# Do North Koreans actually believe this crap? ("the great Kim Jong Il looked over me") **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [July 30, 2012, 9:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-north-koreans-actually-believe-this-crap-the-great-kim-jong-il-looked-over-me/629833 "2012-07-30T09:23:59Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![VinylTurnip](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/b2d939/32.png) [@VinylTurnip](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/VinylTurnip)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2012, 5:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-north-koreans-actually-believe-this-crap-the-great-kim-jong-il-looked-over-me/629833/21 "2012-07-30T17:53:20Z")
I don’t know… I could stare at their [weirdly robotic traffic cops](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MGbQ7QRndcA) all day. ---
**Author:** ![Tom\_Tildrum](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e95f7d/32.png) [@Tom\_Tildrum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tom_Tildrum)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2012, 8:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-north-koreans-actually-believe-this-crap-the-great-kim-jong-il-looked-over-me/629833/22 "2012-07-30T20:17:47Z")
> [@VinylTurnip](#): > > I don’t know… I could stare at their [weirdly robotic traffic cops](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MGbQ7QRndcA) all day. The Youtube ad invites me to “Find an Asian wife.” ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2012, 9:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-north-koreans-actually-believe-this-crap-the-great-kim-jong-il-looked-over-me/629833/23 "2012-07-30T21:06:11Z")
> [@aldiboronti](#): > > I think many North Koreans would believe that and frankly you may as well say the same thing of Christians saying ‘God looked over me’. One belief is no more absurd than the other from a rationalist viewpoint. As glaeken pointed out, Kim-worship is probably less absurd than most religions. Say what you will about him, nobody disputes that Kim Il-sung and Kim Jong-il were real people. There’s no similar consensus about God or Allah or Xenu. ---
**Author:** ![Rachellelogram](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rachellelogram/32/8689_2.png) [@Rachellelogram](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rachellelogram)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2012, 9:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-north-koreans-actually-believe-this-crap-the-great-kim-jong-il-looked-over-me/629833/24 "2012-07-30T21:40:08Z")
Can this belief be shown as substantially different than the ancient Egyptians believing that the Pharaoh was a living deity? Modern people, ancient people, they’re all just people in the end… if you prevent a group from exposure to outside perspectives for long enough, they’ll believe absolutely anything you tell them (or, at the very least, _say_ that they believe absolutely anything, which is indistinguishable from actual belief to foreign observers). ---
**Author:** ![VinylTurnip](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/b2d939/32.png) [@VinylTurnip](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/VinylTurnip)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2012, 9:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-north-koreans-actually-believe-this-crap-the-great-kim-jong-il-looked-over-me/629833/25 "2012-07-30T21:52:33Z")
Well, nobody’s going to look at that little pudgy bastard in charge today and see a deity, I don’t care how many boiled toadstools they’ve eaten. ---
**Author:** ![Morgenstern](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Morgenstern](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Morgenstern)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2012, 10:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-north-koreans-actually-believe-this-crap-the-great-kim-jong-il-looked-over-me/629833/26 "2012-07-30T22:27:06Z")
The amazing thing is how well fed the NK athletes are. They certainly have a life style that most NK citizens don’t have. ---
**Author:** ![Gukumatz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/74df32/32.png) [@Gukumatz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gukumatz)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2012, 11:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-north-koreans-actually-believe-this-crap-the-great-kim-jong-il-looked-over-me/629833/27 "2012-07-30T23:13:23Z")
> [@hogarth](#): > > Like **kanicbird** said, even if he didn’t believe it, I don’t think he really has the option to go on worldwide television and not praise the glorious North Korean regime. “I want to say thank you to my country for sponsoring my quest to find a public, televised venue in which to ask for political asylum.” Doesn’t quite roll off the tongue. (And would get his remaining family disappeared, too.) ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2012, 11:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-north-koreans-actually-believe-this-crap-the-great-kim-jong-il-looked-over-me/629833/28 "2012-07-30T23:18:14Z")
Moved from General Questions to IMHO. **samclem** ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2012, 1:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-north-koreans-actually-believe-this-crap-the-great-kim-jong-il-looked-over-me/629833/29 "2012-07-31T01:13:02Z")
In North Korea they have very strict social hierarchies based on an individuals (and their families) level of fealty to the Kim regime. So anyone who goes to the olympics is probably someone who has been deeply vetted for his/her obedience to the regime (although this seems based more on stupid things like family history or minor transgressions than anything, at least what I see of it). So there is that. But do they actually believe it? I don’t know. I have heard that when they get to China and they have access to legit media, a lot start to wake up about how the system is worse than bullshit since it is the opposite of reality a good deal of the time. That is what I have heard from refugee stories. But admitting you’ve been duped by evil sociopaths is hard to admit, so I can see how denial would come up (Stalin had the same issue, people didn’t want to admit they were wrong). ---
**Author:** ![Arrendajo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e0b2c6/32.png) [@Arrendajo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arrendajo)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2012, 1:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-north-koreans-actually-believe-this-crap-the-great-kim-jong-il-looked-over-me/629833/30 "2012-07-31T01:22:27Z")
> [@Starving\_Artist](#): > > Perhaps due to decades of exposure to propaganda like [this](http://chineseposters.net/images/e16-269.jpg). > > - For some reason the caption doesn’t appear with the linked image. It originally read: “_Chairman Mao gives us a happy life._” That’s an interesting poster; it is an early one, definitely pre-cultural revolution and probably pre-dates the Great Leap Forward, so it is from a time when China was recovering from the chaotic war years and before Mao’s disasterous policies resulted in millions of deaths. Yep, 1954. ---
**Author:** ![KarlGauss](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/karlgauss/32/3713_2.png) [@KarlGauss](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KarlGauss)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2012, 2:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-north-koreans-actually-believe-this-crap-the-great-kim-jong-il-looked-over-me/629833/31 "2012-07-31T02:10:52Z")
> [@Arrendajo](#): > > That’s an interesting poster; it is an early one, definitely pre-cultural revolution . . . You bet. After all, there’s no way that a more contemporary regime would want to spotlight a three-kid family. ---
**Author:** ![Mahaloth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mahaloth/32/1079_2.png) [@Mahaloth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mahaloth)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2012, 2:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-north-koreans-actually-believe-this-crap-the-great-kim-jong-il-looked-over-me/629833/32 "2012-07-31T02:40:50Z")
> [@Chimera](#): > > North Koreans who go overseas for sporting events are very carefully monitored. To speak to the media and NOT be singing the praises of the Great Leader would be suicidal and bring harm to one’s entire family. This is the key point. It explains everything. ---
**Author:** ![Sunspace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunspace/32/1250_2.png) [@Sunspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunspace)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2012, 2:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-north-koreans-actually-believe-this-crap-the-great-kim-jong-il-looked-over-me/629833/33 "2012-07-31T02:43:46Z")
> [@VinylTurnip](#): > > I don’t know… I could stare at their [weirdly robotic traffic cops](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MGbQ7QRndcA) all day. North Korea has traffic! > [@KarlGauss](#): > > You bet. After all, there’s no way that a more contemporary regime would want to spotlight a three-kid family. Huh. I was marvelling at how much that poster resembles a 1950’s-style advertising poster from this side of the Big Pond. The clock, the dress, the furniture: it’s got “enjoy the products of your beautiful General Electric kitchen” all over it. The number of children didn’t even register… ---
**Author:** ![Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/f04885/32.png) [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qin_Shi_Huangdi)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2012, 4:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-north-koreans-actually-believe-this-crap-the-great-kim-jong-il-looked-over-me/629833/34 "2012-07-31T04:02:19Z")
I’m reminded of the scene in _Animal Farm_ where the hens credit Napoleon for laying so many eggs, but I thought that wouldn’t happen in reality even in a totalitarian state. ---
**Author:** ![RandMcnally](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/b782af/32.png) [@RandMcnally](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RandMcnally)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2012, 4:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-north-koreans-actually-believe-this-crap-the-great-kim-jong-il-looked-over-me/629833/35 "2012-07-31T04:29:39Z")
> [@Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](#): > > Similarly related, the Lisa Ling trip to North [del]Carolina[/del] Korea with the team of eye doctors, who were there on a charity mission to do (as I recall) cataract surgery, and restore some vision to a number of the locals. > > One by one, after the surgeries, they all praised the portrait of Kim (don’t recall which one). When one of them was asked in advance of the surgery what they most looked forward to, the translator responded that they looked forward to seeing (a portrait of) either the Great Leader or the Dear Leader. > > It used to be on youtube. Maybe it still is. One thing I wondered after watching that was how much of that was genuine and how much of it was, “well, the guy before me started crying and screaming, so if I don’t want to look bad I better scream about how I’m going to kill Americans. That should keep me safe.” ---
**Author:** ![Musicat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/musicat/32/20189_2.png) [@Musicat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Musicat)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2012, 1:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-north-koreans-actually-believe-this-crap-the-great-kim-jong-il-looked-over-me/629833/36 "2012-07-31T13:23:00Z")
> [@RandMcnally](#): > > One thing I wondered after watching that was how much of that was genuine and how much of it was, “well, the guy before me started crying and screaming, so if I don’t want to look bad I better scream about how I’m going to kill Americans. That should keep me safe.” If enough of them do it, and there is no other reaction, doesn’t that become reality? ---
**Author:** ![Pyper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Pyper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pyper)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2012, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-north-koreans-actually-believe-this-crap-the-great-kim-jong-il-looked-over-me/629833/37 "2012-07-31T16:27:31Z")
I am going to come down on the side of “most of them probably don’t believe it but are just going along with it for safety/conformity reasons.” In the book, _Red China Blues_, Jan Wong describes her time as a young Chinese-Canadian Marxist studying abroad in 1970’s China. She was shocked at the blind adherence of her fellow students and handlers to policies that to her seemed ridiculous. Whenever she tried to question anything, she was harshly told to conform or else. Yet many years later after China had opened up more, she asked these people if they still felt the same about Maoist policies. To her great surprise, practically all of the supposed hard-line Maoists who had been in charge of her indoctrination admitted that they never believed any of it. It had all been just a big lie that everyone told to each other. ---
**Author:** ![Mahaloth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mahaloth/32/1079_2.png) [@Mahaloth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mahaloth)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2012, 1:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-north-koreans-actually-believe-this-crap-the-great-kim-jong-il-looked-over-me/629833/38 "2012-08-01T01:55:18Z")
> [@simple\_homer](#): > > I have been living and working in China for the past 4 years, and most Chinese people that I talk to tell me that Mao is their hero. > Mao supposedly is responsible for the death of 35 million Chinese, but that doesn’t stop people from telling me what a great person he was. By the way, I lived there two years and did not experience anything like this. Most folks I talked to said he was a great hero up until he went power crazy. Then, they seem to think he was a total disappointment. ---
**Author:** ![drewtwo99](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d07c76/32.png) [@drewtwo99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drewtwo99)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2012, 2:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-north-koreans-actually-believe-this-crap-the-great-kim-jong-il-looked-over-me/629833/39 "2012-08-01T02:15:18Z")
Of course he believes it, as do most of the North Korean people. This is all they are told to believe from the moment they are born. It is all they hear on the radio and television. It is their entire lives. They are the most indoctrinated or brainwashed people on the planet. I mean, look at all the people who believe in Christianity… or any world-religion, who only receive a small amount of indoctrination in comparison. They believe it, sure, and they also know the consequence of not stating those beliefs out loud for the entire world to hear at every chance they get. ---
**Author:** ![simple\_homer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9de0a6/32.png) [@simple\_homer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/simple_homer)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2012, 11:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-north-koreans-actually-believe-this-crap-the-great-kim-jong-il-looked-over-me/629833/40 "2012-08-01T11:00:35Z")
> [@Mahaloth](#): > > By the way, I lived there two years and did not experience anything like this. Most folks I talked to said he was a great hero up until he went power crazy. Then, they seem to think he was a total disappointment. Did you spend most of your time in larger cities like Shanghai and Beijing ? My experience is that the few hundred million that live along the east coast of China tend to be more educated and open minded than the billion or so that live in the mid and the west. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-north-koreans-actually-believe-this-crap-the-great-kim-jong-il-looked-over-me/629833.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-north-koreans-actually-believe-this-crap-the-great-kim-jong-il-looked-over-me/629833.md?page=3)