VIII, oont.
Press File page 25
9.
15.
build or not to build. The effect is the same: the continuity of an impression or attachment is maintained or destroyed. Such decisions should not be made lightly, nor should they be made imperiously.
There is more at stake than just money or prestige.
What is it that is at stake? Tan the importance of a national
landmark be conveyed in a single worn-out phrase such as "cultural heritage?" What is cultural heritage really, and what is it worth? To understand what a group of people derives from the collective knowledge of a language, a myth, or a place a work of art or a building is to see into what makes them a group, rather than a random gathering of disparate desires and intentions. To enhance that collectiveness, and so strengthen that understanding, is the best service to society and the true act of creation. It is irrelevant that most people overlook the whole in their anxiety for some particular, and often personal, good. What sets real civic leaders apart is their concern for the socially unifying and the morally strengthening element in their acts, without which all attempts at "progress" are doomed to disinterest and ultimate failure,
stat
The "South China Morning Post" editorial of February 11, 1977,
#1
It is the local community which must take up the cudgels for the sake of its own people and for posterity and at a time when so much new development is takeing place it is essential for governments and citizens to come together to work out what is worth preserving as being of particular antiquarian value".
10. It is acknowledged by Government and the Urban Council that strong public sentiment exists in relation to the K.C.R. buildings. Editorials in two Chinese-language newspapers, and the above extracts from English-language newspapers demonstrate this.
11.
We urge Your Excellency to take all this into consideration and consider the many further issues which require resolution, before committing the Government to a plan which will prove extremely costly and is unsatisfactory to the community. Until now no alternative has been presented.
12.
An alternative which provides for the conservation of the ch
/p.16 buildings
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