Hong Kong was long the main place where large-scale, open remembrance of the events of Tiananmen Square in 1989 was possible. It drew hundreds of thousands.
In mainland China, it is snuffed out to a degree that is shocking.
Steadily, this has been eroded by the authorities.
In 2020, under the premise of covid19 restrictions, there was a clamp down. Many defied it; arrests followed for unlawful assembly. This coincided with Beijing imposing the National Security Law (NSL) in June 2020, which broadly targeted secession, subversion.
In 2021, Tiananmen memorials, museums, and statues (like the "Pillar of Shame") were removed from universities.
Arrests and detentions continued throughout the years for the mere crime of bringing flowers, wearing black clothing, or even just social media posts in commemoration of the Tiananmen massacre.
Just a few weeks ago, the trial of the former organizers of the yearly Tiananmen vigil concluded. They await the verdict, which is almost certain to be a jail sentence.
This year, the authorities have banned family and relatives of the victims from visiting their graves in Beijing.
The ruthless efforts of intensifying censorship by the CCP has swallowed the truth in the land where it happened and now, Hong Kong which was the keeper of its memory.
But this role is no longer, even if it still exists in the hearts and minds of Hong Kongers.
To those of us overseas, this is a duty. We are the keepers of a memory the powerful wish to bury. In our living rooms, across time zones, through late-night conversations and quiet tears, we hold the history to which there are no more monuments, to which there are blank pages in the history books.
We remember the students with their hunger strikes and hopeful banners. We remember the ordinary citizens who stood beside them. We remember Tank Man. We remember the mothers who lost children and were told their grief was unpatriotic.
We remember because forgetting would betray not just history, but the very humanity we share. We honor the courage of those who stood in the square and the quiet strength of those who still mourn in private. We keep alive the dream that was crushed but never fully extinguished.
I hope those of us overseas will post the images, share the news and tell the stories. In this act of fidelity, we become a bridge between what was lost and what may yet be reclaimed.
The CCP may control the narrative within its borders, and now increasingly, well beyond them, but we in the West with an open information ecosystem have a duty to not let this memory die.
As long as we remember, they have not won.
June 4th, 2026
37th Anniversary
@FredBra93439257@SoveyX I would’ve left a very different comment if I had known it was a Unitarian church. The story makes a lot more sense now. I can’t stand Unitarians.
Oh, I didn’t know there were Unitarians. Now it all makes sense. I had to spend so much of my youth being forced to go to the ‘Church’. They are so self-righteous and phony. All this woke shit was going on in Unitarian churches well before it became mainstream. They pretend to be the church where people can believe whatever they want to believe and be accepted except it eventually just devolves down to “Ha ha ha, Christians are so stupid. We are so smart and tolerant.” They are so pathetic.
I doubt he was a demon possessed. But he probably is a technical psychopath. People need to be aware of them and not push their buttons. He will go to jail for the rest of his life, more than likely. I can see the relationship between his wife and her parents and him as very similar to my own family’s. My mother might have ended at the same way if us kids hadn’t basically strong armed her to get a divorce. Sometimes you just needed to know it’s OK to be the first one to leave. Instead of participating in the volatility and pushing buttons that could eventually trigger a sick person to take extreme action.
Trump has been quoted as singing, “It used to be a very bad and gay body of water, but with our big beautiful American missiles, we bombed the gayness out of it completely. It’s tremendous actually, with the way the water flows now it’s become self-baptizing. The Iranians don’t like it, but that’s too bad for them. It’s really a tremendous straight now, and it needs to be renamed accordingly to remind everyone that now it’s big league better.”