Political Violence Internationally

On February 11th, 2020, the first primary for the 2020 presidential candidates was held in New Hampshire. Leading up to the next election, there has been lots of debate and arguments about who should become the next president or if we should keep the current president in office. As I addressed in my last blog post about partisanship, the many people in both political parties are becoming more and more polarized in their beliefs rather than having productive discussions about their opinions. This is causing a lot of tension to build in the political climate. When this tension builds, sometimes it can lead to violence. Unfortunately this was the case when a voter at Windham High School slapped a 15 year old Trump supporter while leaving the high school. Though I don’t agree with the views of the Trump supporter, violence is definitely not the answer to this situation. 

Since this happened, the story has appeared on many news sources such as the New York Post, Fox News, Washington Post, and CNN. While coming across these articles I found it interesting how much attention this story got. This kind of political violence doesn’t happen often in the United States, much less in New Hampshire, which made it get spread around a lot. It can also be used as an accusation for republicans to use against democrats. 

Meanwhile, the spread of the coronavirus throughout China has caused tensions between China and Hong Kong to rise, rekindling the protests that were rampant during the summer and fall of 2019. During these protests there was a lot of violence between the protesters and the police, who used forces such as pepper spray and ammunition. Recently, there have been more protests because Hong Kong citizens want to close the border to China to prevent the spread of the coronavirus. This has brought back some of the violence that was seen in the former protests. Despite this, I only heard about these new protests because I was looking for specific news articles. 

Hong Kong protesters

When minor violence happens in the United States, we see it all over the news and it can cause lots of uproar. Yet when there is major amounts of violence happening in other countries, most people will barely hear about it. These examples of political violence really show how different the political climate is in different countries. It was interesting to see the difference between what is happening in this country versus in other countries, how different it is, and how sometimes we take our safety and ability to freely protest without all of the violence that the protesters in Hong Kong face fighting for their own rights. 

Works Cited

Barron, Laignee. "The Coronavirus Has Brought Out the Ugly Side of Hong Kong's Protest Movement." 

     Time, 19 Feb. 2020, time.com/5784258/ 

     hong-kong-democracy-separatism-coronavirus-covid-19/. Accessed 19 Feb. 2020. 

Fei, Lam Yik. protesters marching. New York Times, 13 Nov. 2019, www.nytimes.com/2019/11/13/world/ 

     asia/hong-kong-protests.html. Accessed 19 Feb. 2020. 

Feuerherd, Ben. "Man accused of slapping teen Trump supporter during New Hampshire primary." New 

     York Post, 14 Feb. 2020, nypost.com/2020/02/14/ 

     man-accused-of-slapping-teen-trump-supporter-during-new-hampshire-primary/. Accessed 19 Feb. 

     2020. 

Griffiths, James. "Hong Kong enters 16th weekend of protests as police warn violence escalating 

     beyond control." CNN, 21 Sept. 2019, www.cnn.com/2019/09/20/asia/hong-kong-protests-intl-hnk/ 

     index.html. Accessed 19 Feb. 2020. 

Hume, Tim. "Arson, Pepper Spray, and Arrests: Hong Kong Protesters Want to Close the Border With 

     China Over Coronavirus." Vice, 18 Feb. 2020, www.vice.com/en_us/article/4ag47d/ 

     arson-pepper-spray-and-arrests-hong-kong-protesters-want-to-close-the-border-with-china-over-coronavi 

     rus. Accessed 19 Feb. 2020.