It’s a week of brutal suppression. Hong Kong has a new number to remember: 47. But, don’t forget, at the same time, Hong Kong Police still keeps on arresting and suing frontline protesters. The administrator of ‘Suck’ telegram channel is one of them. Myanmar military government keeps killing people every day. However, Myanmar people carry on protesting. I admire their courage. Simultaneously, their perseverance is well understood – they know if they don’t resist, they will definitely lose everything. No one in this world will offer helping hands.

The world is not supposed to be like a hell of suffering. Humanity is not supposed to be controlled by tyranny. But, obviously, humans as a whole is not good at uniting to make a choice which benefits all. They are more inclined to safeguard themselves and secure their benefits. Ironically, we do have a lot of organizations fostering international cooperation, for instance, the United Nations. Before the United Nations, the League of Nations had been established. Back in the end of 18th century, Immanuel Kant had written a book called ‘Perpetual peace: A philosophical sketch’ which proposed the idea of international peace. Nevertheless, the League of Nations failed and World War 2 broke out. Nowadays, the United Nations fail again to deal with the problem of tyranny.

It is true that we do not have a total war currently; nonetheless, it doesn’t mean we are leading a life that we want. Humans have learnt a lesson that total war is really destructive. They haven’t learn any lesson of what to do if there are governments massacring people or doing genocide. No government dares to say waging a war out of humanity. There were too many lies in the history. Sadly true is war may liberate some ethnicities under torture, for example, Jews in WW2 and Kurds in Iraq War in 2003. I am not advocating war is a good solution. But, even peaceful measures like sanctions are not carried out seriously. Or, to put it simply, it doesn’t work well.

It is the loophole of humanity. There is a lack of universal ethics for governance in our world. Therefore, if your country is rich enough, or your country is small enough, you can do anything to your citizens. There will not be any effective and strong actions to combat against your country. That’s why Myanmar government dares to keep killing people and Hong Kong government arrests anyone it wants.

We should seriously consider establishing ethics of governance which serve as the principles regulating every government in the world. For instance, genocide should be forbidden. If any country violates the rules, they will face serious consequences. It may sound too ideal; however, it’s exactly what humans urgently need now. WW2 is a great disaster. At that time, humans should have strived for establishing a much better world. On the contrary, the world entered the Cold War immediately. Now, we are also at a turning point whether we would head to the age of darkness or a liberal age. The new order of the world is yet to come. It’s especially important for us to imagine and conceive boldly.

(Pat To Yan, Active in Hong Kong and German Theatre. Playwright, Director, Lecturer. Elected Council Member and the Chairman of the committee of Literary Art of Hong Kong Arts Development Council.)

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