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Nearing the summation, the author uncritically quotes a "senior-level American official." --"The North Koreans have never tortured a white guy physically. Never
by SomeAmerican 8y ago
Nearing the summation, the author uncritically quotes a "senior-level American official." --"The North Koreans have never tortured a white guy physically. Never.” Earlier in the article, "The 82 American sailors captured on the Pueblo were beaten and starved for 11 months before finally being released."
Conclusion: either none of the 82 American sailors were white guys, or "beaten and starved for 11 months" doesn't constitute torture.
- vowelless 8y agoIt's a men's fashion magazine. I don't expect high quality work on this topic from them. I just skim to get a salient point here and there.
- tptacek 8y agoThat's not how this works at all. GQ and Esquire run serious long-form journalism all the time. For that matter, Vanity Fair is Michael Lewis and William Langewiesche's home after leaving The Atlantic.
- tptacek 8y agoJust a few paragraphs earlier the author makes clear that he's talking about since the Pueblo; it's the lead sentence of the graf: Ever since the sailors of the U.S.S. Pueblo were beaten in 1968, there have been no clear-cut cases of North Korea physically torturing American prisoners.
- mthoms 8y agoThis also made me think of John McCain and other POWs. I think this part of the article is poorly worded. The author likely meant since 1968 this hasn't occurred.