They didn't, though. Anti-American demonstrations are legal, just not popular. But that's about it. Yet here in Hong Kong, the only part of China where people have the freedom to express that fury, there was little sign of it. In the only place in China with a free press rather than state-controlled propaganda organs, the people had a chance to learn both sides of the story rather than just the party line.
People feel like they know what's going on.
They realize that there is a diversity of views. So in the one place in China with an economy that is truly free and open, Chinese people showed that they had little interest in mindless nationalism. Hong Kong's citizens, many of them refugees from Communism who grew up under a colonial government, just don't have much patience for nationalism, DeGolyer says. That might deepen the rift between Hong Kong and the rest of China. Not here in Hong Kong.