A brief summary and analysis of the protest movement in Hong Kong since June — Introduction I will briefly summarise the situation in Hong Kong, first by give it a proper context in Part I. Next, in Part II, I will point out main flashpoints during the three months of protests in Hong Kong. In Part III, I will explain what the protest demands are. Then…

While we should respect the choice of the British, we should urge them to avoid no-deal Brexit, as a friend, an ally, and a former colony. — Aotearoa New Zealand’s relationship status with Britain, if it were a line on Facebook, it would be “it is complicated”. Britain signed the Treaty of Waitangi with Maori chiefs in 1840, and subsequently became the colonial power in Aotearoa New Zealand, doing what colonisers do: expanding the Empire at the…

GCSB, the agency responsible for the network security of New Zealand, has denied Spark the use of Huawei telecommunication equipment in Spark’s rollout of 5G network, unless Spark and Huawei can come up with solutions that can allay the security concerns of GCSB. Spark, at this point, is the only…

The Glamour of Asma al-Assad, Melania Trump, and now, Kim Yo-jong, disguises the flaws of the regime they belong to — A few months ago, North Korea threatened to destroy South Korea by fire. Now, however, North Korea sent a delegate to participate in the Winter Olympic in Pyeongchang, South Korea. In addition, Kim Yo-jong, younger sister of Kim Jong-un, the “supreme leader” of North Korea, presented an invitation to the…

Because it fits the textbook definition of discrimination — First of all, I recognise that the Israeli government’s continuing occupation of Palestine cannot be morally justified. Thus I share the outrage and indignation stated by Nadia Abu-Shanab and Justine Sachs. Abu-Shanab and Sachs, however, use the Israeli government’s occupation to call on Lorde to not tour Israel, because that…

Does it matter that interracial romance is simply a product of pure and simple “love”, where racism or colonialism plays no part? I say No, with some qualifications. — The Big Sick tells a story about a man falling for a woman. Except that the man came from Pakistan and the woman is Caucasian. Like Romeo and Juliet, they come from very different background, but overcame their differences and fell in love, eventually. And nobody die at the end.

You should do it not just because you are polite, but because of power imbalance — I watch videos on the virtual assistants like Alexa, Cortana, Google Assistant and Siri. The most interesting aspect of the interactions between human and machine is that no one says “please” to the virtual assistants in all those demo videos. “Alexa, remind me to pick up my daughter from soccer…

Why it is a distinct possibility that the Jacinda Ardern will simply serve the status quo and is not the dawn of a new beginning — A relatively young, charismatic candidate running for political office promised to be an agent of change and hope. However, as it turned out, the candidate continued many of the policies of predecessors. This is one view of the Obama presidency. As a candidate, Obama promised to be an agent of…

From environmental philosophy to politics, via… ZOMBIES! — First, a little bit of pick-a-path science fiction to tease out different philosophical positions: You are the last person on earth. Or so you think. The world population was decimated by an viral outbreak that turned every single person you are aware of into zombies. These zombies are harmless enough…