Venerating the Kims. Just one more religion?

[cbayer]

http://www.economist.com/blogs/erasmus/2013/04/venerating-kims

Apr 7th 2013, 18:50 by B.C.



WHAT is the tenth most widely followed religion in the world? According to www.adherents.com, a site which gathers data on faith from many sources, that honour goes to juche, the national ideology of North Korea, which is credited with 19m followers. As the site's editors explain, "from a sociological viewpoint, it is clearly a religion". Juche is more obviously religious in character than either Soviet communism or Maoism. Thomas J Belke, an American Protestant theologian who has writen a book about juche, agrees that it's a religion. "It has a comprehensive belief system, holy places, distinctive customs...and it displaces other religions."

It does not take a sociological genius to see that the cult of the North Korean state's founder, Kim Il Sung, and of his son and successor Kim Jong Il, who ruled from 1994 to 2011, shares many features with established creeds. Images of the Kims, and their all-wise pronouncements, fill the sensory field of every North Korean, in a way that Christianity permeated daily life in medieval Europe or Byzantium. The founder is sometimes presented as a kind of god, and his successor as the "son of a god"—a formula that has echoes of Christian theology. If the latest member of the dynasty to take the helm, Kim Jong Un, has any legitimacy, it is as the grandson of one divine figure and son of another. The young scion is starting to accumulate laudatory titles of his own.

The birth of Kim Jong Il is said to have been foretold by a swallow and attended by miraculous signs, including a double rainbow and a brilliant star. He is also credited with more banal tokens of miraculous power, such as a record-breaking performance at golf. Whereas schools in some countries have chapels or mosques, places of instruction in North Korea have rooms set aside for learning about the achievements of the divinely guided dynasty. This cult has its sacred statues, its icons and martyrs—such as a girl who is said to have drowned while trying to save images of her leaders from a flood.

Venerating the Kims is only one part of juche, whose core principle is self-reliance: the idea that North Korea is under perpetual threat and must therefore pursue economic and military self-sufficiency so as to survive. But obviously the two things are related: the greater the threat to the nation, the greater its need for a supernatural protector. Rob Montz, a young American documentary-maker, has just put together a film about North Korean propaganda, "Juche Strong". It makes the case that the West hasn't taken juche seriously enough, or realised how the authorities have been relatively successful in seizing control of their subjects' minds.

more at link

[MADem]

1. Oh my!

I don't know why my thought went to the expectant Ms. Kardashian! That's not what this is about at all!!! She does have a lot of followers, but nothing like this!

Is this really "mind control," though...or is it belly control? If you realize that your next meal, the ability to stave off starvation, is entirely dependent upon your possessing an attitude, you might not have a problem adapting yourself to the prevailing attitude. Also, if everyone around you feels the same way, who wants to be that "nail that sticks up?"

This looks like an interesting documentary.

[cbayer]

2. Oh, is she pregnant? I wouldn't recognize her if she boarded my boat right now.

In fact, I don't think I have ever seen a picture of her and I've definitely never seen her on TV.

Anyway, I understand that they pipe propaganda radio into people's homes during all waking hours and you can't turn it off. I think it's both mind control and belly control

Can you imagine?

[MADem]

3. She's on every tv show and in every paper...it's getting to the point where she's impossible to

avoid!

I can't imagine--the relentless Kardashian-indoctrination would probably be a relief to those folks!

[cbayer]

4. LOL, I don't get regular TV and haven't seen a newspaper in a long time (except on line).

And I feel that I miss nothing.

[MADem]

5. Believe me...in this particular instance, you're not missing a thing! nt

[Jim__]

6. I would like to know if the "average" North Korean considers it like a religion.

Do they consider their ruler divine? The article gives us the view from the west, I'd like to hear the view from the people inside.

[cbayer]

7. Great question, but good luck getting that information.

It is telling that those that practice christianity have to do it underground, though.