Month: February 2019

India is known remarkably for the complex rigidity of its caste system, which determines one’s rank by how well he fulfilled his duties in the previous life cycle. The only way to move up in status is to die and have your efforts hopefully prove enough to propel you to a higher rung of the social ladder. The comparisons made between North Korea’s songbun and India’s caste therefore speaks volumes as to how restricted life for North Koreans really is. Following the 1950-1953 Korean War, the people were heavily surveyed and thrown into a class based off their perceived commitment to the the north: either hostile, wavering, or core. One’s songbin rating sealed the fate of not only themself and their family but also the two generations to follow. For those placed into the core class, the opportunities are far greater than those set in  the lower two, who are treated like afterthoughts. With a single slip up possibly meaning the sentence to a lower class, I would constantly have to have my guard up so as not to say anything that would put me in jeopardy. In an oppressive world like North Korea, not one soul goes without being carefully watched or highly classified.

I wonder what thoughts ran through Tae-woo and his wife’s mind when their children finally uncovered the reason for their misfortune. They had kept the truth of their songbun under wraps only to protect their family, but the secrecy only caused greater devastation in the future. “We’ve already been stripped of our own hope. Why do the same to our children?” must have been part of the reason why they kept quiet for so many years. Staying silent kept Tae-woo safe, so the same must be true for his kids, right? As for Mi-hee and Sok-ji, this realization meant that all their past hard work or any efforts made in the future would equate to nothing. This class restriction predestined many years before their births disqualified the hope for a better life not only for them but for their children, too. Here in America, being accepted into the college of one’s dreams can be one of the most life-altering accomplishments in a person’s life, but, because of their beulsun, they’ll most likely never have their opportunity. In the end, no matter of how many hours they spend or labor they do, it will be all for naught.

Almost every Tuesday, when tickets are discounted, my family and I make the drive to Ko’olau Consolidated Theater to munch on some popcorn and enjoy the latest feature films. Whether it’s Mary Poppins Returns, or Bumblebee, or Aquaman, movies have the ability to ignite our imaginations and expand our possibilities. The movie theater is meant to be a safe place, where we can sit back, relax, and let our emotions go wild: crying, laughing, etc. On the contrary, North Korea exploits the magic of film to reinforce their beliefs further upon the people. By promoting themes like self-sacrifice, Capitalism is bad, slowly sinks in. Also the actors strong healthy, people wanted to be like the people on the screen

Almost every Tuesday, when tickets are discounted, my family and I make the drive to Ko’olau Consolidated Theater to munch on some popcorn and enjoy the latest feature films. Whether it’s Mary Poppins Returns, or Bumblebee, or Aquaman, movies have the ability to ignite our imaginations and expand our possibilities. The movie theater is meant to be a safe place, where we can sit back, relax, and let our emotions go wild: crying, laughing, etc. On the contrary, North Korea exploits the magic of film to reinforce their beliefs further upon the people. By promoting themes like self-sacrifice, Capitalism is bad, slowly sinks in. Also the actors strong healthy, people wanted to be like the people on the screen

North Korean doctors are expected to serve the people selflessly.

pg. 106

Doctors would donate their own blood and sometimes skin for skin grafts. They would hike around in the mountains to gather herbs to make pain killers and antibiotics. Doctors would grow cotton in order to make bandages. Doctors were to serve the people of North Korea…selflessly.

This chapter shows that the children seemed to be the most harmed by the regime. They were starving and unable to eat the weeds and bark that most of the people resorted to eat in order to survive. Their stomachs just couldn’t handle it.

Under the regime, people of North Korea were not allowed to choose their careers. They were chosen for them. A big example was the newest character Kim Ji-eun who was introduced in Chapter 7. She grew up wanting to be a teacher but her grades and demeanor landed her a job as a doctor, because she was told she had to be one. Even though that wasn’t her first choice, she did her job well. She worked around the clock and even when the pay and food rations stopped, she continued her work. She was doing what was asked of her. She worked through typhoid and starvation epidemics. Children were starving at rapid rates and there was nothing the hospitals could do. The hospitals were out of resources. Yet, Kim Ji-eun continued to work, because she cared.

Imagine that everything you know and believe to be true about the world you live in is a way of life that has been passed down to you from your family? So I’m going to spin this a little different for a moment……

First let me make it crystal clear that oppressive tyranny and social behavioral control over human beings is just Hella wrong on all levels and I in know way shape or form support what KOREAN LEADER Kim did to is people for so long.

That being said….

Born into this way of life, groomed, educated and completely supported to run your country with absolute control. The very people that gave Kim life and represented what he was born into the world to know as love, said to him everyday things like….we love you son, this is your country these are your people and this is how we do things here son.

Look out there in the western culture…. They are disgusting, there moral compass is broken, they are unimaginably ungrateful for the luxury of life that they have!

They mary out of wedlock! They are overweight pigs that just take take take consume consume consume and stab each other in the back for a $20 bag of crack cocaine!

Then the big lesson/ direction you get from your father and all your peers….. we must at all cost SAVE OUR PEOPLE FOR THIS WAY OF LIFE!

And perhaps Kim even hear on occasion from some of his closest council…. No what we do here and how we run this country isn’t perfect by any means….  But we refuse tolet what has happened to the rest of the world happen to our people, so we do what is best for them even ifit seems like we are evil tyrants….