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44 / Our Community

Volunteers of Safeguard the Children bring full sets of equipment to every protest, including their yellow vests, helmets, goggles and masks.

lar senior volunteer hobbling along action among protesters during the “We might not be able to change
the street with a cane. “What moti- past several months. their political opinions which have
vates the silver-haired to watch out Cody, a member of Part Time Gwai been deeply rooted in their head. But
for the young at the front lines when Suen, who declines to reveal his full [we] hope that [the workshops] can at
some of them might even have knee name, thinks traditional smartphone least help them read more,” he says.
problems?” workshops held by political parties According to a survey published
cannot help the elderly to connect by the Chinese University of Hong
Resolving with the youth as they are only taught Kong (CUHK)’s Centre for Communi-
generational differences to use some old-fashioned social me- cation and Public Opinion Survey in
Apart from standing with young dia apps such as Facebook, which is early August, about one fifth o f
protesters on the front lines, some not popular among young users. the respondents aged
silver hairs have also made great ef- The 18-year-old student observes 55 and above said
fort to learn about mobile technology that many old people receive infor- that they thought
which is widely used by protesters to mation about the protests by reading LIHKG, an online
organise themselves in this leaderless posters on “Lennon Walls”- commu- forum similar to
movement. They try to understand nity message boards set up by move- Reddit where us-
games rules of the virtual world by ment supporters who leave notes and ers exchanged their
using messaging apps and figuring leaflets on walls in different neigh- ideas on protest devel-
out meaning of buzzwords commonly bourhoods across the city to express opments and posted Michael Chan
used in online discussion their support for the pro-democracy calls to action, was Che-ming
forums. movement and inform the public
In a bid to help about what is happening. Cody says
the silver-haired the older generation have limited ac-
community better cess to social media platforms due to
understand what the their lack of knowledge about the use
young protesters are of e-devices.
thinking, a group of stu- Cody says he once met a pro-
Cody dents initiated a cam- government man who attended a
paign called Part Time workshop held by Part Time Gwai
Guai Suen (一班乖孫), or “part-time Suen. The old man has a smartphone
grandchildren” in Chinese, this June. which is the latest model, but he did
They organise workshops to teach the not know how to use the gadget his
elderly how to use social media plat- children bought him. Cody thinks the
forms which play a significant role in young should reach out more to the
facilitating communication and inter- silver-haired regardless of differences
in political views.