New York Times Criticized for Running Op/Ed Favoring China's Treatment of Hong Kong

In early June, the New York Times ran a controversial op/ed from Senator Tom Cotton that advocated for sending the military into American cities to quell the protests that were overwhelming the police. Following the extensive backlash, the op/ed page editor James Bennet resigned from his post. This all feels like forever ago but it's been less than four months.

With that as context, it's mind boggling that the Times ran an op/ed today by Regina Ip, a member of the Executive Council in Hong Kong, justifying the use of China military force to quell Hong Kong protests.

Here are two segments of the op/ed:




Hong Kongers who wanted the city promptly to return to peace thought the authorities’ handling of the situation, which dragged on for months and grew more and more violent, was incompetent. For other locals, many outsiders and apparently much of the global media, a people’s legitimate quest for more democracy was being suppressed. Something had to be done, and the Chinese authorities did it.

To some, the new national security law is especially chilling because it seems simultaneously vague and very severe. But many laws are vague, constructively so. And this one only seems severe precisely because it fills longstanding loopholes — about subversion, secession, local terrorism, collusion with external forces. One person’s “severe” is someone else’s intended effect.









How did no one have the foresight to recognize what a glaring hypocrisy this was before it was published?

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Ryan Glasspiegel grew up in Connecticut, graduated from University of Wisconsin-Madison, and lives in Chicago. Before OutKick, he wrote for Sports Illustrated and The Big Lead. He enjoys expensive bourbon and cheap beer.