Why don't the North Koreans revolt against their leader/government ?

A few deaths on the way for a country of freedom cant be a bad thing ? (worked for other countries)

Even the people in the army must hate it so they could help

If they did revolt cant be any worse than it already is…

Heck even America could get involved !

Thoughts/reasons as to why not

Combination of fear, misinformation, and guns pointed at them.

1 million strong brainwashed / conditioned army?

i think we should be concentrating on revolting against our own government and not really be bothering about someone else’s problems.

Even the people in the army must hate it so they could help

I seem to remember those in the army get better treatment. I’d wager that the collapse of the regime their is inevitable, no idea when that’ll happen.

Although the more high level executions that occur it’ll probably happen sooner rather than later.

A few deaths on the way for a country of freedom cant be a bad thing ?

Unless you are one of the dead. Off you pop over there and let us know how you get on.

It wont happen. You are 20yrs old. For 20yrs you have been told about the Dear Leader daily.

Off you pop over there and let us know how you get on.

I wasn’t offering !

There will be no curiosity, no enjoyment of the process of life. All competing pleasures will be destroyed. But always — do not forget this, Winston — always there will be the intoxication of power, constantly increasing and constantly growing subtler. Always, at every moment, there will be the thrill of victory, the sensation of trampling on an enemy who is helpless. If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face — forever.We control life, Winston, at all its levels. You are imagining that there is something called human nature which will be outraged by what we do and will turn against us. But we create human nature. Men are infinitely malleable

1984 George Orwell

For the same reasons we don’t.

Most of them are brainwashed into believing in the system. There was a documentary I watched a while back about NK, absolutely fascinating. An American charity took a cataract removal machine to the country and just spent day after day restoring people’s sight. The machine wasn’t expensive or complicated but NK didn’t have a single one in the whole country.

One woman came in, been blind for 20yrs, had the operation and could see again, she rushed over to the giant painting of the dear leader and broke down in front of it. She was shouting and throwing her arms in the air thanking the dear leader for restoring her sight. The journalist spoke to her and said, actually, this is a cheap operation that American people have paid for you to have as your government won’t give it to you. Without a moments hesitation she turned to the painting, broke down again and started shouting thanks to the dear leader for allowing the Americans to come!

Total brainwashing.

I used to be in the North Korean army. To be honest, I found it all a bit seoul destroying.

Total brainwashing

it certainly seems to have worked on you

I don’t think they are all entirely convinced by Dear Leader

http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/story-of-a-former-officer-who-organizes-escapes-from-north-korea-a-928228.html

Rusty Spanner – Member
For the same reasons we don’t.

Thats a bit of a juvenile remark our lives are very different, are we starving live in fear etc…NO

A few deaths on the way for a country of freedom cant be a bad thing ? (worked for other countries)

Even the people in the army must hate it so they could help

Well from what I saw when I was there a lot of people really do love their country and they don’t want to overthrow their government, they actually like they system that they have and are deeply suspicious of all outsiders especially the west.

What makes you think that the army hate the set up? If you want to understand why people do what they do then you can’t just apply your opinions and reasoning to it as you’ll only end up getting it wrong. You have to understand why people will think the way they do, then you might stand a chance of understanding the situation properly.

A few deaths, your’s, your children’s? it may be worth the risk if you believe there is any hope, but when the state is so all controlling it is hard to see anything else, other than perhaps escape to the South.

Revolutions aren’t exactly an easy option look at Syria.

piemonster – Member
Combination of fear, misinformation, and guns pointed at them.

This, this and this.^^ Oh and the fact that they seem to be starving would leave very little will to have a scrap if you ask me.

Well from what I saw when I was there a lot of people really do love their country and they don’t want to overthrow their government, they actually like they system that they have and are deeply suspicious of all outsiders especially the west.

What makes you think that the army hate the set up? If you want to understand why people do what they do then you can’t just apply your opinions and reasoning to it as you’ll only end up getting it wrong. You have to understand why people will think the way they do, then you might stand a chance of understanding the situation properly.

Maybe you only met the people that liked it, did you meet all of the population and ask them ? You my friend are as brain washed as I !

For revolution to happen the masses need to congregate and in order to do that they need to communicate with other people who feel the same way and they cannot do that because the state controls all media.

I feel sorry for so much of humanity living in fear and poverty and we need to keep perspective about what a fantastic life we all lead.

It’s because they fear the alternative. To illustrate democracy the government play them a constantly looped video of Dave and George Osborne guffawing at each other.

Is this what you want? Is it?!!!

trailmonkey – Member
Total brainwashing
it certainly seems to have worked on you

Que?

There needs to be a North Korean version of Nelson Mandela

(worked for other countries)

Which ones?

How do you organise a revolution? I don’t know how NK is organised, but I’m guessing it is similar to Soviet Russia or East Germany – the KGB or Stasi will have infiltrated every part of society, and you can’t really trust anyone… I don’t suppose there’s much in the way of Twitter or similar to provide a relatively anonymous means of organisation, either.

If it happens, it’ll be either from the top or as the result of massive rioting (caused by famine or whatever) and a subsequent collapse of civil society.

Most of them are brainwashed into believing in the system. There was a documentary I watched a while back about NK, absolutely fascinating. An American charity took a cataract removal machine to the country and just spent day after day restoring people’s sight. The machine wasn’t expensive or complicated but NK didn’t have a single one in the whole country.

One woman came in, been blind for 20yrs, had the operation and could see again, she rushed over to the giant painting of the dear leader and broke down in front of it. She was shouting and throwing her arms in the air thanking the dear leader for restoring her sight. The journalist spoke to her and said, actually, this is a cheap operation that American people have paid for you to have as your government won’t give it to you. Without a moments hesitation she turned to the painting, broke down again and started shouting thanks to the dear leader for allowing the Americans to come!

I watched this last night again actually.

They ALL ran up to the photo of their leader and said the same thing.

Read “Nothing to Envy”, that will give a good insight into how deep rooted the dictatorship is in the average citizen’s life/mind/heart.

mogrim – Member

How do you organise a revolution? I don’t know how NK is organised

^^^^^

Maybe you only met the people that liked it, did you meet all of the population and ask them ?

Well of course I only met the people that supported it. It’s a closed society so they are obviously only going to let people see those who support the regime. My point it is that you are looking at the situation from the outside with no real knowledge of the country assuming that they will think like us and saying “why aren’t they more like us” when the truth is that they don’t think like us and have not been brought up to think for themselves so they won’t think as we do.

mogrim – Member

If it happens, it’ll be either from the top or as the result of massive rioting (caused by famine or whatever) and a subsequent collapse of civil society.

It’s likely to be something of the sort you suggest.

Mohamed Bouazizi was a 26 year old street vendor, his suicide in protest at the harassment he received from corrupt Tunisian police officers sparked the Arab Spring. It’s easy to imagine a similar incident in North Korea…somebody roughed up by the security forces in a provincial town, local protests, a policeman lynched, a crackdown and reprisals, mass street battles, local garrison mutinies etc etc

‘Under the loving care of the fatherly leader’ is a very good book which starts just before the civil war and follow the rise of the dictatorship to the modern god-king style thing they’ve got going now.

The dynasty is very adept at blaming external forces for all problems.

When I heard this morning than the Number Two of an unelected regime that was hell bent on making the lives of its subjects an utter misery had been executed, even I thought that was harsh treatment of Nick Clegg.

Well of course I only met the people that supported it. It’s a closed society so they are obviously only going to let people see those who support the regime. My point it is that you are looking at the situation from the outside with no real knowledge of the country assuming that they will think like us and saying “why aren’t they more like us” when the truth is that they don’t think like us and have not been brought up to think for themselves so they won’t think as we do.

Fair point…hug and make up ?

Anyone suspected of revolutionary thinking is locked up or worse:

Many prisoners of the camp were born there under North Korea’s “three generations of punishment”. This means anyone found guilty of committing a crime, which could be as simple as trying to escape North Korea, would be sent to the camp along with that person’s entire family. The subsequent two generations of family members would be born in the camp and must also live their entire lives and die there

Wiki – Kaechon internment camp

Arab spring was different. Societies may have been various degrees of oppressive and corrupt, but were more open than NK. Also, tribal factions within countries in N Africa and exiting tensions all helped. And access to internet, social media, not available in NK.

And it didn’t end nicely everywhere, lots died in Libya and it’s pretty lawless now, and Syria is an ongoing disaster.

Not saying it’s impossible, but it would seem hard to organise.

How did change happen in Cambodia post Khymer Rouge?

Just like the fall of Ceausescu, or even the Berlin wall, something will happen out of the blue and the whole rotten edifice will collapse, the question is when?
Maybe a natural disaster, maybe an army regiment will mutiny setting up a chain reaction, I fail to believe in my lifetime that NK will stay the same.
To keep that sort of state in place takes conviction and total commitment by thousands of people, and lets face it, we humans are not good at that, not in the numbers required to keep this show running.

Even if it did, there is also the qustion to be considered of how a dying regime would react. The chances are that they would decide to cause as much damage as possble to South Korea, Japan, and China. Even if the majority of those orders were ingnored, it would only take one loyalist to unleash hell upon the region.

Interesting times indeed…

Very interesting program about NK the other day, filmed on secret cameras by a Chinese smuggler who distributes mainstream movies, wind up radios and laptops to people to try and educate them about the outside world. The lengths people go to to try and get out of the country is astonishing all whilst running the risk of 1 out of every 3 people you know being poised to grass you up to the police about your incorrect thoughts. There does seem to be a slow movement towards an air of distrust of Kim Jong-Un, lots of higher echelon folk questioning his abilities due to his lack of experience. Judging by his Uncle’s demise it seems he is dealing with this problem though.

Also a lot of Stockholm Syndrome and fear of the future I would imagine. Even dissidents cried when Stalin died according to Solzhenitsyn (iirc). I seem to remember reading that even if news is patchy from overseas, people in North Korea do get smuggled South Korean DVDs and rumors. They must have heard about the disaster that’s hit ordinary Russians over the last twenty years and there are plenty of peasants in difficulty in China – both neighbours. Breaking up the Soviet Union is great if you’re Estonian, less stellar if you’re a Turkmenistani…

“Total brainwashing.”

Brainwashing or just the right thing to say when you know there are informers hanging around?