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Yeah, I'm not a fan of "trendy" political causes, either-- especially supporting one side or another in foreign conflicts that have nothing to do with the US, and whose arguments and meanings are generally either barely discerned or grossly misunderstood by the majority of the "activists" who are involved.
Leaving aside the Israel-Palestinian conflict, which I think is too complex to get into here, people essentially support Tibet, I think, because they like the Dalai Lama, not because they actually feel strongly about Tibetan nationalism. Not that I am opposed to Tibetan nationalism, or that I favor China's conquest of Tibet! I'm just saying I think that's what most people are motivated by, right or wrong.
But as for Hawaii...I think they have a pretty good case. The US annexed Hawaii without so much as a by-your-leave from the Hawaiian populace, and I think that since the transition from US Territory to State was conducted under the auspices of a Territorial and Federal government that included no native Hawaiians (as far as I can tell), at the very least, Hawaii ought to be given the same Federal semi-autonomous district status as Native American reservations and tribal lands in the Continental US, and Native Hawaiians ought to have at least partial self-government....
Come to that, the Inuit probably have a fairly good claim on Alaska, too....
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Dull sublunary lovers love,
Whose soul is sense, cannot admit
Absence, because it doth remove
That thing which elemented it.
(From "A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning" by John Donne)
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