President-elect Joe Biden's foreign policy team will soon have access to the letters President Donald Trump exchanged with North Korean Leader Kim Jong Un, correspondence that belongs to the US government -- not Trump -- and could provide insight into one of the world's most enigmatic leaders.
It's not a rationalization at all, it's just a material analysis of why the things are the way they are. If I am a citizen of their country, I would be outspoken against the current state of things. As a westerner, I don't feel like I have any such standing to do so except in certain situations and with a certain tone. Nothing in my post is intended to deem "DPRK good" or "DPRK bad" because that's not a meaningful way of understanding things imo.
Saying they wouldn’t do it if they had a lower military budget is material analysis?
Where did I say that? I said I hope that they would, but I am not a citizen nor a member of the majority party of the DPRK, so I really don't know.
As a human being I have every fucking right to call it barbaric, and arguing anything else is fucking stupid overly woke idiocy.
What does that materially do for the people who live in the DPRK when you call it barbaric and leave it at that? Considering that most of us live in countries and cultures that are eager to fuck up the people living there even more, you're probably contributing to an environment that will allow that to happen. Chapo.chat might be an appropriate place to have a critical discussion of the prison policy of the DPRK, but I think it's worth treading lightly.
Yeah, I personally don't consider them part of the global struggle to achieve socialism/communism right at the moment, but they obviously are nonaligned/non-capitalist which is cool. My hope/impression would be that they would be happy to move along with the rest of the world if it were predominantly socialist.
I don't fully agree, they are too small, underdeveloped, and directly targeted by imperial forces. They are largely unburdened from the forces of capital internally, but they are heavily burdened by capital when dealing with foreign affairs. It sucks that they need to spend so much on their militarization and nuclear program in lieu of infrastructure development, prison reform, and agricultural development (they've had an issue with flooding that caused severe famines in the 90s). However, if they didn't focus so much on defense, they would not exist as a country at all.
In the past decade, they've made huge strides in development. They're putting a lot into the military, but if you look at their tech, a lot of it is designed and assembled in the DPRK. Look at the 2016 and 2020 military parades and tell me there isn't something happening. They'd need massive investment in infrastructure and education to design some of those platforms.
True, I don't disagree that they are building something, I just am not sure how much of a role it will play in building socialism around the world. I think that having a nuke may give them enough security to start directing resources toward internal development though, not to mention they could work with China as they develop their own IP as well (but I know that relationship isn't always as stable as it's most people think).
Edit: just watched the parades, and damn there's definitely a contrast
It's not a rationalization at all, it's just a material analysis of why the things are the way they are. If I am a citizen of their country, I would be outspoken against the current state of things. As a westerner, I don't feel like I have any such standing to do so except in certain situations and with a certain tone. Nothing in my post is intended to deem "DPRK good" or "DPRK bad" because that's not a meaningful way of understanding things imo.
Saying they wouldn't do it if they had a lower military budget is material analysis?
I think that's just making an excuse.
As a human being I have every fucking right to call it barbaric, and arguing anything else is fucking stupid overly woke idiocy.
Where did I say that? I said I hope that they would, but I am not a citizen nor a member of the majority party of the DPRK, so I really don't know.
What does that materially do for the people who live in the DPRK when you call it barbaric and leave it at that? Considering that most of us live in countries and cultures that are eager to fuck up the people living there even more, you're probably contributing to an environment that will allow that to happen. Chapo.chat might be an appropriate place to have a critical discussion of the prison policy of the DPRK, but I think it's worth treading lightly.
DPRK giving off VVITCH vibes with their prison sentences. That's definitely a holdover from feudalism.
Yeah, I personally don't consider them part of the global struggle to achieve socialism/communism right at the moment, but they obviously are nonaligned/non-capitalist which is cool. My hope/impression would be that they would be happy to move along with the rest of the world if it were predominantly socialist.
They're in a much better place to build socialism than most countries.
I don't fully agree, they are too small, underdeveloped, and directly targeted by imperial forces. They are largely unburdened from the forces of capital internally, but they are heavily burdened by capital when dealing with foreign affairs. It sucks that they need to spend so much on their militarization and nuclear program in lieu of infrastructure development, prison reform, and agricultural development (they've had an issue with flooding that caused severe famines in the 90s). However, if they didn't focus so much on defense, they would not exist as a country at all.
In the past decade, they've made huge strides in development. They're putting a lot into the military, but if you look at their tech, a lot of it is designed and assembled in the DPRK. Look at the 2016 and 2020 military parades and tell me there isn't something happening. They'd need massive investment in infrastructure and education to design some of those platforms.
True, I don't disagree that they are building something, I just am not sure how much of a role it will play in building socialism around the world. I think that having a nuke may give them enough security to start directing resources toward internal development though, not to mention they could work with China as they develop their own IP as well (but I know that relationship isn't always as stable as it's most people think).
Edit: just watched the parades, and damn there's definitely a contrast