I totally agree that there are almost innumerable important reasons to seriously question this proposed development. And a thorough-going questioning is certainly needed. King Wong is not going to give up - in fact, I would say the odds are very much in favour of his eventual success with some slightly scaled down version of the last proposal.
You have pointed out that he appears to be very popular with the locals in the Mo Tat Wan, Shek Pai Wan and I suppose Sok U Wan areas. Most pragmatic working folk when asked to choose between bread and freedom or between bread and any other less than immediately relevant ideal like environmental protection, will choose bread. Of course he's popular with locals! An absolutely crucial element here will be for an education program, designed by people a helluv a lot more local than myself aimed at the most local of the locals. I think this is where a group like Green Lamma can make a big difference. King Wong knows the importance of public education as a means to gather support and that's why he put his money behind the book
Lamma Story, which painted a picture of Lamma as an economically distressed backwater who's economy had been gutted by government regulations that had been geared to protect the environment from rampant industrial development. It's time for us to mount at least an equally effective education campaign that provides a more balanced view of the importance of environmental protection and sustainable community development.
And when it comes to King Wong loving Lamma Island, well - I can only guess, cause he aint speaking out around here much in public, but the Lamma he sees is surely a different shade of green than the one I see. All of his developments reek of elitism - they're posh, they're baroque, they're bloody expensive, they're exclusive and they dont appear to embody any basic principles of true community sustainability. The real Lamma community needs an exclusive yachting club like it needs a bloody hole in its head!
So, we need to rally all the forces at our disposal to resist this abomination. And it just so happens that it's necessary to appeal to people's emotions when your trying to get their attention. That's what the role of mascots is. That's why furry seals in Canada's arctic attract so much world-wide attention. In relation to all the facts and to the true injustices and actual incidents of violence against man and nature in the bigger picture, seals gotta be pretty low on the list. But look at all the attention they gather. Wise groups might use that to open the doors to education. It's not rational - it can be abused - but it seems to be the what works with masses of people. Mascots can draw attention to an issue and then all the other less sexy but even more important issues can be seen more closely.