1. (as i now understand it) socialism is a transitional phase where workers control the means of production but class hasn't been eradicated yet
how is class removed at this point? is it "kicking" out rich people and removing hierarchies?
2. north korea is a socialist country
do the workers actually control the means of production in this country? and if so, why is information and travel so restricted? i'd google it but i doubt i'd get a truthful answer
Synergy posted:do the workers actually control the means of production in this country? and if so, why is information and travel so restricted? i'd google it but i doubt i'd get a truthful answer
There are a couple of threads about the DPRK that you should read... The organization of the country as described in its constitution is highly democratic. It's impossible for us to know from here to what degree this democracy is subordinated to the will of the ruling bureaucracy, but it is definitely orders of magnitude less than described in the West, which is actively looking for reasons to demonize the DPRK.
What seems like a "restriction" on the flow of information and travel to us is a product of our bourgeois upbringing. The "liberalization" of data flow can be justified by a desire for "free" speech, but in fact creates a platform to be dominated by the wealthiest propagandist. How would it benefit a North Korean agricultural worker to have access to Wikipedia?
In the same way, international travel for the sake of experiencing the world is not "wrong" in and of itself, but the modern form of international tourism is incredibly bourgeois (reminiscent of young lords surveying their holdings). Setting aside their justified xenophobia as a consequence of the American invasion, allowing a flood of Westerners into their country is probably just not something the average North Korean wants, nor does the average North Korean need to travel internationally since their family and concerns are at home, a place that they like. I haven't seen any evidence of mass repression of internal travel. see ufuk sulekri's post next page
Edited by swampman ()
Synergy posted:ok so bare with me, i'm trying to understand all this correctly:
1. (as i now understand it) socialism is a transitional phase where workers control the means of production but class hasn't been eradicated yet
how is class removed at this point? is it "kicking" out rich people and removing hierarchies?
the purpose of the state is to enforce the dominance of one class over another. the bourgeois state enforces the interests of the bourgeoisie and represses the proletariat.
socialism is achieved when the proletariat seizes the state and now begins to use it to enforce the class interests of the proletariat and repress the bourgeoisie. the state, thus defined, only becomes unnecesary at the point when its purpose has been fulfilled and the existence of the bourgeoisie as a class distinct from the proletariat has been eradicated.
Panopticon posted:because "it's sort of obvious that the withering away of the state is the withering away of the law" (bhpn, rhizzone university press, 2016)
my original post was in response to a question by synergy about the transition from socialism to communism, ie the withering away of the state
pisspantheon if yuor going to respond to my posts write words in there that are an actual response to them, you tremendous waste of time
here is an anime song
http://www.cpgb-ml.org/index.php?secName=proletarian&subName=display&art=243
http://www.fightbacknews.org/2011/12/21/korea-stands-strong-kim-jong-il-context
https://return2source.wordpress.com/2012/01/17/korea-resilient-socialism-in-democratic-korea/ (this one's really dope)
swampman posted:What seems like a "restriction" on the flow of information and travel to us is a product of our bourgeois upbringing. The "liberalization" of data flow can be justified by a desire for "free" speech, but in fact creates a platform to be dominated by the wealthiest propagandist.
ok so if im following you, the reason why information is restricted is to prevent western media from having even more material to manipulate
nor does the average North Korean need to travel internationally
how do you know this?
I haven't seen any evidence of mass repression of internal travel.
are you talking about traveling inside the country or outside of it? everywhere i go online says it's illegal for north koreans to leave the country (can't find any info on marxist sites), is that accurate?
E: stop thinking like an American. What does the average Somalian think about north korea? What about the average syrian who is being bombed? Those are the people's opinions that actually matter, not the white American who is upset they can't fly to Pyongyang and gawk at the natives for Facebook likes.
Synergy posted:swampman posted:What seems like a "restriction" on the flow of information and travel to us is a product of our bourgeois upbringing. The "liberalization" of data flow can be justified by a desire for "free" speech, but in fact creates a platform to be dominated by the wealthiest propagandist.
ok so if im following you, the reason why information is restricted is to prevent western media from having even more material to manipulate
Keep in mind that here in our information-saturated environment people have no problem preoccupying themselves with the most transparent lies. The phrase "restriction of information" calls to mind the censorship of politically inconvenient facts and ideas by the bureaucracy.
Rather, the capitalist Western press are censored because there can be no benefit to engaging in discourse with an inherently violent ideology. This is related to the idea of allowing "no platform" for the expression of fascism, and from the DPRK's perspective, there is no difference between bourgeois democracy and fascism in America. Before talking about whether information is "restricted" we have to actually get a sense of the political consciousness of the average North Korean. Do they have a historical, material analysis of political events? Do they correctly understand the nature of the conflicts in Syria and the Ukraine? Are they informed on issues of national production, and so forth - these are measures of the "restriction" of information, not whether they can read a Tweet about any conceivable subject.
Synergy posted:"nor does the average North Korean need to travel internationally" how do you know this? everywhere i go online says it's illegal for north koreans to leave the country (can't find any info on marxist sites), is that accurate?
In America the average person doesn't need to travel internationally. I mean really, and since there is not a massive North Korean diaspora, can you come up with a reason that North Koreans should need to go to China or another continent on holiday? (Again I am not opposed to traveling, just international tourism for individual benefit.)
This means wealthy people and people with highly specialized skills. While outside the country, people who reflect high levels of societal investment on behalf of the DPRK are likely to be seduced by western capitalism. This happens in a variety of ways - some people are plunged into bourgeois class comforts and Americanized, others are simply bribed.
More important, the "right" to travel internationally is a "right" that can only be guaranteed to those with the means to travel.
In Cuba, the situation allowed Castro to open the door for the gusanos to self-impose their exile without robbing Cuba of their material holdings. If Castro had simply said, I respect the right of people to leave if they don't want the revolution, the gusanos would have stripped the country of value they still held privately on their way out the door. As it stands, they still were overwhelmingly white collar workers and by fleeing their fellow citizens they caused economic hardship.
Cuba's mass training of doctors is partly a response to this problem of "brain drain" because it stops the USA from crippling the Cuban healthcare system by poaching doctors. We should also remember that the Cuban healthcare system is something that the people of Cuba want, and it's likely that the "restriction" of information and travel in the DPRK is something that the people want as well.
Edited by swampman ()
Horselord posted:pisspantheon
heh
swampman posted:There are a couple of threads about the DPRK that you should read... The organization of the country as described in its constitution is highly democratic. It's impossible for us to know from here to what degree this democracy is subordinated to the will of the ruling bureaucracy, but it is definitely orders of magnitude less than described in the West, which is actively looking for reasons to demonize the DPRK.
Good thinking. It's impossible for us to know, but somehow we definitely know.
Ronnski posted:swampman posted:There are a couple of threads about the DPRK that you should read... The organization of the country as described in its constitution is highly democratic. It's impossible for us to know from here to what degree this democracy is subordinated to the will of the ruling bureaucracy, but it is definitely orders of magnitude less than described in the West, which is actively looking for reasons to demonize the DPRK.
Good thinking. It's impossible for us to know, but somehow we definitely know.
What does this mean? I'm admitting that the DPRK is not perfect. Do you think that the western portrayal of Kim Jong Un as an absolute dictator is accurate?
The choice to maintain the assumption that north Koreans are not free rather than they are is purely ideological and not based on any coherent logic, the idea that we cannot know is a compromise which liberals refuse to even consider because of the house of cards effect it could have on the extra-logical foundations for almost all of their beliefs.
Edited by babyhueypnewton ()
babyhueypnewton posted:the latter is circular reasoning and relies on an external factor proving north korea is not free to set the circle in motion
how about satellite imagery of concentration camps
Panopticon posted:babyhueypnewton posted:the latter is circular reasoning and relies on an external factor proving north korea is not free to set the circle in motion
how about satellite imagery of concentration camps
I'm curious how your arrived at your username since, while Foucault didn't create the concept of the panopticon, he popularized its use as a general metaphor for the disciplinary power of modern ways of seeing. Unless you stumbled upon the word by accident, i shouldn't have to explain to you how satellite images create imperialistic and inhuman ways of seeing. In fact there's a whole book about it specifically referring to north korea as the object of discipline. It should also not need explaining that referring to "concentration camps" is the crudest form of discursive violence and regulation of what can and cannot be thought.
colddays posted:Supporting the DPRK is a matter of anti-imperialism imo. I don't really buy that North Korean society and politics are staunchly democratic and pro-people because by the standards BHPN uses, you could say that America is free and good(tm). "We don't know" is probably the most accurate line at this time, and of course the context of 30,000 American troops in South Korea, constant threats of annihilation, and a history of colonization topped off with a genocidal war must be taken into consideration. Either way, regime change is wrong, racist propaganda is wrong, and starving an entire country with sanctions is wrong. The DPRK does not have to be a socialist paradise for a socialist to support them against imperialism.
The entire point is that it's not the case. Noam Chomsky correctly points out that democracy and capitalism are incompatible by definition because the profit motive annihilates anything that interferes with its reproduction. He points out that a corporation is the most "totalitarian" institution that had ever existed as it regulates everything from what you eat and what you say to even what you think and how you appear. Nothing exists in socialism that is similar, there is no reason factory workers in the dprk have to learn the corporate song and point and smile in a certain way while this is imperarive for Disney's intellectual property.
swampman posted:Ronnski posted:
swampman posted:
There are a couple of threads about the DPRK that you should read... The organization of the country as described in its constitution is highly democratic. It's impossible for us to know from here to what degree this democracy is subordinated to the will of the ruling bureaucracy, but it is definitely orders of magnitude less than described in the West, which is actively looking for reasons to demonize the DPRK.
Good thinking. It's impossible for us to know, but somehow we definitely know.
What does this mean? I'm admitting that the DPRK is not perfect. Do you think that the western portrayal of Kim Jong Un as an absolute dictator is accurate?
It means you assert that its impossible to know anything about the DPRK and then immediately assure us, somehow, that its definitely much much better than what the west claims, based on nothing except presumably that you view the DPRK as being on "your side"
babyhueypnewton posted:colddays posted:
Supporting the DPRK is a matter of anti-imperialism imo. I don't really buy that North Korean society and politics are staunchly democratic and pro-people because by the standards BHPN uses, you could say that America is free and good(tm). "We don't know" is probably the most accurate line at this time, and of course the context of 30,000 American troops in South Korea, constant threats of annihilation, and a history of colonization topped off with a genocidal war must be taken into consideration. Either way, regime change is wrong, racist propaganda is wrong, and starving an entire country with sanctions is wrong. The DPRK does not have to be a socialist paradise for a socialist to support them against imperialism.
The entire point is that it's not the case. Noam Chomsky correctly points out that democracy and capitalism are incompatible by definition because the profit motive annihilates anything that interferes with its reproduction. He points out that a corporation is the most "totalitarian" institution that had ever existed as it regulates everything from what you eat and what you say to even what you think and how you appear. Nothing exists in socialism that is similar, there is no reason factory workers in the dprk have to learn the corporate song and point and smile in a certain way while this is imperarive for Disney's intellectual property.
Yes, but corporations are not the only repressive institutions. A socialist state is still able to take actions contrary to the well-being of the people. These are mistakes rather than an inherent component and consequence like they are under capitalism, but they are possible. In the DPRK, we don't truly know the facts about their socialism and their state. The imperialist narrative is obviously 100% lies, but taking the things North Korea states at face value is not the right way to get to the actual truth. Whether or not Rodong Sinmun has ever painted an overly optimistic picture of North Korea it is right to support the DPRK.
i don't think anything more needs to be said, really
Horselord posted:you can't export a new political-economic reality to a country and have it result in anything other than a failed state
Idk I think every country on earth has at some point had a new political-economic reality exported to it
Ronnski posted:Good thinking. It's impossible for us to know, but somehow we definitely know.
or you can just replace "degree" in your quote with "exact degree" which was obviously what was meant. pretending to be stupid is the pits.
swampman posted:it's likely that the "restriction" of information and travel in the DPRK is something that the people want as well.
babyhueypnewton posted:In fact there's a whole book about it specifically referring to north korea as the object of discipline
Which book is this?
Gssh posted:babyhueypnewton posted:In fact there's a whole book about it specifically referring to north korea as the object of discipline
Which book is this?
https://www.amazon.com/Visual-Politics-North-Korea-Interventions/dp/0415839483
This is about as close as your can get to speaking honestly about north korea without finding your grant money has magically vanished. He doesn't talk about the truth of propaganda so much as how technology enables propaganda in the first place. Still interesting though.