The Internet isn't Something We Should Take for Granted

Imagine that tomorrow the internet is going to be shut off. This change will be permanent, for the foreseeable future at least. But don't worry the government will put up a new internet, well at least that's what they'll call it. All this internet will be is government propaganda and chat sites, which will be easily monitored by the government. All together there will be around 100 websites that the government will let you see. That as you may of already figured out means, no more Twitter, no more Facebook, no more Wikipedia, basically every website you have known and loved will be gone. If this world seems like a place you would want to go, then I'm here to tell you there is a place just like this in the world. Just buy your plane ticket to South Korea and somehow manage to smuggle yourself across the boarder and just like that your in North Korea, the world's internet black hole.

In North Korea censorship is everywhere. Only the highest ranking of government officials, mathematicians, scientists and people directly related to Kim Jong-Un, North Korea's dictator, are allowed to view the real internet. Anyone else is out of luck. They can't watch the world news, they can't surf the internet, they can't even own a cell phone other than the government approved ones. If you are caught with a cellphone that is not North Korean, the consequences would be major, to say the least. This includes getting thrown into one of their concentration camps or getting executed.  Just for having a cell phone.

North Korea's Red Star Computers

In North Korea there is only one "Internet Café" and it is located in the nation's capital, Pyongyang. There the computers runs on an operating system known as Red Star, North Korea's own custom operating system. If someone was to read through one of the government's propaganda sites they would notice that every time the name Kim Jong-Un shows up it seems to pop out at them. This is because every time his name or any other of his relative's names are mentioned they are put in a larger font just to make people notice that name better out of all of the words surrounding it. To remind them to remember who has the power in that country.

North Korea's Leader Kim Jong-Un

Through all of this censorship there is a small, yet feint glimmer of hope of people rebelling against the censorship. Some people are getting information from another country, their neighbors, South Korea. South Korean people are sending balloons that have flash drives in them across the boarder to people in North Korea so that they can have some uncensored information. These flash drives have information such as Korean T.V. shows and some Korean versions of Wikipedia. Although this is highly illegal these people still do it to get this pure information that they wouldn't be able to get any other way.

This subject relates to our History class very well, especially to the John Peter Zenger case. Zenger was the first person to be accused of seditious libel and be tried Not Guilty. Seditious libel was when someone published content about the government that "stirred people". This crime has to do with censorship of the truth and not going against the leaders of the government. This is just what North Korea is doing now. They censor information from people so they don't think it's better else where and so that they don't rebel. Although the punishment for going against the government in North Korea can lead to a worse fate then just losing your printing company. For those of us that have read Plato's Allegory of the Den in English class this relates to this subject as well, with the prisoners of the cave being starved for truth and given false ideas, just like the people of North Korea who are given false knowledge and told that this is the truth.

This article of censorship and the "internet" was very interesting and showed me how important something as simple to us as the internet is. We just take it for granted every day we use it as if it's nothing special when in other places there is no internet and in the case of North Korea it's loaded with government propaganda and false information. We should be grateful for how easily we can get true information and how much of this information is available at every place we go. Hopefully someday North Korea can escape from the darkness of it's censorship, but for now there is only hope and sometimes even a little bit of triumph.


Citation:
Lee. Dave. North Korea: On the net in the world's most secretive nation. BBC News. BBC. Accessed 3/26/14. http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-20445632

Pictography

Red Star Computer. Picture. BBC. http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-20445632

Kim Jong-Un. Picture. NPR.com. http://www.npr.org/2011/12/22/144111961/north-koreas-heir-apparent-has-his-work-cut-out-for-him