To me it's too specific. You should be speaking for human rights first, or perhaps, for North to have an attitude to take heart and listen to these kinds of advocacy in the first place. Anyone that is aware of what North Korea is can plainly see that this is out of reach under the current regime.

I'm not going to, say, advocate net neutrality in North Korea because it doesn't even have free internet to begin with.

It is a bad idea to do that because North Korea already kidnapped soldiers and tourists in the past to begin with.

With the fat boy already throwing a fit and executing his relatives and other top brass to appear strong, what the hell do you think it will happen if the Norks manage to get their hands on those activists? Specially when having a challenging presence at your door step that can make you look weak by doing nothing.

First, that's an Appeal to Worse Problems argument. Secondly, considering women make up half the people on this planet, that's not exactly what I'd call a specific issue. Regressive societies like North Korea tend to almost never have isolated cases of subjugation. The food shortages, lack of access to healthcare, strict information control and revisionist education programs are closely related to the fact that North Korean women aren't exactly up to date on civil rights.

You can solve social problems in conjunction with one another. In the US, for example, it was certainly not a coincidence that Cesar Chavez, Malcolm X and Gloria Steinem were all operating under the same broad time frame despite occupying different sectors in the civil rights movements.

Of course this is easier said than done, but it's quite feasible to do both.

edited 23rd May '15 9:32:03 PM by Aprilla

It's not because the problems are worse but the problems preclude any further progress. This is not US we're talking about, where those activists would be genuinely heard. If North won't budge on the what (treating human beings like human beings), there's no hope of progress on the how (addressing inequalities among the citizens).

There's always some risk in crossing over (DMZ) and into (North) dangerous places, but aside from that, I don't think the leadership will intentionally try to go too far. I'm sure North knows that attacking would just cause further outcries and sanctions from the international community.

It couldn't go without a worse timing, NK is already under sanctions, but Kim Un is trying to prove he is intimidating on his own. I don't think we will let the opportunity to give a show of force be wasted.

Having protesters would be just another bargaining chip for them, like the American-Korean priest arrested in NK and other visitors.

Personally, I'm not actually expecting the North Korean authorities to be cognizant of what the activists are trying to convey, but in aggregate, activist operations like these are very much needed even if they're primarily symbolic gestures. However, taking a defeatist stance is and has been one of the methods by which regimes like this one stay in power as long as they do. I've been lurking in this thread for a while now, and I recall someone basically saying that North Korea is a modern day example of a house of cards.

They look pretty on the surface, but enough poking and prodding is going to have them toppling. How and when that toppling occurs is where activists should develop a contingency. Steinem has written on this subject before. As as another troper said a very long time ago, we have to avoid the romantic notion that we can just swoop in and destroy the current leadership, partly because of the power vacuum it would create and partly because we're talking about a lot of disadvantaged people (in this case, women) who'd be left to rebuild what's left. Afghanistan and Pakistan have had this problem numerous before.

I'm teasing you a bit when I say this, but is there ever a good time when it comes to North Korea?

edited 23rd May '15 9:56:09 PM by Aprilla

Tywin would have been the uncle who got executed....

While it is a nice action, what I'm afraid it is more likely to cause another geo political clusterfuck long endangering the protesters.

If more than anything I'm afraid it will make things worse.

Eh. It's dangerous, but I'm not too worried. They have my support. Really, the ball's in Kim's court.

Walking across the DMZ doesn't sound like a good idea to me because of all the left behind landmines. It really is dangerous for most people even if no one is guarding the zone.

Yeah, that's a fair point.

^^ I fail to see the problem with that.

(inb4 "misogynist shitlord" or somesuch )

So what is this march across the DMZ about, I first heard it was a call for peace,implying that both North and South Korea are the problem. Now I hear it's about equal rights for North Korean women.

The Albany Movement didn't magically solve the problem of segregation over night, so there's no reason to make it sound as if crossing the DMZ is going to do the same for North Korean women. They're not claiming to have some sort of mystical wand that will make all of the bad stuff go away. Symbolic marches (especially those meant to raise awareness of a relatively unknown issue) are kind of a Civil Rights 101 thing. Not hard to grasp, really.

edited 24th May '15 10:38:07 AM by Aprilla

My issue with the walk is that it pushes a Golden Mean Fallacy, it acts as if the South is as much the problem as the North.

Looks like common-or-garden variety useful idiocy to me.

No matter what they're marching for, it's not going to help in any sort of way. Dictatorships do not bow to foreign protesters.

Considering people are having an actual debate about how people are being treated in North Korea when they ordinarily wouldn't, I'd say it's a good first step.

Are you guys expecting them to go in there guns blazing or something? (That was a rhetorical question, by the way.)

edited 24th May '15 11:42:19 AM by Aprilla

That'll be the North Koreans...

Unless "people" includes the North Koreans I'm not seeing the use.

That would be the case if the initiative was actually in good faith; as several commentators have pointed out, the organizers have previous pro-North bias. Worse, their grandstanding is catnip for Pyongyang's propagandists, and it detracts from the struggles of real North Koreans - such as the 200 who spoke to the UN's Commission of Inquiry on human rights abuses in the North.

This is the worst kind of hypocritical "peace activism".

Okay.

After reading these articles I really have to ask: What is these people's end game? What do they gain from that, except attention?

They'll gain nothing besides attention. The intended target will not listen to them, and/or will paint them in the usual way.