Check out these crazy pictures from North Korea

infected slut princess · Fri Jan 30, 2015 11:20 pm

These are really interesting photos. They were taken by some kind of tour guide in places that are legal to go. They show what seem to be wealthier people by North Korean standards, maybe more "middle-class" by our Western standards. Actually a lot of it looks pretty "Western" overall.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... z3QEu52VcI

Anyhow, it's always interesting to see pictures like this. What impressions do you get from these pictures?

name_here · Post by **name_here** » Sat Jan 31, 2015 12:13 am

North Korea has this habit of staging photos and only building fronts of buildings.

fectin · Post by **fectin** » Sat Jan 31, 2015 12:29 am

That's true. But they also are having a problem with people passing around pirated copies of South Korean soap operas and watching them on laptops (which breaks their cultural monopoly), so they obviously have more than mud huts in some areas.

tussock · Post by **tussock** » Sat Jan 31, 2015 3:28 am

Everyone only builds the fronts of buildings, by the way. It's called a facade. That's a thing which cities do, where the buildings adjoin each other, you just make the front look finished even if the inside is not currently occupied.

They're poor as fuck, the society is highly stratified, it's very cold, they have very little access to fuel, and aren't part of the standard international trade system. Otherwise they buy all their junk from China just like you do, except they have knock-offs rather than brand names. There's much less junk and what they do buy is much cheaper and more practical, like a $5 phone that makes phone calls instead of a $500 phone that plays more songs and games than you can legally afford to buy. Just like in the USA, their government is watching all their calls just in case someone is a terrorist, and sometimes random people get tortured or killed because they dialled a wrong number.

If you want to know what it looks like, try google maps. Street view will not be present, nor will low-altitude aeroplane maps, but it's still fairly obvious what's what. Almost everything you see about NK, or anywhere in Africa, or the Middle East, in western media is just lies to support the war agenda. Everyone buys their shit from China, we all drive the same fucking cars and motorbikes with slightly different badges, it's just that a lot of people only make a couple bucks a day to live on and can't afford one.

Mistborn · Post by **Mistborn** » Sat Jan 31, 2015 4:01 am

Wow such edge Very cynicism

Please don't pull your "don't belive the media man there's no difference between side A and side B" hipster bullshit in a thread about North Fucking Korea. It's actually kind of offensive.

darkmaster · Post by **darkmaster** » Sat Jan 31, 2015 5:57 am

I'm sure the book about the Korean prison camps where you, and your entire family can be sent to stay for three generations for the crime of not being patriotic enough, a biogrophy about the only man to ever (as far as we know) escape from one such camp, is just a part of the western propaganda machien.

Escape from Camp 14 is atually really good though, you should check it out. A sobering tale about morlality and the effects of the environment in which you're raised.

DSMatticus · Post by **DSMatticus** » Sat Jan 31, 2015 6:30 am

Tussock hasn't learned to tell the difference between being cynical and being an offensive piece of shit. He's spent most of his time on this forum not being convinced it should really matter to American women whether their elected officials are Democrats or Republicans, and that's not an isolated mistake. It's the underlying character flaw that makes tussock such a tussock. Even as he rails against completely unnecessary human suffering caused by completely unethical policy decisions, his conclusion is always the completely abhorrent "and that's why we should stop paying attention to human suffering." The only real question is why the fuck is he the only one who doesn't get that.

infected slut princess · Sat Jan 31, 2015 6:54 am

LOL!! Uhh. Lord Mistfuck, you are an idiot. The only thing offensive in this thread is how fucking dumb you are. Maybe you need to learn to read.

If some of you weren't totally retarded (hard to imagine, I know), you may have noticed I didn't say anything about "don't believe the media" or "western propaganda machine." North Korea is a stupid piece of shit country and the way its people are treated is a moral abomination.

I've been to Cuba and I've seen the "build-the-front-of-buildings-only" style of construction (tho' I was surprised how clean most of the bathrooms were), and I've seen lots of commie propaganda photo ops. My own impression was that these pictures looked sort of "real." But so what? News Flash: that doesn't mean North Korea is a magic land of peace and prosperity.

Now, if you knew how to read, you might have seen that I pointed out that these were places that the government lets tourists go, and the article says the tourists are closely monitored, so it's obvious that this isn't an accurate depictions of "normal" North Korean life.

So why are the photos interesting? because they make North Korea look nice. It's deceptive, and _that's why it's interesting_. Whoa. The pictures also suggest what the upper class in North Korea looks like, and it was interesting to me how they look quite fairly Western.

I have a theory that I could say "If I drop a rock it will fall to the ground" and you guys would disagree with it just because.

But I will say I am actually impressed that you don't all fap to North Korea, since you are all Stalin-fappers. So good job, I guess.

I think Mistborn's welfare check was late this month, and he's grumpy about it.

Occluded Sun · Post by **Occluded Sun** » Sat Jan 31, 2015 6:55 am

The best photo is the one taken at night, from orbit. You can see SK quite clearly, lit up by artificial lights - and then the straight line where that cuts out, leading straight to darkness. NK.

Clearly the NK government is superior because they're fighting global warming. Thank God for government-controlled societies... NK shows us the way.

darkmaster · Post by **darkmaster** » Sat Jan 31, 2015 8:13 am

ISP. Litterally no one after the second post has been talking you. Please remove your head from your anus so that you can read, you oversensitive shit.

DSMatticus · Post by **DSMatticus** » Sat Jan 31, 2015 8:23 am

ISP wrote:Maybe you need to learn to read.

This is very funny for reasons wholly unintended.

Omegonthesane · Post by **Omegonthesane** » Sat Jan 31, 2015 9:11 am

darkmaster wrote:ISP. Litterally no one after the second post has been talking you. Please remove your head from your anus so that you can read, you oversensitive shit.

Then who was Mistborn accusing of (for once) incorrect accusations of media lies? The only thing that even comes close is tussock saying everyone builds the fronts of buildings, and that just means that building fronts are not on their own all that surprising.

DSMatticus · Post by **DSMatticus** » Sat Jan 31, 2015 9:58 am

Omegonthesane wrote:
darkmaster wrote:ISP. Litterally no one after the second post has been talking you. Please remove your head from your anus so that you can read, you oversensitive shit.
Then who was Mistborn accusing of (for once) incorrect accusations of media lies? The only thing that even comes close is tussock saying everyone builds the fronts of buildings, and that just means that building fronts are not on their own all that surprising.

tussock wrote:Almost everything you see about NK, or anywhere in Africa, or the Middle East, in western media is just lies to support the war agenda.

Hm.

Omegonthesane · Post by **Omegonthesane** » Sat Jan 31, 2015 10:48 am

DSMatticus wrote:
Omegonthesane wrote:
darkmaster wrote:ISP. Litterally no one after the second post has been talking you. Please remove your head from your anus so that you can read, you oversensitive shit.
Then who was Mistborn accusing of (for once) incorrect accusations of media lies? The only thing that even comes close is tussock saying everyone builds the fronts of buildings, and that just means that building fronts are not on their own all that surprising.

tussock wrote:Almost everything you see about NK, or anywhere in Africa, or the Middle East, in western media is just lies to support the war agenda.
Hm.

I stand corrected.

If I was a shill, I might try to pull something about how it was NK's lies that were merely being bought by the western media... but no one buys NK lies.

Mistborn · Post by **Mistborn** » Sat Jan 31, 2015 12:53 pm

infected slut princess wrote:LOL!! Uhh. Lord Mistfuck, you are an idiot. The only thing offensive in this thread is how fucking dumb you are. Maybe you need to learn to read.

I think the person who needs to learn how to read is you, I was clearly responding to tussok. It wasn't even remotely about you

What's your deal? It's like you have some kind of desperate need for my sick fires. Is this some kind of tsundere crush? Because I'm not sure if I'm comfortable having a man presumably many years my senior tsuntusning all over me.

erik · Post by **erik** » Sat Jan 31, 2015 2:34 pm

Watch out LM!

Reynard · Post by **Reynard** » Sat Jan 31, 2015 3:12 pm

infected slut princess:
> They show what seem to be wealthier people by North Korean standards, maybe more "middle-class" by our Western standards.
Wat.

That's regular urbanites. From capital, yes. But still - regular urbanites. Upper 20-30%, at the very least.

> What impressions do you get from these pictures?
Mild annoyance. What happened to the "crazy" part? Even comments to the photos do not inspire Rightful Wrath Against Communism.

That's how you do it:

P.s. do people really get tortured and killed in the USA for dialling a wrong number? Or that's just tussock's opinion?

fectin · Post by **fectin** » Sat Jan 31, 2015 3:23 pm

Reynard wrote:P.s. do people really get tortured and killed in the USA for dialling a wrong number? Or that's just tussock's opinion?

I live in the US and have never been tortured and/or killed.

erik · Post by **erik** » Sat Jan 31, 2015 3:24 pm

I haven't been killed but I did watch Babel.

Kaelik · Post by **Kaelik** » Sat Jan 31, 2015 5:54 pm

Reynard wrote:P.s. do people really get tortured and killed in the USA for dialling a wrong number? Or that's just tussock's opinion?

The number of US citizens in the United States who have been detained and tortured for contact with terrorists is zero.

The number of US citizens who were detained for contact with terrorists while not in the US is some decidedly non-zero number.

It is fair to say that calling up terrorists in the United States will never get you tortured (except to the extent that the things we already consider due process, like police interrogation tactics already used on drug dealers is considered torture).

So Tussock is, unsurprisingly, completely full of shit.

Shrapnel · Post by **Shrapnel** » Sat Jan 31, 2015 6:07 pm

fectin wrote:
Reynard wrote:P.s. do people really get tortured and killed in the USA for dialling a wrong number? Or that's just tussock's opinion?
I live in the US and have never been tortured and/or killed.

I'm totally sigging that.

Ikeren · Post by **Ikeren** » Sat Jan 31, 2015 8:38 pm

The number of US citizens in the United States who have been detained and tortured for contact with terrorists is zero.

I don't have much of a stake in this race, but is that true? What about that wikileaks guy? I guess he was detained and tortured but not for contacting terrorists, but for leaking sensitive data?

Kaelik · Post by **Kaelik** » Sat Jan 31, 2015 8:51 pm

Ikeren wrote:I don't have much of a stake in this race, but is that true? What about that wikileaks guy? I guess he was detained and tortured but not for contacting terrorists, but for leaking sensitive data?

Well since Julian Assange is not a US citizen, was not in the US, was never detained by the US, and was never tortured by the US, I would go so far as to say that he definitely is not a counter example to my claim.

fectin · Post by **fectin** » Sat Jan 31, 2015 10:02 pm

I think he was pointing at Manning, not Assange.

Manning is also a bad example. Everything I'm aware of that might have been torture in another context came from specific threats of suicide (e.g. when you say "I'm going to hang myself using my clothes," your jailers will take all of your clothes away and observe you constantly).

Kaelik · Post by **Kaelik** » Sat Jan 31, 2015 10:15 pm

fectin wrote:I think he was pointing at Manning, not Assange.

Manning is also a bad example. Everything I'm aware of that might have been torture in another context came from specific threats of suicide (e.g. when you say "I'm going to hang myself using my clothes," your jailers will take all of your clothes away and observe you constantly).

Okay yes, Manning was clearly not arrested for contact for terrorists, because you know, Julian Assange is not a terrorist (unless you are a young woman).

Also there is really no evidence that she has been tortured.