Like there’s literally no point at all in talking to these people who believe Kim Jong Un strapped a man to a rocket and blasted him into space and murdered his family. You can show them shit written by westerners debunking everything and they’ll shrug and say “ok but North Korea is still bad.” Tell them that North Koreans are subhumans in South Korea and they’ll shrug and roll their eyes. “How can they be discriminated? They’re Koreans!” Then immediately assume they’re a sinister spy when they decide to go back home.
I don’t go out of my way to defend North Korea but my god. These people make me sound like I’m an adherent of Juche because they simply cannot fathom that perhaps they’re being lied to.
The worst thing is when someone who is a skeptic but still says like "I don't like North Korea but a lot of the stories they tell about it are made up" and not once do they think "What even are the reasons I don't like DPRK, and how many of them are made up?"
Like, they reject the propaganda but still come to the same conclusion the propaganda wanted them to reach anyway.
“I don’t like North Korea but a lot of the stories they tell about it are made up”
Phrasing things with that kind of opinion qualifier is a key part of getting people to actually listen to the fact-based part.
Yeah people will just ignore you if you don't, why when I espouse the virtues of covid zero policy I list New Zealand before China.
Same, I always said “we need to do what Australia, New Zealand, and China have done” although now Australia has been removed from the list
:chomsky-yes-honey: (I love anarchist grandpa but this hit it too on the nose)
While I recognize the value of autarky and resource nationalism as a way of defending a country from imperialism, I think it's a method that also reifies the nation state, which is an 18th century anachronism that's been carried into the 21st century by the imperial powers.
That's the grounds on which I dont like North Korea.
But also it's probably a better place to live than a highly imperialized country in a similar position.
Why don't these people under sanction and the threat of eradication simply surrender the power of the state
Obviously they can't, but it's better to see the North Korean state as colonial imposition to be combated as far as is practically possible than as a good strategy. Take for example Venezuela's devolution of power to communes or Bolivia's evangelist internationalism. That's what combatting the state in the face of imperialism looks like.
US Americans will hear something about the DPRK from Western media and think "that's unbelievable!", and then proceed with believing it 100%.
For real, it's like... for as much as US Americans talk about distrusting the media, hating their own politicians, and think their government is corrupt, they sure do lap up propaganda better than anyone on earth.
I think my favourite was when CNN interviewed some defector who claimed that "the color red is banned in North Korea because it represents capitalism".
Yo, what? Even their fucking flag is like 70% red lmao
Those are 3 of my favorite things! Wtf now I hate North Korea!
They don't have a word for smokeshow of the week in North Korean
Even more basic and close to home things the media warps peoples minds about. Seeing the real time normalization of hundreds of thousands of children and teachers getting a serious disease with unknown longterm effects, and blaming it on the teachers no less, is wild to see. How the fuck are you supposed to convince someone the truth about the target of propaganda that is a whole world away and completely foreign.
Great writeup, but didn't the dprk get some support from China and the ussr?
The only way a person can stop believing every ridiculous thing about a place like North Korea, is for them to have a baseline distrust of western media. If they believe the media, they will believe everything the media says about other countries.
Nah, chuds distrust the media, but they also believe anything bad about DPRK.
This is some sectarian bullshit. Not saying I don't believe you but this is not helpful or constructive.
"Everyone who isn't ML holds [x view]" Is not only silly but non-materialist.
Anarchists should oppose hierarchy, (also you're meeting one now) the US is the top of the global hierarchy of capitalist hegemony. Therefore, anarchism has to be anti-imperialist and reject western narratives of opposing ideologies. You probably know more anarchists that understand this than you think, hell I even know libs that understand this but they are still trapped in a world of civility and electoralism and rules.
hiding inconvenient truths won't benefit us any. the people being called out need to do better, not be coddled
I'm not saying to coddle anyone, call people out when they are wrong by all means but making broad generalizations like this is unhelpful on many levels.
Chuds distrust most mainstream media but they're still opening themselves up to heavy influence from some outlets. The outlets they choose are anti-North Korea.
Check out We Went To North Korea To Get A Haircut and My Brothers and Sisters in the North. Fascinating stuff.
here's an album i put together a while ago with almost 400 pictures from the dprk (organized by cities)
most of the pictures are taken from instagram travel accounts
https://imgur.com/a/BybJ7DQ
based: https://i.imgur.com/7vfrmxL.png
in communist dictatorship there is no fun: https://i.imgur.com/LvQ9qMe.png https://i.imgur.com/sfO6ma5.png https://i.imgur.com/Kkv70h5.png
got me thinking about riding a bike thru NK
Loyal Citizens of Pyongyang in Seoul is another great documentary (it's from PSL) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BkUMZS-ZegM
There's also the Proles pod episode where they interview rapper Xiangyu about his two trips to the DPRK, good stuff.
uncritical support for the DPRK in its heroic struggle to liberate occupied Korea from the genocidal American empire
Not having shit takes about the global south has made me the Cool White Guy at work an that's nice. Turns out the average South Korean dude also does not buy this crap and ahtes to see it
The most awkward moment of my life was a coworker calling me the "blackest white guy he's ever met"
We're friends and I totally understood it in context but like what am I supposed to say to that.
Try explaining what Juche is to them and they'll walk away.
Once got into it with someone in Youtube comments (yeah I know :agony-soviet: in my defence it was under a leftist video) and it didnt matter what I wrote to them or what sources I linked they just went "They think that Kim hits hole-in-one in every hole the first time he played golf and they found a unicorn! Korean man not poop haha!".
The dude was a weird sex-pest anyway, being hella horny about Kim Yo-jong, but I hope someone else reading through the comments got something out of them and the linked sources.
whenever you are arguing online, you should pitch it for onlookers and not try to convince the dumbass whose ego is at stake
EDIT: at least in spaces where you can't assume some level of good faith
The dude was a weird sex-pest anyway, being hella horny about Kim Yo-jong
I swear to God, that's the weirdest part of NK hate. Liberals would embrace NK as quickly as Concervatives embraced Putin's Russia, if only you could give them a Sexy Hillary analog to fetishize.
I lived in South Korea for awhile and once when I returned to America I randomly told this bodega owner in Brooklyn that I was spying for North Korea and he believed me, to my great surprise. I don’t usually do that sort of thing, I was just in a certain mood. I also pass as white.
Heck some leftists believe in that "NK practices songbun" shit. The sheer level of western chauvinism is insane when it comes to other countries.
