lord of flies

Because a false equivalency allows them to cling to the idiocy and failure that is capitalism.

The end of the Soviet Union saw a cascading collapse, ruining tons of peoples lives: the demise of Yugoslavia into civil war, sometimes nonsensical country borders (Belarus is not part of Russia), the creation of "independent" central Asian states that have virtually no arable land because their borders were drawn on the assumption that they would always be part of the USSR, the economic collapse of North Korea, the sudden resurgence of ethnic infighting in the Balkans. But I guess it's a "good thing" Russia's democratic now, right? Oh wait, it isn't, and the people there still have a worse standard of living.

I already explained that North Korea is only on the verge of the collapse because of the collusion of a number of factors and that up until the 60s it was ahead of South Korea economically, and even after that was capable of offering them aid in September 1984. Those factors are namely, a famine, the cascading economic and social collapse following the demise of the USSR and economic isolation. Assuming for a moment that it has a "corrupt, incompetent brutality," the precise opposite would be true: the corrupt incompetent brutality being caused by it being on the verge of collapse. If you're not even going to read the OP, I don't know why you'd post in the thread.

Yes, the lack of toilet paper is just the most horrific thing, and definitely a consequence of the communist system and not the crushing depression/famine/economic isolation that the DPRK is being put through.

Correct. The correct statement is that all progressive revolutions are right, ergo the fact that they are drenched in blood is irrelevant. The worker's state is the most progressive of all ideals, therefore all the blood shed in its processes is irrelevant.

The point is that all revolution is drenched in blood. Don't like it, go back to enjoying ancient, barbaric absolutist monarchies.

Did you know that Tories were lynched en masse in the revolutionary USA in what amounted to a purge?

You do realize Lenin legalized homosexuality, abortions and no-fault divorces, right?

Better to live free in Somalia, than in Lenin's RSFSR, is that right?

History page suddenly jumps from 1953 to 1982. No thanks. Also... oh no! Not a country which sends "illegal" immigrants back to where they came from. edit: found a source on DPRK being ahead of RoK until the late 60s: Time.

Where did you get this from? Reactionary exiles? From the Department of State's "2008 Human Rights Report on the Democratic People's Republic of Korea*": Basically, it's a long rant about how terrible North Korea is, followed by "we don't have any evidence for any of this."

1979, Iran. Counter-revolutionaries fled in large amounts, which they would have just as much if the revolution had been a purely democratic one, rather than a democratic/religious one. I also explained a major cause for emigration, which is the famine and economic collapse following the demise of the Soviet Union (one of the greatest tragedies in modern history). Sorry, I can't seem to find my source again. I'll work on it. Hmm, yes, it is literally impossible that a country can be attacked and then counterattack with massive success. No country defending itself has ever been prepared for war. Escalation has never taken place by both sides prior to war. My threads/posts are not horrible, by the way. No, I didn't, stop asking me that. There are three major problems with this post here:Firstly: I never said that it was a better place to live than the United States. Secondly: I stated that quality of life, while not as atrocious as many capitalist countries, has gone down significantly in recent years. Thirdly: A major premise is that the DPRK has been being ruined by western sanctions (such as removing their ability to have clean water).

North Korea, henceforth referred to as the Democratic People's Republic of Korea or the DPRK, was founded by partisans who had spent literally decades fighting the brutal Japanese imperialists. South Korea on the other hand was a continuation of the occupation regime carried out under a new master, the USA. Almost every individual of any political or military importance in South Korea was a holdover from the Japanese administration. Not only that, North Korea was in fact a localised and independent continuation of the People's Republic of Korea The Korean war is generally presented to us as one in which the north launched an unprovoked attack on the 25th June 1950 on the grounds that the DPRK had permission from the USSR to attack, in fact there is a great deal of evidence that the war was begun by the south and that in any case the official beginning of the war only amounted to a quantitative increase in fighting which had already been going on for some time. During the war the combing carried out of the North by the US was so extensive and intensive that the north lost at the very least 1'500'000 people and likely as many as 4'000'000. This constituted a higher proportional loss of population than Cambodia suffered under the Khmer Rouge. By the end of the war more than half of the buildings in North Korea had been destroyed and around a quarter of the population were living in caves. Before and during the war the South Korean government carried out numerous massacres of suspected leftists and others. The post-war history of the two Koreas is an interesting one. For most of the period the North was considerably better off than the south. A little known fact is that up til the late 1970's the North used to send food aid to the South rather than the other way round. Up until this time North Korea was the second most industrialised east Asian nation, the first of course being Japan. Another piece of information that's gone down the memory hole is that until 1987 South Korea was a military dictatorship. This was then overturned in the Great Workers Struggle Another highlight of the period is North Korea defeating Italy in 1966 World Cup and making it through to the quarter finals. In 1991 the DPRK lost her most significant trading partner with the collapse of the USSR. This combined with record-breaking floods followed by record-breaking droughts in 1995 resulted in famine conditions. In assessing this we must remember the role of the "sanctions" placed upon the DPRK by the imperialist countries. For example, a favourite trick used on the DPRK and others (for example Yugoslavia) is to prohibit the target country from importing chlorine on the grounds that it is a "dual use" substance and can be used to make chemical weapons. The point of this manouver is that without chlorine you cannot operate a water-purification plant, leading to the spread of Typhus, cholera and other diseases. Ironically, this blockade, ostensibly put in place to prevent chemical attack, in fact constitutes a biological attack. The number of deaths caused by this famine is estimated to lie between 200'000 and 900'000. During this period250'000-300'000 North Koreans sought refuge in China, most of whom have since returned without major incident or being punished. The DPRK maintains that although the people suffered great hardship nobody died. This is an incredible claim, however I would suggest that there may be a great dal of overlap between the number of people lost and the number who fled to China. We are all familiar with the long list of atrocity stories concerning the North Korean authorities as well as claims concerning the lavish lifestyle of Kim Jong-Il. Although in a country of millions suffering such incredible hardship it would be a miracle if no such abuses occurred, when we read such things as "The Bright Eyes of the Tailless Beasts" we must consider the lengths to which the USA has gone to vilify other enemies. My two favourite examples:

Nooo, an upcoming video game got delayed by a whole 20 days! Why, God? WHY? [/firstworldproblems]

I look forward to playing the open beta of Victoria 2 when it comes out Q2 2010, when the capitalists only build in AI countries and creating puppet states crashes the game.

And you call me the troll?

So, if I avoid having sex with everybody, meet the minimum number of characters, talk the least amount of time (so as to avoid filling out a dossier), complete the minimum number of missions, et cetera... what will my % complete be?

I also had an interesting idea for an Oblivion-style "open ended" RPG: a fantasy version of the East Indies. You play as a "european" colonial guard, something along the lines of the KNIL or the Indian Imperial Police. You can either fulfill your military duties, following orders diligently, even if that means burning down native villages, or you can desert. If you desert, there are a much larger number of things you can do: you can fight against your former comrades-in-arms to free the native populace, become a mercenary or other criminal element, or simply kill everyone you can find for no reason.

"Sis"? Are you saying I'll get to "enjoy" some pseudo-Japanese "Onii-chan"-style fetishisation of brother-sister incest? Also, naming your characters with very close names to each other is not a great plan. "Sie" and "Sis" are only one letter - and one syllable - apart! Edit: As a corollary, anything you can tell us about this woman?

Is "purple haired teenage girl with revolver(s)" still in the game? This is buy/don't-buy information here!

Uh, actually, it probably does. The underlying belief behind modern racism is typology, that humanity can be rather cleanly divided into a few broad races and then individual attributes can be applied to these races, as one might with different types of beetles. If you hold the opinion that there is a large universal difference between races, you are a racist.

Do you think its impossible for a minority to hold negative opinions about his own minority group?

It's not self delusion if I really am a better poster that you lot. Anyway, this is a getting a bit off-topic, so let's get back on the original topic, which is now the fact that Tigranes is clearly racist against people of south east Asian descent.

A game where you play as a revolutionary in Latin America. Your goal is to undermine the current regime and build broad public support across the country, all the while dodging CIA agents and the corrupt dictatorship's secret police. If you're careful and lucky, you can lead a revolution with a broad base of support, collapse the nation's current, counter-revolutionary military and put yourself in power. Alternatively, an adventure game where you play as an American journalist in Russia during the October Revolution. Your goal is to collect as much information as possible to write an objective, thoughtful analysis of the nation's development following the February Revolution up until the end of the Russian Civil War. The ending is that you go back home only to find that the government has been spying on you the whole time, your articles get your magazine closed down for sedition, you get arrested over and over, no one wants to listen to you that there should be no intervention in the RCW on the side of the whites, and then you go back to Russia and promptly die of typhus.

Uh, no, they didn't. I didn't even get an official warning, actually. I plan on remaking that thread someday, but I guess with a different title.