Comment on .ml has got to be the only place on earth where I'd get downvoted for a comment like this

• SpookyBogMonster@lemmy.ml ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

  I said there are elections. People go vote for their representatives. Whether that electoral process is effective, or those representatives truly representative of their constituents is a different question which we lack good information on. This isn’t hard to grasp

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  • T00l_shed@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

    What isn’t hard to grasp is that NK isn’t democratic, and sham elections dont count

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    • SpookyBogMonster@lemmy.ml ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

      Again, thought terminating cliche. why do you believe that to be the case? Have you read its constitution? Engaged in good faith with Conflicting defector accounts? Looked at past electoral data? Or Studied the country’s history to conclude why North Korean politics has taken the shape that it has?

      Or, have you simply swallowed an orientalized view of a country on the other side of the world, without really questioning it?

      Let’s address the elephant in the room here. You and I probably agree that the cult of personality around the Kim family in the DPRK is not conducive to a healthy political culture,and I would consider it a failure within the DPRK’s political project. I don’t think there’s anything controversial about that.

      Why is there a cult of personality to begin with? If we look at charts of electoral results immediately preceding and following the Korean War, we see North Korea go from an incredibly vibrant, multi party, Socialist Republic, to a system where the Workers Party heavily dominates the legislative process. So this centralization in North Korean politics has a clear material origin.

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      But did you know that, in contrast to this centralization, the Kims have all held different positions in government? Did you know that those positions, on paper at least, get progressively more diffuse and less centralized as time has gone on?

      Those facts alone don’t tell us everything about the DPRK’s politics. But it does lead us to consider why these two concurrent trends, the cult of personality and the diffusal of power, have are happening. Perhaps it points to factional divisions.

      What I’m getting at is not that China, or the DPRK, or any other country on earth for that matter, is not some secret, perfect, democratic utopia. But that these places have political cultures and institutions that arise from history, and we can analyze them to see how and why they work (or sometimes don’t work). And that making sweeping generalizations based on aesthetic vibes isn’t helpful. We have to strive to actually understand the world if we want to meaningfully discuss it

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      • T00l_shed@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

        Its not a sweeping generalization. Look i appreciate you actually putting some genuine well meaning into this reply. I really do. But calling something democratic, when it clearly isn’t doesn’t help anything except to push the narrative. I can call my fridge an oven , I can even show you were it gets hot. It doesn’t make my fridge an oven. With that being said, again, I appreciate this reply, but let’s be honest, this isn’t going anywhere. I wish you a good evening

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    • ClamDrinker@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

      You really should know how silly this makes you look, even to someone sharing your judgement of how democratic those processes are in NK or China. They’re just explaining how things work in the political systems of those countries objectively.

      If you’re from the US - someone can explain to you how the electoral college works without making a judgement on whether or not that’s democratic or not. If you’re not from the US, many democratic systems have such mechanics like indirect appointments or indirect voting, whether good or bad.

      Objective knowledge gives you the power to form better opinions and take action, including for those systems of power that you are a part of. Rejecting such knowledge carte blanche because it’s about a country you don’t like is incredibly self defeating in the long term. It makes you easy to manipulate.

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      • T00l_shed@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

        Look i know how these countries operate. Saying they do “x” doesn’t mean it to be true. Its not hard to understand

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