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lastat06513
Joined: 18 Mar 2003
Location: Sensus amo Caesar , etiamnunc victus amo uni plebian
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 Posted: Tue Nov 15, 2005 1:33 am Post subject: Why is South Korea so skiddish about criticizing the North? |
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-Public executions
-Family imprisonment
-Leaving dead bodies on the street
-A clandestine Nuclear program
-one of the biggest exporters of drugs and counterfiet money worldwide
-proliferator of nuclear and missile technology
-Corruption
-Brinkmanship
-mass mismanagement
-creating a regoinal/ global threat
-a 100,000 man special operations force
-1.2 million man army
-ran by an alcoholic pervert surrounded by a cohort of family and friends in high-ranking positions.
-extortion (on a global scale)
Yet in spite of all this, South Koreans block all negative coverage of the country and proclaim North koreans as "Brotheren"
I mean, I can understand national reconciliation, but this is totally rediculous. Almost to the point of breaking up the 50 year old alliance with the US.
And to top it off, Korea refuses to show the execution video already seen around the world, and which they claim is fake 
And they obstain from a broadly supported UN resolution that condemns North Korea for its human rights abuses.
This all sounds alittle like Europe in the 1930's in a bid to stave off WWII, which failed on a huge, tragic scale.
If the world is doing this to avoid a conflict with North Korea and even China.
All I can say is "you can appease a tyrrant" and "if they truly want to go to war, there is nothing the world can do to stop them" |
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dulouz
Joined: 04 Feb 2003
Location: Uranus
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| Posted: Tue Nov 15, 2005 2:15 am Post subject: |
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| Yea, its perversely complicated and perverse. I've never seen anything like it. They have a brotherhood with the north yet they don't want them here because it costs too much money. |
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schwa
Joined: 18 Jan 2003
Location: Yap
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| Posted: Tue Nov 15, 2005 2:44 am Post subject: |
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| But its kind of like having a giant hornets nest next door. Would poking it with a stick be the smartest thing to do? |
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rok_the-boat
Joined: 24 Jan 2004
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| Posted: Tue Nov 15, 2005 2:46 am Post subject: |
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| Maybe they want in on the action ... |
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Ya-ta Boy
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
Location: Established in 1994
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| Posted: Tue Nov 15, 2005 5:51 am Post subject: |
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| I think two things are at play in this: #1) The Uri Party would like to convert to a socialist system, and #2) Most Koreans think unification means international power so are willing to overlook any inconvenient truths about the North. |
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canuckistan
Mod Team
Joined: 17 Jun 2003
Location: Training future GS competitors.....
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| Posted: Tue Nov 15, 2005 8:27 am Post subject: |
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| It's better than pushing them towards their Chinese communist comrads? |
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Hater Depot
Joined: 29 Mar 2005
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| Posted: Tue Nov 15, 2005 12:11 pm Post subject: |
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| Before the Sunshine policy began -- less than 6 years ago! -- things were practically the total opposite of what they are today. In fact, America was then being criticized for being too soft on the North, while today we are slammed for being too tough. What's actually different about our policy or the behavior of the North? Jack squat f*ck-all. |
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Hater Depot
Joined: 29 Mar 2005
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| Posted: Tue Nov 15, 2005 1:18 pm Post subject: |
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A tip of the hat to OneFreeKorea....
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From the Korea Times...
The United States will consider expanding its broadcasts to North Korea and providing literature for its people to learn about the outside world, a U.S. government report said Sunday.
The State Department report to Congress said non-governmental organizations have proposed a number of ways to reach the people in North Korea, an isolated communist country.
They include expanding Korean-language broadcasting, increasing medium-wave radio broadcasts, and providing radios or other devices capable of receiving foreign broadcasts in North Korea, it said.
Providing literature from outside North Korea and recording programming onto cassette and video tapes for use in the country have also been proposed, it said.
"The Department of State would explore these and other proposals through a formal process to determine which would be the most effective programs in reaching an audience inside the DPRK without involuntarily putting people in danger of increased harm at the hands of authorities," the report said. |
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Bulsajo
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
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| Posted: Tue Nov 15, 2005 2:17 pm Post subject: |
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| Ya-ta Boy wrote: |
| #2) Most Koreans think unification means international power so are willing to overlook any inconvenient truths about the North. |
There are enough people in the ROK govt who know that sudden unification similar to what happened with the Germanys will probably destroy the Korean economy (not to mention the a lot of other things such as a relatively young and fragile democracy) and will affect the other regional powers (i.e. Japan and China) in a way that will produce negative feedback for Korea.
So while they don't really want unification, or at least not the sudden unification that 'most Koreans' seem to want, they still have to pander to this populist sentiment. Verbally pissing on the ROK-US relationship is an easy way to appear to be doing something without actually doing anything. |
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Ya-ta Boy
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
Location: Established in 1994
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| Posted: Tue Nov 15, 2005 4:25 pm Post subject: |
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So while they don't really want unification, or at least not the sudden unification that 'most Koreans' seem to want, they still have to pander to this populist sentiment. Verbally pissing on the ROK-US relationship is an easy way to appear to be doing something without actually doing anything.
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I don't disagree with what you are saying, but I do think there is more to it. When I arrived back in '94 the radicals were saying 'Unification now!' Neither they nor anyone else discussed the problems that would cause. The one and only goal was unification. No one would discuss what form of government the unified country would have.
It was quite odd really. It was kind of like talking to a little kid about Santa Claus. No hint of practicality or problem solving. Reindeer can't fly. Well, won't talk about that.
It strikes me that by holding up unification as an ideal without any discussion of the obstacles is one way of criticizing the present social, economic and political system without specifically doing so. I don't think you can convince a princess to give up her hand phone and her hours at the coffee shop. She just isn't going to agree to do it. But you can get her whipped into a frenzy about Korea taking her rightful place as the world's number one cultural center, economic power-house and political leader once unification occurs. Create the mental image and only later tell her what it will cost her personally, when it's too late for her to object. Once everyone is convinced unification soon is possible, then it is unpatriotic to object to giving up cell phones and plastic surgery...then ownership of private property and the vote. |
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BigBlackEquus
Joined: 05 Jul 2005
Location: Lotte controls Asia with bad chocolate!
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| Posted: Tue Nov 15, 2005 4:31 pm Post subject: |
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South Korea is not a Democracy. There are a certain number of 'elite' families who have control through the Chaebols. Those elites are manuvering to have as much control of North Korea as possible when it drops, and they are building alliances with the elites in North Korea over the issue. It's all about trying to gain control over what's up there. Be it for cheap labor, racial pride, or whatever, South Korea's elite are controlling the media here for their own personal advancement purposes.
After living here a while, I have realized that a lot of the reason why schools are as crappy as they are is because those elites who run everything behind the scenes WANT South Korean people to be dummified lemmings who memorize math problems in hagwons and vocabulary words from the dictionary. The education system here does not teach people to think and argue on their own points effectively, and I have come to realize that is all by design. |
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excitinghead
Joined: 18 Jul 2005
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| Posted: Tue Nov 15, 2005 4:59 pm Post subject: |
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Back in 2002 I wrote a paper/essay/assignment (whatever you call it) on Anti-Americanism in Korea for my MA in East Asian Studies, which ended up mainly talking about the Sunshine Policy.
In a nutshell, I discovered that the academic consensus was and still is that the Kim-Dae Jung and now especially the Noh-Mu Hyeon administrations CAN'T criticise North Korea for to do so would be to admit that all the billions in aid, showy summits, etc. etc. for the past 8 years has done NOTHING to democratice North Korea and/or make the peninsula a safer place (Hater Depot summed it up really well!  ). It would be political suicide for the individual politicians and parties involved. |
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Moldy Rutabaga
Joined: 01 Jul 2003
Location: Ansan, Korea
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| Posted: Tue Nov 15, 2005 6:09 pm Post subject: |
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[....]
Last edited by Moldy Rutabaga on Wed Jan 01, 2014 11:59 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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Ya-ta Boy
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
Location: Established in 1994
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| Posted: Tue Nov 15, 2005 6:19 pm Post subject: |
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| Quote: |
| I have realized that a lot of the reason why schools are as crappy as they are is because those elites who run everything behind the scenes WANT South Korean people to be dummified lemmings who memorize math problems in hagwons and vocabulary words from the dictionary. |
I don't agree with this analysis at all. The chaebol owners know, probably better than anyone, that well-educated people are needed to work in the chaebols.
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| South Korea is not a Democracy. There are a certain number of 'elite' families who have control through the Chaebols. |
I can't agree with this either. The 'liberals' have won the last two presidential elections. DJ wasn't so much of a problem, but the Uri Party, under No, said quite openly at the beginning of his administration that they were not interested in expanding the pie, only in redistributing what wealth was already here. They got in to office by promising 'reform'. At the time, I asked my friends exactly what reforms. None of them knew or cared. They just liked the sound of the word. The Uri benefited from the general discontent...everyone knows there are problems in Korea...and they got away without having to say just how they would reform things. |
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Ya-ta Boy
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
Location: Established in 1994
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| Posted: Tue Nov 15, 2005 6:27 pm Post subject: |
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Spite. Like a contrary teenager, the South has developed a flirtation with the North to prove that it's a grown-up because it irritates America, a little like a teenage girl who dates a biker because she wants to get back at her parents.
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I agree. I think spite is playing more of a role than anyone suspects. There is a certain air of petulance to the whole thing. I think the odds of Korea ending up 'officially neutral' while automatically backing China in everything is very high. They've had a couple of milleniums' experience doing it. |
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