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In 2018, I got connected to 5 refugees who escaped North Korea to the USA. What surprised me was all 5 were able to escape by different variations of saving up

by jimhi 5y ago

In 2018, I got connected to 5 refugees who escaped North Korea to the USA. What surprised me was all 5 were able to escape by different variations of saving up enough money to bribe people along the way. The only way to save up money for their ages (16-23) was to become "entrepreneurial" EDIT: If you are interested in North Korea, check out the stories by some friends of mine: Charles - North Korean refugee turned programmer https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ziqq5gUXu8g https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ziqq5gUXu8g North Korean Spy https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t9rLqYXTaFI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t9rLqYXTaFI Girl with parents who worked in the government whose whole family escaped https://www.youtube.com/c/Pyonghattan/videos https://www.youtube.com/c/Pyonghattan/videos

teakettle42 5y ago
This seems universal to authoritarian states where corruption is the only viable strategy to get ahead. Unfortunately, it also seems to consistently produce an entrenched, corrupt power class that persists long after the regime is overthrown. See also the former Soviet Bloc.
- pphysch 5y ago
  - vkou 5y ago
    All power structures are authoritarian. Get rid of congress, and you'll simply have your local landholders pay private enforcers to keep the rabble in line. Property rights in theory apply to everyone, but in practice, are consistently enforced in a way that protects large, wealthy property owners more than everyone else.
  - gitgrump 5y ago
    Erm, no? That's unnecessarily reductionist. "Can compel you to pay taxes" is not the same as "authoritarian". Go ahead, criticize the President online in the United States. Notice how you weren't jailed or executed? Now try something similar in an authoritarian nation.
    - aspenmayer 5y ago
      Laws are enforced through use of force or literally denying freedom of movement, or by threatening to do the above to subjects who do not obey. It’s a spectrum. How violent are the reprisals, how lethal, how indiscriminate. How egregious are the prison terms, how outsized are the fines and fees. But all governments are inherently authoritarian, unless they allow subjects to instead choose punishment by exile instead of strongarm tactics. I’m not aware of any that do. Mostly because there’s nowhere to be exiled to. All governments have claimed all of the available land, so you can’t even choose exile independently. Societies vary on the freedoms they allow; all governmental bodies are by nature authoritarian. If no one were to submit to them, nations would have no standing to declare binding authority over members of the public. Governments are systems of control, and that control is allegedly by consent of the governed. However, if one is never given a reasonable alternative or opportunity to object, they are not free. They are only as free as their society allows them to be. This one-sided state of affairs makes freely-given consent to be governed impossible. I am open to being convinced otherwise, though. We’re freer than we’ve ever been, but we’ve only changed the window dressing. We’re still beholden to government representatives that themselves have multiple competing interests. Full direct democracy with vote delegation for those who want it is a start. Proportional representation instead of first past the post elections would also be necessary.
      - aspenmayer 5y ago
        It just occurred to me that the closest we have in USA to self-exile is joining a Native American tribe via marriage, or otherwise being adopted onto a reservation and settling on res. I’ve done humanitarian work and outreach with various Native American/Indian tribes in western states. My great-uncles both married Native women. No disrespect is intended in any of my above statements. I don’t take these issues lightly, but for the purposes of debate, I included this post to illuminate how hard it is to be freer in a free society that has its warts and issues.
    - pphysch 5y ago
      Are you aware what the current date is and its significance to dissidents of the current regime in Washington? Hundreds of (primarily non-violent) dissidents prosecuted and incarcerated in the last year alone. To be clear, I don't agree politically with those dissidents.
hereforphone 5y ago
Interesting. I guess you speak Korean?
- jimhi 5y ago
  Just Chinese and learning Russian now :) Some of them speak English, others we had a translator.
pphysch 5y ago
How did you get connected with those refugees, if you don't mind my curiosity?
- jimhi 5y ago
  An event held by LINK - https://www.libertyinnorthkorea.org/ https://www.libertyinnorthkorea.org/ They are a nonprofit that helps people escape from North Korea
decafninja 5y ago
I've met and worked with an organization that sort of comes from the other side of the equation. They are involved in helping North Koreans flee from the country, as well as helping those that have already managed to get across the border on their own *. The end goal is to get them into South Korea. This sometimes involves providing the bribes that you speak of. * Often times for women, there is a second level of escape. "Brokers" help them cross the border into China, where they are then forced into prostitution, sexual slavery, or "sold" as brides. This organization also bribes the various peoples/groups (often times gangsters, pimps, etc.) holding these North Koreans in bondage in China into letting them go.
FpUser 5y ago
Back in the 80s when I was a scientist in the old USSR's Academy of Science we've had few Koreans in our lab. I think they were studying in the Universities and later had somehow managed not to return to Korea. They were all insanely nice.
- aspenmayer 5y ago
  Did they prefer USSR to DPRK?
  - FpUser 5y ago
    Trying to imply they were the same? Make a wild guess. While not a shining citadel of freedom USSR in the 80s was infinitely better than North Korea. Their words, not mine.
    - aspenmayer 5y ago
      No implication at all, I was simply curious. I think in the West we assume that the communist experience was bad, but I have no frame of reference for this, as I wasn’t there at the time. Then comes comparing between communist regimes, which is farther removed from my experience. I wish the CIA would’ve let democratically elected communist regimes alone, like Vietnam or certain Latin American countries. It just grinds my gears I guess. We claim to support democracy, except when we say that they’re holding it wrong, or doing it wrong. Who are we to say that?
      - stickfigure 5y ago
        We have modern Venezuela as a ripe example.
        aspenmayer 5y ago
        I’m not sure that is the same. Would you consider Venezuela a democracy?
        5y ago

by jimhi 5y ago

teakettle42 5y ago

This seems universal to authoritarian states where corruption is the only viable strategy to get ahead. Unfortunately, it also seems to consistently produce an entrenched, corrupt power class that persists long after the regime is overthrown. See also the former Soviet Bloc.

pphysch 5y ago
- vkou 5y ago
  All power structures are authoritarian. Get rid of congress, and you'll simply have your local landholders pay private enforcers to keep the rabble in line. Property rights in theory apply to everyone, but in practice, are consistently enforced in a way that protects large, wealthy property owners more than everyone else.
- gitgrump 5y ago
  Erm, no? That's unnecessarily reductionist. "Can compel you to pay taxes" is not the same as "authoritarian". Go ahead, criticize the President online in the United States. Notice how you weren't jailed or executed? Now try something similar in an authoritarian nation.
  - aspenmayer 5y ago
    Laws are enforced through use of force or literally denying freedom of movement, or by threatening to do the above to subjects who do not obey. It’s a spectrum. How violent are the reprisals, how lethal, how indiscriminate. How egregious are the prison terms, how outsized are the fines and fees. But all governments are inherently authoritarian, unless they allow subjects to instead choose punishment by exile instead of strongarm tactics. I’m not aware of any that do. Mostly because there’s nowhere to be exiled to. All governments have claimed all of the available land, so you can’t even choose exile independently. Societies vary on the freedoms they allow; all governmental bodies are by nature authoritarian. If no one were to submit to them, nations would have no standing to declare binding authority over members of the public. Governments are systems of control, and that control is allegedly by consent of the governed. However, if one is never given a reasonable alternative or opportunity to object, they are not free. They are only as free as their society allows them to be. This one-sided state of affairs makes freely-given consent to be governed impossible. I am open to being convinced otherwise, though. We’re freer than we’ve ever been, but we’ve only changed the window dressing. We’re still beholden to government representatives that themselves have multiple competing interests. Full direct democracy with vote delegation for those who want it is a start. Proportional representation instead of first past the post elections would also be necessary.
    - aspenmayer 5y ago
      It just occurred to me that the closest we have in USA to self-exile is joining a Native American tribe via marriage, or otherwise being adopted onto a reservation and settling on res. I’ve done humanitarian work and outreach with various Native American/Indian tribes in western states. My great-uncles both married Native women. No disrespect is intended in any of my above statements. I don’t take these issues lightly, but for the purposes of debate, I included this post to illuminate how hard it is to be freer in a free society that has its warts and issues.
  - pphysch 5y ago
    Are you aware what the current date is and its significance to dissidents of the current regime in Washington? Hundreds of (primarily non-violent) dissidents prosecuted and incarcerated in the last year alone. To be clear, I don't agree politically with those dissidents.

hereforphone 5y ago

Interesting. I guess you speak Korean?

jimhi 5y ago
Just Chinese and learning Russian now :) Some of them speak English, others we had a translator.

pphysch 5y ago

How did you get connected with those refugees, if you don't mind my curiosity?

jimhi 5y ago
An event held by LINK - https://www.libertyinnorthkorea.org/ https://www.libertyinnorthkorea.org/ They are a nonprofit that helps people escape from North Korea

decafninja 5y ago

I've met and worked with an organization that sort of comes from the other side of the equation. They are involved in helping North Koreans flee from the country, as well as helping those that have already managed to get across the border on their own *. The end goal is to get them into South Korea. This sometimes involves providing the bribes that you speak of. * Often times for women, there is a second level of escape. "Brokers" help them cross the border into China, where they are then forced into prostitution, sexual slavery, or "sold" as brides. This organization also bribes the various peoples/groups (often times gangsters, pimps, etc.) holding these North Koreans in bondage in China into letting them go.

FpUser 5y ago

Back in the 80s when I was a scientist in the old USSR's Academy of Science we've had few Koreans in our lab. I think they were studying in the Universities and later had somehow managed not to return to Korea. They were all insanely nice.

aspenmayer 5y ago
Did they prefer USSR to DPRK?
- FpUser 5y ago
  Trying to imply they were the same? Make a wild guess. While not a shining citadel of freedom USSR in the 80s was infinitely better than North Korea. Their words, not mine.
  - aspenmayer 5y ago
    No implication at all, I was simply curious. I think in the West we assume that the communist experience was bad, but I have no frame of reference for this, as I wasn’t there at the time. Then comes comparing between communist regimes, which is farther removed from my experience. I wish the CIA would’ve let democratically elected communist regimes alone, like Vietnam or certain Latin American countries. It just grinds my gears I guess. We claim to support democracy, except when we say that they’re holding it wrong, or doing it wrong. Who are we to say that?
    - stickfigure 5y ago
      We have modern Venezuela as a ripe example.
      - aspenmayer 5y ago
        I’m not sure that is the same. Would you consider Venezuela a democracy?
      - 5y ago