For the time being at least, smartphones in Hong Kong have been transformed from thought-sapping siphons into frontline tools for passing on encrypted information and capturing history-shaping events in real time. They have suddenly been weaponised and used to educate, agitate and organise. And people holding them seem energised and inspired in their reduced dependence, and capable of moments of sublime creativity, such as the appearance of a masked orchestra playing Glory to Hong Kong.

Tragically, those not touched by the struggle – our own entitled expat offspring, for instance – still inhabit an intellectual void where smartphones relentlessly fulfil their intended purpose of dumbing down the masses.

When a Facebook notification says one of our children is “active”, I know it for the lie it is, and understand they are, in fact, supine on a sofa clasping their phone like a religious relic as they wait for the helper to bring them a jam and peanut butter sandwich. Barely breathing. Barely moving. Barely alive. Just posting and liking mindless dross.

Somewhere in the shallows of their subconscious, they must be dimly aware that social media is the establishment’s way of keeping them subdued while harvesting every marketable detail of their pitiful, privileged existences.

“If only the little brats had a cause of their own that the police would oppress them for,” my wife observed drily as I poured her another gin. “Apart from anything else, they could use the exercise.”