Junior Scholastic news article is misleading our students

By SJ Otto

There is lots of room for criticism of our educational system and one thing I have found to be extremely critical are some of the so called “news magazines” designed for middle and high school students. My most recent disappointment has been with an outfit called Junior Scholastic and the article is called: “North Korea vs. the World”; with the kicker beneath: “The Communist country and its unpredictable leader continue to spark outrage around the globe by testing nuclear weapons. Can its nuclear program be stopped before it’s too late?” The article is by Rebecca Zissou.

Besides arguing the issues, Democratic People’s Republic (North) Korea is a small country trying to defend itself from a powerful super-power that has invaded two other countries, in recent years. North Korea and two other nations were called the "axis of evil" by former President George W. Bush. One of those countries was invaded and the government was overthrown, in Iraq. The kicker on Zissou’s article asked “Can its nuclear program be stopped before it’s too late?” Too late for what? What is this nation supposed to do that we are afraid of?

A blatant mistake was calling North Korea a ”Communist country.” It is not. According to Wikipedia:

“Former North Korean leader Kim Jong-il officially authored the definitive statement on Juche in a 1982 document titled On the Juche Idea. After the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union, North Korea’s greatest economic benefactor, all reference to Marxism–Leninism was dropped in the revised 1998 constitution. Kim Jong-Il incorporated the Songun (army-first) policy into Juche in 1996.”

So it is completely wrong to refer to North Korea as “communist.” The regime does use the term “socialist,” but it no longer refers to itself as communist. That was a bad mistake to make for a news magazine that is supposed to be an educational tool for class rooms.

This article gives an inaccurate look at the history of the founding of the two Koreas:

“North Korea’s troubled history with the U.S.—and its neighbors in Asia—goes back to the end of World War II. In 1945, the Korean Peninsula, which had been occupied by Japan since 1910, was divided into two zones.
The North, led by Kim Il Sung (Kim Jong Un’s grandfather), established a Communist government backed by the Soviet Union and China. (Under Communism, the government owns all land and businesses, and individual freedom is limited.) South Korea became a democracy and a key U.S. ally.”

Quite often, such articles simply state that the Soviet Union “installed” Kim Il Sung. This article didn’t say that. The truth is that Kim led a guerrilla army against the Japanese Government during World War II. The Soviet Union helped him, but he already had a present in the north.
The South had to be completely created from Scratch. There was nothing like that government at that time in the south. It was created by the US to act as a client state. In the beginning it was almost like a colony of the US. Until about the 1990s, South Korea was a dictatorship. They occasionally had elections, but the leaders tended to be strong men who did not tolerate opposition politicians. Individual freedom was limited in that country also. During the 1970s and 1980s there were riots in South Korea, with people demanding an end to the dictatorship. For example, according to Wikipedia:

“Park Chung-hee (Hangul: 박정희; Hanja: 朴正熙; 14 November 1917 – 26 October 1979) was a South Korean politician and general who served as the President of South Korea from 1963 until his assassination in 1979, assuming that office after first ruling the country as head of a military dictatorship installed by the May 16 coup in 1961. Before his presidency, he was the chairman of the Supreme Council for National Reconstruction from 1961 to 1963 after a career as a military leader in the South Korean army.

Park's coup brought an end to the interim government of the Second Republic and his election and inauguration in 1963 ushered in the Third Republic. In 1972, Park declared martial law and amended the constitution into a highly authoritarian document called the Yushin Constitution. Formally, the pretense was that the Yushin Constitution was the seventh Constitutional amendment. In actuality, its effect was tantamount to an abolishment of the former Constitution -- effectively creating a new one in an effort to legitimize the new Fourth Republic^.”

Zissou’s article looks at Sanctions and the role they play in North Korea:

“In response to the latest nuclear test, the United Nations (U.N.) imposed additional sanctions against North Korea. It hopes that further weakening the country’s economy will prevent North Korea from being able to finance its nuclear program.”  

Zissou also writes about the food shortages in South Korea:

“The country’s state-run economy has struggled to provide enough food for its citizens. In the 1990s, droughts and floods contributed to a famine that killed tens of thousands of people. Many North Koreans, including Joseph, (a major character in the article) resorted to eating weeds.” 

What Zissou and other writers on North Korea overlook is that the sanctions actually contribute to the food shortages. The US could easily have helped North Korea with food aid, but this country was more interested in using that country’s starving people as a political tool to try and change North Korea’s behavior. So the US contributed to the starving of people in North Korea.
Some of what I have written here is just opinion. But some of the points I make are facts that student really should be exposed to. The treatment of communism in US literature and news articles for US students is extremely limited and unfactual. For example, the article says “Under Communism, the government owns all land and businesses, and individual freedom is limited.” What does that really tell anyone about communism? That statement is really an opinion. It wouldn’t hurt anyone to give students some basic information about communist theory. They might actually understand the theory behind such governments as Cuba and other past governments. Communism is a theory, not just a government or system. Americans are terribly ignorant about communist theory. That is what is unnecessary today.