Comrade Ferret

2025-08-01 06:10:50

ferret@hub.workersofthe.world

Just a few days of starting to follow hashtags again and I'm already spending so much time just blocking stuff. Was trying to keep open and also look at what the propagandists are saying on the #northkorea tag but I just can't with The Daily NK and the like. It's so agonizingly obvious and it hurts me that people even read this garbage let alone take it as a source.

2025-08-01 06:29:41

Comrade Ferret

ferret@hub.workersofthe.world

@Comrade Ferret Take this one for example, near the top of the recommended articles right now.

I should note that it's impossible not to go down a rabbit hole on this site, because it has so many in-line links that make you think you'll be taken to a source, when it's just more unsourced articles on their own site with only the flimsiest relation to the linked text.

https://www.dailynk.com/english/superstition-thrives-young-north-koreans-seeking-life-guidance/

The article is about young people supposedly paying for fortune telling and such is on the rise (because imagine that; surely that would never happen in any civilized western country), and further says:

North Korea’s Criminal Law Article 291 (Superstitious Practice Crime) states that “those who engage in superstitious practices shall be subject to labor training punishment,” and “those who habitually engage in superstitious practices or cause serious consequences through superstitious practices shall be subject to labor reform punishment of up to 5 years. In serious cases, they shall be subject to labor reform punishment of 5 to 10 years.”

You can fact-check this really easily, and it shows how Daily NK works. Yes, there is a code in the DPRK's criminal law titled "Acts of Superstition". And if you just glance at it, you might go, wow, it's real — until you actually read what it says:

A person who engages in acts of superstition after receiving money or goods shall be sentenced to a term of short-term labour of less than 1 year. In cases where a person has taught several people acts of superstition or has caused grave consequences due to acts of superstition, he or she shall be sentenced to a term of reform through labour of less than 3 years. In grave cases, he or she shall be sentenced to a term of reform through labour of more than 3 years and less than 7 years.

Entirely different from what Daily NK is claiming. For one thing, most obviously, the sentencing is far lower, but far more importantly: This is a law against the grifters and not the people who buy from them. But try not to draw attention to the fact that the DPRK actually punishes people who prey on the insecurities and gullibility of certain workers for profit and cause harm in doing so; can't make the country look too based, now, can we?

If I kept reading this slop, all I would ever end up doing is exactly this: Going, "I know that can't be real," and then spending my time and energy cross-referencing it, and then probably fighting and most likely failing the urge to make a miffed post about it in hopes that it'll convince at least one person to think more critically about this propaganda.