Western Moral Superiority?

[Genivaria]

Do any of the other western nations take a more accomodating position towards the DPRK?

Probably? I know Brazil has a relatively friendly relationship with North Korea, and my own country, Canada, has historically interacted with the North, and has only recently suspended relations after the incident with the Cheonan.

Do any of the other western nations have workers control of the means of production?

I know they have a much higher income equality, social programmes and civil rights than America. Some of them even have nationalized or partialy-nationalized industries for the benefit of the people, like the NHS, and some encourage the development of co-operatives and work closely with worker unions, like Germany.

I'm struggling to see what either point has to do with your selective targeting of the US, though.

Its getting kind of old.

[Chinese Regions]

If you call brainwashing 'education'

Considering how many commercials (which are by very design intended to change one's subconscious thought processes to make one more likely to take certain actions - or they simply wouldn't be profitable) a Westerner sees in a year, I don't really see how you can qualify the teaching of proper ideology in order to raise worker consciousness as "brainwashing".

Some western nations have free healthcare and education, mind.

1.
2. Neither does North Korea. Try the Kibbutzim in Israel.

[Jerusalem and Damascus]

Ehh, I've had much more extensive conversations with that. The one I've talked to the most is a young man studying English at Kim Il Sung University. No government position.

A lot of our communication has been on helping each other learn the other's language, cultural things (food, holidays, music in our countries), even more mundane stuff, girls, tae kwon do forms, the weather, whatever.

It might be surprising, but they aren't these mindless robot autonomatons the media has them out to be. They're normal human beings like you or I or anyone else really. Shocking, I know.

People are starving in the DPRK. Dying in the streets from hunger. This glorification of one of the worst regimes of the 20th and 21st centuries is appalling.

[Dokuritsu Nippon]

There are quite a few Cooperatives yes.

Which have, in their own terms, no political sovereignty, thus no means of abolishing private ownership of the means of production.

Don't pretend that the workers actually are in control in North Korea.

Of course they are. It's a workers' state.

[Genivaria]

There are quite a few Cooperatives yes.

Which have, in their own terms, no political sovereignty, thus no means of abolishing private ownership of the means of production.

Don't pretend that the workers actually are in control in North Korea.

Of course they are. It's a workers' state.

[Dokuritsu Nippon]

So is OP the new Tokyoni?

OP is Tokyoni. Just noticed.

I for one welcome our Juche overlords.

And then they shot you for not being Korean.
Juche isn't even Stalinism. Its North Korean Nazism.

Empirically false. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ZtkHUkZ ... re=related

[Jerusalem and Damascus]

And then they shot you for not being Korean.
Juche isn't even Stalinism. Its North Korean Nazism.

Empirically false. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ZtkHUkZ ... re=related

Well holy heck, I suppose if you're just going to use YouTube videos, I could just use this. Of course, I'm sure you have some good excuse.

[Dokuritsu Nippon]

The west dosen't have much moral superiority its an evil imperialist bastard with no respect to anyone exept the rich. But it holds absolute moral superiority over North Korea. If a nation can't even feed its own people its not much of a nation. Its the most corrupt nation on the planet unable to do anything exept for Pyongang although once it was better than its Southern equivalent by a long way its lost any credibility it has.

Cuba is a communist country I am willing to defend... But North Korea is pure evil worse than anyone else on the planet by a long shot.

You do realize... North Korea doesn't have sufficient arable land to feed its people... right?

Ideology can't magically change geography.

[Norstal]

I have to admit, NSG, I think I'm in love.

Please take a moment to watch my lovely future wife's video discussing the hypocrisy of Western imperialist powers:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I9HxGhIo-6k

Really, it seems rather absurd that Western nations, with so much larger GDP per capitas, and thus the means of actually improving the conditions for their people, don't give enough of a shit about their own citizens to actually improve their conditions, and yet claim moral superiority over nations that strive for the same with so many fewer resources to work with.

And seriously, Pak Jin Jun, sarang hae!!!!!!!!!! <3<3<3

Well, I guess that university grant they're giving that covers everything means that they don't care about me.

Time to move to, what was it again? Oh Micronesia. Right.

[Norstal]

Probably? I know Brazil has a relatively friendly relationship with North Korea, and my own country, Canada, has historically interacted with the North, and has only recently suspended relations after the incident with the Cheonan.



I know they have a much higher income equality, social programmes and civil rights than America. Some of them even have nationalized or partialy-nationalized industries for the benefit of the people, like the NHS, and some encourage the development of co-operatives and work closely with worker unions, like Germany.

I'm struggling to see what either point has to do with your selective targeting of the US, though.

Its getting kind of old.

I really wonder why he won't leave us alone and how much he is getting paid to do this.

[Jerusalem and Damascus]

The west dosen't have much moral superiority its an evil imperialist bastard with no respect to anyone exept the rich. But it holds absolute moral superiority over North Korea. If a nation can't even feed its own people its not much of a nation. Its the most corrupt nation on the planet unable to do anything exept for Pyongang although once it was better than its Southern equivalent by a long way its lost any credibility it has.

Cuba is a communist country I am willing to defend... But North Korea is pure evil worse than anyone else on the planet by a long shot.

You do realize... North Korea doesn't have sufficient arable land to feed its people... right?

Ideology can't magically change geography.

There's still enough food to feed everyone there, you know. Because Korea has been feeding most of its people for most of history.

[Dokuritsu Nippon]

Empirically false. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ZtkHUkZ ... re=related

Well holy heck, I suppose if you're just going to use YouTube videos, I could just use this. Of course, I'm sure you have some good excuse.

It's demonstrating that there's an American defector living (quite comfortably) in the DPRK. In response to someone's assertion that they kill all non-Koreans or some other such idiocy.

[Dokuritsu Nippon]

2. Neither does North Korea. Try the Kibbutzim in Israel.

Do they have sufficient power to abolish private ownership of capital?

[Jerusalem and Damascus]

Well holy heck, I suppose if you're just going to use YouTube videos, I could just use this. Of course, I'm sure you have some good excuse.

It's demonstrating that there's an American defector living (quite comfortably) in the DPRK. In response to someone's assertion that they kill all non-Koreans or some other such idiocy.

Mmm-hmm.

Now, no government would like the DPRK would have any benefit in making someone a poster-boy to say how lovely they are...

And I guess all those people they kidnapped are doing quite well, too.

[Neohippies]

So they have prisons in the DPRK? Really? Who'd have thunk?

Prisons are for criminals. The link is talking about death camps, slave labour and executions of the " political dissenters ".
The DPRK has sent people to FUCKING DIE because of their poor mourning of Kim Jong-IL.

You are probably trolling, sir. And if not, I want to move to Mars.

Woop-ti-doo. Why the hell do we have to compare every fucking thing to North Korea? US this, N-Korea that, China this, N-Korea that, Europe this, N-Korea that... thanks for bringing a new view to the debate, bub.

[Arbites]

A very strange series of events

North Korean prison camps. "Concentration camp" as a term isn't strictly limited to the Holocaust, it refers to any mass imprisonment facility. The US had them for Japanese citizens in WWII, doesn't mean the US was right, but it doesn't make them Nazis either. Besides, the Nazis were also operating death camps, which are different and we don't see evidence for in North Korea. You're borderline Scientology here with your threats of modly intervention.

800,000 to 1.5 million are thought to have starved to death. Due to North Korea's insane clampdown on the flow of information, we can't get definitive numbers.

Did you know that Kim Jong-Il could control the weather based on his mood? Say what you will about the US founding fathers, but anyone with a basic knowledge of history would recognize they didn't really like democracy all that much (hence the property requirements), were a bunch of slaveholders, and were all quite flawed individuals. Source on Washington becoming a god?

So when they shelled a South Korean island last year, that must have been in self defense, am I right?

[New England and The Maritimes]

2. Neither does North Korea. Try the Kibbutzim in Israel.

Do they have sufficient power to abolish private ownership of capital?

North Korea certainly hasn't, just like the USSR never did. The private owners changed, but they're still owners. The Party elite still get to do anything they want. Kim Jong Il still had lobster airlifted to his private train in the midst of one of the most utterly destructive famines in human history. No constitution in the world changes the simple fact that North Korea treats its "workers" like insects, or the fact that the majority of people can only get enough food to survive from non-sanctioned private markets.

[Dokuritsu Nippon]

I have to admit, NSG, I think I'm in love.

Please take a moment to watch my lovely future wife's video discussing the hypocrisy of Western imperialist powers:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I9HxGhIo-6k

Really, it seems rather absurd that Western nations, with so much larger GDP per capitas, and thus the means of actually improving the conditions for their people, don't give enough of a shit about their own citizens to actually improve their conditions, and yet claim moral superiority over nations that strive for the same with so many fewer resources to work with.

And seriously, Pak Jin Jun, sarang hae!!!!!!!!!! <3<3<3

Well, I guess that university grant they're giving that covers everything means that they don't care about me.

Time to move to, what was it again? Oh Micronesia. Right.

Do workers there control the means of production?

[Norstal]

It's demonstrating that there's an American defector living (quite comfortably) in the DPRK. In response to someone's assertion that they kill all non-Koreans or some other such idiocy.

Mmm-hmm.

Now, no government would like the DPRK would have any benefit in making someone a poster-boy to say how lovely they are...

And I guess all those people they kidnapped are doing quite well, too.

Pictures of captured Americans in North Korea, look at how much they're treated well:

It's all in the fingers.

[Norstal]

Well, I guess that university grant they're giving that covers everything means that they don't care about me.

Time to move to, what was it again? Oh Micronesia. Right.

Do workers there control the means of production?

I wouldn't want them to do that. I lived in a village in Indonesia where the workers controlled the means of the production. Long story-short, they made a fertile rubber farm barren. Instead of professionals, that farm was managed by slack-jawed yokels who don't know a thing about fertilizers or biology. I have a slew of other anecdotes I can throw and you may claim anecdotal fallacy, but meh, you're doing it as well in the OP.

Now don't get me wrong. I hate business majors, bean counters, and other paper-pushers. That doesn't mean, however, that I hate entrepreneurship, which is something a worker-controlled production prevents.

[Minnysota]

I have to admit, NSG, I think I'm in love.

Please take a moment to watch my lovely future wife's video discussing the hypocrisy of Western imperialist powers:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I9HxGhIo-6k

Really, it seems rather absurd that Western nations, with so much larger GDP per capitas, and thus the means of actually improving the conditions for their people, don't give enough of a shit about their own citizens to actually improve their conditions, and yet claim moral superiority over nations that strive for the same with so many fewer resources to work with.

And seriously, Pak Jin Jun, sarang hae!!!!!!!!!! <3<3<3

Cause North Korea does a much better job, aye?

[Avenio]

2. Neither does North Korea. Try the Kibbutzim in Israel.

Do they have sufficient power to abolish private ownership of capital?

In Israel, probably not, but in Germany, for example, 25% of all workers belong to the Confederation of German Trade Unions alone, and that unions are an integral part in the German economy and political system.

Frankly, the German model sounds much closer to a 'workers' state' than North Korea is.

[Minnysota]

Are you insane?

So they have prisons in the DPRK? Really? Who'd have thunk?

All a matter of scale and perspective. Both per capita and total, the US by far has the largest incarcerated population on earth: http://www.prisonsucks.com/

You're comparing concentration camps to the conventional US prison? What a fair comparison.

[Norstal]

So they have prisons in the DPRK? Really? Who'd have thunk?

All a matter of scale and perspective. Both per capita and total, the US by far has the largest incarcerated population on earth: http://www.prisonsucks.com/

You're comparing concentration camps to the conventional US prison? What a fair comparison.

At least you can get a free tattoo in U.S prisons.

[Dokuritsu Nippon]

A very strange series of events

North Korean prison camps. "Concentration camp" as a term isn't strictly limited to the Holocaust, it refers to any mass imprisonment facility. The US had them for Japanese citizens in WWII, doesn't mean the US was right, but it doesn't make them Nazis either. Besides, the Nazis were also operating death camps, which are different and we don't see evidence for in North Korea. You're borderline Scientology here with your threats of modly intervention. [/quote]

I'm simply objecting to the use of a word with such negative historical connotations, to what you yourself assert is merely a prison system. I myself am opposed to much of the institution of the much larger (per capita and total) US Prison Industrial Complex, but I'd never think of downplaying the actual, much worse suffering of those under that horrible fascist regime by calling such "concentration camps". That's simply offensive, and I'd ask, for civility's sake, for others to not use such a term for it as well.

800,000 to 1.5 million are thought to have starved to death. Due to North Korea's insane clampdown on the flow of information, we can't get definitive numbers.

Which again, they don't have all that much arable land to work with, the USSR had ceased to exist to trade with them, and they had bad weather. Don't see how any of that is caused by the DPRK's government.

Did you know that Kim Jong-Il could control the weather based on his mood?

Err...? I take it you're being facetious? 0_0

Say what you will about the US founding fathers, but anyone with a basic knowledge of history would recognize they didn't really like democracy all that much (hence the property requirements), were a bunch of slaveholders, and were all quite flawed individuals.

Generally, yeah. I kind of like Paine, but, mmm.... Kim was definitely morally superior to them.

Source on Washington becoming a god?

http://www.aoc.gov/cc/art/rotunda/apoth ... erview.cfm

when they shelled a South Korean island last year, that must have been in self defense, am I right?

The South had fired first, after being asked by the North not to, and continued to for an hour after the DPRK had stopped:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombardmen ... g#Timeline