If you want to see the correlation between Liberal Studies [in Hong Kong’s education curriculum] caused today’s rift in the society, it’d lead to you to the fact that this subject is filled with serious problems, and is a joke. The protesters, who are occupying the streets, believe that they’re engaging in an act of civil disobedience. Similar to social activism, you need to know the history of the West in the 20th century to understand those concepts. In particular, even if you don’t know world history, you should know some sociology. Liberal Studies, which is completely unrelated to those two subjects, has absolutely no reference. It’s pointless to ask students “what is social activism” in an exam. Teaching the concept of civil disobedience in Liberal Studies must include Martin Luther King leading a large group of African-Americans in the March on Washington in 1963, stemming his opposition to Segregation. In an act of civil disobedience, MLK asked African-Americans not to obey laws of the United States, because they were unfair [e.g.: the law that Rosa Park broke]. Where did MLK’s idea come from? It came from Mahatma Ghandi in India, who led his fellow citizens in a salt march to the coast, because he opposed to the British exploiting India’s natural resources, and then selling it back to Indians through a middle man. Thus, in terms of the Liberal Studies curriculum in the last few years, why does officials in the CY Leung administration feel they’ve been duped, and believe that the exam questions is fanning the students, and developing their independent thought and democratic beliefs? The rift in Hong Kong is caused by the parents of the protesters, middle-age people and the upper class expressing that one can’t do anything illegal. Many middle-aged Hongkongers are professionals, but have never studied world history. The student protesters are now using the concept of civil disobedience that they’ve learned from Liberal Studies to challenge their parents. Hence, [Hong Kong’s Liberal Studies subject] is trying to teach politics, and copy the civic education like that of the UK and US, but don’t have their prerequisite, which is that these countries teach history… Now, the train of thought of the entire society is messed up… regardless of how high the GDP is, how high the ratio of postsecondary graduates is, or how the turnover of the stock market is comparable to that of London, New York and Tokyo. These are just superficial things. The way Hong Kong thinks beneath the surface isn’t that of an international city (if “being international” means western). “Model answer” is a train of thought produced by Hong Kong’s education system, which is you must obey all laws, and it’s wrong to occupy the roads, because it infringes other people’s right to use the roadways. But once you get to the level of civil disobedience and social activism, it elevates the issue to a philosophical level. ~ Chip Tsao, on the problem with the entire Liberal Studies subject in Hong Kongs curriculum, on the 10/11/2014 edition of Summit.
Posted on: Tue, 11 Nov 2014 21:45:40 +0000
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