Seoul police are investigating how a North Korean defector who fled south ended up back in the North. Appearing tearful in a North Korean television interview, Lim Ji-hyeon told viewers she had escaped a capitalist hell.
She was a TV personality, of course she ate. Highlighting that south korea doesn’t actually have a lot of food is a really weird thing to say.
She appeared on a TV show because that's often the only job that a North Korean defector can get. They probably gave her a few hundred dollars at most. She's not a wealthy celebrity. Most North Koreans have a hard time landing a job in the south. Poor people in every capitalist country are food insecure. I find her statement 100% believable, especially given the recent documented case of a North Korean defector who starved to death in her apartment in Seoul.
And then there’s this
Lim - who described herself as “human trash”
That sounds to me like she's depressed. I figure most people who are motivated to flee a country which they consider a hell-hole would be depressed.
they all call her a “TV personality” and highlight her appearanceS on tv. (She was on reality shows, did interviews, was on talk shows, etc)
North Koreans are placed on TV in South Korea the same way that a boy who eats cockroaches is placed on Jerry Springer's studio in America, as freaks to gawk at. Do you think that every person who is interviewed on a daytime talk show is wealthy?
Did you learn this stuff from a different article? This one just says she was "forced to appear on South Korean television to make the North appear more miserable than it actually was."
Maybe she was rich and famous; it's possible. All I'm saying is that it's not at all guaranteed given what I know about most defectors. If she was unable to find a job except for a couple token interviews, that would still make her a "TV personality", but she could still have trouble making rent in Seoul.
What she said doesn't necessarily mean that she was lacking food though, just that she went South imagining she would have a good life and eat well, but didn't anticipate the hardships she would encounter that were the price she had to pay to "make it" in the South, stuff she mentions like lying about her country and people, being told to read a script, and other things that are normal for lots of people that have to move away from their homes, like missing friends and family, feeling isolated, and getting culture shock. That's how I interpreted it.
That's quite a reach on your part. Ask yourself why coercion is the first place your mind went and on a scale from 8-10 how much of a role anti-communist propaganda played in that reaction.
You've (1) inventively extrapolated from "I thought I'd live and eat well" to "they said they were starving despite being a TV celeb" (with all kinds of false assumptions about how the South Korea detector exploitation TV industry works) and (2) interpreted self-deprecation of the kind you'd literally see on this exact website as suggestive of coercion.
This is absurd and it's problematic to reach for anti-communist tropes so easily and without coherence. Please try to restrain yourself from feeding such crap through ridiculous speculation.
In your hurry to defend north korea from imperialist propaganda
Unless you're (correctly) calling your own words imperialist propaganda, this is not describing anything I've said to you.
Oh do try to dig yourself out of your own ass, you seem to have gone too far up there.
Reddit tier faux condescension has no place here. Kindly go fuck yourself until you've figured out how to talk to other people.
Now see, I read your comments before saying anything and no, you actually did lead with these insinuations and then doubled down on them. If you meant something else, that's on you for failing to communicate because no fewer than three separate people (100% of responses) have the same understanding as I do.
You're avoiding very basic self-crit, here. In fact, you went out of your way to excise the preceding sentence to avoid the new bit of self-crit I highlighted.
Go have your shitty imperialist thought process elsewhere until you can handle conflict among comrades without becoming a huge lib stooping to misleading selective quotation.
I am talking about how articles about this take quotes out of context to present a narrative
That's true, but Deutsche Welle is a German state media outlet which seeks to present the narrative "North Korea bad", so I doubt the context would make things seem worse (although I'd like to see the video too).
Edit: Oh, maybe that's what you've been trying to say all along lol. I see you edited your original comment for clarity.
This could mean "eat well and live well," depending on how you read it (and the translation). If all she had was a low-paying job with high living expenses, eating well may have been an issue.
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She appeared on a TV show because that's often the only job that a North Korean defector can get. They probably gave her a few hundred dollars at most. She's not a wealthy celebrity. Most North Koreans have a hard time landing a job in the south. Poor people in every capitalist country are food insecure. I find her statement 100% believable, especially given the recent documented case of a North Korean defector who starved to death in her apartment in Seoul.
That sounds to me like she's depressed. I figure most people who are motivated to flee a country which they consider a hell-hole would be depressed.
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North Koreans are placed on TV in South Korea the same way that a boy who eats cockroaches is placed on Jerry Springer's studio in America, as freaks to gawk at. Do you think that every person who is interviewed on a daytime talk show is wealthy?
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Nothing in the article she said implies she was "starving".
Just that South Korea wasn't what she thought...which could mean anything.
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where?
I went back to the start of the thread and the first person to mention she said she was starving in SK was you.
I'm not even necessarily defending the video or whatever, I was just saying you were extrapolating from her statement something that's not evident.
I implied that she could be food insecure despite appearing on TV, because that is a distinct possibility.
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Did you learn this stuff from a different article? This one just says she was "forced to appear on South Korean television to make the North appear more miserable than it actually was."
Maybe she was rich and famous; it's possible. All I'm saying is that it's not at all guaranteed given what I know about most defectors. If she was unable to find a job except for a couple token interviews, that would still make her a "TV personality", but she could still have trouble making rent in Seoul.
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Can you share the link, please?
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What she said doesn't necessarily mean that she was lacking food though, just that she went South imagining she would have a good life and eat well, but didn't anticipate the hardships she would encounter that were the price she had to pay to "make it" in the South, stuff she mentions like lying about her country and people, being told to read a script, and other things that are normal for lots of people that have to move away from their homes, like missing friends and family, feeling isolated, and getting culture shock. That's how I interpreted it.
That's quite a reach on your part. Ask yourself why coercion is the first place your mind went and on a scale from 8-10 how much of a role anti-communist propaganda played in that reaction.
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You've (1) inventively extrapolated from "I thought I'd live and eat well" to "they said they were starving despite being a TV celeb" (with all kinds of false assumptions about how the South Korea detector exploitation TV industry works) and (2) interpreted self-deprecation of the kind you'd literally see on this exact website as suggestive of coercion.
This is absurd and it's problematic to reach for anti-communist tropes so easily and without coherence. Please try to restrain yourself from feeding such crap through ridiculous speculation.
Unless you're (correctly) calling your own words imperialist propaganda, this is not describing anything I've said to you.
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Reddit tier faux condescension has no place here. Kindly go fuck yourself until you've figured out how to talk to other people.
Now see, I read your comments before saying anything and no, you actually did lead with these insinuations and then doubled down on them. If you meant something else, that's on you for failing to communicate because no fewer than three separate people (100% of responses) have the same understanding as I do.
Are you capable of any self-crit whatsoever?
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Because there's no irony there.
You're avoiding very basic self-crit, here. In fact, you went out of your way to excise the preceding sentence to avoid the new bit of self-crit I highlighted.
Go have your shitty imperialist thought process elsewhere until you can handle conflict among comrades without becoming a huge lib stooping to misleading selective quotation.
Reread this thread, comrade, in 5 minutes from the start, you both got side tracked here a little bit
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That's true, but Deutsche Welle is a German state media outlet which seeks to present the narrative "North Korea bad", so I doubt the context would make things seem worse (although I'd like to see the video too).
Edit: Oh, maybe that's what you've been trying to say all along lol. I see you edited your original comment for clarity.
This could mean "eat well and live well," depending on how you read it (and the translation). If all she had was a low-paying job with high living expenses, eating well may have been an issue.