In recent years, Hong Kong is becoming a less peaceful and harmonious society. Different people with different ideas or thoughts have arguments everywhere. Hongkongers seem to be hot-tempered and a small thing against their will will trigger their anger. Unless this situation is turned around, our society will never be peaceful and harmonious.
How can we see the disharmony in the city? Priority seats should be no stranger to everyone. The existence of priority seats has yet shown one of the problems in Hong Kong. Originally, the seats are for those in need, just like the elderly, pregnant women, and so on, which is good. However, there is more and more news about people arguing just because of who gets the right to take the priority. We hear about heated arguments and a bad image is attached to the priority seats, causing the priority seats being empty in most of the time in different kinds of public transportation. Why does this become an issue? It is because whenever there is a conflict about the priority seats, people just take out their phones, record it and post it on the social media later and people criticize about it. However, no one tries to stop the conflict in real life. This is a kind of problem that Hongkongers have nowadays. They will do nothing to stop something bad, but instead, they will choose to record and put it on social media, letting others have online judgement. In fact, there is some terms in Cantonese from this kind of situation — “keyboard fighters” to describe those who only criticize others on the Internet, “Fai Lau” and “Fai Ching” to describe the elderly and teenagers who go against one’s idea. This is a kind of illness causing our society to be so unpeaceful and not harmonious.
Not only the priority seats, another issue that every Hongkonger must know is the “Umbrella revolution”. Maybe, not all know about the details, but at least the name and what had happened are not strange to everyone. This splits Hong Kong society into two halves, for those who support it and those who don’t. The major event of occupying the Central has become a heated topic in society later on. There are lots of ideas on the Internet towards the Umbrella revolution. Of course, “keyboard fighters” act promptly and they post some false or incomplete information and extreme opinions, which may mislead the viewers. Hence, this intensifies the arguments between supporters and opposors. The relationship between them becomes worse, tearing our city further.
Personally, I don’t think that the situation of our society nowadays is too bad to be changed and it is just a matter of time. In order to change the current situation, some measures are needed. It is believed that no one likes to live in an unhappy society.
Solutions? Actually there is no quick fix to remove the negativity in society. However, this does not mean that we do not do anything. A change in mindset is one of the ways to help. Let’s not be those who just receive information and believe all. Please think critically. Don’t write and send something out without thinking about the results because it’s irresponsible. Some may say that this won’t help a lot. But in fact, small things make big changes. When many people behave like this, the misleading information can hardly affect us. Besides, communication is important. It is indeed the wise and best way, at least much better than yelling and scolding before figuring out the whole thing. The process may take some time, but let’s do it step by step patiently. It is believed that Hong Kong society will be much more peaceful and harmonious than the current stage if we all are willing to communicate and share.
Nowadays, our society is less peaceful and not harmonious. Many people have a solder mindset and only focus on what they know and what they want to know, and they will fight for themselves only and for what they think is right. Others can hardly change their minds in any way. Let’s be a wise and clear-minded person in this hot-tempered society. Never be the ones who are being affected, but the ones who stay calm!