On Anti-ELAB Bloody June sentiments

cw: police brutality, depression, anxiety, suicide
I think being in the diaspora as a first-generation immigrant really fucks with your mind sometimes, especially in times where shit is going down in your motherland.

Here's the gist: 2019 dawn of spring, we have all become fugitives.
Recently since late May, the Hong Kong government has been trying to push the Extradition Bill in Legco so that any fugitives from mainland and Taiwan can be extradited for trial. This whole thing started with a murder in ROC/Taiwan, where a Hong Konger killed his girlfriend and came back to Hong Kong. Since there isn't international law between Hong Kong and Taiwan, it was impossible to prosecute the alleged murderer or send him to Taiwan for trial. The Hong Kong government then wrote an extradition bill, but the problem is that it is so obvious that the purpose is for PRC to tighten the grip on Hong Kong liberties. Because why would you need to include mainland China, a place where the judicial system is repressive and unfair, when the murder case was in Taiwan? Not to mention, the Taiwanese government tried to reach out numerous times to figure this out with Hong Kong without passing an extradition bill that would involve PRC, but the Hong Kong government gave poor and barely any response to the ROC government, which is in itself disrespectful to the girl who was murdered and obvious that they are using this as a repressive tool.

June of 2019. I don't think I will ever forget this dark and traumatizing month. The exact dates, the helpless feeling, the late nights long days keeping up with live updates, the anger, the tears, the effort trying to help while being overseas. Everything was so surreal. This was going on at the same time as the Sudanese crisis. I had to tell my friends in US that I'm mentally torn and feel so bad that I don't have the capacity to advocate for Sudan because I was so fucked from Hong Kong crisis already. It was the first time I absolutely felt like the world is a terrible place to live in. It was a dark time.
June 9, 2019: Prior to this day, international rallies were planned in at least 40 major cities in the world. It was one of the biggest turnouts for protest in Hong Kong. 1.03 million Hong Kongers took over Hong Kong island to protest against the bill. My dad and brother went too, which was really surprising to consider how much my dad never goes outside. I was really proud of all my close friends and family for participating. Carrie Lam said this will not make the government withdraw the bill. Outrageous, everyone was extremely heated. To be honest, I didn't expect much from this shitty government but it's infuriating when the worst expectation really came true. The government does not care about its people.
June 12, 2019: I will never in my life forget this day. Thousands of college students, working-class people, and other Hong Kongers occupied the streets of Central and surrounded government HQ complex. Police use teargas, rubber bullets to shoot protesters, literally aimed at their face and teargassing people in short distance. At least 20 people were unconscious from bullets, their faces were bleeding badly. 128 teargases were shot. I know friends who got teargassed. Getting WhatsApp messages from traumatized friends, keeping up with live updates of the police brutality, trying to make sure all my friends are safe. I vividly remember it was a Wednesday because a Michigan Daily news writer contacted me about this. I asked my best friend for her experience during the chaos, she said her boyfriend tried to build blockades from random objects on the streets, trying to block the police attacks. My other friend who had to run for her life after getting teargassed, along with so many other civilians. These are people I grew up with in Hong Kong, these are people my age, these are college students, running for their lives and resisting tyranny. Why do we have to worry about things like this, about our survival as a 20-year-old? It doesn't make sense, it's insane. All I could do was to sit on my bed, watching young Hong Kongers like me getting shot in their head, unconscious, blood oozing everywhere, a person delivering water to other protesters suddenly getting surrounded and beat up by 20 police with their batons, screaming for help on the floor. And the government has the audacity to tell the public we were rioters and supports police using force to put down the riot. Rioters... rioters who are unarmed, beaten up, getting shot in their heads, teargassed, running for their lives?
June 16, 2019: It was fathers day. And people were "celebrating" it by protesting again on the street. 2 million Hong Kongers gave up their time to protest when they could be celebrating father's day. That is 30% of the entire Hong Kong population decided to protest rather than celebrating father's day, including my dad and brother, again. I was so proud of them finding out they were at the protest. I am always really proud to be a Hong Konger but I don't think I was ever this proud to be a Hong Konger, seeing such a strong community resisting oppression. Especially when the entire movement was planned on LIHKG (a Hong Kong version of reddit) and has no prominent organizers, we are so creative, smart, strong, talented, loving as young Hong Kongers. We had detailed plans organized on the platform, sorted into resource team, documentation/archive team, international team, network team, etc to strategize everything. The most creative protests such as calling a sit-in "picnic" and a road blockade "carfest show," using airdrop to spread protest information, it was absolutely amazing.

It was a restless and emotional month, especially hearing about young people committing suicide because they felt so hopeless in Hong Kong.  So many people expressed mental distress this month, including my friend who suffered from mental illness. One of them is literally 21 years old college student, studying music and education. She was just like me, and my friends, and any other college student. This could have been any of us. Her suicide note was about the situation in Hong Kong, encouraging other Hong Kongers to stay alive and keep resisting without her. I found out about this when I woke up yesterday morning, tearing up on my bed. She is my peer, and she killed herself because of the system in our home falling apart.

I think the most fucked up thing about all this is when public health service is used as tools for political crackdown. After police arrest severely injured people straight from the hospital, no one had faith in our health system. Imagine living in the first world getting shot by police and you can't even seek help from health services because they will arrest you. Someone has to be so demonic and evil to use the public health system as a repression tool on top of police brutality. The most ironic thing is when the police had their crisis mediator trying to compromise with the protesters as if that solves anything. It's like the government knows how to push its people to the edge. People can't even seek mental health services from public health sectors because we are all too scared that our mental health information would lead to possible prosecution.

I remember having so many clustered thoughts to myself about police brutality and the use of militant force. I knew it was a global issue, but when it was used on people I love and know personally, I really understood the psychological trauma from police brutality. Police was also raiding college dorms to arrest student protesters that same night, crack down on IP address to arrest organizing group chat admins, stole hospital records to arrest injured individuals. After discussing it with friends and internalizing everything, I've had so many epiphanies of global power structure. The way reactionary people with different belief behaves, supporting police sanction and tearing down the graveyard of the person who committed suicide, really made me realize so many shitty things, even with leftists on the internet that I used to trust. The worst part is that when there are barely any Hong Kongers around where I live in the US, needless to say Hong Kongers that understands my leftist decolonial politics, I can only formulate my own thoughts by myself, from my lived experiences and my knowledge, without any resources or advice.It has been really lonely.

It is July 1st 2019, the 22nd anniversary of HKSAR establishment day, isn't it weird to see young Hong Kongers with helmets and masks occupying the inside of Legco and defacing everything while police were surrounding the Legco building? When two protest over a million people showed up, countless of police brutality, three Hong Kongers committed suicide because of the hopeless atmosphere of HK, Carrie Lam has the audacity to say "I'm busy tonight" when pro-democratic leaders tried to speak to her. Being a Hong Konger is exhausting.When a therapist also felt helpless hearing from a 13-year-old teenager that was so hopeless despite having so much privilege in his life, it's shows how depressing a society is.

I think this all made me internalize the trauma in the diaspora. For the first time, I was in desperate need of a community of Hong Kongers on campus that understands my pain that all my other US friends cannot. For the first time, I truly feel the helplessness of watching your motherland fall apart being away from home. For the first time, I felt like I am homeless. I used to think some leftist people who are super adamant about their politics are elitist and tone policing. But now I understand the frustration of having to be lonely in diaspora feeling like everyone is too annoyed to listen to all your struggles for months and years when none of these things affect them directly. In a way, I am technically in exile if the bill is passed, because I would technically be a fugitive if I step foot in Hong Kong. Advocating and processing this trauma by ranting is what I can do to cope with this. So friends, please bear with me and be patient with me, I have no choice.

It is all too surreal.