JessicaJul 29, 2023

TIL Kowloon Walled City existed and is the real world origin for many visual representations of oppressive urbanization in cyberpunk media

https://lemmy.world/post/2329560

TIL Kowloon Walled City existed and is the real world origin for many visual representations of oppressive urbanization in cyberpunk media - Lemmy.world

I came across a video on Youtube discussing it (there are several), and Kowloon Walled City is just endlessly fascinating. A few notable videos I found on the subject were: The Densest City on Earth [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4YuNvIfM-YA] Kowloon Walled City: Hong Kong’s City of Darkness [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PcSBOUpgngM] Inside Hong Kong’s Kowloon Walled City [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0fd56CGnVRU] There is also a book on the city called City Of Darkness Life In Kowloon Walled City [https://archive.org/details/city-of-darkness-life-in-kowloon-walled-city-1993], which I found on archive.org [http://archive.org] in high resolution. It is full of photographs and detailed accounts of the comings and goings within the enclave.

Show threadfuboJul 29, 2023

Curiously, in cyberpunk media this sort of mega-slum is often portrayed as an excess of capitalist urbanization, whereas in historical reality it was an exclave of “communist” China inserted into “capitalist” British Hong Kong, wherein the “capitalist” authorities had no jurisdiction.

(Edited: Sounds more like the point was that it was effectively nobody’s jurisdiction.)

Show threadTheBucklessProphetJul 29, 2023
What the fuck are you talking about? In actual reality it was a product of capitalism. Specifically British imperialist capitalism in China. It took until the mid 80’s (40 years after the Communists came to power) for the British to allow China to have control over the area and it was turned in to a park less than a decade later, clearly indicating that the Communists were in no way interested in continuing the existence of the dystopian walled city.
Show threadfuboJul 29, 2023
Sorry, are you saying the British Hong Kong authorities had any jurisdiction there?
Show threadTheBucklessProphetJul 29, 2023
It’s more accurate to say that the British prevented either themselves (through inaction) or China (by treaty/law) from having any practical control. If you’d bother to read the wiki article OP linked you’d know. China should have had jurisdication, but Britain techincally had (imperialist) jurisdication. The result was a no-man’s until Britain finally gave up.
Show threadremotelove
Jul 29, 2023 at 4:00amWeb