Andrew Chan, the chairperson of the Societas Linguistica Hongkongensis, a group that promoted Cantonese, dissolved the organization after Hong Kong authorities objected to a work published on the Societas website.
If Chan acted to close the doors, is the headline of the present post inaccurate? Not really. His action was equivalent to that of someone who hands over his wallet when threatened by a mugger. The mugger has stolen the wallet even if the victim “gave” it to him and the bad guy did not have to physically snatch it. The Guardian reports (August 29, 2023):
Citing legal risks and a lack of resources, Chan said he immediately dissolved the organisation “in order to ensure the safety of my family and former members”. Chan told the Guardian he was no longer in Hong Kong, and didn’t feel he could return in the current climate.
“Since I am now a suspect under the national security law, and the conviction rate is 100%. The action of national security police entering my home without a warrant had actually scared me. It made me feel that they could do anything they want,” he said.
The provocative action of the Societas Linguistica Hongkongensis was to publish a story about freedom, discussion of which the governments of China and Hong Kong regard as a grave threat to national security. According to ABC News (August 28, 2023):
The fictional article in question is about a Hong Kong-born man who had emigrated with his parents to the United Kingdom when he was young and revisited his birthplace. . . . It was written by a third party who used their pen name.
In the article, the government changes the names of places to erase colonial elements and suppresses religious freedoms. [It ends by quoting] Czech writer Milan Kundera: “The struggle of man against power is the struggle of memory against forgetting.”
Chan says he won’t come back to Hong Kong until he feels safe, which may be a very long time if he is realistic. He shouldn’t assume that after a certain number of months or years, the Hong Kong government will have forgotten about him.
