‘Come on, beat me to death’: Elderly woman unleashes on Hong Kong protesters

An elderly woman has gone viral after launching a furious rant against Hong Kong demonstrators and journalists in the middle of a busy highway.

An elderly woman has gone viral after unleashing a furious rant against Hong Kong’s demonstrators about the inconvenience they’ve caused her.

The woman, who says she is 70 years old, moved traffic cones, bricks and barricades off a major highway in the territory so that vehicles could get through.

“So many of you people could be doing something, but what do you do? You block people from getting about. Explain that to me,” she says. “Why do you need to block the road?

“Explaining things to you is f**king useless,” a demonstrator responds.

“If you kill people, set fires, I don’t care. But you’re blocking the roads. None of the cars can move,” she continues.

“Thank goodness you’re not my children. I know you want to beat me to death. Beat me to death, that would be good. I will be the first blood of this ‘revolution’. Come on, beat me to death.”

A protester off-camera challenges her: “Use your heart to think about what’s happening to Hong Kong.”

“You’ve lost your minds!” she yells back. “Why did you dig up the bricks? To throw at people. You think I’m a crazy granny? I know I’m useless. The efforts of one person are useless.”

She says she “doesn’t know whether they’re angels or demons”, adding that, “Now in this world, we don’t know.” It’s unclear if this is directed at the protesters or the journalists filming her.

As Hong Kong enters its 18th week of unrest, an elderly woman vents her frustration while clearing a protest barricade:...

Posted by South China Morning Post on Monday, 7 October 2019

When a reporter asks the woman why she thinks the protesters are on the streets, she says: “You’re a reporter. You ask them. Why is it that you’re a reporter and you’re not asking them?

“This has lasted four months and it’s becoming worse and worse. It’s because of you guys. You don’t use your brains and ask them questions.

“There is so much trash in Hong Kong. If you used all this time to clean the streets, all of Hong Kong would be clean. But you don’t. You throw trash everywhere.”

Towards the end of the 10-minute rant, a protester puts a Chinese Communist Party flag in her hand, to which she responds, “Don’t set me up!” She then throws the flag into the bushes.

The video has gone viral, with more than 28,000 shares on the South China Morning Post’s Facebook page.

China’s state media has seized on the video, with the Global Times newspaper reporting it’s received 61 million views on Weibo since Monday night.

AUTHORITIES SAY THEY MAY SEEK CHINA’S HELP

The video follows the 18th consecutive weekend of protests across Hong Kong.

The demonstrations started as a fight against a controversial extradition bill to mainland China but have since become a broader protest against the Chinese Communist Party and the territory’s embattled leader Carrie Lam.

Ms Lam has not ruled out asking Beijing for help as the Asian financial hub struggles to deal with the ongoing protests that are damaging its economy.

She says Beijing wants Hong Kong to solve its own problems but under its mini-constitution, known as the Basic Law, Hong Kong could ask Beijing for help.

“If the situation becomes so bad then no options could be ruled out if we want Hong Kong to at least have another chance,” she said yesterday.

“But at this moment, I and my team, we are still very committed in making sure we can use our own instruments … to try and restore calm and order in Hong Kong,” she said, adding there were no plans to expand emergency laws introduced on Friday.

“But I would appeal (to) everyone in society to join hands to achieve this objective,” Ms Lam said.

Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam has not ruled out asking Beijing for help to stop the protests.

The protests, which show no sign of abating, pose the biggest popular challenge to Chinese President Xi Jinping since he came to power in 2012 and are Hong Kong’s thorniest political crisis since Britain returned it to China in 1997.

Ms Lam said protests were severely damaging Hong Kong’s economy. “Hong Kong’s various sectors will enter a severe winter season,” she said.

Tens of thousands of protesters took to the streets of Hong Kong at the weekend wearing face masks despite Ms Lam banning masks under colonial-era emergency laws invoked on Friday.

Protesters have been using masks to shield their identities and to protect their faces from police tear gas.

The protests have entered their 18th consecutive week.

The rallies spiralled into some of the most violent clashes since protests started four months ago, forcing the unprecedented shutdown of the city’s metro after many stations were torched and scores of shops and China banks damaged.

Sunday night marked the first interaction between protesters and Chinese troops stationed in the territory who have so far remained in barracks.

Protesters targeted a military barracks with laser pointers, prompting troops to hoist a banner warning them they could be arrested.

Senior ranking People’s Liberation Army officers have said violence will not be tolerated.

Hong Kong police said on Tuesday 77 people had been arrested for violating the anti-mask law.

The rallies spiralled into some of the most violent clashes since protests started four months ago.

Since Friday, more than 200 shops and public utilities have been damaged in the unrest and police have fired 367 tear gas rounds, a police spokesman said.

What started as opposition to a now-withdrawn extradition bill has grown into a pro-democracy movement against what is seen as Beijing’s tightening grip on the city, which protesters say undermines a “one country, two systems” formula promised when Hong Kong returned to Chinese rule.

China dismisses such accusations, saying foreign governments, including Britain and the United States, have fanned anti-China sentiment.

US President Donald Trump said on Monday that if anything bad happened in Hong Kong it would be bad for the US-China trade talks.

China’s October 1 National Day holiday week is usually a time when Hong Kong is flooded with visitors, but many shops were closed and tourist numbers plummeted, Ms Lam said, warning the city’s third-quarter economic data would “surely be very bad”.