Be Water: Roles in Motion

When people think of the Hong Kong protests, they often remember the crowds.

But what made the movement hard to contain was the way it organised itself.

They used a phrase that became a strategy: “Be water.” Not a castle. Not one fixed position.

Flexible, decentralised, able to change shape. From above, it didn’t look like

one mass. It looked like layers — a formation built from roles. At the top,

you see the police line. Closest to pressure is a thin front layer.

Just behind them is a buffer layer. And behind that is the main crowd — the broad base

of participants. Support layers can also hold the sides together. And at the back,