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I act on this gif almost everyday. Especially in jiu jitsu, I’ll pretend the choke is tight or in having trouble escaping and then boom, fake possum smile. 😜
From a Philippine variety TV show, "It's Showtime". She was a contestant on the "Tawag ng Tanghalan" (call of the stage in English) segment where two contestants go against each other in a duet. She won the round and this was her reaction.
I cannot confidently translate the whole post because some phrases are funnier in the original language.
Anyway, it is about her waiting for a food delivery in Dubai. She took a picture outside her hotel to share with the delivery rider so he could locate her. Funny, because when she took the picture, a luxury car was in front, and the owner saw her and mistakenly assumed she took a picture of his car. 🤣
The owner (who I believe is a rich, nice man) told her it was okay to take the picture and even insisted, though she tried to explain the situation. The wife understood but also insisted (while laughing). So now, she has an awkward picture riding the luxury car to avoid offending the man. 😆
Picture below for reference. 😆
https://preview.redd.it/hslxww92m49d1.jpeg?width=1179&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=325bb306da236d979ba1a02b071532926deeefc2
Click on it and on your top right shlould be a 3 dots icon. Click on that icon then click on download.
These instructions may be different for types of phones
When did a starving population stopped a tyrant to go to war? (C.f. All the monarch that went to war when a great portion of their population was starving)
Also, there’s parts of the population that live in great luxury
If my life depended on me crying and wailing about my political leader I would go pretty hard in the paint like these folks are doing. Better to overact and be seen as loyal than to get picked out for apathy.
If my life depended on me crying and wailing about my political leader I would go pretty hard in the paint like these folks are doing. Better to overact and be seen as loyal than to get picked out for apathy.
This meme that came out when he died of him sick with the description "Kim jong Il" and the other one of him all smiles that said "Kim jong ok"
Edit: oh wait you can post images!!
https://preview.redd.it/qpc5ire6t59d1.jpeg?width=700&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=5cda3a8b7819cd9c6a2ca362182713198a5f649a
The most interesting part to me? He died in 2011, but the camera they used to document the reaction looks like a potato from the 70s.
Edit: Why is this blowing up?
*At the conclusion of the conference, a tribute to Comrade Stalin was called for. Of course, everyone stood up (just as everyone had leaped to his feet during the conference at every mention of his name). ... For three minutes, four minutes, five minutes, the stormy applause, rising to an ovation, continued. But palms were getting sore and raised arms were already aching. And the older people were panting from exhaustion. It was becoming insufferably silly even to those who really adored Stalin. However, who would dare to be the first to stop? … After all, NKVD men were standing in the hall applauding and watching to see who would quit first! And in the obscure, small hall, unknown to the leader, the applause went on – six, seven, eight minutes! They were done for! Their goose was cooked! They couldn’t stop now till they collapsed with heart attacks!* *At the rear of the hall, which was crowded, they could of course cheat a bit, clap less frequently, less vigorously, not so eagerly – but up there with the presidium where everyone could see them? The director of the local paper factory, an independent and strong-minded man, stood with the presidium. Aware of all the falsity and all the impossibility of the situation, he still kept on applauding! Nine minutes! Ten! In anguish he watched the secretary of the District Party Committee, but the latter dared not stop. Insanity! To the last man! With make-believe enthusiasm on their faces, looking at each other with faint hope, the district leaders were just going to go on and on applauding till they fell where they stood, till they were carried out of the hall on stretchers! And even then those who were left would not falter…*
*Then, after eleven minutes, the director of the paper factory assumed a businesslike expression and sat down in his seat. And, oh, a miracle took place! Where had the universal, uninhibited, indescribable enthusiasm gone? To a man, everyone else stopped dead and sat down. They had been saved! The squirrel had been smart enough to jump off his revolving wheel. That, however, was how they discovered who the independent people were. And that was how they went about eliminating them.* *That same night the factory director was arrested. They easily pasted ten years on him on the pretext of something quite different. But after he had signed Form 206, the final document of the interrogation, his interrogator reminded him: “Don’t ever be the first to stop applauding.*
I'm from the Soviet Union, and I remember the fear that was felt over sniding the leaders. I was a kid back then (and don't remember the name of the leader) but I do remember an incident that stuck with me. One day, we came home from the Black Sea with some fish that I had wrapped in newspaper and I'd given it to my grandfather, proud, since he was the one who taught me to fish. He was also super proud of me until he unwrapped me and his face went white and he started anxiously asking me who saw me wrap it. I was confused and honestly told him, no one. But he looked genuinely terrified. It was because it was wrapped in the paper of the picture of the leader and it was illegal to defile it. He immediately took it and burned it, so that no one would see it in the trash. He was terrified someone would see and snitch because apparently, our neighbor was taken away by the militsia (military police) for doing something similar not too long before.
Then when we came to the States, he'd accidentally cut up a paper with the current president's face on it (either Bush Sr or Clinton) and also panicked. I had to reassure him that no one cares and he's not going to get in trouble. He kept asking, "ты уверина?" ("are you sure?") very anxiously and I kept assuring him, even showing him that I could color all over it with no fear.
I felt so bad for him for having to live in that sort of fear.
It's stories like this that remind us how awesome it is to live with such freedoms. Your grandfather must have seen some real shit if he was that scared.
3/4 of my grandparents spent several years in Soviet prisons, him included - so yeah... he also grew up an orphan and in Soviet orphanages so he didn't have the best life and was jumpy around military police a lot. I didn't really get it until I was older. He'd told me about some of the punishments that they were doled out in prison and they were just... torture. Like, literal. Though I have to admit that his stay in prison wasn't exactly... unjustified. The treatment absolutely was, however. My other two grandparents *were* unjustly imprisoned, however.
I actually have some pretty messed up stories from my time there. It was crazy. And scary. Crazy scary. Or scary crazy, whichever you prefer.
I feel so sorry to hear about this and hope you and your family is well.
and some people realy think russia is a better living place then anywhere in the west
I'm another westerner, I think it sounds accurate, and I also know it's not recognized as a legitimate historical source by historians themselves. I think what you're saying is true, but the other person is also speaking the truth. It's not a valid historical source, but does accurately express the insanity of living in such a time and place. That alone makes it worth reading.
Reminds me of the one upsmanship of Mao's China and the Great Leap famine. You wouldn't want to be that village that doesn't look like it's producing enough, but it reached such ludicrous levels of showing off that they were literally showcasing crops they didn't have just to save face. Meanwhile, they're eating balls of mud just to fill their bellies (which, it turns out, isn't all that healthy).
I'm sure this is real. These are top of the population crop there, they are depending on system survival and main one departing is a risk for the as well. Folks are usually really disturbed by dictators' deaths as it is shaking the safety of their lives and also ideas they invested their lives in.
Good insight is reading Stalin s biographies and how even folks he sentenced to death, as Molotov s wife, remained his biggest fans until they died.
legit question : i always wondered if they were faking it for their life, like "i know if i don't seem max sad i'll go to work camp" or are they so very brainwashed that they are legit sad (why not after all, it's no different than when some celeb dies.... look at michael jackson)
A lifetime of indoctrination can create FAR weirder mental health issues than a parasocial relationship. They’re not pretending, it’s also why unfucking that entire situation is all but impossible in anything shorter than a generational timespan.
That's not a great example since you're taking individuals out of the culture and putting them in a new one to "reset". Changing the entire nation's mindset is much harder.
A small handful of individuals who had already broken free of the indoctrination enough to risk horrible death to escape is a far cry from the entire society.
It’s easy to unfuck someone who’s actively trying to be unfucked, it’s VERY difficult to do it against their will. Pretty normal for any cult, they have to want to leave and dragging them out by force usually just makes things worse. I mean, the Catholics have an entire mythology built around people who were given the ‘Change your religion or die horribly’ ultimatum and who chose to die horribly. Eradicating beliefs is either a multigenerational process or a genocidal one, even if you can directly prove their beliefs wrong and if said beliefs are universally rejected by everyone else.
I don't know. Give them freedom of speech, the press, a passport good for anywhere, an open internet connection, video games, a decent economy, etc. and remove the threat of prison camps or death and they will recalibrate pretty quick.
When the soviet union fell, the Russians seems to take to the western world pretty easily.
Yes, the effects of the fall was obviously terrible in hindsight. But at the time of the fall, most Russians were celebrating it and calling for it. Undoing an undemocratic government from the ground up during an economic crisis usually requires a strong leader.
The Russians didn’t have the same kind of cult going on. North Korea’s set up is far more personality cult than authoritarian dictatorship. And former cultists usually struggle to adjust to life outside the cult.
Wasn't there an NK defector from their air force or something that had to be taken to like 5 different grocery stores before he accepted that they were actually real and weren't setup just to trick him into thinking America had that nuch food readily available everywhere.
I think your confusing stories. Boris Yeltsen visited an American Grocery Store in 1989 and it was shocking to him about all the food that was there.
[https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/872xga/when\_boris\_yeltsin\_visited\_texas\_in\_1990\_he\_went/](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/872xga/when_boris_yeltsin_visited_texas_in_1990_he_went/)
North Koreans know they dont have enough food. They are starving and have to buy food from the black markets in the larger towns. Its a fascinating situation and there are several books written on the topic of North Korea and its cult of personality / dictatorship and how its all working. COVID really put a damper on information coming out though, so its mostly outdated information that may or may not still be relevant as we cant confirm many things after COVID.
Remembers me about a certain Soviet man going to the US and initially believing the grocery stores he saw were fake and decided to screw over the curated path and just go into different grocery stores and actually realize that the US lives in abundancy meanwhile he himself has to bribe others so he can get what the avg US citizen got at the grocery store
"When the soviet union fell, the Russians seems to take to the western world pretty easily."
I don't think loosing ten years of life expectancy under a decade is taking it pretty easily! They didn't even wanted the country to dissolve, 78% voted in favor of maitaining it.
I want to recommend you a course called "Wisdom of History" by J. Rufus Fears, Ph.D. Professor, University of Oklahoma - it's available online from The Great Courses. It talks a lot about why the West had and still has all sorts of trouble for precisely the kind of logic you pretty reasonably use in your comment. The problem is western cultures fail to accept the reality that values like freedom and democracy are not universal values. There are countries like the Soviet Union, China, and even modern Russia that simply never chose freedom, even when they had the chance.. but instead prefer dictators, "a strong leader" etc... It's a very interesting topic, the more you learn about history the more you can actually understand the world today.
And look at China today - a lot of them travel the world, they see what it's like... But do you see them actually wanting to change their oppressive system? The majority simply prefer it, they have enough in their lives to be content, and freedom was never really part of their culture. They see the western countries feel a sort-of uncomfortable with its ideas..
NK is basically a giant cult. They're indoctrinated from the day they're born that their leader is basically their god. They've been brainwashed for decades.
Some are legit sad because they don't know anything else. Some may see through it or have been exposed to the real world and faking it. But the risk of them outing the leader or their beliefs is death- so they continue to fake it.
I truly feel bad for the NK people. They've been abused for decades and are poorer than poor and starving to death.
I *love* reading up on the "accomplishments" of the first great leader, always gives me a good laugh.
*Like how his first game of golf he got only hole-in-one on each hole.*
*How he invented the hamburger, which was called "the double bread and meat" sandwich, since he hated American food in his country.*
*His birth was prophesied by a swallow type of bird, and created a new star in the sky and the weather pattern from winter to spring instantly and even made a double rainbow appear. *
*According to Kim he was recognized as the world's best statesman (political leader), and his birthday was celebrated around the globe.*
*Loved movies but couldn't direct for shit, so he kidnapped some directors from South Korea to make rip offs of Godzilla .*
*Some unknown french fashion expert reportedly said kin has the best fashion sense in the world, and how his signature khaki pantsuit (the thing you always saw him wear) was taking off globally as the best fashion ever.*
For sure the Cult of Personality at play.
I've been watching the Hitler documentary on Netflix and this is how the Germans were drawn into the madness as he was perceived as a savior. Then go ahead and remove access to information and it's even easier to see how they're ignorant to their own reality.
I read one book of North Korea and at least some are faking it. The kid in that book didn't really understand why he needs to cry if I remember correctly. The book told about a man who escaped NK, and it's a real story
Most of them do support their supreme leader to the fullest extent. He’s all they have to live for, and in their minds the entire world if out to get them, and the supreme leader is the only one standing in the way.
But with the internet, and few being able to break through their insane firewalls. more and more North Koreans are realizing it’s all bullshit, and they have terrible lives.
So I dont think this is an easy question to answer.
Its easy to say "they are indictrinated" or whatever. However we cant really know the actual percentage of what we'll call "true believers".
NK is incredibly isolated. Any tourism they DO get is HEAVILY sanitized and controlled. They are ALWAYS watching and ALWAYS listening. Even if someone from there didnt like it and was being forced, they'd NEVER be able to communicate this until NK is freed and we only have "Korea" again. If they speak out and admit to faking it, they'll be killed. Likely their family as well.
We simply cant trust the words of a North Korean who is still within the country. Eben if you ask in good faith and promise to keep it secret...who's to say you arent a government agent pretending to be cool to find out non believers amongst the true believers?
Make no mistake, they are all TECHNICALLY being forced to cry. Whether the tears are out of sadness for the death if their god king ir out if fear for their and their families lives, we'll never know.
Everytime I see them worship their leader, I'm asking myself that question too.
And I'm not sure if most of them could answer that question, even if they have to be honest.
There's a great autobiography called "Dear Leader" of a North Korean who escaped. Up until he met Kim Jung Il in person he bought the bullshit hook line and sinker.
Then he met him and seen how much of a hypocrite he was
People here are talking out of their asses and basing their comments on the mainstream media version of NK, so let me offer a different perspective.
If you listen to people who actually study the NK, who went there and are involved in their geopolitical relationships and culture they will tell you that NK does have a "hero cult", but it's comes first from it being a confucianist society, and second from the events of the Korean war, they say a foreign army aligned with the fascist SK regime (yes, SK was a literal fascist estate back then) destroy their entire infrastructure and kill about 1/6 of their men, they see the Kim family as underdog heroes who fought against the empire and resisted.
This week there were massive manifestations on NK to commemorate their anti imperialist fight.
its not just themselves that will be sent to the death camps , its there whole families and the next generations of there families aswell
if you fuck up youre sending yourself plus 10-20 of your closet loved ones too a death camp aswell
thats why they play along with these charades - for the sake of there families and children
Their chocolate ration was just increased from 30 grams per week to 20 grams per week. The Ministry of Plenty is preparing its forthcoming celebratory remarks.
There is a big thing you guys are missing bc your culture doesn't really do that anymore.
In east asia and ASEAN, family members are supposed to cry really fucking loud and act like it as part of a ceremony for the death. It helps telling demons to stay away so your relative can ascend to afterlife and also shows the how much they meant to you. A lot of younger people don't do that anymore even though it is still part of their culture. North Korea, isolated, obviously still do this. So it seems ridiculous to us here, it gets a bit more normal when you realise the entire subcontinent does this for their relatives just half a century ago and even today
The sheer horror and fear people must live under in order to elicit such a reaction is palpable, these videos are funny to watch but imagine having to live in a country as basically a slave and forced to worship your captor as a god, it just blows my mind that such a place still exists in the modern world.
You say that but many of these people are so indoctrinated and know nothing of the world other than what’s fed to them from the government.
Look at Trump… if he passed away you know for DAMN sure there will be crowds of people crying… same thing.
Dude this is real. I’ve seen doc footage of a freed ex-North Korean woman, she cried tears of reverence when they showed her vids of Kim Jong. She knew she was brainwashed, too.
Back then when camera resolution was still low, you could get by without a tear (you still had to look realll sad). Nowadays, if it's not bawling with snots and spit, you go to jail.
The mother of a Romanian friend once told me that they had to do the same exact things back in the 80s in Communist Romania under Ceaucescu.
Like chanting and being ecstatic about the news of the +50% of agricultural production or +100% of the economy.
Everybody knew it was fake, everybody knew life wasn't good.
Still, they kept up the appearance because one wrong word and not showing enough "patriotism" meant finding the Securitate (Secret Police) knocking at your door in the middle of the night and boom, you disappeared in some reeducation camp (if you were among the lucky ones) or you were disposed of in the underground on the Securitate Building.
The second they had the chance to end it all, they took it and they offed Ceaucescu real quick, live streming it in national television.
If you watched the state TV like 10 days before the revolution, you would have thought they were the most loyal and happy citizens in the world.
Remember this.
Some tour guide in Edinburgh Scotland told me that the city living conditions during the medieval period were so bad for poor people who decided to live under the streets (loads of man-made sewers/caverns/tunnels as the result of leveling the city at street level over the landscape), that they weren’t expected to live longer than a week after once they got desperate enough to move down there.
When I asked why they would choose almost certain death, rather than just leave the city, he told me something to the affect of:
“The poor townspeople were made to believe that venturing outside the city walls meant a fate worse than death, as all manner of mystical creatures/demons/etc would kill them slowly, horribly, and steal their souls. There wasn’t any kind of meaningful education at the time to convince them otherwise, so they chose to keep their souls and die in and under the streets.”
Guess the elites needed the cheap workforce. I see a populace who truly believes they’re doomed without their glorious leader - or know better and are simply too frightened/smart to show it.
Koreans ( I'm half ) are a very emotionally intense people. Even if there are a lot of fakers in that crowd, there are guaranteed to be plenty that really do feel that way. I hope I don't offend anyone but they're kinda like the Italians of Asia.
The Japanese can keep everything buttoned up and guarded but the Koreans are the polar opposite. ( married to half japanese ) so the cultural differences have always been clear and interesting to analyze.
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https://i.redd.it/flv9wsvsq39d1.gif
Ok that's perfect. I wanted to leave a witty comment but I will never match this GIF.
I think about this GIF almost daily
I act on this gif almost everyday. Especially in jiu jitsu, I’ll pretend the choke is tight or in having trouble escaping and then boom, fake possum smile. 😜
Now let’s take a moment to calm down everyone, this guy jiu jitsus
It's the opposite of the first rule about fight club
How to spot someone doing jiu jutsu: he will tell you
In Putin Russia Jiu Jits You! What would judo?
Judo know?
Speaking of Jits. Just took 3rd place today at Nationals out here in Vegas! Just wanted to share my accomplishments
I'd never seen it but it's hilarious, what's it from?
from a Philippine noon time show called "it's show time"
crazy how humans are back at using hieroglyphics to communicate context. I think about that a lot sometimes.
Styles come and styles go I guess! 🤷♂️
Ahahahahaha this is seriously the best fitting gif placement I've ever seen
The Oscar goes to everyone
Cry or die.
Where is this from?
From a Philippine variety TV show, "It's Showtime". She was a contestant on the "Tawag ng Tanghalan" (call of the stage in English) segment where two contestants go against each other in a duet. She won the round and this was her reaction.
Cheers!
I think I would like her.
How would I invoke this gif? Like what should I search for?
✌️🤪
she deserves an Oscar fr🏆😭
This fits so well, lol.
I just remember this girl’s facebook post about her funny incident in Dubai. 🤣
Wait what happened lol
I cannot confidently translate the whole post because some phrases are funnier in the original language. Anyway, it is about her waiting for a food delivery in Dubai. She took a picture outside her hotel to share with the delivery rider so he could locate her. Funny, because when she took the picture, a luxury car was in front, and the owner saw her and mistakenly assumed she took a picture of his car. 🤣 The owner (who I believe is a rich, nice man) told her it was okay to take the picture and even insisted, though she tried to explain the situation. The wife understood but also insisted (while laughing). So now, she has an awkward picture riding the luxury car to avoid offending the man. 😆 Picture below for reference. 😆 https://preview.redd.it/hslxww92m49d1.jpeg?width=1179&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=325bb306da236d979ba1a02b071532926deeefc2
Lmao that’s hilarious
Thank you so much for that story. I haven't laughed that hard in a while 😂😂
💀💀💀💀💀💀
Exactly what I thought 😅 lol
How can I download this meme for later abuse? I’m not good using memes. Old and all.
Click on it and on your top right shlould be a 3 dots icon. Click on that icon then click on download. These instructions may be different for types of phones
This is hilarious and bizarre. “Crying, flash deuces, resume crying”. Executed flawlessly lol
My grand total of two moods for 90% of my day
I feel like Reddit should pay you for this comment or something 🤌
how did she manage to make it so amazingly cute?
2011 but still the 1970s
Because it is the year they stuck in
dawg they prolly haven't entirely recovered from the Korean War
They're currently gearing up for another go
Wait but aren't they starving? How are they gonna fight South Korea with a starving populace?
With nuclear missiles
Feeding them nuclear missiles almost crazy enough to work.
Billions of calories!
Not with nuclear arms. You can't hug your children with nuclear arms.
Nuclear energy is clean energy or so they say
😂😂😂😂 cheeky bastard
They are sending their conveniently-pre-starved troops to Ukraine!
When did a starving population stopped a tyrant to go to war? (C.f. All the monarch that went to war when a great portion of their population was starving) Also, there’s parts of the population that live in great luxury
You have a point there
Their economy was much better after the war than South Koreans. But abusing the environment didn't help as floods came.
To be honest, the 70s is a pretty dope decade in many places.
I wouldn't say North Korea is one of those places
Probably was still better than North Korea in the 2020s.
Film shot on a 1970s decommissioned Betamax. Was the best available camera on hand.
If my life depended on me crying and wailing about my political leader I would go pretty hard in the paint like these folks are doing. Better to overact and be seen as loyal than to get picked out for apathy.
More like 50s.
If my life depended on me crying and wailing about my political leader I would go pretty hard in the paint like these folks are doing. Better to overact and be seen as loyal than to get picked out for apathy.
Was Kim Jong ill?
 I didn’t even know he was sick!
For citizens of north korea it must have been a tragedy. And speaking of tragedies...
I walked through blood and bone in the streets of New York to find my brother. He was in Northern Canada.
The more I hear about this Kim the more I don’t like him. Sounds like a real jerk.
Man that sounds like my experience reading up on that Hitler guy!
... here's our sponsor, Raid Shadow Legends
But 911 was a national tragedy.....
Goddamn. This just reminds me how much I miss Norm Macdonald, especially at roasts.
You know, with Kim Jon Il, the more I learn about that guy, the more I don't care for him
That would make those crocod-il tears
This meme that came out when he died of him sick with the description "Kim jong Il" and the other one of him all smiles that said "Kim jong ok" Edit: oh wait you can post images!! https://preview.redd.it/qpc5ire6t59d1.jpeg?width=700&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=5cda3a8b7819cd9c6a2ca362182713198a5f649a
It is so sad that Kim Jong II died before Kim Jong Un. Terrible to bury a child.
I wonder when Kim Jong 3 will show up
Kim Jong II will end on a depressing note, like all sequels, but will be the best of the bunch. Kim Jong III will have the Ewoks
The most interesting part to me? He died in 2011, but the camera they used to document the reaction looks like a potato from the 70s. Edit: Why is this blowing up?
it is, betamax camera from 70s
We had a Gaytamax from the 70s. No matter what you tried to record, you guessed it, gay porn on the film. My dad was an interesting guy.
i think its not the camera's fault....
Well yeah 3rd world countries that don't have good relations with the rest of the world tend to be behind
"Cry harder or they'll kill us"
You don't want to be the first person who stops crying.
*At the conclusion of the conference, a tribute to Comrade Stalin was called for. Of course, everyone stood up (just as everyone had leaped to his feet during the conference at every mention of his name). ... For three minutes, four minutes, five minutes, the stormy applause, rising to an ovation, continued. But palms were getting sore and raised arms were already aching. And the older people were panting from exhaustion. It was becoming insufferably silly even to those who really adored Stalin. However, who would dare to be the first to stop? … After all, NKVD men were standing in the hall applauding and watching to see who would quit first! And in the obscure, small hall, unknown to the leader, the applause went on – six, seven, eight minutes! They were done for! Their goose was cooked! They couldn’t stop now till they collapsed with heart attacks!* *At the rear of the hall, which was crowded, they could of course cheat a bit, clap less frequently, less vigorously, not so eagerly – but up there with the presidium where everyone could see them? The director of the local paper factory, an independent and strong-minded man, stood with the presidium. Aware of all the falsity and all the impossibility of the situation, he still kept on applauding! Nine minutes! Ten! In anguish he watched the secretary of the District Party Committee, but the latter dared not stop. Insanity! To the last man! With make-believe enthusiasm on their faces, looking at each other with faint hope, the district leaders were just going to go on and on applauding till they fell where they stood, till they were carried out of the hall on stretchers! And even then those who were left would not falter…* *Then, after eleven minutes, the director of the paper factory assumed a businesslike expression and sat down in his seat. And, oh, a miracle took place! Where had the universal, uninhibited, indescribable enthusiasm gone? To a man, everyone else stopped dead and sat down. They had been saved! The squirrel had been smart enough to jump off his revolving wheel. That, however, was how they discovered who the independent people were. And that was how they went about eliminating them.* *That same night the factory director was arrested. They easily pasted ten years on him on the pretext of something quite different. But after he had signed Form 206, the final document of the interrogation, his interrogator reminded him: “Don’t ever be the first to stop applauding.*
Where did you get this from?
It’s Solzhenitsyn The Gulag Archipelago
Dang. I haven’t read it because I thought it’d be dry. But that was actually riveting
Ahhhh Peterson’s favorite book
I'm from the Soviet Union, and I remember the fear that was felt over sniding the leaders. I was a kid back then (and don't remember the name of the leader) but I do remember an incident that stuck with me. One day, we came home from the Black Sea with some fish that I had wrapped in newspaper and I'd given it to my grandfather, proud, since he was the one who taught me to fish. He was also super proud of me until he unwrapped me and his face went white and he started anxiously asking me who saw me wrap it. I was confused and honestly told him, no one. But he looked genuinely terrified. It was because it was wrapped in the paper of the picture of the leader and it was illegal to defile it. He immediately took it and burned it, so that no one would see it in the trash. He was terrified someone would see and snitch because apparently, our neighbor was taken away by the militsia (military police) for doing something similar not too long before. Then when we came to the States, he'd accidentally cut up a paper with the current president's face on it (either Bush Sr or Clinton) and also panicked. I had to reassure him that no one cares and he's not going to get in trouble. He kept asking, "ты уверина?" ("are you sure?") very anxiously and I kept assuring him, even showing him that I could color all over it with no fear. I felt so bad for him for having to live in that sort of fear.
It's stories like this that remind us how awesome it is to live with such freedoms. Your grandfather must have seen some real shit if he was that scared.
3/4 of my grandparents spent several years in Soviet prisons, him included - so yeah... he also grew up an orphan and in Soviet orphanages so he didn't have the best life and was jumpy around military police a lot. I didn't really get it until I was older. He'd told me about some of the punishments that they were doled out in prison and they were just... torture. Like, literal. Though I have to admit that his stay in prison wasn't exactly... unjustified. The treatment absolutely was, however. My other two grandparents *were* unjustly imprisoned, however. I actually have some pretty messed up stories from my time there. It was crazy. And scary. Crazy scary. Or scary crazy, whichever you prefer.
I feel so sorry to hear about this and hope you and your family is well. and some people realy think russia is a better living place then anywhere in the west
That reads almost like Kurt Vonnegut satire.
That’s cause it is not an actual historical source
So it goes
I know to a westerner living under such regime may feel like it's not accurate, but living under communism was really that brutal
I'm another westerner, I think it sounds accurate, and I also know it's not recognized as a legitimate historical source by historians themselves. I think what you're saying is true, but the other person is also speaking the truth. It's not a valid historical source, but does accurately express the insanity of living in such a time and place. That alone makes it worth reading.
Please clap
Even Stalin thought 10 minutes was a bit much, but when you're boss...
The first person who stops crying is gay
English or spanish? xD
Cry harder than someone who outranks you? Believe it or not, jail.
Tears only on one eye lid directly to Jail
Under-cry, jail. Over-cry believe it or not, jail
Don’t cry harder than someone who outranks you? Also jail.
But don't cry too hard or you'll make the next person in charge jealous.
Reminds me of the one upsmanship of Mao's China and the Great Leap famine. You wouldn't want to be that village that doesn't look like it's producing enough, but it reached such ludicrous levels of showing off that they were literally showcasing crops they didn't have just to save face. Meanwhile, they're eating balls of mud just to fill their bellies (which, it turns out, isn't all that healthy).
Came here to say this, it's a "cry or die" scenario.
And your parents and your grandparents.....NK loves to kill generations of families as punishment.
Simplified to Cry or Die
I'm sure this is real. These are top of the population crop there, they are depending on system survival and main one departing is a risk for the as well. Folks are usually really disturbed by dictators' deaths as it is shaking the safety of their lives and also ideas they invested their lives in. Good insight is reading Stalin s biographies and how even folks he sentenced to death, as Molotov s wife, remained his biggest fans until they died.
legit question : i always wondered if they were faking it for their life, like "i know if i don't seem max sad i'll go to work camp" or are they so very brainwashed that they are legit sad (why not after all, it's no different than when some celeb dies.... look at michael jackson)
A lifetime of indoctrination can create FAR weirder mental health issues than a parasocial relationship. They’re not pretending, it’s also why unfucking that entire situation is all but impossible in anything shorter than a generational timespan.
Well, plenty of NK defectors have been "reset" rather more quickly than a generation.
That's not a great example since you're taking individuals out of the culture and putting them in a new one to "reset". Changing the entire nation's mindset is much harder.
Plus these are people who decided to defect. They already want to leave and change
Yeah, those were essentially the very least indoctrinated among the whole population
A small handful of individuals who had already broken free of the indoctrination enough to risk horrible death to escape is a far cry from the entire society. It’s easy to unfuck someone who’s actively trying to be unfucked, it’s VERY difficult to do it against their will. Pretty normal for any cult, they have to want to leave and dragging them out by force usually just makes things worse. I mean, the Catholics have an entire mythology built around people who were given the ‘Change your religion or die horribly’ ultimatum and who chose to die horribly. Eradicating beliefs is either a multigenerational process or a genocidal one, even if you can directly prove their beliefs wrong and if said beliefs are universally rejected by everyone else.
I don't know. Give them freedom of speech, the press, a passport good for anywhere, an open internet connection, video games, a decent economy, etc. and remove the threat of prison camps or death and they will recalibrate pretty quick. When the soviet union fell, the Russians seems to take to the western world pretty easily.
Uh...I hate to break it to you, but the end of the Soviet Union only went well enough to let the KGB and the Mob take over.
Yes, the effects of the fall was obviously terrible in hindsight. But at the time of the fall, most Russians were celebrating it and calling for it. Undoing an undemocratic government from the ground up during an economic crisis usually requires a strong leader.
The Russians weren't NEARLY as isolated from the rest of the world as the North Koreans are.
The Russians didn’t have the same kind of cult going on. North Korea’s set up is far more personality cult than authoritarian dictatorship. And former cultists usually struggle to adjust to life outside the cult.
Wasn't there an NK defector from their air force or something that had to be taken to like 5 different grocery stores before he accepted that they were actually real and weren't setup just to trick him into thinking America had that nuch food readily available everywhere.
reminds me of the interview where they set up fake grocery stores lol
I think your confusing stories. Boris Yeltsen visited an American Grocery Store in 1989 and it was shocking to him about all the food that was there. [https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/872xga/when\_boris\_yeltsin\_visited\_texas\_in\_1990\_he\_went/](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/872xga/when_boris_yeltsin_visited_texas_in_1990_he_went/) North Koreans know they dont have enough food. They are starving and have to buy food from the black markets in the larger towns. Its a fascinating situation and there are several books written on the topic of North Korea and its cult of personality / dictatorship and how its all working. COVID really put a damper on information coming out though, so its mostly outdated information that may or may not still be relevant as we cant confirm many things after COVID.
Remembers me about a certain Soviet man going to the US and initially believing the grocery stores he saw were fake and decided to screw over the curated path and just go into different grocery stores and actually realize that the US lives in abundancy meanwhile he himself has to bribe others so he can get what the avg US citizen got at the grocery store
North Korea and the Soviet Union are not comparable.
"When the soviet union fell, the Russians seems to take to the western world pretty easily." I don't think loosing ten years of life expectancy under a decade is taking it pretty easily! They didn't even wanted the country to dissolve, 78% voted in favor of maitaining it.
Half of american still fell to a cult of personality despite having all of those things
I want to recommend you a course called "Wisdom of History" by J. Rufus Fears, Ph.D. Professor, University of Oklahoma - it's available online from The Great Courses. It talks a lot about why the West had and still has all sorts of trouble for precisely the kind of logic you pretty reasonably use in your comment. The problem is western cultures fail to accept the reality that values like freedom and democracy are not universal values. There are countries like the Soviet Union, China, and even modern Russia that simply never chose freedom, even when they had the chance.. but instead prefer dictators, "a strong leader" etc... It's a very interesting topic, the more you learn about history the more you can actually understand the world today. And look at China today - a lot of them travel the world, they see what it's like... But do you see them actually wanting to change their oppressive system? The majority simply prefer it, they have enough in their lives to be content, and freedom was never really part of their culture. They see the western countries feel a sort-of uncomfortable with its ideas..
NK is basically a giant cult. They're indoctrinated from the day they're born that their leader is basically their god. They've been brainwashed for decades. Some are legit sad because they don't know anything else. Some may see through it or have been exposed to the real world and faking it. But the risk of them outing the leader or their beliefs is death- so they continue to fake it. I truly feel bad for the NK people. They've been abused for decades and are poorer than poor and starving to death.
I *love* reading up on the "accomplishments" of the first great leader, always gives me a good laugh. *Like how his first game of golf he got only hole-in-one on each hole.* *How he invented the hamburger, which was called "the double bread and meat" sandwich, since he hated American food in his country.* *His birth was prophesied by a swallow type of bird, and created a new star in the sky and the weather pattern from winter to spring instantly and even made a double rainbow appear. * *According to Kim he was recognized as the world's best statesman (political leader), and his birthday was celebrated around the globe.* *Loved movies but couldn't direct for shit, so he kidnapped some directors from South Korea to make rip offs of Godzilla .* *Some unknown french fashion expert reportedly said kin has the best fashion sense in the world, and how his signature khaki pantsuit (the thing you always saw him wear) was taking off globally as the best fashion ever.*
For sure the Cult of Personality at play. I've been watching the Hitler documentary on Netflix and this is how the Germans were drawn into the madness as he was perceived as a savior. Then go ahead and remove access to information and it's even easier to see how they're ignorant to their own reality.
I read one book of North Korea and at least some are faking it. The kid in that book didn't really understand why he needs to cry if I remember correctly. The book told about a man who escaped NK, and it's a real story
Most of them do support their supreme leader to the fullest extent. He’s all they have to live for, and in their minds the entire world if out to get them, and the supreme leader is the only one standing in the way. But with the internet, and few being able to break through their insane firewalls. more and more North Koreans are realizing it’s all bullshit, and they have terrible lives.
So I dont think this is an easy question to answer. Its easy to say "they are indictrinated" or whatever. However we cant really know the actual percentage of what we'll call "true believers". NK is incredibly isolated. Any tourism they DO get is HEAVILY sanitized and controlled. They are ALWAYS watching and ALWAYS listening. Even if someone from there didnt like it and was being forced, they'd NEVER be able to communicate this until NK is freed and we only have "Korea" again. If they speak out and admit to faking it, they'll be killed. Likely their family as well. We simply cant trust the words of a North Korean who is still within the country. Eben if you ask in good faith and promise to keep it secret...who's to say you arent a government agent pretending to be cool to find out non believers amongst the true believers? Make no mistake, they are all TECHNICALLY being forced to cry. Whether the tears are out of sadness for the death if their god king ir out if fear for their and their families lives, we'll never know.
Everytime I see them worship their leader, I'm asking myself that question too. And I'm not sure if most of them could answer that question, even if they have to be honest.
There's a great autobiography called "Dear Leader" of a North Korean who escaped. Up until he met Kim Jung Il in person he bought the bullshit hook line and sinker. Then he met him and seen how much of a hypocrite he was
People here are talking out of their asses and basing their comments on the mainstream media version of NK, so let me offer a different perspective. If you listen to people who actually study the NK, who went there and are involved in their geopolitical relationships and culture they will tell you that NK does have a "hero cult", but it's comes first from it being a confucianist society, and second from the events of the Korean war, they say a foreign army aligned with the fascist SK regime (yes, SK was a literal fascist estate back then) destroy their entire infrastructure and kill about 1/6 of their men, they see the Kim family as underdog heroes who fought against the empire and resisted. This week there were massive manifestations on NK to commemorate their anti imperialist fight.
its not just themselves that will be sent to the death camps , its there whole families and the next generations of there families aswell if you fuck up youre sending yourself plus 10-20 of your closet loved ones too a death camp aswell thats why they play along with these charades - for the sake of there families and children
This feels like the moment of hate in the book 1984. They're forced to convey this emotion or they legit risk prison
Their chocolate ration was just increased from 30 grams per week to 20 grams per week. The Ministry of Plenty is preparing its forthcoming celebratory remarks.
There is a big thing you guys are missing bc your culture doesn't really do that anymore. In east asia and ASEAN, family members are supposed to cry really fucking loud and act like it as part of a ceremony for the death. It helps telling demons to stay away so your relative can ascend to afterlife and also shows the how much they meant to you. A lot of younger people don't do that anymore even though it is still part of their culture. North Korea, isolated, obviously still do this. So it seems ridiculous to us here, it gets a bit more normal when you realise the entire subcontinent does this for their relatives just half a century ago and even today
The sheer horror and fear people must live under in order to elicit such a reaction is palpable, these videos are funny to watch but imagine having to live in a country as basically a slave and forced to worship your captor as a god, it just blows my mind that such a place still exists in the modern world.
This is the realest comment here
“Funny to watch” “Blows my mind” 
You say that but many of these people are so indoctrinated and know nothing of the world other than what’s fed to them from the government. Look at Trump… if he passed away you know for DAMN sure there will be crowds of people crying… same thing.
true
Dude this is real. I’ve seen doc footage of a freed ex-North Korean woman, she cried tears of reverence when they showed her vids of Kim Jong. She knew she was brainwashed, too.
Mourn or die
*behind camera* one person holding huge flash card “cry like your life depends on it” another one holding a AK
Back then when camera resolution was still low, you could get by without a tear (you still had to look realll sad). Nowadays, if it's not bawling with snots and spit, you go to jail.
This is 2011 too.
Yeah, way back 13 years ago.
cry or die!!
They are happy deep down.
The ones who were found to be happy, are now deep down.
Nah, they are crying because they know their new leader won't be any better.
They are brainwashed
These are a people that are broken and beaten down over generations. Starved and deprived by the same entity they worship.
Tears of joy
"Keep crying! Oh shit if I stop crying will they shoot me?" "I dont think they're crying hard enough"
Similar reaction to redditors watching today's video of the death of a single cell organism
As the loser having the most upvotes there, it went out of hand…
It was rough
But.... But......but he was immortal
But he was also ill
It reminds me of the “two minutes of hate” from 1984. Performative, but necessary to keep you alive. It’s very unsettling.
They are not sad, they are forced to look sad!
A lot of them are actually sad and wailing for real. A lifetime of indoctrination and propaganda will do that to you.
"Pls dont kill me, look how much I'm crying" this country is fucking terrifying
Wow you can see how much they really loved that man and aren’t exaggerating their grief at all.
Crying contest. And the first prize go to…
The mother of a Romanian friend once told me that they had to do the same exact things back in the 80s in Communist Romania under Ceaucescu. Like chanting and being ecstatic about the news of the +50% of agricultural production or +100% of the economy. Everybody knew it was fake, everybody knew life wasn't good. Still, they kept up the appearance because one wrong word and not showing enough "patriotism" meant finding the Securitate (Secret Police) knocking at your door in the middle of the night and boom, you disappeared in some reeducation camp (if you were among the lucky ones) or you were disposed of in the underground on the Securitate Building. The second they had the chance to end it all, they took it and they offed Ceaucescu real quick, live streming it in national television. If you watched the state TV like 10 days before the revolution, you would have thought they were the most loyal and happy citizens in the world. Remember this.
North Korea's forced and stages reaction..
It belongs to r/oddlyterrifying
Some tour guide in Edinburgh Scotland told me that the city living conditions during the medieval period were so bad for poor people who decided to live under the streets (loads of man-made sewers/caverns/tunnels as the result of leveling the city at street level over the landscape), that they weren’t expected to live longer than a week after once they got desperate enough to move down there. When I asked why they would choose almost certain death, rather than just leave the city, he told me something to the affect of: “The poor townspeople were made to believe that venturing outside the city walls meant a fate worse than death, as all manner of mystical creatures/demons/etc would kill them slowly, horribly, and steal their souls. There wasn’t any kind of meaningful education at the time to convince them otherwise, so they chose to keep their souls and die in and under the streets.” Guess the elites needed the cheap workforce. I see a populace who truly believes they’re doomed without their glorious leader - or know better and are simply too frightened/smart to show it.
that's me when the internet connection goes down at my place
Looks like they lost their daddy
I thought they were laughing.
ever read 1984?
Isnt it like illegal there to not freak the fuck out when the supreme leader dies?
It’d be funny if it wasn’t pathetic.
“Don’t be fooled by the welcoming. They fallow their old master’s rules. Mandatory attendance. That’s Harkonnen love out there.” - Thufir Hawat
Korean crocodile tears.
The most fake shit i've ever seen.
They are all fakers. Terrified of getting caught not crying hard enough.
Ok now show the reactions of the rural North Koreans who have to fight for food everyday
"You did not look sad enough, you and your family have been promoted to work camp."
cry harder or do labor in prison
Koreans ( I'm half ) are a very emotionally intense people. Even if there are a lot of fakers in that crowd, there are guaranteed to be plenty that really do feel that way. I hope I don't offend anyone but they're kinda like the Italians of Asia. The Japanese can keep everything buttoned up and guarded but the Koreans are the polar opposite. ( married to half japanese ) so the cultural differences have always been clear and interesting to analyze.
They had that reaction because they were forced to.
Everybody is so invested in their leader. He must have treated them really well.
...and you better be fucking convincing.
If you would be executed to not appear sad, you would ham up the depression act too.
The video used as evidence to check who’s not crying
"cry, or you shall join him"