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Then & Now | Hong Kong’s ‘Christian’ bigots and China mouthpieces spew toxic anti-LGBTQ rhetoric targeting Gay Games, but they don’t speak for the people, polls show

  • Self-appointed arbiters of ‘public morality’ attack Hong Kong’s hosting of the Gay Games as a symbol of LGBTQ lifestyles they see as a ‘Western cultural import’
  • That they are followers of foreign imports, in Christianity and communism, is an irony lost on them. Meanwhile, polls show public support for LGBTQ equality

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Participants in the 2015 Hong Kong Pride Parade. Attacks on LGBTQ community interests are a sobering reflection of Hong Kong’s dramatic civil society realignment, Post columnist Jason Wordie writes. Photo: Jonathan Wong

They’re at it again. Hong Kong’s self-appointed “public morality” arbiters have launched another poorly aimed salvo at a perceived easy target – the local LGBTQ community as represented by the forthcoming Gay Games in November.

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In depressing tandem, Hong Kong’s only LGBTQ radio show, RTHK’s We Are Family, broadcast since 2006, will be axed next month – after 17 years of post-midnight broadcasting – due to “programming changes”.

In their latest nasty foray, various crank-up, scratchy-sounding mouthpieces of other “minds” wearily echo similar civil society crackdowns in mainland China, targeting local LGBTQ activists’ perceived advocacy of decadent “Western” lifestyles.

Dolefully baying attack dogs lose their original purpose when their political opponents have quietly decamped, are locked up pending trial, or have otherwise opted for public discretion in these strange times.

When calling for the deaths of their political opponents at public rallies becomes redundant, fresh targets have to be sought. For what else justifies their continued existence but vindictive harassment of a new cohort of supposed victims specifically targeted for the proxy purposes of others?

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