Michael Yates
Brad De Long wrote:
>
> >Yoshie Furuhashi wrote:
> >> >> No, I'd criticize North Korea more freely, *if* I were a North
> >> >> Korean, but I'm *not*.
> >
> >Dennis:
> >> >I'll believe that the precise moment you can find me a North
> >> >Korean who openly criticized their own government and lived
> >> >to tell about it.
> >> >
> >> >As a general principle, First World radicals shouldn't nail their
> >> >flags to the masts of Third World one-party states of whatever political
> >> >provenance. That's not our job.
> >
> >Brad De Long:
> >> Plus it causes most everybody else you talk to to conclude that you
> >> are a monster raving loon...
> >
> >Isn't there an epistemological problem here? How do we know
> >things about North Korea?
>
> We know relatively little because the North Korean government tries
> hard to make sure that we know little.
>
> Thus North Korea falls into the class of Communist-ruled regimes
> desperate to keep what is going on secret. The other members of this
> class are Stalin's Russia, Mao's China, Pol Pot's Cambodia...
>
> Brad DeLong