![\"456592160\"](\"http:\/\/www.chinesepen.org\/english\/files\/2014\/10\/456592160.jpg\")
<\/a>Paula Bronstein\/Getty Images<\/p>\nA pro-democracy protester yells out in Hong Kong’s Mongkok neighborhood, October 3, 2014. Thousands of pro-democracy supporters continue to occupy the streets of Hong Kong’s financial district.<\/p>\n
\u201cDozens of mainlanders were taken away by the police because they openly supported Occupy Central and at least ten of them have been detained\u2026They are in Jiangxi, Shanghai, Shenzhen, Beijing, Chongqing, Guangzhou, etc,\u201d Hong Kong-based blogger and journalist Annie Zhang posted on her Facebook page on October 1, the 65th National Day of the People\u2019s Republic.<\/p>\n
The day before, Occupy Central supporters took to the streets to demand greater democracy and autonomy for their city. All of the world watched. All the world, that is, except mainland China, which was in the middle of its \u201cmost censored day of the year.\u201d Reporter @\u6731\u5b66\u4e1c captured the disconnect in a microblog post from inside the Great Firewall: \u201cthe distance from Taiping Shan in Hong Kong to Beijing is only 1,976 km (1,227 miles), but who knows the distance between people\u2019s hearts?\u201d<\/p>\n
In the days since, mainlanders have looked for ways to speak their minds online. Mainland students and alumni of Hong Kong\u2019s universities added their support for the pro-democracy protestors by setting up a Facebook page. Sina Weibo, the massive (and heavily censored) microblogging platform, has quickly become a battleground for free speech about Hong Kong, its users deploying ever-more subtle tactics to keep their opinions from being deleted by mainland censors.<\/p>\n
Some drew on history to signal their hope that China\u2019s leaders would deal with the Hong Kong protesters with leniency. Microblogger @\u5f20\u4fee\u6797\u5fae\u535a referenced the pro-democracy protests in Taiwan in 1979: \u201cWhen the leaders of the movement were arrested, the army called for the death penalty, to make examples of the disobedient protesters. The then-chancellor of National Tsing Hua University, Shen Junshan, warned Kuomintang leader Chiang Ching-kuo that \u201conce the blood touched the ground, it could never be taken back.\u201d Chiang fell silent but heeded Shen\u2019s advice and didn\u2019t kill a single protestor.<\/p>\n
Many mainlanders questioned the protests on the grounds that they could damage Hong Kong\u2019s economy. Influential liberal and outspoken microblogger @\u674e\u5b87\u6656_Huey, a Ph.D. student in Chinese politics, dismissed the criticism with a reference to World War II: \u201cThat\u2019s bullshit! The anti-Japanese War also had a devastating effect on Chinese economy!\u201d he wrote. ZHANG XIAORAN 10.03.14 Paula Bronstein\/G … Continue reading
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