REVERSE PROPAGANDANorth Korean Horror Toons Fall From the Sky
BY BEN FREEMAN, PHOTO BY SAM WHEADON, ILLUSTRATIONS COURTESY AIMSKOREA.ORG
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| Meet Noh, disseminator of subversive anti-North Korean materials. |
Noh Young Sung was born and raised in North Korea. His father was a veteran of the war between the North and South who became a beekeeper. Noh and his family survived on meager means and often ate grass and tree bark to supplement small scrapings of honey from Dad’s hives. After his parents divorced, Noh escaped across the Tumen River into China with his mother and sister.
Today there are an estimated 150,000 North Koreans living illegally in China, and nearly all support themselves by working in heinous places, such as unregulated coal mines. Before he was fired for being an illegal alien, Noh worked as a miner. Noh was eventually caught, imprisoned, repatriated to North Korea, and locked up again. Later he re-escaped across the Tumen back into China and tracked down his sister. She put him in touch with a group of Christian activists who made a documentary film about Noh’s defection, which it used to exert diplomatic pressure on South Korea and secure Noh residential status. That’s the short story, anyway.
Noh now works with a defectors’ organization, sending airborne reverse-propaganda messages over the border into North Korea. When I first heard about this, I pictured a group of guys sneaking up to a barbed-wire fence with notes scrawled on McDonald’s menus attached to a few helium-filled party balloons, flinging them into the air, making a wish, and heading home feeling smug. Noh explained that it’s a bit more complicated.
Messages slamming the North Korean government are secured to balloons weighing up to 50 pounds, which are then pointed in the direction of strategic locations on the other side of the border. This activity is known as Bbi-ra, and defectors gather in groups of five or six to carry out a single hope-dissemination mission. Mostly they distribute interviews, personal accounts of escape and life in the outside world, poetry, illustrations, and calls for revolution. Photos are never sent because they’re easy to trace and can be used as evidence by counterintelligence teams in North Korea. Most defectors are certain this is an effective way of speeding up the unification process and spend up to three hours each day sending out a single balloon. This practice, though, is in no way officially sanctioned by the South Korean government, which sees it as interfering with an already hugely unstable diplomatic process with the North.
We got hold of some of this reverse propaganda, which follows. It is not pretty.
Excerpt from “I Sell My Daughter for 100 Won”
By defector poet Chang Jinsung
Wherever there are people
There is the sound of gunshots.
Today in front of the public
Another someone is executed.
You should never feel compassion.
If dead, you have to kill once again, with rage.
Left unsaid from the declaration
In front of the bang-bang of gunshots
How so is it that today
the silence of the people feels heavier?
Stealing a sack of rice,
The criminal was killed with 90 gunshots.
His occupation
a farmer.
See all articles by this contributor Anonymous, on Sep 3, 2009 wrote:
RIP to that kid’s family and all the other innocent people that have died | | Anonymous, on Sep 1, 2009 wrote:
thank you for this piece | | Anonymous, on Aug 31, 2009 wrote:
I hope that kid grows up to be Batman. | | Anonymous, on Aug 26, 2009 wrote:
By all accounts, defection across the Tumen IS easier than one might expect. But yes, once inside, they have to keep a lower profile than Mexicans in the US. Unscrupulous Chinese companies are willing to employ defectors. Comparing the two situations in simplistic terms is problematic as illegal immigration into the US is usually financially driven whereas defection form N Korea is usually a political action. | | Anonymous, on Aug 26, 2009 wrote:
All true, but China isn’t America. You don’t see Koreans showing up at the emergency room in China. Sorry, I’m not trying to take this in any kind of political direction but you must admit getting into America is a simpler process than getting into China. | | Anonymous, on Aug 25, 2009 wrote:
China’s population is 1.3 BILLION. 150,000 is a drop in the crispy wonton soup. TO put it in perspective, it’s the same ratio as 15,000 sneaky Mexicans making it into the USA, and similarly the Chinese can use the cheap & desperate labour | | Anonymous, on Aug 25, 2009 wrote:
"how can they eat feces if there is no food to poop out?"
there is always something to poop out. just like you can pee even when you’re dehydrated. | | Anonymous, on Aug 25, 2009 wrote:
Can’t believe China has allowed or missed 150,000 Koreans in their midst. They have such tight control over everything coming and going. | | Anonymous, on Aug 20, 2009 wrote:
how can they eat feces if there is no food to poop out? | |
| kennyp, on Aug 18, 2009 wrote:
you rarely actually hear about anything that happens in north korea, so articles like these are so neccesary | | Anonymous, on Aug 18, 2009 wrote:
shit like this makes you wonder how people can be so horrible. | | Anonymous, on Aug 18, 2009 wrote:
HOLY SHIT. You cannot get any worse than drinking your own piss and eating your dog’s shit. | | Anonymous, on Aug 18, 2009 wrote:
at least that dude was getting his protein. | |
| joe bananas, on Aug 18, 2009 wrote:
i think that i would rather not be a farmer. | |
| TonyFunfetti, on Aug 18, 2009 wrote:
moving poetry and story.. its a shame he cannot use the internet to spread his word because it is a message that should be told more efficiently | | Anonymous, on Aug 17, 2009 wrote:
Well done, sir. Keep up the good fight. | |
| sketchballer, on Aug 17, 2009 wrote:
jesus. i wouldn’t want to be a farmer in north korea. actually, i wouldn’t want to be anything there. | | Anonymous, on Aug 17, 2009 wrote:
It takes balls to do this and maybe more balls to be photographed and named in this article. Kudos to Noh. | |
| smokey robinson crusoe, on Aug 17, 2009 wrote:
it’s not sanctioned by south korea but they aren’t going to do anything to stop it it sounds. that’s great. leading by example. let the people do their own thing. | | Anonymous, on Aug 17, 2009 wrote:
Dissemination of hope. Good times. They all have a million karma points. | | Anonymous, on Aug 17, 2009 wrote:
The last part of the article got me thinking. What if the North Koreans could stage a birth strike? No more babies until serious changes are made. | | Anonymous, on Aug 17, 2009 wrote:
It seems these defectors weren’t chosen for art class when they were assigned their careers. | |
| dingo dick, on Aug 17, 2009 wrote:
a communist beekeeper. that is mind-boggling. | |
| skidmarx, on Aug 17, 2009 wrote:
this is great. it’s like good vibes artillery. i wonder how accurately they can shoot their prop-rockets. | | Anonymous, on Aug 17, 2009 wrote:
“I Sell My Daughter for 100 Won” is a heavy, heavy read. It gave me the bad kind of chillbumps. | |
| Kirby Puckett, on Aug 17, 2009 wrote:
First off, this is awesome. Reminds me of cold war shit. But... what happens to people found to have these notes? I hope their efforts aren’t backfiring when a NK soldier finds a pamphlet on someone. | | Anonymous, on Aug 17, 2009 wrote:
eat my chode | | Anonymous, on Aug 17, 2009 wrote:
they should drop off some new food recipes... the food in the north needs a little flair | |
| duck duck goose, on Aug 17, 2009 wrote:
easy, tiger? it’s the title of an article in vice magazine. this isn’t a current affair. they play on words. | | Anonymous, on Aug 17, 2009 wrote:
"Reverse Propaganda" is kind of a goofy term, no? Isn’t it just counter-propaganada? | | | Next 30 comments > |
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