Officials advise teachers to help students "cultivate habit and confidence" while singing anthem.

Hong Kong officials have singled out at least two schools for singing the Chinese national anthem “too softly”.

Teachers at a third school have been asked to help students “cultivate habit and confidence” in singing it.

Hong Kong has redoubled the emphasis on “patriotic” education since 2020 when China cracked down on the city’s pro-democracy movement.

Officials said students’ voices at the Hong Kong and Macau Lutheran Church Primary School were “soft and weak” and “should be strengthened”. At Yan Chai Hospital Lim Por Yen Secondary School, teachers were told to “help students develop the habit of singing the national anthem loudly in unison”.

  • Deceptichum@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
    523·
    6 months ago

    Don’t American school kids all have to like salute their flag and pledge themselves or some shit each morning?

    • NOT_RICK@lemmy.worldEnglish
      542·
      6 months ago

      It’s not mandatory but yeah. Some dumb fuck teachers and administrators have tried to make it mandatory but the courts never agree with them. It’s a weird Cold War relic I wish would just go away.

      • PlainSimpleGarak@lemm.eeEnglish
        2·
        6 months ago

        And when they are sued for it, if they haven’t been already, it’ll never hold up in court. Regardless of the state in question. Fortunately.

    • TheGalacticVoid@lemm.eeEnglish
      102·
      6 months ago

      To add onto what other commenters said:

      1. It isn’t legally mandated, only customary
      2. If it was mandatory, such a mandate would probably be illegal
      3. Plenty of teachers and school officials (but not most) will be pissed/will punish you if you don’t do the pledge.
    • SOMETHINGSWRONG@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
      149·
      6 months ago

      Lmao @ the Americans getting all uncomfortable trying to weasel out of this

      Yeah bullshit it’s “not mandatory,” how can you have such a basic denial of reality?

      Totally optional, that’s why every time some kid understands and abstains, the teachers and other students bully them mercilessly, give them detention, suspension, expulsion, and it makes national news whenever someone actually tries.

      I bet joining the NSDAP was fucking optional too, don’t try to deny your christofascism that everyone just accepts because somehow it’s better when America does it

      • Riven@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
        7·
        6 months ago

        Not all states or schools. At least my siblings and I never had to. We lived in 3 states and went do dozens of schools between the 4 of us.

      • YeetPics@mander.xyzEnglish
        71·
        6 months ago

        Idk, I didn’t stand for the pledge and they didn’t disappear me into a white van or exile me to Cuba 🤷

        Maybe, and stop me if I’m going too far here, maybe you weren’t aware it isn’t forced. That’s fine because now you’ve been handed a personal account of the opposite to be true, I’m sure you will reassess you stance 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

      • explodicle@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
        3·
        6 months ago

        My kids don’t say the pledge, they just stand there silently. I will Karen so fucking hard if they try to pull that shit.

    • AmidFuror@fedia.io
      513·
      6 months ago

      To an extent, but you expect demands for hegemony from western imperialists.

      In the Hong Kong case, it’s the government - an agent of the people - which is just enforcing the desire of the people to praise the revolution. It’s not that the kids can’t sing softly. It’s that if they sing softly it’s because of the lingering influence of the colonizers. Therefore they need re-education until their minds are properly free.