Honestly if you’re living in a Western country, you are a victim of major anti North Korean propaganda that goes all the way back to the Korean War.
Like, North Korea is nowhere near as bad as people think, and it’s people are fairly happy, yes the government censors and controls media, but it also creates a unified and strong society with far less division than all these Western countries tearing themselves down the middle about which party is less evil.
The country has been in the news of late, as ongoing negotiations between the Trump and Kim Jong-un administrations appear to have soured. The chief casualty of this diplomatic failure, the New York Times (5/31/19) breathlessly reported, was Kim Jong-un’s negotiating team, with the vice chair of the North Korean Workers’ Party, Kim Yong-chol, being sent to a forced labor camp in “the latest example of how a senior North Korean official’s political fortune is made or broken at the whims of Kim Jong-un.”
The linked NYT article says this:
Now, he has suddenly become the latest example of how a senior North Korean official’s political fortune is made or broken at the whims of Kim Jong-un. This week, leading South Korean newspapers reported Kim Yong-chol’s fall from grace. One of them, the conservative daily Chosun Ilbo, went so far as to report that Mr. Kim had been banished to forced labor, with many of his negotiating team members either executed or sent to prison camps.
South Korean officials and analysts cautioned that it was too early to say with precision what was happening inside Kim Jong-un’s opaque regime. South Korean news media offered differing conjectures, including whether Kim Hyok-chol, the North’s special nuclear envoy to the United States, had been executed by firing squad in March, as the Chosun Ilbo reported, or was still under interrogation.
But they all agree on one thing: Kim Yong-chol and his negotiating team, which had driven Kim Jong-un’s diplomatic outreach toward Washington, have been sidelined, as the North Korean leader sought a scapegoat to blame for his disastrous second summit meeting with Mr. Trump, held in Hanoi, Vietnam, in February.
That seems pretty reasonable? It says that the official has found disfavor, says what one other paper reported with language of “went so far as to report”, and also notes that it’s hard to say for sure because North Korea is very opaque.
The FAIR article then says:
There was one problem: Kim Yong-chol appeared only a few days later at a high profile art performance alongside Kim Jong-un.
Yeah, that’s hard evidence he wasn’t executed, but that’s about it. Situations like this can change on a whim in a dictatorship. Maybe Kim Jong-un had a good breakfast and decided that the official’s forced labor could be done.
FAIR also says this in that article:
North Korea is also a favorite location for wacky and easily disprovable stories. The BBC (3/28/14) originally reported that all men were required to wear their hair like Kim Jong-un, with other haircuts banned.
The BBC article has a correction that it’s university students and not all men (which is missing from the FAIR article), so is that true? And it’s weird to say that stuff like that is wacky when stuff like this apparently happens:
A second, and unprecedented, TV series this winter showed hidden-camera style video of “long-haired” men in various locations throughout Pyongyang.
In a break with North Korean TV’s usual approach, the programme gave their names and addresses, and challenged the fashion victims directly over their appearance.
That looks legit, with footage on youtube. Is there any reason to think that’s fake? That certainly confirms my mental model of North Korea as a wacky dictatorship if it’s true.
EDIT: FAIR’s other statements in that article are dunking on the worst possible interpretations of what people say, which just makes FAIR seem like it has a chip on its shoulder about North Korea for some reason. I’d take what they say about North Korea with a grain of salt.
It’s mind-boggling how you and others like you (assuming you aren’t just a bot or being paid to say this stuff) can say/comment/post this stuff when there is SO MUCH EVIDENCE proving it wrong.
From Western media in English. You’re in a cultural and linguistic bubble online where people who think like you ( or within an expected range of dissenting opinions ) post and respond.
The ideas and values you see and even have fall into a range that believe it or not is different in other communities, often segregated by language.
It’s hard to explain if you’re a monolinguist, but the language you speak includes ideas and cultural nuance for idea that doesn’t often cross the language and cultural boundaries.
“Our country is so strong because we all agree we love dear leader, ignore the famines, camps, and executions, thats hust the work of western spies who hate us for loving dear leader, we da best.”
Honestly if you’re living in a Western country, you are a victim of major anti North Korean propaganda that goes all the way back to the Korean War.
Like, North Korea is nowhere near as bad as people think, and it’s people are fairly happy, yes the government censors and controls media, but it also creates a unified and strong society with far less division than all these Western countries tearing themselves down the middle about which party is less evil.
Can we get a source for this?
https://fair.org/home/propaganda-against-north-korea-and-the-travel-ban-go-hand-in-hand/
I read that and was prepared to have my mind blown. Not really impressed, though. That article says this:
That links to this article, which says:
The linked NYT article says this:
That seems pretty reasonable? It says that the official has found disfavor, says what one other paper reported with language of “went so far as to report”, and also notes that it’s hard to say for sure because North Korea is very opaque.
The FAIR article then says:
Yeah, that’s hard evidence he wasn’t executed, but that’s about it. Situations like this can change on a whim in a dictatorship. Maybe Kim Jong-un had a good breakfast and decided that the official’s forced labor could be done.
FAIR also says this in that article:
The BBC article has a correction that it’s university students and not all men (which is missing from the FAIR article), so is that true? And it’s weird to say that stuff like that is wacky when stuff like this apparently happens:
That looks legit, with footage on youtube. Is there any reason to think that’s fake? That certainly confirms my mental model of North Korea as a wacky dictatorship if it’s true.
EDIT: FAIR’s other statements in that article are dunking on the worst possible interpretations of what people say, which just makes FAIR seem like it has a chip on its shoulder about North Korea for some reason. I’d take what they say about North Korea with a grain of salt.
I mean it is possible their near constant need for international food aid, is just a plot to get free food.
And 90% are environmental pioneers that have given up electricity…
It’s mind-boggling how you and others like you (assuming you aren’t just a bot or being paid to say this stuff) can say/comment/post this stuff when there is SO MUCH EVIDENCE proving it wrong.
From Western media in English. You’re in a cultural and linguistic bubble online where people who think like you ( or within an expected range of dissenting opinions ) post and respond.
The ideas and values you see and even have fall into a range that believe it or not is different in other communities, often segregated by language.
It’s hard to explain if you’re a monolinguist, but the language you speak includes ideas and cultural nuance for idea that doesn’t often cross the language and cultural boundaries.
“Our country is so strong because we all agree we love dear leader, ignore the famines, camps, and executions, thats hust the work of western spies who hate us for loving dear leader, we da best.”