The way liberals flip out when you don’t agree that the DPRK is literally Mordor is exactly how conservatives react when you defend any other country that the US attacks. “Oh yeah, i bet it’s a real heavenly paradise with no problems! Why don’t you move there if you love it so much?! Why don’t you go there if it’s sooo perfect?! Kiss them on the lips and marry them maybe? Fuckin stupid traitor.”
Just instant ridiculous maximalism, like a 12 year old who gets called out for being wrong about something and responds with “Oh yeah and you’re never wrong ever, right?!” No ability or willingness to engage with what’s actually being said, just an instant defensive jingoist freakout.
A defector is going to have an inherent dislike of the DPRK because they… well, defected. If someone is happy there, they’re not going to defect are they?
Bull$hitters like Yeonmi Park don’t make me inclined to believe defectors.
This is a good point, we should ask some average North Koreans directly, that way we get a better balance of viewpoints. Maybe we can catch some on a vacation abroad or something.
They can and have been asked.
"In North Korea the math book says, you know, there are four American bastards. You kill two of them.
Then how many American bastards left to kill. And as a child I had to say, ‘Two American bastards.’"
“I was horrified that I felt no sympathy when I crossed a young man begging for food while his intestines leaked from his body”
A bit on information from the DPRK I wrote earlier:
The problem with reporting on the DPRK is that information is extremely limited on what is actually going on there. Most reports come from defectors, and said defectors are notoriously dubious in their accounts, something the WikiPedia page on Media Coverage of North Korea spells out quite clearly. These defectors are also held in confined cells for around 6 months before being released to the public in the ROK, in… unkind conditions, and pressured into divulging information. Additionally, defectors are paid for giving testemonials, and these testimonials are paid more the more severe they are. From the Wiki page:
Felix Abt, a Swiss businessman who lived in the DPRK, argues that defectors are inherently biased. He says that 70 percent of defectors in South Korea are unemployed, and selling sensationalist stories is a way for them to make a living.
Side note: there is a great documentary on the treatment of DPRK defectors titled Loyal Citizens of Pyongyang in Seoul, which interviews DPRK defectors and laywers legally defending them, if you’re curious.
Because of these issues, there is a long history of what we consider legitimate news sources of reporting and then walking back stories. Even the famous “120 dogs” execution ended up to have been a fabrication originating in a Chinese satirical column, reported entirely seriously and later walked back by some news outlets. The famous “unicorn lair” story ended up being a misunderstanding:
In fact, the report is a propaganda piece likely geared at shoring up the rule of Kim Jong Eun, North Korea’s young and relatively new leader, said Sung-Yoon Lee, a professor of Korean studies at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University. Most likely, North Koreans don’t take the report literally, Lee told LiveScience.
“It’s more symbolic,” Lee said, adding, “My take is North Koreans don’t believe all of that, but they bring certain symbolic value to celebrating your own identify, maybe even notions of cultural exceptionalism and superiority. It boosts morale.”
These aren’t tabloids, these are mainstream news sources. NBC News reported the 120 dogs story. Same with USA Today. The frequently reported concept of “state-mandated haircut styles”, as an example, also ended up being bogus sensationalism. People have made entire videos going over this long-running sensationalist misinformation, why it exists, and debunking some of the more absurd articles. As for Radio Free Asia, it is US-government founded and funded. There is good reason to be skeptical of reports sourced entirely from RFA about geopolitical enemies of the US Empire.
Sadly, some people end up using outlandish media stories as an “acceptable outlet” for racism. By accepting uncritically narratives about “barbaric Koreans” pushing trains, eating rats, etc, it serves as a “get out of jail free” card for racists to freely agree with narratives devoid of real evidence.
It’s important to recognize that a large part of why the DPRK appears to be insular is because of UN-imposed sanctions, helmed by the US Empire. It is difficult to get accurate information on the DPRK, but not impossible; Russia, China, and Cuba all have frequent interactions and student exchanges, trade such as in the Rason special economic zone, etc, and there are videos released onto the broader internet from this.
In fact, many citizens who flee the DPRK actually seek to return, and are denied by the ROK. Even BBC is reporting on a high-profile case where a 95 year old veteran wishes to be buried in his homeland, sparking protests by pro-reunification activists in the ROK to help him go home in his final years.
Finally, it’s more unlikely than ever that the DPRK will collapse. The economy was estimated by the Bank of Korea (an ROK bank) to have grown by 3.7% in 2024, thanks to increased trade with Russia. The harshest period for the DPRK, the Arduous March, was in the 90s, and the government did not collapse then. That was the era of mass statvation thanks to the dissolution of the USSR and horrible weather disaster that made the already difficult agricultural climate of northern Korea even worse. Nowadays food is far more stable and the economy is growing, collapse is highly unlikely.
What I think is more likely is that these trends will continue. As the US Empire’s influence wanes, the DPRK will increase trade and interaction with the world, increasing accurate information and helping grow their economy, perhaps even enabling some form of reunification with the ROK. The US Empire leaving the peninsula is the number 1 most important task for reunification, so this is increasingly likely as the US Empire becomes untenable.
I wonder why there isn’t a more reliable source of info coming out of North Korea. It must be a near utopia in there if the only people that make it out of the country are these unreliable defectors that universally agree that life is bad there.
Not all defectors do agree that life is bad there. Further, no, it isn’t a utopia, and there is state media you can access, such as KCNA. The DPRK isn’t a utopia, nobody claims it is, we just agree that it’s one of the most misunderstood and propagandized against countries on the planet, and there’s logical reason for that.
They defected because they don’t think life is bad in the place they were fleeing? Why are they fleeing if they don’t believe life is bad in North Korea?
I recommend you check out some of the links I posted. In many cases they flee for the same reason Cubans do, outside pressure results in economic crisis, especially during the 90s when the USSR dissolved and their main trading partner no longer existed overnight.
So life is bad enough to need to leave to survive economically, but this isn’t them thinking life is bad there.
I’m not accepting more homework assignments and class reading than I already have, peace if you don’t want to elaborate ✌️
I’m saying that defectors may leave not because they believe the system itself is bad, but because of certain economic crisis inflicted from the outside. Further, some defectors leave for the ROK and find life worse than they expected, or are in some cases are kidnapped by the ROK after being lured into overseas programs. There are well-documented cases of this, which is why my comment has lots of sources, so if you want more then please see it.
Nodutdol, an anti-imperialist group of Korean expats, released a toolkit on better understanding the situation in Korea. This is more like homework, though.
Ah yis, the CIA knows nothing same as any other westoid. But you, dear OP, you know the DPRK so well. You can totally tell when Burgerland tells a fantasy about The Good Place Cause You Like It.
I recommend you read my top-level comment.
I did and I still dont think any of these nations truly care about people. Not the US Empire, not the DPRK, not the Russian Empire, not anything. If these places were more interested in peace and welfare like they claim we would never be in this situation in the first place. Why would the DPRK not invite reporters in if it cared about the truth and was itself just? It would, as it would be in its own best interest. But it doesn’t, because nations are more interested in power and control than truth and welfare.
The DPRK does let in reporters, though. They don’t let in people willy-nilly, as they’ve been victims of genocide at the hands of the west, and frequently sabotage has happened under the guide of more benign groups. There are many documentaries about life in the DPRK these days such as My Brothers and Sisters in the North.
Most travelers are from Russia, China, and Cuba. Visits from Statesians are rare, because the US Empire makes it illegal to do so.