…not in North Korea, where Twitter bombing can’t change the country’s ironclad lock on information:
North Korea’s state media released a “detailed report” Tuesday claiming that American journalists Laura Ling and Euna Lee entered the country illegally in order to record material for a “smear campaign” against the reclusive communist state.
It added that the two women “admitted that what they did were criminal acts … prompted by the political motive to isolate and stifle the socialist system of the DPRK by faking up moving images aimed at falsifying its human rights performance and hurling slanders and calumnies at it.”
What these two journalists did was illegal by North Korean law, just as what Iran’s citizens are doing is illegal by Iranian mandate. The former will eat the one-sided story told by NK’s government and work in prison camps for 12 years until bandied about as a bargaining chip by the missile bearers; Americans sit smugly, calling the women out because “they knew the consequences.” The latter are lifted by an echoing, international shout to make things right, to tell as many sides of the story as we can unfold. Differing degrees of fear and disdain turn injustice into ignorance and back.
sure hope they weren’t actually in NK. not that it matters much for the Obama admin., they’re another bargaining chip.
they’ll be out when NK decides it wants to eat.
“hurling slanders and calumnies at it.”
Isn’t that what the guy in “I Annonymous” did to the mannequin?
Isn’t calumny basically just a synonym for slander?
“work in prison camps”
do you really think NK will show journalists the insides of a working prison camp? really? speaking of ignorance…..
Part of the issue here is that in Iran, there are people who are able to get information out – it has a cast of thousands, not simply two. There are actions that people can take to assist in Iran now, but there’s not really anything I can do to help those two women. You might as well ask why the jailing of journalists in Iran didn’t bring about this kind of hue and cry – it’s on a different scale.
So the question will be – what can we do from here to assist NK in changing? Will what we learn from the proxy battles in Iran allow us to make some progress there? To a large extent, the population has to have access to technology in the first place to enable this sort of thing to happen. Given that they have issues with simply eating, that seems unlikely.
What sides of the story can we unfold with a lack of technology in the hands of the people who have the stories?
Americans sit smugly? Is there any American who is smug about this? It’s certainly not reflected in the link.
Meh.
Korean War, Cuban Embargo – whatever.
You old guys are so stuck in the last century.
There’s a few minor differences, Sam. For starters, Iran has the third largest number of bloggers per capita, whereas North Korea limits the internet to a handful of super trusted members of the regime. Iran since the Revolution has always had some honest (until now) electoral outlet for the will of the people, even if limited. Iran has multiple radio stations, TV stations, and has allowed illicit satellite dishes for years. Iran hardly counts as a free society, but it’s far, far, far more free than North Korea. In North Korea, radios are built by the state, and receive only the one state run station.
Also, in Iran, the people are rising up. In North Korea, the regime has a grip so iron clad that the Kims make Stalin look like a big ‘ol softy. Hell, there were numerous resistance groups to be found in Nazi Germany, but none in North Korea. It ain’t apples to apples.
Everyone in Leader’s Paradise has a twitter account on their Glorious Leader 5G cellphone, Gitai.
But they’re invisible so they won’t harsh the environment and make all the kittens cry.
“Smear campaign”? The best smear campaign is that goof ball leader. You can’t cook up anything to make that asshole look any worse than he has himself. What a communist turd.
@7: Christ, Will, don’t let me down!
Interestingly heard this week: NK won’t put those women in an actual NK gulag because they don’t want to let foreigners see what happens. If they do put them there, those women will never leave because the NK don’t want reports escaping. Supposedly, the two journalists are being held in housing formerly occupied by members of the royal dictatorship. Before I heard this, my one consolation was that these reporters’ careers were confirmed for the rest of their lives.