000,000 advances that Boris Johnson and David Cameron received, respectively, for their memoirs. In other ways, it is all too typical. Truss’s retelling of her 49-day stint as Prime Minister is narcissistic, with the usual pointless score-settling, whether against Nick Clegg or Polly Toynbee. Moreover, there is virtually no self-reflection and she indulges in a nauseating amount of self-pity. 

‘Saving Western civilisation’ has been a sub-genre unto itself, especially on the right, for a long time, and Truss has ticked all the usual genre conventions. Truss argues that ‘the West has lost its way’ and long since become ‘decadent’ and ‘complacent’; the education system has been colonised by  ‘wokeism’, making us hate our own heritage; big business is enthralled by ‘“wokenomics,” where they are more focused on so-called environmental, social and governance objectives than making money’; and anti-capitalist leftists and environmentalists with their Net Zero obsession threaten future prospects of economic growth and progress. She doesn’t forget to name-drop Michel Foucault as supposedly being the godfather of identity politics, even though anyone who seriously knows anything about Foucault would understand that he saw identity politics as a form of ‘essentialism’—i.e. turning something that is a social and cultural construct into an ontology—and opposed it for that reason. 

If that wasn’t bad enough, Prime Minister Truss was going to stop the rot and save the West with a radical programme of supply-side economics but was undermined and overthrown by the ‘economic establishment’, the administrative state, and her rivals within the Tory party who didn’t accept her as leader. 

The subtitle of the book is ‘leading the revolution against globalism, socialism, and the liberal establishment’, which clearly shows that she is trying to pivot to a radical right audience. Yet this new animus towards globalism is a baffling triangulation. For most of her career, Truss has been advocating for what many would call a neoliberal form of capitalism. She was originally for the UK staying in the European Union. Even when she became a Brexiteer, it was so that Britain would become more ‘global’. She has always been a partisan of free trade. As Prime Minister, she even moved to liberalise immigration rules to grant more VISAs to newcomers. In her memoir, she defends her policy ideas, from education to the economy, by saying that she wanted to make Britain more ‘competitive’ in the global marketplace.  

On foreign policy, she is a thorough Atlanticist. She is firm in her support for arming Ukraine against Russian aggression, advocates a ‘restoration of British and American exceptionalism’, and wants to see a new  ‘coalition of the willing’ against rogue states such as China, Iran, and Russia. Isn’t this Atlanticism an example of the globalism that her desired allies on the radical right would detest? 

When Truss calls herself a ‘conservative’, she really means that she supports a conservative form of liberalism: low taxes, free trade, and the downsizing of the state against progressive liberalism, which is based on higher taxes and more state intervention in the economy. What she seeks to ‘conserve’ is the post-Cold War world order based on Anglo-American hegemony that has been in crisis for the past decade. This isn’t the radical, anti-establishment politics she portrays herself as representing. 

For someone who is supposed to be an avid defender of capitalism against anti-capitalist leftists, she doesn’t get how much of the big government and the administrative state that she lambasts is actually essential to the functioning and management of capital accumulation and the capitalist system as a whole. What she calls ‘socialism’—overbearing statism that intervenes invasively in people’s lives—is already served up to us by contemporary capitalism. Think, for example, of the ‘nanny state’, so detested by Truss. You don’t have to be a Marxist to understand this point. 

Truss’s chief complaint about her failed tenure as premier is that unelected officials and bureaucrats failed to respect her mandate. This only begs the question: what mandate? She wasn’t voted in democratically by the British public, nor was she even supported by most Conservative MPs in her bid to take over after the implosion of the Boris Johnson administration. Truss became Prime Minister because she was selected by the Tory membership in an internal, closed-off party contest. Then she banked on the markets instead of the British public to support her programme and the markets did her in. That’s the entire story of her premiership (admittedly, it wouldn’t make for a very long or a very interesting memoir). 

Ten Years to Save the West is the work of a failed politician whose historical legacy will be the unprecedented shortness of her premiership. She is now pivoting to the next stage of her career and trying her luck as an anti-establishment populist. Except she is repackaging very established ideas as ‘radical’ and ‘anti-establishment’. It is true that Western economies have been in a rut and that we desperately need a radical programme to generate more wealth and greatly improve people’s standards of living. But we didn’t need Liz Truss to tell us that. She was never the saviour of the West. Her policy ideas did not have democratic legitimacy and would not have worked. While Britain is still not in a good way politically and economically, it is no worse off than if Liz Truss was still in power—or had never existed at all.

Further reading

‘This rebarbative profession’ – Rory Stewart’s ‘Politics on the Edge’, reviewed, by Daniel James Sharp

The post Liz Truss, the nobody PM: review of ‘Ten Years to Save the West’ appeared first on The Freethinker.

Vladimir Putin is one of the last defenders of Christian civilisation from an onslaught of wokeness taking over the West. The liberal democratic world is in danger of collapsing if it doesn’t return to its Judeo-Christian roots. The rise of secularism in the United States and Europe has created a spiritual and moral vacuum which is being crammed with conspiracism, political extremism, and identity politics.

These are a few of the ideas you’ll encounter if you spend some time listening to the New Theists. While the term ‘New Theism’ has been used before, the journalist Ed West provided a useful definition in a December 2023 article in The Spectator: ‘Their [the New Theists’] argument is not that religion is true, but that it is useful, and that Christianity has made the West unusually successful.’ While the extent to which the New Theists regard religion as true varies from person to person, West’s definition captures the general thrust of the movement.

The conservative public intellectual and self-help guru Jordan Peterson is the Richard Dawkins of New Theism. Peterson has spent many years defending religious narratives as integral to human understanding and flourishing, and he believes a recommitment to these narratives is indispensable for the survival of Western civilisation. He also believes that Western civilisation is a product of Judeo-Christian values and institutions—despite the long history of secular resistance to religious dogma and tyranny in the West.

In a recent conversation with the philosopher Daniel Dennett, Peterson described religion as the ‘enterprise that specifies the highest aim, or the most foundational of aims’. If you ask Peterson to define words like ‘religion’, ‘god’, or ‘divine’, you’ll get labyrinthine, metaphor-laden monologues about hierarchies of values, the logos, consciousness across time, something called the ‘transcendental repository of reputation’, and so on to a boundless extent.

Meanwhile, Peterson won’t answer straightforward questions about his attitude toward the metaphysical claims of Christianity. During a 2018 debate, Susan Blackmore asked Peterson if he believed Jesus was divine: ‘Did he do miracles?’ He responded: ‘How about this? “Render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s and unto God what is God’s.” That’s a miracle.’ The host didn’t allow Blackmore a natural follow-up, like: ‘Sure, but did he rise from the dead?’

Peterson isn’t the only New Theist who shies away from explicit affirmations of his theological beliefs—particularly beliefs which require faith in any supernatural phenomena. In November last year, Ayaan Hirsi Ali published an essay about her conversion to Christianity, in which the name ‘Jesus’ appears nowhere.

Hirsi Ali described her atheism as a reaction to the horrors of fundamentalist Islam—particularly the September 11 attacks, but also her vivid memories of religious stupidity and persecution, which she has bravely confronted all her life. She said her discovery of Bertrand Russell’s 1927 lecture ‘Why I am Not a Christian’ was a great relief which offered a ‘simple, zero-cost escape from an unbearable life of self-denial and harassment of other people.’ She discussed her contempt for the refusal among many Western ‘politicians, scholars, journalists, and other experts’ to acknowledge the theological motivations of the perpetrators on September 11. She said she enjoyed spending time with ‘clever’ and ‘fun’ New Atheists like Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens.

But Hirsi Ali now calls herself a Christian for purely instrumental reasons—she believes that ‘Western civilisation is under threat’ from the aggressive authoritarianism of China and Russia, radical Islam, and the ‘viral spread of woke ideology’. She laments the ineffectiveness of ‘modern, secular tools’ at countering these threats: ‘We are either running out of money, with our national debt in the tens of trillions of dollars, or we are losing our lead in the technological race with China.’ She continues: ‘The only credible answer, I believe, lies in our desire to uphold the legacy of the Judeo-Christian tradition.’

Hirsi Ali made three main points: Western civilisation is ‘built on the Judeo-Christian tradition’, the only way to defend liberal values is through a recommitment to this tradition, and atheism ‘failed to answer a simple question: what is the meaning and purpose of life?’ These are the central arguments made by many other New Theists.

Hirsi Ali spent many years as an atheist, so it’s surprising that she attributes the development of ‘freedom of conscience and speech’ in the West solely to Christianity. She says nothing about the secular humanism developed by Enlightenment thinkers like Voltaire and David Hume. She doesn’t mention Thomas Paine’s great attack on Christianity, The Age of Reason. She skips over Thomas Jefferson’s Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom, the document which laid the foundation for the First Amendment and erected what Jefferson described as the ‘wall of separation between church and state’ in the United States.

Many of the most important advancements for free speech and conscience in the West were made despite furious religious opposition. The Enlightenment was in part a response to centuries of religious bloodletting in Europe, which is why criticism of religious authority was such an integral part of its development. The reason Peterson celebrates Christ’s injunction to ‘Render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s and unto God what is God’s’ is that this line provides Biblical authority for the separation of church and state. But it still took centuries of moral and political progress—almost always in conflict with religious power—to institutionalise that separation.

According to Hirsi Ali, Peterson, and other New Theists (such as the historian Tom Holland), the liberal principles and institutions of the West—democracy, free expression, individual rights, and so on—are all ultimately attributable to Christianity. As Holland puts it, ‘We are goldfish swimming in Christian waters.’ Hirsi Ali says that Christianity is the ‘story of the West’. Peterson describes the Enlightenment as ‘irreducibly embedded inside this underlying structure’ of the Judeo-Christian tradition.

But what does a recommitment to this tradition look like in practice? Beyond their selective history which leaves out the centuries of political and philosophical struggle against religious dominion, the New Theists don’t have much to offer in the way of solutions to what they view as a spiritual and political crisis in the West today.

Hirsi Ali recommends Christianity as a source of social solidarity, as it will fill the ‘void left by the retreat of the church’ with the ‘power of a unifying story’. She doesn’t explain how this will better equip the West to confront China or Russia, and she doesn’t seem to care that the ‘unifying story’ doesn’t apply to the 37 per cent of Americans (and much larger proportions in many European countries) who aren’t Christians.

Hirsi Ali believes religion has been replaced by a ‘jumble of irrational quasi-religious dogma’, such as the ‘modern cult’ of wokeness. This is a common claim. West says that the ‘collapse of American Christianity gave rise to a new intolerance towards anybody who diverged from progressive opinion.’ In his 2019 book The Madness of Crowds: Gender, Race and Identity, the conservative commentator Douglas Murray argues that Christianity has been replaced by a ‘new religion’ of strident identitarian activism.

There are several problems with this narrative. First, the process of secularisation has been going on for decades, while many movements the New Theists decry as ‘woke’ have emerged more recently. Second, Christianity has historically been compatible with a vast range of political and social movements. Many Nazis were Christians, as were many liberators of the concentration camps. Christianity has been used to justify slavery for millennia, but it was also invoked by civil rights leaders like Martin Luther King, Jr. (with crucial support from secularists like Bayard Rustin and A. Philip Randolph).

According to Hirsi Ali, ‘We can’t withstand China, Russia and Iran if we can’t explain to our populations why it matters that we do.’ But we don’t need Christianity to explain why resisting theocracy, imperialism, and totalitarianism matters. Take Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, for instance. The West—even in its secularised and allegedly degenerate state—shocked Putin by rallying to Ukraine’s defence when his forces attempted to abolish its existence as an independent state. Ukraine’s desire to join the Western system of economic and political organisation was the trigger for the war, and solidarity with a fellow democracy under siege was sufficient to convince Ukraine’s Western allies that they had a responsibility to help.

Many politicians and intellectuals who present themselves as defenders of the Christian West don’t have an inspiring record on Ukraine. Viktor Orbán has cultivated an image of himself as the leader of a ‘Christian government’ which is defending traditional Christian values against sinister, godless globalists. He also wants to abandon Ukraine. He recently declared that Donald Trump ‘will not give a penny in the Ukraine-Russia war. That is why the war will end’, and he regards Trump as the ‘man who can save the Western world.’

Trump wants to pull the United States out of NATO and he says the Russians should be able to ‘do whatever the hell they want’ to American allies that haven’t made sufficient investments in their militaries. The overwhelming majority of white evangelical Protestants supported Trump, and this support has held despite his attempt to overthrow the 2020 election. These American Christians aren’t just indifferent about the fate of Ukrainian democracy—they’re willing to put their own democracy in peril to bring their favourite demagogue back into the Oval Office. Is this what the defence of Western civilisation looks like?

Hirsi Ali’s fellow New Theist Jordan Peterson sneers at Western solidarity with Ukrainian democracy as ‘shallow moral posturing’ and a ‘banal form of dimwit flag-waving.’ Peterson has long been opposed to Western support for Ukraine, and he blames the invasion on ‘NATO and EU expansionism’ (a standard argument for Putin’s apologists like the ‘realist’ academic John Mearsheimer, whom Peterson has consulted with).

In an essay published several months after the invasion of Ukraine, Peterson argued that the conflict is a ‘civil war’ within the West. He believes liberal democracies like the United States have become increasingly degenerate and spiritually bankrupt, and he’s impressed with how Putin presents Russia as a ‘bulwark against the moral decadence of the West.’

Putin has increasingly cloaked his authoritarianism and imperialism in the garb of the Russian Orthodox Church, but instead of recognising the grotesque cynicism of this ploy, Peterson says he feels reassured by these professions of faith. He also suspects that Putin is on the right side of the global culture war: ‘Are we degenerate, in a profoundly threatening manner? I think the answer to that may well be yes.’ Peterson believes Putin decided to ‘invade and potentially incapacitate Ukraine’ to keep the ‘pathological West out of that country’, and his recommended course of action is total surrender.

Peterson is the most influential New Theist in the world, and he’s sympathetic to the cultural grievances of a brutal dictator who started the most devastating conflict in Europe since World War II. He believes the ‘pathological West’ should submit to the whims of that dictator and abandon his victims—people who are risking and losing their lives to uphold the values and institutions of the West every day. Hirsi Ali isn’t just wrong when she says that belief in Christianity is necessary to defend Western civilisation from its most dangerous foes—she fails to see how belief can actually be a severe impediment in that fight.

The New Theists aren’t the guardians of Western civilisation they purport to be. They use religion as a crutch and cudgel—they have a ‘god-shaped hole’ in their lives and assume that the only way to find any real meaning or purpose in life is to fill it with Christian dogma. Then they insist that this spiritual problem is universal—and tell us that they alone have the solution. That’s the thing about New Theism—it doesn’t take long to realise that there’s nothing new about it.

Further reading on New Atheism and New Theism

The case of Richard Dawkins: cultural affiliation with a religious community does not contradict atheism, by Kunwar Khuldune Shahid

Do we need God to defend civilisation? by Adam Wakeling

What has Christianity to do with Western values? by Nick Cohen

What I believe: Interview with Andrew Copson, by Emma Park

Against the ‘New Theism’, by Daniel James Sharp

How three media revolutions transformed the history of atheism, by Nathan Alexander

Atheism, secularism, humanism, by Anthony Grayling

‘An animal is a description of ancient worlds’: interview with Richard Dawkins, by Emma Park

‘Nature is super enough, thank you very much!’: interview with Frank Turner, by Daniel James Sharp

Consciousness, free will and meaning in a Darwinian universe: interview with Daniel C. Dennett, by Daniel James Sharp

Christopher Hitchens and the long afterlife of Thomas Paine, by Daniel James Sharp

‘The Greek mind was something special’: interview with Charles Freeman, by Daniel James Sharp

‘We are at a threshold right now’: interview with Lawrence Krauss on science, atheism, religion, and the crisis of ‘wokeism’ in science, by Daniel James Sharp

The post Can the ‘New Theists’ save the West? appeared first on The Freethinker.

It is hard to tell the story of my transformation from a practising Muslim to a freethinker. It did not happen in a day or two. It took almost a decade.

I was born and raised in a moderately religious family in Pakistan. I was taught religion even before I could understand words. I was Muslim. I knew the greatest of all was Allah. I was supposed to worship Allah and do good deeds to make Him happy. When I turned seven, my parents told me that I had to pray five times a day daily. To begin with, I carried out some of my prayers and missed others, but within a few years, I was doing them regularly. I wore loose clothing. I fasted during Ramadan, and refrained from acts which are considered sins in Islam.

While doing this, I was studying journalism at a university in Lahore. I would go there in an abaya. I never stepped into the radio section of the department at that time because I thought it was wrong for men to listen to the voice of a woman from outside their family.

I had no plans to become a journalist. I was just studying it after one of my uncles suggested to my father that he put me in that field. Before my graduation I had decided to apply for a doctorate at a foreign university. I started applying for scholarships quietly. I was preparing the required documents, filling out long forms, and waiting for the results. I knew there would be a lot of resistance: in my family, as in most families in Pakistan, unmarried girls do not take decisions about their lives, especially ones like going abroad to study. I thought that once I had got the scholarship and admission letter, I would then speak to my family.

Before I could speak to them, however, they spoke to me. They had received a marriage proposal from our extended family. The man was a mufti, an Islamic cleric. My parents thought it would be the best proposal for me since I was religious: I used to pray regularly and cover myself before going out, and was not very social. I, on the other hand, had bigger dreams: to get a PhD and to teach at a university.

When my father informed me that my family had accepted a marriage proposal on my behalf, my world was shaken. I thought of the implications of being tied to the household of an Islamic religious scholar. It would undoubtedly mean a strict, orthodox life with rigid expectations as to how I dressed, spoke, and conducted myself in public.

As a 23-year-old, I wavered between the excitement of finally getting married and anxiety over what I would have to sacrifice. My dreams of graduate study abroad and a writing career seemed uncertain. I asked my family to ask them if they would agree to my getting a PhD and having a career after the marriage. If they said yes, I decided I would be happy to marry the mufti, otherwise I would decline his proposal. The answer was a clear no: they would not let me pursue my career after getting married. But this was because my family thought I would give up on my dream of graduate study and that it did not mean much to me.

According to a report of the Asian Development Bank, although women in Pakistan are increasingly pursuing higher education, only 25 per cent of those who do complete higher education end up working outside the home. They are married off as soon as they get their degrees, or sometimes even before that, but with the groom’s family promising that the bride will complete her education after the marriage. Many times, however, these promises are not fulfilled.

Despite their having rejected my conditions for marriage, and although I was reluctant, both families agreed to move forward with the engagement. It lasted for two years. In those two years, I was at least allowed to go to China to do a Master’s in International Journalism and Communication at a university there.

My time in China expanded my perspectives in the ways I had not expected. I went there to get a Master’s degree, but it proved a vital step along a path that I had never even thought to follow. As an international student far from home, I gained experiences that I had never had before. I attended lectures in which we would discuss values that were different from those in my home country. I had classmates from all over the world. We would gather in our spare time and talk about different subjects. Those conversations helped to open my mind a little. Over time, I realised that, in China, I was living a life free from the oppressive cultural and religious expectations of my homeland. I felt both safe and free.

Meanwhile, I was also talking to my fiancé. Our phone calls, in which he would dictate strict rules on my conduct and the people with whom I could associate, left me deflated. I confided in fellow Muslim women students who faced similar restrictions and, as it were, remote control from their families back in their home countries. We would talk about the cultures in which we grew up and then compare them with the culture we were experiencing in China. It was totally different. None of us wanted to go back to our Muslim majority countries.

This forced me to think seriously about why I and my fellow Muslim women students did not want to go back home. The answer was simple, but it took me a decade to work it out. The reason we did not want to go back home was the religion that was forced on us. We wanted to practise it in our own ways as independent women. We did not want guardians. We wanted our own identity.

It was the first time that I had started to think about the contradictions between the progressive values I yearned for and the religious dictates that I had followed unquestioningly when younger. I started to write blogs chronicling my evolving thoughts about women and their rights. Although I was mostly criticising the oppression of the traditional Pakistani culture which I had been raised in, I realised that the culture I was questioning was founded on a religious basis. The more I became concerned about patriarchy and autocracy, the more I began to doubt what I had previously accepted as infallible religious truth.

I then started to engage with progressive thinkers and academics. I found several YouTube channels where freethinkers were answering the questions I had been turning over in my mind for years. I started listening to their videos. I bought their recommended books. These also helped to clarify my thoughts.

The fact that I was writing publicly about how I was questioning the cultural structure in which women in Pakistan were held became a serious problem for my fiancé. Both families decided to call off the engagement. I am grateful to that relationship for making me what I am today. It helped me to turn towards the liberation of reason and made me an individual who believes in progressive values, including those which support a liberal secular society and democratic government, and which allow free speech and other freedoms to everyone without any discrimination.

The change did not happen in a day, but gradually. Instead of focusing on praying and fasting, I started instead to think about helping people in whatever way I could. I was a journalist; I started drawing attention to social issues in Pakistan, particularly those related to women, ethics and religious minority groups. As I and other journalists brought these issues to the attention of institutions which could resolve them, I would feel a sense of happiness and achievement.

As Simon Cottee discusses in his book The Apostates: When Muslims Leave Islam, while men question the teachings of Islam after not finding answers to their questions about the universe, women question it when they start to become uncomfortably aware of how they are being controlled and deprived of their rights. I felt the same, though for most of my life I considered myself a Muslim, a liberal one.

As I went further into questions of who I was and why I existed, I became less convinced of the existence of absolute truths about Islam, though more confident in my own moral compass. My idea of God grew broader than the way He was depicted in the orthodox scriptures. I felt closer to universal moral truths rather than narrow commands. This questioning process led me to realise the significance of the humanity that we all share.

I started to report on religious extremism and human rights violations, specifically those happening to women. It brought me the label of ‘bad woman’ in Pakistan. However, I realised that there were some people in my audience that appreciated my work. This appreciation gave me the courage to move forward with my journalistic career. This sense of support is the only thing that pushes the small minority of progressives in Pakistan to keep doing their work.

Now, back in Lahore, the azaan still echoes around me five times a day from multiple mosques at the same time. I think about the misuse of loudspeakers by these mosques. The local law permits them to use their loudspeakers for Friday sermons and call for prayers only. However, there are seven mosques in my neighbourhood. Some mosques use their loudspeakers for daily sermons and recitation. I cannot question this practice as a citizen of the country. I cannot even write about it in the local media as a journalist. I would put myself in danger if I did so.

In April 2017, the Indian singer Sonu Nigam described in a series of tweets how he was constantly ‘woken up by Azaan’ and questioned when this ‘forced religiousness’ would end in India. His tweets caused him lot of trouble. According to the Times of India, he has been placed on the hit list of the terrorist organization Lashkar-E-Taiba.

My transformation was neither planned nor easy. It is very difficult for most women in Pakistan and much of the Muslim world to freely question or leave religion as I have. Those who dissent often face threats or exclusion. The small communities of progressives and freethinkers that exist remain low-profile to protect themselves.

While this ongoing exploration at times feels lonely, it has connected me to liberal, freethinking communities abroad and at home. I feel more confident in myself, liberated, and connected with progressive values that are welcomed by people around the world. It gives me peace – more than I have ever received from the religion in which I was enlisted a few minutes after my birth.

The post From religious orthodoxy to free thought appeared first on The Freethinker.

2023 has been an eventful year for free thought, humanism and secularism. Below, Emma Park and Daniel James Sharp look back on some of the major issues that have been debated in the Freethinker this year.

I. Free speech, religion and the culture wars

Free thought and intellectual progress are not possible without a shared culture of free speech, open debate and a willingness to engage with different points of view. One of the Freethinker’s concerns this year has been with attempts to repress free speech, especially in the UK and elsewhere in the English-speaking world, and in the context of the ‘culture wars’.

In Ireland, a new bill on hate offences threatens to undermine free speech, not just about religion but on a variety of the most sensitive topics – in other words, topics on which open debate is crucial. In Wakefield, England, in February, a non-Muslim woman, presumably under pressure, donned a veil and made a humiliating public apology in the local mosque, because her autistic son had brought a copy of the Quran into school and it was accidentally scuffed. And Puffin has made attempts to censor Roald Dahl in the name of ‘sensitivity’.

Free speech at universities also remains under pressure, as illustrated by the case of Professor Steven Greer, who was hounded by Bristol University Islamic Society in a smear campaign that was supported by academic colleagues who should have known better. Daniel reviewed Greer’s book about his experiences.

Across the pond, Professor Alex Byrne’s contract for a book critical of gender identity ideology was cancelled by Oxford University Press, but has since been published by Polity. From a different perspective, former vice chancellor Julius Weinberg argued that ‘freedom of speech is not as simple as my right to express my ideas’.

To supporters of democracy in Hong Kong, the culture wars are all but an irrelevance. The suffocating control of the Chinese Communist Party, said Kevin Yam, forced campaigners across the political spectrum to work together.

II. Science, philosophy, and humanism

As well as exploring the issues of the day, the Freethinker has also explored some of their deeper philosophical and historical contexts.

We interviewed the philosopher Daniel C. Dennett about the relationship between philosophy and science, meaning and consciousness in a godless, Darwinian universe, and New Atheism. With historian Charles Freeman, we discussed the richness and variety of the ancient Greek mind and how the coming of Christian orthodoxy put an end to that tradition. And we caught up with the humanist and author Sarah Bakewell to explore different traditions of humanism.

Meanwhile, Matt Johnson and Daniel Sharp both contributed articles about one of the most famous freethinkers of recent years, the late Christopher Hitchens.

III. Islam and free thought

With the rise of Islam in Britain and across the West, it has become urgent to consider how far the religion can be compatible with Western values and approaches. To explore this question, we interviewed Taj Hargey, possibly Britain’s only liberal imam. Other contributors have explored the need to rekindle irreverence for Islam in Muslim thought around the world, why the hijab is not a good symbol for women, and whether it is possible to distinguish between religious and political Islam.

IV. Secularism

Secularism is the principle that religion and state should be separated, and that religion should have no undue influence on public life. In the UK, thanks to a combination of political apathy and entrenched privilege, we still have an established church and unelected clergy in Parliament. Paul Scriven, a Liberal Democrat peer, spoke to the Freethinker about why he introduced a bill to disestablish the Church of England.

With a general election on the cards for 2024, Stephen Evans of the National Secular Society discussed where the political parties stand on faith schools. Two recent events in which the NSS participated revealed some of the challenges involved in secularisation. Daniel also argued in an article for Only Sky that the Church of England’s record on gay marriage is another reason to hasten disestablishment.

Other contributors to the Freethinker have looked at secularism, its history and future, in Québec, Turkey and Wales, and the strengths and weaknesses of French-style laïcité.

Did you know that, while the advancement of any religion, as well as of humanism, is considered a charitable aim under English law, the advancement of free thought, atheism or secularism is not? See Emma’s piece for New Humanist.

V. Israel and Palestine

One of the year’s biggest events—the Hamas attack against Israel on 7 October and the ensuing war—has produced a wide range of often emotional and heated responses. In contrast to all this sound and fury, the Freethinker has published a series of articles dealing with the conflict from different and often disagreeing, but rationally and charitably argued perspectives.

Kunwar Khuldune Shahid wrote about the ‘leftist postcolonial apologia’ for Hamas and argued that the Israel-Palestine conflict is, at root, a religious one, while in Emma’s interview with Taj Hargey, the imam was staunch in his support of the ‘occupied and oppressed’ Palestinians. Hina Husain wrote about her Pakistani upbringing and being inculcated with Islam-based anti-Semitism. Finally, Ralph Leonard responded to all these articles, arguing that the conflict is, in fact, inspired more by competing nationalisms than religious impulses.

VI. Republicanism

Free thought and secularism have been closely intertwined with republicanism in British history. The Freethinker has reinforced this link since its beginnings in 1881.

This year, we have continued in the same spirit of religious and political anti-authoritarianism, publishing a review by Daniel of the republican activist Graham Smith’s anti-monarchy book. Later in the year, Daniel interviewed Graham Smith in person at Conway Hall. Meanwhile, Emma delved into the archives to discover the connection between the Freethinker and Republic, of which Smith is the CEO.

See also Daniel’s article on the republican Thomas Paine’s influence on Christopher Hitchens and Tony Howe’s discussion of an even earlier famous British republican, John Milton.

VII. Free thought history

In June, we were saddened to hear of the death of Jim Herrick (1944-2023), former editor of the Freethinker. Bob Forder, NSS historian, wrote an obituary commemorating Jim’s lifelong dedication to free thought, humanism and secularism.

The composer Frances Lynch wrote a guest post about her rediscovery of Eliza Flower, a radical nineteenth-century composer associated with Conway Hall, who was neglected by the historical record because she was female.

We have also been reflecting on the history of the Freethinker and of the various non-religious movements in the UK. Former editor Nigel Sinnott kindly agreed to let us republish an article he wrote for the magazine in 1970 in which he discussed the complicated historical relationship between humanists and secularists. Historian Charlie Lynch introduced the recent book he co-wrote with two other academics charting the history of organised humanism in Britain, which Emma has also reviewed for New Humanist. And Bob Forder argued that free thought and secularism are inseparable.

VIII. The future of free thought

Artificial intelligence has made great strides in 2023. (We even used Dall-E, a generative AI model, to illustrate this post.) Given the exponential pace of development, it is clear that the implications need to be monitored very carefully. For instance, there are concerns that ChatGPT may be biased in favour of certain interpretations of Islam. And artificial general intelligence (AGI) may be just around the corner, making ethical oversight all the more urgent.

Emma and Daniel spoke about the nature of free thought and the challenges facing it today and in the future on the Humanism Now podcast, on Freethought Hour and to the Reading Humanists. Emma also spoke to the Central London Humanists about Pastafarianism, arguably the world’s fastest growing religion, and a topic about which there is much to say.

This year also saw the publication of two intriguing books about the impact of digital technology on free thought, one by Simon McCarthy-Jones, and another by Laura Dodsworth and Patrick Fagan. Emma interviewed Laura Dodsworth for the Freethinker and reviewed both books for the Literary Review. We will be looking further at the implications of digital technology for free thought in 2024.

Finally, a request for your support…

The Freethinker is an independent, non-profit journal and completely open-access. We are funded by donations and legacies given by generations of readers back to the 19th century – and not by big corporations or billionaires. To keep us going in the future, we depend on the generosity of readers today. If you believe in the importance of fostering a culture of free thought, open enquiry and irreverence, please consider making a donation via this link.

And don’t forget to sign up to our free fortnightly newsletter, to keep abreast of the latest developments in free thought in the UK and around the world.

Postscript: a merry Christmas of sorts from Christopher Hitchens…

The post Year in review: 2023 appeared first on The Freethinker.

By Western ideological standards, Cardinal Joseph Zen, the former Roman Catholic Bishop of Hong Kong, would hardly be considered a progressive. On social issues, he has previously opposed legislation extending anti-domestic violence laws to same-sex couples. On liturgical matters, he is a staunch defender of the pre-Second Vatican Council Tridentine Latin mass. At the level of Vatican ecclesiastical politics, he pals around with the likes of the late Cardinal George Pell, who aside from being doctrinally conservative, was also implicated in shielding paedophile priests in Australia.

At the other end of the spectrum is the Hong Kong pop singer, Denise Ho. So outspoken has she been about LGBT rights, at least by Asian standards, that she was once banned from performing in Malaysia over her LGBT identity. She has campaigned for gay marriage rights in Hong Kong. She once said, ‘[w]e can be openly gay as someone else can be Christian or Muslim,’ seemingly implying that homosexual and religious identities are mutually exclusive.

If Zen and Ho were in the West instead of in Hong Kong, it is likely that they would have nothing to do with one another except as adversaries. For many decades now, self-declared ‘conservatives’ and ‘progressives’ in the West have fought never-ending culture wars over various social and identity-related issues. These include religion, rights related to sexual orientation and identity, reproductive rights, race, language, national identity (in the UK’s case, this is particularly apparent in relation to Europe) – you name it.

Political and culture-war affiliations in the West are linked increasingly with social as opposed to economic identities. Particularly in places like places like the United States and Australia, the traditional alliance between secular progressives and religious voters from lower socio-economic backgrounds, and those who emphasise economic justice over issues of personal morality, is unravelling. Centre-left political alliances have attracted less religious support.

But Zen and Ho are not in the West. Far from falling in with Western culture war faultlines, they have made common cause in the fight for democracy and autonomy in Hong Kong. Zen is an old warrior on this front, having been involved as early as 2003 in backing mass protests against China’s first, aborted attempt to impose national security laws on Hong Kong. In addition to her LGBT rights advocacy, Denise Ho became identified with Hong Kong’s democracy movement when she openly supported Hong Kong’s 2014 Umbrella Movement, which involved mass protests for genuine universal suffrage.

Then came the protests of 2019. What started as mass protests against the Hong Kong government’s proposed legislation allowing for extradition to China expanded to a full-blown resistance movement for democracy and against authoritarian police brutality. As the period of the protests lengthened from days to weeks to months, the number of protesters being arrested mounted. From the outset, organisations were set up to provide various forms of assistance to those hurt or arrested by Hong Kong’s increasingly authoritarian regime.

Once such organisation was the 612 Humanitarian Relief Fund, which was named after the date (12 June) of the first major episode of indiscriminate police brutality during the 2019 protests. According to its website, the fund provided ‘humanitarian and relevant financial support to persons who are injured, arrested, attacked or threatened with violence’; the support provided was primarily ‘legal, medical, psychological and emergency financial assistance’.

The fund was overseen by a board of trustees. Its members included Joseph Zen and Denise Ho. The fact that Zen and Ho were, by Western standards, ideological opposites on culture wars issues, did not appear to be a problem for them in co-operating on the cause of democracy in Hong Kong and resistance to authoritarian violence. In overseeing the fund, they stood together, they were arrested together, and they were convicted together.  

In the democracy movement, and the resistance to China’s authoritarian overreach in a Hong Kong that had been promised at least 50 years of ‘One Country, Two Systems’ as part of the deal in China’s resumption of sovereignty, Zen and Ho’s co-operation was not unique. Benny Tai, the initiator of the 2014 Umbrella Movement, is a devout Christian who contributed to a Chinese language anti-LGBT rights book. Yet he is currently on trial under Hong Kong’s National Security Law with LGBT rights figures such as Ray Chan and Jimmy Sham for their joint involvement in a 2020 informal primary election.

The well-known, and now also jailed, Hong Kong democracy activist, Joshua Wong, had his run-ins with his socially conservative father. Yet his father was also the one who inculcated pro-democracy ideas into him from a young age (link in Chinese), and was highly supportive of his activism. And prior to its disbandment in 2021, an umbrella organisation called the Civil Human Rights Front organised many of Hong Kong’s largest protests in favour of democracy and against the erosion of human rights. Its member organisations include a diverse assortment of religious, feminist and LGBT rights groups, as well as political parties and anti-Communist trade unions.

So what kept Zen, Ho and these various groups, whose views on issues in the Western culture wars varied wildly, working together, right up until the point when China imposed a draconian National Security Law on Hong Kong in July 2020 to crack down upon resistance? This is a question that has not really been discussed and analysed within Hong Kong itself. It was as if the fact of co-operation between these individuals and groups to resist China’s authoritarian overreach was taken as a given. Nobody made a big deal about any ‘cross-ideological grand alliances’. And yet, on further reflection, whether conceptually or as a matter of factual circumstances, these people’s and groups’ decision to put aside the culture wars and face a greater adversary together as one makes sense.

Conceptually speaking, in order to have a culture war, one needs an environment that tolerates it. This would involve the existence of, or even respect for, freedom of speech, assembly, association and conscience, as well as a democratic government obliged to take account of the strength in numbers that culture warriors claim to represent. But when these basic freedoms are under threat and are undermined by an authoritarian government, everyone, no matter what his or her opinions, is at risk. It therefore made sense for those with ideological differences in Hong Kong to work together to resist authoritarian attempts to silence them all.

The campaigners’ concerns about being silenced are justified by the facts. China has a track record of cracking down on civil society groups of all stripes. It has cracked down on both Catholic and Protestant churches, as well as on Uyghur and Hui Muslims. It has cracked down on LGBT advocacy groups. It has cracked down on civil society generally to the point of collapse. And in the case of Hong Kong, the fears of being silenced were realised. Since China’s full-scale crackdown against the city started in 2020, at least 58 civil society groups have folded, and those that remain have become muted.

China’s programme of cracking down on diversity of opinion and dissent does not stop at its own borders. It seeks to silence dissidents living abroad with surveillance and threats. Its ‘United Front’ operations in the West are little more than influence, interference and infiltration operations designed to undermine democratic processes. Its intimidation tactics have in the last year or two started escalating to the point of going after families of popularly elected Members of Parliament who have been critics of China. This has happened in places such as Britain (creating obstacles to the university applications of Iain Duncan-Smith’s children) and Canada (attempts at intimidating the family of Michael Chong MP). 

Despite the real threat that China presents to the West’s relatively free and democratic way of life, many participants in Western public debates remain consumed by their obsession with the culture wars. If anything, the tenor of the disputes appears to have deteriorated since around the mid-2010s, coinciding with the onset of Trumpism and, in the UK, the Brexit movement. What had once at least been relatively reasoned if ideological arguments over controversial issues has now descended into puerile name-calling, with terms like ‘woke’, ‘fascist’ and ‘TERF’ being bandied about almost at random. And on the question of the threat posed by China, ideological cultural warriors have used it either to go down the ethno-nationalist ‘yellow peril’ path (eg ban all overseas students from China) or to engage in insidious anti-Western whataboutery (eg dismissing atrocities against Uyghurs because Australia treated its indigenous people poorly).

These exacerbated divisions and name-calling merely play into China’s hands. Moreover, the continuation and intensification of the Western culture wars has in itself taken an authoritarian turn, in which both sides manifest a lack of tolerance and respect for opposing viewpoints. The way the China issue has played out in the context of the culture wars, with the two sides as usual adopting equally extreme positions – either in support of a racialised approach in dealing with China or in defence of its authoritarianism – is but a case in point.

This is fertile ground for China to push its anti-democratic agenda beyond its borders, such as through disinformation campaigns. The West’s ability to resist is weakened by its own internal obsessions and intolerances. And while China cannot necessarily impose itself on the West as quickly or as directly as it has done in Hong Kong, it has shown itself capable of establishing firm footholds and exercising control over apparently democratic processes. Take, for example, China’s secret funding and compromising of candidates for elected office in Canada, its disinformation campaigns about the political system in Australia, its illegal funnelling of political donations to both major parties in New Zealand, and its suppression of Hong Kong dissident protests in the UK. Activities such as these are stepping stones towards displacing the Western liberal democracy-based world order led by the US, and replacing it with a China-led authoritarian world.

There is a real risk that by the time the bickering cultural warriors realise that their freedoms and rights are being undermined by a greater force, it could be too late.

This is where the examples of Joseph Zen, Denise Ho, Benny Tai, Ray Chan, Jimmy Sham, Joshua Wong and his father, and various ideologically diverse groups in the now-defunct Hong Kong Civil Human Rights Front, are instructive for the West. Of course, it may be said that despite their refraining from fighting culture wars and standing in solidarity in resisting authoritarian China, they have suffered setback after setback. What is the point of cross-ideological solidarity if it makes no difference in the end?

Except it very probably did make a difference. China’s push to erode and ultimate destroy Hong Kong’s autonomy and freedoms did not just start in 2019. It had been taking place for many years under the radar, even at local community levels. By putting culture wars to one side in the face of a common threat, pro-democracy Hong Kong activists and groups with divergent views on social issues played an important role in holding the line against China, until the dam broke upon the state’s full-scale crackdown in 2020. This crackdown has been all-encompassing, ranging from mass arrests and the jailing of dissidents, to the dismantling of civil society groups, education curricula and electoral systems, to the removal of politically sensitive books from libraries, to the general silencing of all criticism of authority by ordinary people.

Hong Kong is under China’s sovereignty and is ultimately subject to its authoritarian whims. The odds were therefore stacked against Hongkongers even though they were relatively united. The situation is different for Western democracies, where China needs more time and must use less direct methods to gain influence.

Where those engaged in socio-political discourse in the West are willing to set aside their internal differences to resist China’s efforts, they stand a much better chance at keeping China’s creeping authoritarianism at bay than Hongkongers ever had. In contrast, however, for Western democratic societies that choose to continue to allow themselves to be consumed by the culture wars, China’s efforts to undermine and, potentially, control them will be left relatively unopposed. The West’s inward-looking obsession with the culture wars, or just inertia, has, for example, enabled the Chinese government to open up secret police stations in many Western countries to facilitate the intimidating of its critics there. It is only in the last year or so that they are being discovered and gradually looked into by Western governments.

For those in the West who are caught up in arguing ceaselessly about their ideological differences, trying to set all that aside and work together to resist a more nefarious force may appear difficult. But the likes of Joseph Zen and Denise Ho have shown that it can and should be done. Internal squabbles may be a tolerable or even acceptable part of political discourse when democratic ways of life are not under threat. However, they become a luxury that one can ill afford when the distraction they afford opens the door for authoritarian encroachment.

As China becomes increasingly assertive in imposing its influence and control around the world, it is high time for the voices on both sides of the culture wars to lay aside their differences and give solidarity a chance. Hong Kong has shown the world how, even in the most difficult of circumstances, solidarity between erstwhile adversaries matters when confronted by an authoritarian giant. If Hongkongers can do it, then so can those in the West.

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The post In the fight against authoritarianism, the culture wars are a distraction appeared first on The Freethinker.

「如果你想知未來的樣子， 你就想像一隻皮靴永遠踩在一個人臉上」 – 喬治．歐威爾

Update, 7/1/22: Chinese translation (traditional characters) by the author now follows the English original.

您亦可直接跳至英文文末並閱讀筆者鄭文傑 (Simon Cheng) 所翻譯的繁體中文版本。

On 16th October, a group of Hongkongers gathered outside the Chinese Consulate in Manchester to protest against the further consolidation of General Secretary Xi Jinping’s power at the Chinese Communist Party’s Congress in Beijing, and in support of their pro-democracy movement in Hong Kong. During their peaceful protest outside the Consulate – on British soil – they presented their ideas through visual art. One of the protesters displayed a satirical poster of a naked Xi Jinping, dressed, as it were, in the ‘emperor’s new clothes’. The reference to the folktale suggested the absurdity of absolute power, and the way in which it can corrupt and distort the face, and lead to the construction of a ‘parallel truth’.

This poster, as well as other signs, placards and banners held by the protesters, apparently made the officials in the Consulate feel uncomfortable. In response, video footage shows staff from the consulate, dressed in riot gear, opening the gate and stepping outside the Consulate grounds onto the street in an attempt to kick down, remove and vandalise the placards. The protesters tried to protect their property from being vandalised and snatched away. A scuffle ensued; and the Consulate resorted to brutal violence. Consular officials can be seen dragging protestors onto Consulate grounds behind the gates and proceeding to beat them in full view of the Greater Manchester Police.

The Consul hastily fabricated a ‘parallel truth’, alleging in a statement to the police that ‘the Consulate grounds were stormed by a group of protesters and members of consular staff were required to physically fend off unauthorized entry and subsequent assaults.’ This ‘counter-narrative’ propaganda, with its own dedicated Twitter feed, ‘Manchester Story’, quickly and systematically spread out among many pro-Beijing groups of Chinese students and expats overseas, as well as local influencers on social media and video platforms such as Twitter and YouTube (for example here and here).

In the Consulate’s statement to British media (in Chinese), they said that ‘diplomatic missions wouldn’t tolerate their head of state being denigrated by protestors’. This cannot justify their violent crackdown on protestors who were attempting to hold the one-party dictatorship in Beijing to account for its abuse of power. In fact, what actually happened was that Consul Zheng Xiyuan, who is one of China’s top diplomats, acted violently and spoke disingenuously, manifesting a totalitarianism which ought to be unimaginable in the world’s oldest liberal democracy.

The Manchester incident raises the question of how far China’s representatives will go in their attempts to suppress all critics who challenge their political system and its leader overseas. It suggests that they are behaving in an increasingly assertive and even aggressive way, using what has been named ‘wolf warrior diplomacy’, after a classic patriotic film.  

For one thing, the consulate staff were wearing riot gear, such as protective vests and helmets. This suggests that they expected and even prepared for potential conflict. For another, the violence they inflicted on the protesters would have been impossible had it not been sanctioned by the Consul – who even admitted not only issuing the order, but also pulling the hair of one protester, which he claimed it was his ‘duty’ to do. The Consul’s statement to the police said that the protests were ‘deeply offensive’ – the typical rhetoric of bullies who want to silence criticism. If such a crackdown was prepared on the orders of the top diplomatic official in the Consulate, then it should be regarded as the behaviour of the State rather than a matter of individual failings.

If the British authorities do not follow up this state-sponsored assault on its critics with the strongest legal and diplomatic consequences, it will send a very worrying signal: that the UK permits China’s diplomats to abuse power on British soil without fear of the consequences. In such circumstances, who knows what China will do over here next.  

As for those Hongkongers who are seeking asylum in the UK, and who value the freedoms which were taken away one by one in Hong Kong, they are in a far more vulnerable position than the Chinese diplomats. They are not protected by diplomatic immunity, but they continue to be menaced by the Hong Kong National Security Law. This effectively criminalises dissenting thought; moreover, Article 38 asserts extraterritorial jurisdiction over non-citizens of mainland China and Hong Kong, even if they reside outside the country’s borders. In the first month after its enactment, the Hong Kong police issued an arrest warrant for six activists, including the author of this article, and (as reported in the Columbia Journal of Transnational Law) Samuel Chu, an American citizen and founder of Campaign for Hong Kong, for ‘collusion with a foreign government’. In December 2021, the Hong Kong Economic and Trade Office, which represents the territory in the UK, sent a letter warning the Sunday Times that an article they had published criticising Hong Kong’s electoral system might be illegal under Chinese law, even though it had been published by a UK paper in the UK. And there are other examples of this jurisdiction creep.

There are already political tensions in the UK between the emerging community of exiles from Hong Kong and well-established pro-CCP Chinese communities. However, the incident at the Consulate indicates a systemic threat to the rights of everyone in the UK – and potentially in other Western countries – and ought to be considered in the context of national security.

First, the CCP could use its diplomatic impunity and privilege as a shield for its security agents, under the guise of diplomatic staff, enabling them to hunt down dissidents violently overseas. Secondly, China’s assertive economic policy in recent years, such as with its Belt and Road Initiative, has resulted in the establishment of a political, business, academic and media nexus between the UK and China which helps to subtly thwart critics of the CCP. There already appears to be a serious infiltration of CCP influence in every echelon of British society. For instance, the United Front Work Department, the propaganda unit by which the CCP seeks to strengthen its power abroad, is operating in the UK, through agents such as Christine Lee. The Confucius Institutes spread cultural propaganda. And some British Chinese groups, who have received government funding to welcome Hongkongers moving to the UK, have been accused of being infiltrated by CCP agents like Lee.

It is widely suspected that the British police have been advised by Chinese community leaders who also serve in the top state institutions under the one-party leadership in China, such as the Overseas Chinese Affairs Committee of the National People’s Congress and the Overseas Chinese Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference. In both of these, there is a quota for ‘returned overseas Chinese’ participants.

The police could spend many months on their investigation of the Manchester incident. This delay would give politicians and civil servants a convenient excuse for deferring any action against Beijing. It would also give the Chinese foreign ministry plenty of time to send the diplomats involved off to other countries before they could be touched by the UK authorities.

Some might argue that politicians who take a ‘hawkish’ stance against the CCP, in the name of national security and human rights, are standing in the way of protecting the UK’s interests in China. However, looking back at what has happened to Hong Kong since 1997, the CCP has gradually used economic and judicial measures to tighten its grip there, and to claim legitimacy for such tactics overseas. If the UK and other liberal countries do not resist China’s acts of totalitarianism on their home ground today, they will legitimise them. Future generations will suffer the consequences.

Instead, the British authorities should take decisive action now, and not kick the can down the road:

(1) The Greater Manchester Police must promptly carry out a thorough investigation and make their findings public.

(2) Those responsible for the violence must be duly punished in accordance with English law, as far as the Vienna Convention allows, so as to uphold justice.

(3) The Consulate staff members must be condemned for violation of the Vienna Convention; they must be declared personae non gratae and expelled from the country forthwith.

(4) If the Chinese Consulate General in Manchester has become nothing more than a centre for the surveillance of dissidents and critics, it must be closed.

(5) A police forum should be held with Hongkongers in each region of the UK. Hongkongers should be represented on one of Manchester Police’s Independent Advisory Groups (IAG).

(6) The consulate should be challenged on its attempt to characterise the protesters’ satire as ‘hate speech’. Rather than being ‘Sinophobic’, the protesters were exercising their legitimate right of free speech to protest against a political leader who is widely considered to be abusing his own power over his country. The CCP’s propagandistic attempts to identify itself with the whole of the Chinese people en masse should be resisted: a totalitarian regime does not represent its citizens.

(7) The UK foreign office should immediately issue a stronger statement on the attack.

The protests in Manchester referred to the recent Party Congress in Beijing. Chairman Xi Jinping is widely suspected of deliberately ushering out former Chairman Hu Jintao in front of the international media during the closing session of Party Congress, in order to demonstrate that the era of a comparatively ‘liberal’ China under the Hu-Wen leadership is gone. Instead, Xi’s far more aggressive and dictatorial narrative looks likely to dominate China in the coming years.

By scrapping the limit to the term of his chairmanship in state-party constitutions and so enabling him to rule indefinitely, as well as by weakening the collective leadership, and removing the premier Li Keqiang and other opponents, Xi has eliminated all obstacles in the way of consolidating near-absolute power in his own person. As a result, he may feel strong enough to wage war against Taiwan and neighbouring countries. Some analysts estimate that an invasion of Taiwan could happen as soon as next year. At the same time, aggression from CCP diplomats, agents, and loyalists in the UK, and elsewhere in the West, may also be scaled up.

The diaspora of Hongkongers will sit tight and be prepared to tackle the security challenges posed by China. We will carry on being robust advocates for democracy and freedom here in the UK – and hope sincerely that all freethinking, liberal-minded people will join us.

On the reasons why Hongkongers are leaving the territory and coming to the UK in large numbers, see further our article here.

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10月16日，一群港人在中國駐曼徹斯特總領事館門外集會示威，抗議中共總書記習近平藉着正在北京舉行的中共黨大會進一步集中權力，並支持香港的民主運動。 就在他們在領館以外的英國領土和平地表達抗議之際， 他們通過視覺藝術畫作表達他們的想法。其中一名抗議者展示了一張赤裸的習近平的諷刺海報，他身著「皇帝的新衣」。 這樣的民間故事暗示了絕對權力的荒謬，它可以腐化和扭曲面孔及事實，並進而構建虛假的「平行事實」。

這張海報，以及抗議者舉著的其他標語、標語牌和橫幅，顯然讓領館官員感到不舒服。 作為回應，視頻片段顯示領事館的工作人員身著防暴裝備，打開閘門，走出領事館範圍，走到英國街上並踢倒、移除和破壞標語牌。 抗議者試圖保護他們的財產不被破壞和搶走。 隨後發生了混戰； 領事館採取了殘暴的暴力手段。 可以看到領事官員將抗議者拖到大門後面的領事館場地，並在大曼徹斯特警察眾目睽睽之下毆打他們。

領事倉促編造了一個「平行事實」，在給警方的一份聲明中聲稱「領事館場地遭到一群抗議者的猛攻，領事館工作人員被要求以肉體抵擋未經授權的侵入和隨後的襲擊。」隨事件以後而成立的推特帳號「曼徹斯特故事」 (Manchester Story) 開始帶出引導輿論風向的敘事宣傳， 隨後在許多親北京的中國學生和海外僑民群體以及社交媒體和視頻平台（如 Twitter 和 YouTube） 開始流傳及散播。

在領事館對英國媒體的聲明中（中文），他們說「外交使團不會容忍他們的國家元首被抗議者詆毀」。這絕不能正當化他們暴力鎮壓反對獨裁政權的抗議者，因為他們是濫用權力的罪魁禍首。 事實上，中共在曼徹斯特當地的最高外交官鄭曦原總領事行為粗暴，言辭不實，在這古老的自由民主國家大放厥詞，公然發表着極權專制的言論，實在難以想像。

曼徹斯特事件引發了一個問題，即中國代表將在多大程度上繼續壓制所有在海外挑戰其政治制度及其領導人的批評者。 這表明他們的行為方式越來越自信甚至咄咄逼人，不少媒體以「戰狼外交」來形容近年中國外交的趨勢，命名取材自一部典型的中共愛國主義宣傳電影。

一方面，領事館工作人員穿著防暴裝備，例如防護背心和頭盔。 這表明他們已經預料到甚至為潛在的衝突做好了準備。 另一方面，如果沒有總領事的批准，他們不可能貿然對抗議者施暴。實際上，總領事不僅承認發布命令，甚至還拉扯一名抗議者的頭髮，他聲稱這是他的「職責」去做。總領事向警方發表的聲明稱，抗議活動「極具冒犯性」—— 這無寧是典型的霸凌者想要壓制批評的言論。如果這樣的鎮壓是奉領事館最高外交官員的命令準備的，那麼這應該被視為國家的行為，而不是個人失誤的問題了。

如果英國當局不以最強烈的法律和外交後果去跟進及回應這次由極權國家支持的對其批評者的攻擊，這將發出一個非常令人擔憂的信號：英國允許中國外交官在英國領土上濫用權力，而不用擔心後果。 在這種情況下，誰知道中國接下來會在這裡做什麼。

至於那些在英國尋求庇護、珍惜自由卻在香港被一一剝奪的香港人，他們的處境遠比中國外交官脆弱。他們不受外交豁免權的保護，但他們繼續受到香港國安法的威脅。這條惡法將異議思想定為犯罪；此外，第 38 條規定對非中國和香港的公民，即使他們居住在中國境外，具有域外管轄權。法案頒布後的第一個月，香港警方對包括本文作者在內的六名活動人士發出逮捕令，以及（據《哥倫比亞跨國法雜誌》報告）美國公民、香港自由運動 (Campaign for Hong Kong) 的創始人朱牧民控以「勾結外國勢力」等罪名。 2021年12月，香港駐倫敦經濟貿易辦事處致函《星期日泰晤士報》，警告他們發表的一篇批評香港選舉制度的文章足已違反中國及香港的法律，儘管該文章由英國的一家報紙在英國發表，這都是中共長臂管轄的一些例子。

在英國，新興的香港流散社區和已發展具規模的親中共華人社區之間因政見不同而存在緊張的局勢。 然而，在領事館發生的事件表明，英國、其他西方國家及國際社會上的每個人的權利都受到這政權系統性的威脅，應該在國家安全的背景下加以考慮。

首先，中共可以利用其外交有罪不罰和特權作為其秘密警察人員的保護網，打著外交人員的幌子，使他們能夠在海外暴力追捕異見人士。 其次，中國近年擴張式的經濟政策，例如「一帶一路」倡議，導致英中之間建立了政治、商業、學術和媒體之間的利益共生裙帶關係，這有助於巧妙地、隱晦地稀釋及中和對中共的批評。 中共的影響似乎已經嚴重滲透到英國社會的各個階層。 例如，中共尋求加強其在海外的權力及利益， 中共宣傳部及統戰部等部門利用包括英國華人律師李貞駒（Christine Lee）等代理人開展活動、孔子學院開展文化宣傳 ，一些獲得政府資助歡迎香港人移居英國的英國華人團體，被指控被中共滲透。

人們普遍懷疑，英國警方的諮詢機制納入了不少華人社區領袖，他們當中有些更在中國一黨專政下的最高國家機構任職，例如全國人民代表大會僑務委員會和中國人民政治協商會議僑務委員會。 在這兩者中，「歸僑」都有被安排固定名額。

警方可能會花費數月時間來調查曼徹斯特事件。 這種延遲將為政界人士和公務員提供一個方便的理由，推遲針對北京的任何行動。 這也將使中國外交部有充足的時間，從容不迫地將相關外交官派往其他國家，以免他們受到英國當局的處置。

有人可能會爭辯說，以國安和人權為名對中共採取「鷹派」立場的政客正在阻礙英國在中國的利益。 然而，回顧1997年以來香港所發生的一切，中共逐漸利用經濟和司法手段加強對香港的控制，並在海外宣稱這種做法的合法性。 如果英國和其他自由國家今天不在本國抵制中國的極權主義行為，中共就會將其合法化及正當化，而後代將承受惡果。

相反，英國當局應該馬上採取果斷行動，而不是迴避問題：

(1) 大曼徹斯特警方必須及時進行徹底調查並將調查結果公之於眾。

(2) 在《維也納公約》允許的範圍內，必須根據英國法律對暴力行為的責任人進行應有的懲罰，以維護社會及司法正義。

(3) 領館工作人員違反《維也納公約》，必須受到譴責； 他們必須被宣佈為「不受歡迎人物」，並立即驅逐出境。

(4）如果中國駐曼徹斯特總領事館變成了監視異見者和批評者的基地，它必須被關閉。

(5) 英國各地警方應與居英港人建立恆常的溝通機制，包括舉行社區及國土安全論壇。 在此事件中，大曼徹斯特警方的獨立諮詢小組 (IAG) 中應該納入港人社區代表。

(6) 領事館試圖將抗議者的諷刺描述為「仇恨言論」，應受到質疑。 抗議者不是「反華」，而是在行使合法的言論自由權利，抗議一位被廣泛認為濫用職權統治國家的政治領導人。 應該抵制中共政權綁定中國人民認同的政治宣傳：專制政權不代表其公民。

(7) 英國外交部應立即就中共駐曼徹斯特總領事館施襲事件發表更強有力的聲明。

話說回來，曼徹斯特的抗議活動所針對近日在北京舉行的黨代會，習近平主席被廣泛認為在黨代會閉幕式上故意在國際媒體面前將前主席胡錦濤趕下台，以表明胡溫領導下相對「自由」的時代已然過去 . 相反，習近平更具侵略性和獨裁的敘述似乎在未來幾年將繼續主宰中國。

通過廢除黨國憲法對國家主席任期的限制，使他能夠無限期連任執政，通過削弱集體領導、罷免李克強總理等黨內不同派系的競爭者，消除了所有在他身邊的一切障礙，令他得以進一步鞏固近乎絕對的權力。 結果，他可能會覺得自己足夠強大，可以對台灣和周邊國家發動戰爭。 一些分析人士估計，台灣最早可能在明年發生。 與此同時，身在英國和西方其他地方的中共外交官、代理人和效忠者的氣燄也可能不斷升級擴大。

居英港人將坐穩，準備應對中國帶來的安全挑戰。 我們將繼續在英國大力倡導民主和自由 —— 並真誠地希望所有思想自由、開明的人都能加入我們的行列。

關於大量香港人離開香港來到英國的原因，請在此處進一步查看我們的文章。

作者：鄭文傑（Simon Cheng）是英籍民主運動人士、人權倡導者、流亡港人。 先後在國立台灣大學和倫敦政治經濟學院學習政治學，並在英國駐香港總領事館從事貿易投資工作。 由於他堅定地追求民主自由等價值，他被中國當局拘留，被國安警察追捕，並被官方媒體污名化。 他是非盈利港人組織 英國港僑協會 (Hongkongers in Britain) 的創始人。

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The post Jackboots in Manchester 暴政踐踏之下的曼徹斯特 appeared first on The Freethinker.

Since 31 January 2021, a new BNO visa has been available to Hong Kong residents holding Hong Kong British National (Overseas) passports. The BNO allows such people to come to the UK with their close family members and stay for five years. After five years of residence in the UK, they will be entitled to apply for settlement (also known as ‘indefinite leave to remain’), and after one further year of residence, to apply for British citizenship.

Oliver and his wife, Jenny, applied for the new visa immediately in July 2021 after getting all the documents and money ready. Oliver was an engineer and Jenny was a primary school teacher. Both were born and educated in Hong Kong.

The cost of applying for a visa to stay for five years is £250. In order to use the National Health Service (NHS) in the UK, applicants each need to pay the healthcare surcharge. It costs £3,120 if one is staying for 5 years. For each child under 18 it costs £2,350.

‘We had to get quite a large sum of money ready,’ Oliver says. ‘Apart from the application costs and flight tickets, we also needed to prove we had enough money to pay for our housing and to support ourselves and our family for 6 months.’

‘We have two boys,’ Jenny adds, ‘Adam was six and Bobby was four. You can imagine how much money we needed to get hold of before we start our journey.’

‘But it’s all worth it,’ Oliver continues with a sigh. ‘We are now safe. We didn’t want to see our kids continue with their schooling in Hong Kong, where they have changed the whole curriculum – including all sorts of misinformation trying to brainwash children into believing that Communist China is a “progressive, selfless and united regime”, while denouncing democratic government as a “fierce inter-party rivalry that makes the people suffer”.’

The Chinese Communist Party-backed National Education curriculum required schools to spend up to one quarter of their study time during six years of primary education on activities and talks about patriotism. Oliver was worried that, with this in force, his children would succumb to the negative effects of brainwashing.

Back in May 2011, the Hong Kong Education Bureau announced the introduction of  a ‘Moral and National Education’ (MNE) as a compulsory school subject in primary and secondary schools. ‘National identity’ was one of the priority values that the curriculum reforms proposed should be promoted. The whole MNE programme aimed at instilling in the students a ‘blind patriotism’. Assessment examples included students’ reporting on whether their peers showed emotions, such as tears in their eyes when singing the national anthem and watching the hoisting of the national flag.

‘The learning of the national situations emphasises “affection”, focuses on “feeling” and is based on “emotion”.’  (MNE Curriculum Guide)

Realising the danger of the many elements of indoctrination in the MNE, in 2012, parents, teachers and students formed a ‘Civil Alliance Against the National Education’. They organised protest marches and occupied the Hong Kong government headquarters, where they staged a hunger strike and other demonstration events. Tens of thousands of supporters joined in the occupation, and the Hong Kong Government had to shelve the MNE and proposed a revised version – which, however, included elements similar to the MNE.

‘We know the Communist China Regime and the Hong Kong Government would not give up on controlling what is taught in schools and what to censor,’ says Jenny. ‘So for the sake of our boys, we had to come here to provide them with a more objective style of education. The boys are happy here in local schools, and I don’t have to worry about their getting brainwashed and not being able to develop critical thinking with an open mind.’

Oliver and Jenny are amongst the many young couples with children who have realised that Hong Kong is no longer the city with civil liberties they were promised by the CCP’s regime, as stipulated in the Hong Kong’s Basic Law. The ‘one-country-two-systems’ promise has been nothing but empty words, and the city has very quickly developed into an authoritarian state, just like any other Chinese city on the mainland. Worst of all, freedom of expression has been suppressed and any voices of dissent stifled.

Eva, an accountant clerk, came to reside in the UK all alone because she could not endure the stifling atmosphere in Hong Kong. ‘I felt suffocated in Hong Kong,’ she explains. ‘Every day when I opened the newspapers or turn on the television, I couldn’t help but feel despair.  Sometimes my anger was so intense I wanted to smash the TV screen.’

News of political dissenters being arrested and jailed has never ceased since actions to curb civil liberties began in 2015. In that year, five booksellers disappeared and later found out that they had been ‘arbitrarily detained’. They were ‘ill-treated and forced to confess’ by the CCP’s special forces.

In the past, there were protest marches every year on special days. Millions used to take to Hong Kong’s streets to voice their frustration and anger with government policies, and to shout out their demands for freedoms and democracy. Slogans were always chanted asking the Chief Executives, Leung Chun Ying (2012-2017) and Carrie Lam (2017-2022) to step down. The history of these protests is well documented in Antony Dapiran’s A City of Protest, published in 2017. But when the protests and demands fell on deaf ears, Hong Kong escalated into a City On Fire, as Dapiran chronicled, taking us to the 2019 scenarios when violence surged, and injuries and deaths become more horrifying. 

‘By the end of 2019, over the course of seven months, Hong Kong police had fired over 16,000 rounds of tear gas onto the streets of Hong Kong.’ (Dapiran, City On Fire, 2019)

‘I could smell the tear gas even in my flat three storeys high above the street,’ says Eva, recalling the battles between the protesters and the police. ‘When a protester died after falling off a building, when a young girl died mysteriously and her naked body was found floating in Hong Kong waters, and when another young student protester died during a demonstration, I made up my mind to leave this city.’

Like Eva, many young people in Hong Kong have been pondering the options for leaving this city where civil liberties are diminishing, where control of the citizens is the government’s top priority, and where the separation of powers – legislative, executive and judicial –  is quickly being eroded. 

Hong Kong used to be called the ‘Pearl of the Orient’, a vibrant and lively city in which Chinese and Western cultures merged harmoniously. It was one of the most successful capitalist economies in the world, staying consistently near the top of global economic rankings. Hong Kong people could enjoy freedom of expression, of the press and of publication; freedom of association, assembly, procession and demonstration; and the right and freedom to form and join trade unions, and to strike. Although all these freedoms are still enshrined in the Basic Law of Hong Kong, most of them have gradually become empty words. 

Similarly, Article 35 of the Constitution of People’s Republic of China states that ‘Citizens of the People’s Republic of China shall enjoy freedom of speech, the press, assembly, association, procession and demonstration.’ This sounds grand and democratic. But we all know these are just slogans, if not blatant lies, to deceive the people.

Nowadays Hong Kong citizens, who have experienced the erosion of civil liberties in their beloved city, can no longer see the magnificent glow of the ‘Pearl of the Orient’. 

Another vital blow to stifle dissent and silence pro-democracy activists was struck only last year.

On 6 January 2021, 53 Hong Kong activists including former legislators, social workers and academics were arrested by the National Security Department of the Hong Kong Police Force under the National Security Law. The charges concerned their organisation and participation in the primaries for the subsequently postponed Legislative Council election. This was the largest crackdown under the National Security Law. Its effect was to leave the Legislative Council completely controlled by pro-government legislative councillors.

‘What do you expect of these “hare-brain’d slaves” who have now infested the Legislative Council ?’ says Leo. ‘They all behave after an “undressed, unpolished, uneducated, unpruned, untrained, or rather, unlettered, or ratherest, unconfirmed fashion” – and they know nothing but kowtowing to their leaders.’

Leo was until recently a professor at a Hong Kong university, teaching English Literature. In 2018, before the 2022 mass exodus to the UK, he already knew he would no longer be able to call Hong Kong home. Together with his wife, Mary, he came to the UK to pay a visit to a close friend of his and to search for possibilities for emigrating. The couple eventually decided to buy a house here for their retirement. They both hold British passports which they attained by way of the Right of Abode arrangement, an agreement offered to some Hong Kong citizens after its handover to China in 1997.

‘We decided to stay here for good,’ Leo continues. ‘My wife is worried that I might be arrested if I return to Hong Kong.’

‘Almost one hundred percent!’ Mary says with confidence. ‘You will be arrested right at the airport. Look at all those publications of yours! Criticising government policies, condemning the Communist China regime, establishing Non-Governmental Organisations, participating in protests and demonstration marches. They can easily charge you with crimes of secession, subversion, terrorism, and collusion with foreign organisations.’

‘Yes, I can’t disagree with you, Mary,’ Leo sighs. ‘Most of my activist friends have been arrested and are now detained awaiting trials.’ He points out that the largest pro-democracy paper, Apple Daily, announced closure on 24 June, 2021 and the chief editor and five other executives were detained. All vociferous pro-democracy NGOs were disbanded. ‘Where else can we publish any criticism or voice our opinions? Who else dares to take to the streets and risk being dumped into the ocean or thrown off buildings?’

Leo and Mary have academic friends who have also migrated to the UK. Some have found jobs and many are trying to settle in, looking for a place to live, getting their children integrated into local schools, and adapting to British culture. In short, starting a new life here. 

Up till now, statistics from the Hong Kong Immigration Department have recorded the daily statistics on Passenger traffic. In the UK, government figures published in March 2022 by the Home Office have revealed that since the introduction of the BNO visa scheme, 113,742 Hongkongers have been granted visas to the UK. The daily reports of Hong Kong citizens leaving for the UK from the Hong Kong International Airport have clearly indicated that a mass exodus is taking place. There must have been and will be many Olivers, Jennys, Evas, Leos and Marys amongst them. Hopefully, many children too will be able to escape the brutal brainwashing education system and enjoy their liberties and schooling here in the UK.  

The Hong Kong diaspora to the UK is most likely to continue for the foreseeable future. Other residents may consider other free countries, with other reasons for emigration. (As to the effect of the Covid lockdowns, their absurdity and disruption to people’s lives, that would require a whole article of its own.) Wherever they plan to go, for many Hongkongers, the exhortation, ‘Let’s leave this town,’ will long be in their thoughts and dreams, awaiting realisation.

The names of some of the people mentioned in this article have been changed to protect their identities.

More on China’s creeping totalitarianism: Jackboots in Manchester 暴政踐踏之下的曼徹斯特, by Simon Cheng

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