Disclaimer: I am biased just as most people here in the discussions. But I am bi-lingual and I read lots (hundreds) articles both in English & Chinese (Simplified & Traditional) and I've been to Hong Kong and have had personal experiences working with HK Police. And I also have Hong Kong friends both native (born in HK) and immigrants from mainland.

There was an OpEd[1] written by Ronny K. W. Tong, a former chairman of the Hong Kong Bar Association, posted on SCMP, a major local Hong Kong newspaper published in English. I agree with it.

Of all the five demands:

1. Full withdrawal of the extradition bill.

This is kinda of BS, even though HK government has completed gave in on this. The bill is effectively dead. But just think about it, this is about a case where a murder suspect who committed murder and was supposed to be face justice. HK law is probably too lenient on capital punishment than in mainland, which the suspect is mostly like to be served with death penalty. I can understand the fear HKers towards a in-transparent justice system with potential political descendants abuse.

2. A commission of inquiry into alleged police brutality

This is also BS. My first hand experience with HK Police has been very positive and professional. Any riots with colour revolution approach and significant violence against law enforcement, major damages to public infrastructure like subway stations, government buildings, and not a single protester was killed but hundreds of HK police officers were injured some were badly injured, a few were blind due to protester shooting high powered laser beams into the eyes of officers in short distance and doxxing against thousands of HK police officers and their spouses/children, this is practically unheard of anywhere in the history. The restraint there is unmatched.

Can you imagine if this happened in the U.S.? Any protester & violent rioters dare to post threat to law enforcement/police officers, they will be shoot or tased or choked dead. Pretty sure you will get near zero chance to win in arguing police brutality with the judge either. Ok, maybe U.S. is not a good example to compare to because gun ownership makes it unique. But what about the HK Police during British ruling? I haven't seen any comparison report before 1997 vs. after 1997. I will challenge the protester to do some homework on that topic and leave it at that.

3 Retracting the classification of protesters as “rioters”

BS x 3. See #2. Protest became violent, lots of HK Police officers were hurt and injured, even officers' spouses and children became doxxing victims. If this is not riots what is?

4. Amnesty for arrested protesters

BS x 4. You know what's screw-up after all these arrests? The foreign judges free them! Yes, you heard that right. Hong Kong inherits the legal justice system from the British ruling, like any other western countries, the judges are appointed for life. And you know what, most of the top judges are foreigners who are also citizens from the Commonwealth, by definition, that means these judges also pledge the allegiances to other countries in additional to Hong Kong. How could the judge be unbiased if they have dual/triple citizenship? What if their allegiances to other Commonwealth countries has a conflict of interests to their jobs as Hong Kong judges? This is also unheard of in any countries with a fair record of justice systems. Obviously, those foreign judges doesn't like to be criticized.[2] They want to keep it that way.[3][4]. If I were a Hong Konger, I certainly won't like to be judged by a foreign judge especially the judge pledge the allegiance to a hostile nation (UK) with a strong political biased than my own country (China).

5. Dual universal suffrage, meaning for both the Legislative Council and the Chief Executive

This wasn't part of the 1997 deal between UK + China. Hong Kong had never had universal suffrage under British ruling. So what makes the protesters think they will have a leverage on negotiating that? If the government doesn't agree to it, they burn down the whole city, block the subway and airport and make every Hong Konger suffer? I am being cynical here, under the current situation neither Beijing nor Hong Kong government would consider that.

I've read many OpEds and discussions, the consensus of mainland media focus on the living standard of average Hong Kongers were the major cause of social unrest. I agree with that.

The five demands have no bearing on changing the lives of lower class Hong Kongers and on the future hope of young Hong Kongers. Instead, they should be asking for changes in legislation on public housing (one of most expensive places to live on earth), on economic stimulus in creating jobs for youngsters, narrowing a huge income gap between the ultra wealthy and the poor lower class (a city with slightly less population with 20 billionaires with net worth over $2B, totally $170B, or 55% of the GDP controlled by 20 people/families, how did Hong Kong end up like that?[5]). The social economical divide is astonishing.

Although democracy is arguably an ultimate destination for citizens to ask for, democracy doesn't necessary solve Hong Kong's social + economical problems that I outlined. Additionally, democracy doesn't necessarily bring prosperity, there are authoritarian states that people have a much better living standards, namely Saudi., UAE, Qatar and a bunch of middle eastern countries, and then there is Singapore.

The 5 demands of Hong Kong Rioters totally miss the point of urgent issues and introduce violence and break law & order is the wrong way for all of Hong Kong people. Let alone vast majority of the Hong Kong people did not fully agree with the protesters to begin with.

That's my opinion on the 5 demands.

[1]: https://www.scmp.com/comment/opinion/article/3017719/hong-ko...

[2]: https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/law-crime/article/209614...

[3]: https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/politics/article/2096355...

[4]: https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/2128060/why-c...

[5]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Hong_Kong_people_by_ne...