More Lunacy from North Korea

Mayabird · Post by **Mayabird** » 2005-01-09 11:07am

I thought people needed some twisted humor today.

The BBC wrote:N Korea wages war on long hair

Men's hairstyles reflect their 'ideological spirit'

North Korea has launched an intensive media assault on its latest arch enemy - the wrong haircut.

A campaign exhorting men to get a proper short-back-and-sides has been aired by state-run Pyongyang television.

The series is entitled Let us trim our hair in accordance with Socialist lifestyle.

While the campaign has been carried out primarily on television, reports have appeared in North Korean press and radio, urging tidy hairstyles and proper attire.

It is the strongest media campaign against men's sloppy appearances mounted in the reclusive and impoverished Communist state in recent years.

The propaganda drive on grooming standards has gone a stage further than previous attempts. This time television identifies specific individuals deemed too shoddy.

Crew cut

Pyongyang television started the campaign last autumn with a five-part series in its regular TV Common Sense programme.

Stressing hygiene and health, it showed various state-approved short hairstyles including the "flat-top crew cut," "middle hairstyle," "low hairstyle," and "high hairstyle" - variations from one to five centimetres in length.

The programme allowed men aged over 50 seven centimetres of upper hair to cover balding.

It stressed the "negative effects" of long hair on "human intelligence development", noting that long hair "consumes a great deal of nutrition" and could thus rob the brain of energy.

Men should get a haircut every 15 days, it recommended.

Named and shamed

A second, and unprecedented, TV series this winter showed hidden-camera style video of "long-haired" men in various locations throughout Pyongyang.

In a break with North Korean TV's usual approach, the programme gave their names and addresses, and challenged the fashion victims directly over their appearance.

The North Korean media normally reserves the reporting of names of its citizens to exemplary individuals who show high communist virtues.

The series was shot at various public locations - on the street, at a sports stadium, a barbershop, a bus stop, a restaurant, a department store.

Some unruly-haired pedestrians or customers captured on camera "meanly ran away", the programme said, while others made excuses about being too busy to get a trim.

Television newsreels such as "Employees of Pyongyang Textile Plant keep their hairstyle and dressing neat and tidy" and "Hairdressers at Ch'anggwangwo'n manage men's hair according to the demands of the military-first era" have also aired.

What not to wear

State radio programmes such as "Dressing in accordance with our people's emotion and taste" link clothes and appearance with the wearer's "ideological and mental state".

Tidy attire "is important in repelling the enemies' manoeuvres to infiltrate corrupt capitalist ideas and lifestyle and establishing the socialist lifestyle of the military-first era," the radio says.

Newspapers too highlight the civic advantages of short hair and smart shoes.

Hair is a "very important issue that shows the people's cultural standards and mental and moral state", argues Minju Choson, a government daily.

"No matter how good the clothes, if one does not wear tidy shoes, one's personality will be downgraded."

For party papers such as Nodong Sinmun, the struggle against foreign and anti-communist influence is being fought out in the arena of personal appearance.

"People who wear other's style of dress and live in other's style will become fools and that nation will come to ruin," it says.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/4157121.stm

DocHorror · Post by **DocHorror** » 2005-01-09 11:09am

Fucking hell.

Jeremy · Post by **Jeremy** » 2005-01-09 11:25am

We need this in the South.

Chmee · Post by **Chmee** » 2005-01-09 11:44am

Newspapers too highlight the civic advantages of short hair and smart shoes.

Hair is a "very important issue that shows the people's cultural standards and mental and moral state", argues Minju Choson, a government daily.

"No matter how good the clothes, if one does not wear tidy shoes, one's personality will be downgraded."

Damn. Tell the CIA that 'Plan Birkenstock' is a failure.

Jalinth · Post by **Jalinth** » 2005-01-09 12:18pm

Chmee wrote:
Newspapers too highlight the civic advantages of short hair and smart shoes.

Hair is a "very important issue that shows the people's cultural standards and mental and moral state", argues Minju Choson, a government daily.

"No matter how good the clothes, if one does not wear tidy shoes, one's personality will be downgraded."
Damn. Tell the CIA that 'Plan Birkenstock' is a failure.

So what happens when the person has virtually no clothes or shoes? North Korea is not exactly the manufacturing capital of world. New clothing is pretty damn limited.

I think we should restrict North Korea posts to those that aren't about absolutely insane policies. Although we might get one every ten years this way.

Anhaga · Post by **Anhaga** » 2005-01-09 12:37pm

Actually this isn't unprecedented- Hastings Banda, the President of Malawi in the 1980's 'used his presidential power to institute a dress code for all citizens of Malawi, which many foreign visitors found strange. For example, women were not allowed to bare their thighs and trousers were not allowed. For men, long hair was a sign of dissent and thus also outlawed. Men could be seized and forced to have a haircut on the discretion of border officials or police.- Wikipedia

In the 1960's in Singapore, then Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew also introduced similar laws regarding male haircuts.

Post by **Sea Skimmer** » 2005-01-09 12:44pm

This campaign was probably spawned by some secret goverment plan to solve the countries fuel shortage by burning human hair.

Post by **Darth Wong** » 2005-01-09 01:05pm

They're obviously desperate for weaponry to supply their armies, so they're going back to bows and arrows and they need human hair for makeshift bowstrings.

Post by **Gandalf** » 2005-01-09 04:39pm

Men should get a haircut every 15 days, it recommended.

How fast is hair growing in NK?

Anhaga · Post by **Anhaga** » 2005-01-09 05:10pm

Really fast apparently- it's all them good nutrients in the bullshit regularly fed to them by the Dear Leader.

Nieztchean Uber-Amoeba · Post by **Nieztchean Uber-Amoeba** » 2005-01-09 05:42pm

North Korea is like the comedy network of countries. No money, pretty bad all around, but funny as hell.

Shinova · Post by **Shinova** » 2005-01-09 07:27pm

Anhaga wrote:Actually this isn't unprecedented- Hastings Banda, the President of Malawi in the 1980's 'used his presidential power to institute a dress code for all citizens of Malawi, which many foreign visitors found strange. For example, women were not allowed to bare their thighs and trousers were not allowed. For men, long hair was a sign of dissent and thus also outlawed. Men could be seized and forced to have a haircut on the discretion of border officials or police.- Wikipedia

In the 1960's in Singapore, then Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew also introduced similar laws regarding male haircuts.

What a retard! I would've mandated mini-skirts and the like.

Frank Hipper · Post by **Frank Hipper** » 2005-01-09 07:59pm

Well, in a country where starvation is to the point that one can find human flesh in meat markets, I suppose the "long hair consumes too much nutrition" argument would make sense, if keeping hair short actually prevented it from growing!

Patrick Degan · Post by **Patrick Degan** » 2005-01-09 08:04pm

It's just another set of hoops to make the people jump through; another reason for any crackdown of any sort at all. Dictatorships seek to impose total behavioural control over the masses and as long as they can do so, they effectively stifle rebellious impulses. Not lunacy at all, but an expression of the State's absolute power over all of life in North Korea.

Wicked Pilot · Post by **Wicked Pilot** » 2005-01-09 08:29pm

What the fuck is wrong with these people? Everyone knows commies have long hair, it's capitalist that have short hair.

Mayabird · Post by **Mayabird** » 2005-01-09 11:56pm

Frank Hipper wrote:Well, in a country where starvation is to the point that one can find human flesh in meat markets, I suppose the "long hair consumes too much nutrition" argument would make sense, if keeping hair short actually prevented it from growing!

I was thinking it's their newest excuse for the famine: "You're not starving; your hair is too long! So just shave your head and return to your treebark soup, and everything will be just fine, by the Dear Leader!"

Master of Ossus · Post by **Master of Ossus** » 2005-01-09 11:58pm

I find it ironic that the rabid hippie/communist stereotype has just been dubbed counter-revolutionary.

Howedar · Post by **Howedar** » 2005-01-10 12:08am

I find it funny that one can be counter-revolutionary WRT a revolution that occured decades ago. One would think the North Koreans would want to prevent revolutionary stuff, not counter-revolutionary stuff.

Chmee · Post by **Chmee** » 2005-01-10 12:15am

Mayabird wrote:
Frank Hipper wrote:Well, in a country where starvation is to the point that one can find human flesh in meat markets, I suppose the "long hair consumes too much nutrition" argument would make sense, if keeping hair short actually prevented it from growing!
I was thinking it's their newest excuse for the famine: "You're not starving; your hair is too long! So just shave your head and return to your treebark soup, and everything will be just fine, by the Dear Leader!"

You mean the new high-protein hair-noodle treebark soup?

Imperial Overlord · Post by **Imperial Overlord** » 2005-01-10 12:19am

Howedar wrote:I find it funny that one can be counter-revolutionary WRT a revolution that occured decades ago. One would think the North Koreans would want to prevent revolutionary stuff, not counter-revolutionary stuff.

The problem with that, from the regime's point of view, is that means admitting that the revolution is over and the people are right now enjoying the benefits of living in the worker's paradise.

As "paradise" isn't the word most of us think of when we think of North Korea, stating the revolution is over is essentially admitting that the revolution is a failure.

Obviously, they aren't going to admit that. So the revolution is still ongoing and all the problems the North Koreans have are caused by evil imperialist capitalists.

But wait! The glorious leader will persavere. The worker's paradise is just the other side of that hill. Keep toiling for the great glory etcetera, etcetera.

Howedar · Post by **Howedar** » 2005-01-10 12:21am

Imperial Overlord wrote:
Howedar wrote:I find it funny that one can be counter-revolutionary WRT a revolution that occured decades ago. One would think the North Koreans would want to prevent revolutionary stuff, not counter-revolutionary stuff.
The problem with that, from the regime's point of view, is that means admitting that the revolution is over and the people are right now enjoying the benefits of living in the worker's paradise.

As "paradise" isn't the word most of us think of when we think of North Korea, stating the revolution is over is essentially admitting that the revolution is a failure.

Obviously, they aren't going to admit that. So the revolution is still ongoing and all the problems the North Koreans have are caused by evil imperialist capitalists.

But wait! The glorious leader will persavere. The worker's paradise is just the other side of that hill. Keep toiling for the great glory etcetera, etcetera.

Oh, I know the regime's logic on this. It just cracks me up, that's all.

Imperial Overlord · Post by **Imperial Overlord** » 2005-01-10 01:09am

Cracks me up as well.

Must . . . not . . . admit . . . . the . . . . obvious.

Coalition · Post by **Coalition** » 2005-01-10 04:36am

Must . . . not . . . admit . . . . the . . . . obvious.

As long as you don't split hairs about it, no problem.

Rye · Post by **Rye** » 2005-01-10 10:49am

Hahaha, that's so ace!

I find it amazing that a country exists in the present where there's actually repeated campaigns to get people to look the way they want, in accordance with "socialist lifestyle."

"The programme allowed men aged over 50 seven centimetres of upper hair to cover balding. "

That's so sweet, I can imagine all these oppressive army types in angular poses inspecting peoples' hair, cocking an AK, then "oh wait, he's over 50...this hair is to cover his baldness...move along, citizen."The idea they'd take into account the worries of balding men, awww.

"It stressed the "negative effects" of long hair on "human intelligence development", noting that long hair "consumes a great deal of nutrition" and could thus rob the brain of energy. "

It's funny, since I've got longer hair than almost everyone I meet, and I'm usually smarter than everyone I meet too! And, as Frank said, it's not like the hair stops growing anyway!

It's just amazing the shit they do, I often wonder if the NK sense of humour is perhaps one based on just letting other people do something stupid and not stopping them, and they're all laughing at this shit behind closed doors.

Falkenhayn · Post by **Falkenhayn** » 2005-01-10 11:15am

Shut up Rye.

North Korea just said they value individual intelligence and initiative.

Now relax to the sounds of heads exploding.