askchapo

Yeah, NK's state media has always had a very off and somewhat idealist view of the DPRK. Most information you find on the nation doesn't pass the sniff test. They also seem to be the oddball of the socialist countries.

This is one that made me question the western narrative on NK. An article about a stoner getting some North Korean weed and smoking in a restaurant like it was no big deal.. Very good read

I don't think anyone here really knows. The only people who know are defectors, and not only are defectors themselves not always reliable (Yeonmi Park being the obvious example), documentaries and interviews where defectors tell their experiences will often be edited to fit certain narratives. Not even necessarily for nefarious purposes, but for the same reason that spooky, ominous music plays when a documentary shows a lion sneak up to a gazelle. Telling scary stories about how kim jong-un will execute your family for wearing a tie he finds ugly will keep audiences more interested than "it really isn't all that special over there, you guys" and since there's 0 consequences for making up outrageous lies (since nobody is able or willing to fact check you), that's what we get.

I'm more inclined to believe what I hear from the DPRK itself, but I don't think anyone here can truly tell you what life over there is like.

There’s a Chinese communist from the early days of the CPC - and I feel bad that I’ve forgotten his name - who I have read some of his thoughts on this. He said the first generation after the revolution will still have brains full of worms, even among the best and most upstanding comrades. This will get better over time, but you’re talking many generations. Because we are all products of our environment. We cannot escape the social conditions we grew up in. Being a communist doesn’t mean you are now some new person completely cleaved from any connection to the world around us and our personal histories. The Soviet Union did make attempts to fight sexism, racism, nationalism et al within their borders, but thinking you can just propagandize people into right thinking is idealism. The USSR had to start with the social conditions they inherited - and that society, which was part feudalist part capitalist - had a lot of sexism, racism, nationalism, etc (and of course cruelty to animals).

I’ll make a confession: I still sometimes have reactionary thoughts and ideals pop into my head. And it takes active, conscious thought to tell myself “what the fuck dude, cut that shit out”. If I was not actively engaged in checking myself on that, it is possible that the brainworms could come back. It’s something we are all susceptible to in some form, I think.

Because without the threat of revolution you'll never get those rights in the first place and as soon as the threat is removed the rights you have or won will be rolled back at the earliest convenience

Without revolution the capitalist class will call your bluff each time, and if you get mad at them what're you going to do? You already took revolution off the table

As a result Liberal radicalism can best be described as a snake eating it own ass

There is no democracy. If there was, we would agitate for people to vote.

https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/perspectives-on-politics/article/testing-theories-of-american-politics-elites-interest-groups-and-average-citizens/62327F513959D0A304D4893B382B992B

Multivariate analysis indicates that economic elites and organized groups representing business interests have substantial independent impacts on U.S. government policy, while average citizens and mass-based interest groups have little or no independent influence.

[...]

In the United States, our findings indicate, the majority does not rule — at least not in the causal sense of actually determining policy outcomes. When a majority of citizens disagrees with economic elites and/or with organized interests, they generally lose. Moreover, because of the strong status quo bias built into the U.S. political system, even when fairly large majorities of Americans favor policy change, they generally do not get it.

Because we want real structural shifts in the distribution of power, not just treats from our ruling class overlords.

Look at things in the context of slavery, as an analogy for the ultimate unequal society.

If a slave owner gives his slaves more comfortable beds, or reduces their working hours, or gives them better food, we can agree that these changes are good for the slaves without praising the slaveowner. And if someone in 1820 or whatever went to an abolitionist protest with a sign that said "Comfier beds for slaves", they would (rightfully) get punched in the face.

Why? Because these things are not truly progress. They haven't changed the power dynamic. The slaveowner can still take away the new beds and increase the working hours and start giving them worse food again. The only things that really matter are structural shifts of power.