Friends, Forever

Nothing succeeds in disarming someone like an admiring compliment does. And what could possibly be more complimentary than an expression such as I'm your friend for life. Who would want to be your friend for life if you're not an admirable individual whose qualities and values are beyond reproach, and whose authenticity as a human being are worthy of emulation and prolonged friendship?

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, left, and former NBA star Dennis Rodman watch North Korean and U.S. players in an exhibition basketball game at an arena in Pyongyang, North Korea, Thursday, Feb. 28, 2013. Rodman arrived in Pyongyang on Monday with three members of the Harlem Globetrotters basketball team to shoot an episode on North Korea for a new weekly HBO series. Photograph by: Jason Mojica, The Associated Press - See more at: http://www.ottawacitizen.com/sports/Photos+Dennis+Rodman+North+Korea/8030897/story.html#sthash.05tLqDX4.dpuf

Photograph by Jason Mojica, Associated Press

Surely, you might think, anyone making such a declaration would do so only after having deeply considering the consequences concluded it was a reflection of the truth, and whether or not the object of such veneration is worthy of it?  Well, if your own judgement and intelligence is always being called into question, despite  your celebrity status due to a physical, sporting talent, then perhaps your declarations of friend-forever can be taken lightly.

It would be, by those who find it offensive. It would not be by those who are disarmed by its charming nature. People who share the thought that they are unique and whose motives and intentions are above questioning; they politically powerful and powerfully attractive. And, it is, after all, diplomatic when in someone else's territory to affirm you're there in trust and you trust you will be permitted the freedom to leave as and when you wish.

In the interim, however, to be treated like royalty, which you believe yourself to be in any event, and treated to a good time by another member of royalty, tinged with godlike status. Exposure to the best the country has to offer, in extravagant dining, drink, entertainment and lodgings goes a long way to enhancing the distorted opinion that a closed society like North Korea is healthy, wealthy and wise.

If all you can see, and all you really want to be exposed to is the bright side of things. watch Monty Python, and then it's more than convenient to overlook the truth, that the country is a pariah even among pariah states, that its people are subjugated to a life of misery and poverty, dissenters among them placed in gulags that use the most egregious types of torture through which not many survive.

Above all, that the culture of the elite is one of brutality, belligerence and sinister danger to the world around it. Spurn the wisdom of a governing elite in starving its people while using its scarce treasury to accomplish the scientific research miracles of placing satellites in orbit, perfecting long-range ballistic missiles, and assembling new-generation miniaturized nuclear warheads, and you represent the enemy.

Dennis Rodman, former basketball player, pro wrestler, cross-dresser, boyfriend of Madonna, B-movie performer and reality television show star is clearly concerned to demonstrate  his admiration for North Korea and Kim Jong Un, the country's most dearest of leaders, its shining star and incomparable hero of the Stalinist revolution.

"Looking forward to sitting down with [leader] Kim Jong Un. I love the people of North Korea." It's doubtful whether this man's love for them will placate their shrunken frames resulting from endemic malnutrition, their fears of speaking about the oppression they labour under, their fears of being sent to the gulag overwhelming their sense of injustice.

"If a guard wants to kill someone 'legitimately', it is very easy. The worker is given work that he can't finish and then he gets less food, which makes him even less  productive the next day, because he is starving. It sets off a [self] reinforcing] cycle of weakness and starvation. You can kill someone in two weeks through this method": Jung Kwang II.

Labels: Armaments, Corruption, Crime, Crisis Politics, Culture, Human Rights, North Korea, Nuclear Technology, Persecution, Political Realities

posted by Pieface @ Saturday, March 02, 2013