२१ जानेवारी, २०२१

"We must strongly eradicate the ‘puppet words’ and ‘puppet style’ in our society."

Said Kim Jong-un, quoted in "Kim Jong-un outlaws slang from South Korea" (The London Times).
North Korean propaganda refers to South Korea as a puppet of the United States. Despite strict censorship and propaganda North Koreans have been increasingly exposed to South Korean culture in the past decade. People can watch foreign content on mobile phones, and smugglers and activists bring in films, dramas and news programmes in memory cards.

Kim expressed special concern about the words “oppa” and “dong-saeng,” which, the Times tells us "mean older brother and younger sister but which are used of friends, or flirtatiously."

२९ टिप्पण्या:

rehajm म्हणाले...

Someone must have smuggled in this and it's making the rounds: Oppan Gangham Style

Psy hits a bit close to home for Kim Jong-un.

Ann Althouse म्हणाले...

@rehajm

That is discussed in the linked article.

wendybar म्हणाले...

Starting to sound like the left in America...Cancelling words and changing the meanings of words.

Laslo Spatula म्हणाले...

Dong-saeng are you stuck?

I am Laslo.

rehajm म्हणाले...

Sorry. I only see Just £3 for 3 months. Ends soon. I'm not motivated to part with a shilling at present.

Lucid-Ideas म्हणाले...

"It's a beautiful thing Winston, the destruction of words."

Bob Boyd म्हणाले...

Censorship never works.
Cracking down never works.
Wake up Jack.
Wake up Mark.
Read a fucking history book.
This time isn't different.
Can you censor better than Kim Jong-un?
Eh, Oppa?

DavidUW म्हणाले...

Commies gonna commie, here and abroad.

gspencer म्हणाले...

The hegemony of Islam is also cracking through Muslims being exposed to the actual and vile acts of their so-called prophet. As Muslims begin to understand/know the character of Mohammad as described in their own book they're repulsed.

Kate म्हणाले...

What a confusing headline. The lower case "-un" scans as "unoutlaw". Then I flip back and forth with "outlaw" as a noun/verb. After that, "slang" becomes contextual gibberish.

JPS म्हणाले...

"We must strongly eradicate the ‘puppet words’ and ‘puppet style’ in our society."

He's still pissed about Team America making fun of his dad, isn't he? ("I'm ronery, I'm so ronery, I'm ronery and sadry arone....)

Still, if I were a Nork and I heard him say "strongly eradicate," I'd be pretty nervous about using those words.

mandrewa म्हणाले...

Yeonmi Park in her book "In Order to Live: A North Korean Girl's Journey to Freedom" says that most North Koreans believe in the North Korean regime.

Something I realized reading that book is that North Korea is a true socialist state. One can argue that the ruling Kim family, and the official state worship of that family, have nothing to do with Marxism. But even if we grant that, many of the policies and beliefs and the specific activities that people spend their days doing in North Korea are a very earnest attempt to practice Marxism.

One of the things that Yeonmi talks about in her book is the hold that these ideas have an people's minds. If the woke were there, born into the system, they would be totally into it.

Despite seeing smuggled movies and such, and Yeonmi grew up with this, so this is not a new thing, North Koreans don't really take in and understand what is being portrayed in those movies. People living in North Korea believe in the Marxist ideology that surrounds them and that they are continually being taught.

Of course North Korea is a place where even the slightest dissent can get you executed or sent to a work camp for the rest of your short life, so it may be that Yeonmi doesn't really know what other people think and is merely recording what she thought. But I suspect she is for the greater part, for most people, probably right.

Mary Beth म्हणाले...

They're not upset by the noona dramas? (The shows with a female lead who is a good bit older than the male lead.)

Dong-saeng is any younger sibling, not just sisters. Familial terms are used with people who are not actually family, like calling an older person grandmother/grandfather out of respect. A male's older brother is "hyung", an older sister is "noona". A female's older sister is "unnie" and older brother, as quoted, is "oppa".

North Korea doesn't dislike the words, it dislikes evidence that people are watching South Korean shows.

Mary Beth म्हणाले...

The real problem North Korea is going to have is that the shows are becoming more realistic. Where it used to be that 90% were about a poor girl in high school who's working three part-time jobs because her parents ran up a lot of debt and the fled the country. She still had the latest smart phone and a very nice wardrobe. Then she would meet the cold, but popular chaebol (1%er) heir who can't resist her goodness and beauty. He would fall in love, she would make him a better person.

Now there are more slice-of-life shows and ones that are just about regular students or working class people.

It was easy to convince people that nothing they see is real when the show is a modern fairy tale. I think it will get harder when it's just stories about regular people.

Jaq म्हणाले...

Speaking of puppets, here is Biden mumbling “salutes the Marines” instead of actually saluting the Marines the way his earpiece told him to.

https://twitter.com/QuestonEvrythng/status/1351925852133441539

What a fine specimen of a man!

walter म्हणाले...

We must cleanse ourselves from words..like mother and father!

rehajm म्हणाले...

He is using an ear piece!!!! Watch on C-span @ ~3.5 hours in, as Joe Biden enters the capitol building he DOES NOT SALUTE the Marines standing there. Instead as he enters the building he says "Salute the Marines." Wow, just wow.


We must strongly eradicate the 'puppet words' and 'puppet style' in our society. 'Ear piece' will be next...

Sally327 म्हणाले...

I'm not a fan of puppets. I think they're creepy. Puppets and clowns. And Democrats. But I repeat myself.

It is fascinating how forbidden communication can seep through the tightest barrier. Although I think North Korea might want to talk to Jack Dorsey, he's been having a lot of luck with that recently.

ALP म्हणाले...

K-dramas *are* insanely addicting. No wonder they want to keep them out.

YoungHegelian म्हणाले...

I, for one, strongly condemn the cultural appropriation of American culture by Korean cultural imperialism.

Seriously, aren't these girls so cute ya just want to eat 'em up?**

**Don't go there, Laslo.

Magson म्हणाले...

@YoungHelian

They don't even try to hide it anymore, singing their k-pop in English that they'll Rule the World

JPS म्हणाले...

tim in vermont,

"Speaking of puppets, here is Biden mumbling 'salutes the Marines' instead of actually saluting the Marines the way his earpiece told him to."

Presidents do slip and read their stage directions now and then. I'm remembering Bush 41, a better man than president, saying with great emphasis, "Message: I care."

JPS म्हणाले...

Also I imagine the new president has been so conditioned to do as he's told by his handlers, on the fly, he's like a slightly smarter version of Forrest Gump in Basic Training:

"Guuuuump! What's your sole purpose in this Army?"
"To do whatever yew tell me Drill Sergeant!"
"Godddamn it, Gump! You're a goddamn genius. That's the most outstanding answer I've ever heard!"

mikee म्हणाले...

I, for one, think that Joe is already in the bag for everyone (Russia, Iran, China, Venezuela, Cuba, all other civilized nations, perhaps even the French), except North Korea. What Lil' Kim doesn't understand is that with Joe, the pallets of cash aren't delivered TO your country by Joe, they are delivered FROM your country, TO Joe et al., to achieve your policy aims.

Readering म्हणाले...

North Korea is an ongoing experiment in the issue raised by Orwell in the nearby post. Many thought the regime could not survive 30 years past the breakup of the USSR and the revolutions of the internet and computer miniturazation, yet here it stands still.

mandrewa म्हणाले...

Another thing Yeonmi Park talked about in her book was the big disconnect between what people do and what they say. So for instance the government in North Korea has failed on virtually every level, and can't seem to accomplish much of anything, to the point where most factories in North Korea don't actually produce anything, and most jobs in North Korea, which everyone officially has, aren't really about doing anything except showing up for work.

And the consequences of this massive failure is that there is not enough food to go around and people starve to death because of that. And people freeze to death because there is no fuel, or at least many people have no fuel. And the negative consequences of the nation not being able to produce very much just go on and on.

But of course there are things an individual can do to improve their own odds. And so a very large proportion of the North Korean population is engaged in these semi-illegal activities to keep themselves alive and which could be named a kind of capitalism. And of course that is what actually keeps people alive in North Korea.

But if you talk to people they almost all talk as if they are socialists, and Yeonmi thinks they are sincere -- but of course it's compelled speech -- and somehow people don't think about what it is they actually do to stay alive.

n.n म्हणाले...

North Korea is ahead of the progressive curve (PC). I wonder if they will suffer the same fate as the Libyan incursion. Do we have an ambassador to North Korea? He may want to cover his back hole... black hole.... black whore h/t NAACP.

n.n म्हणाले...

Starting to sound like the left in America...Cancelling words and changing the meanings of words.

Semantic games. Conceptual corruption. Conflation of logical domains.

The Vault Dweller म्हणाले...

Pretty sure France does something similar.