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Satellite Images of North Korea Prison Camps Find 200,000 Living as Slaves

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Re: Satellite Images of North Korea Prison Camps Find 200,000 Living as Slaves

#171

Post by [deleted] »

ars wrote: post #163
chillax wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is one started up last year in Norway: Ten years and 1.5 billion Norwegian kroner ($252 million) in the making, Halden is spread over 75 acres (30 hectares) of gently sloping forest in southeastern Norway. The facility boasts amenities like a sound studio, jogging trails and a freestanding two-bedroom house where inmates can host their families during overnight visits. http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0…

How is that a good thing? They've basically made a prison city, I thought we don't do things like that anymore (i.e. Australia).

[deleted]

Re: Satellite Images of North Korea Prison Camps Find 200,000 Living as Slaves

#172

Post by chillax »

ars wrote: post #163
chillax wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is one started up last year in Norway: Ten years and 1.5 billion Norwegian kroner ($252 million) in the making, Halden is spread over 75 acres (30 hectares) of gently sloping forest in southeastern Norway. The facility boasts amenities like a sound studio, jogging trails and a freestanding two-bedroom house where inmates can host their families during overnight visits. http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0…

How is that a good thing? They've basically made a prison city, I thought we don't do things like that anymore (i.e. Australia).

A prison city? The prison isn't that big. Either way, these people will be locked up for a great deal of their lives. And one day they will be out on the streets again.

Why lock them up in dehumanizing crime schools? Though, we have some of those too.

Here is another example: http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,,4125865,00.html

Re: Satellite Images of North Korea Prison Camps Find 200,000 Living as Slaves

#173

Post by [deleted] »

kmfrk wrote: post #149
tptacek wrote: post #106

157 votes so we can have an amateur North Korea/US comparative studies class. Respite from 3-year-old LKML security flame war, also on the front page? Maybe. Still sad. See you in a week or so. My "minaway" is 10,000 again. Old timer? Have you tried this yet? It's a revelation. You will thank for me this advice. Noprocrast=yes, minaway 10000+. You might code instead, or drink whiskey and read a good book, or find som…

Remember how pg outlined grumpiness as one of the biggest problems HN is facing? Yeah. Flag the thread like the rest of us and don't be an internet martyr about it.

[deleted]

Re: Satellite Images of North Korea Prison Camps Find 200,000 Living as Slaves

#174

Post by jbrun »

pragmatic wrote: post #137
zedshaw wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having actually worked for the penal system collecting and analyzing statistics on prisoner abuses and policy enforcement, I can easily tell you that you are wrong (assuming your confusing deconstructionist prose means what I think it means). In general, Europe has some of the best prisons, and some of the worst prisons. France, Italy, Turkey, and Russia have horrendous prisons where in many cases prisoners don't sur…

What society/nation has the best prisons overall? Is there a country/region that does it "right"?

Canada has a fairly good prison system that has often been emulated abroad. However, our recently elected Federal government has plans to increase obligatory sentences, prison sizes and reduce costs - which all leads to a very bad mix. Zed, any comments on Canada?

Re: Satellite Images of North Korea Prison Camps Find 200,000 Living as Slaves

#175

Post by Jun8 »

tptacek wrote: post #106

157 votes so we can have an amateur North Korea/US comparative studies class. Respite from 3-year-old LKML security flame war, also on the front page? Maybe. Still sad. See you in a week or so. My "minaway" is 10,000 again. Old timer? Have you tried this yet? It's a revelation. You will thank for me this advice. Noprocrast=yes, minaway 10000+. You might code instead, or drink whiskey and read a good book, or find som…

What exactly are you objecting? That this topic is covered in HN or that it is being discussed in an "amateurish" way.

If it is the first, this brings us back to the "what should be covered by HN" debate. I, for one enjoy discussing matters unrelated to C++, Erlang, VCs, YC, Apple, etc. every now and then. If you don't agree, there are tons of other topics on HN.

The second point is more self-evident: of course it is amateurish, we don't have foreign policy experts here (I think). Yet we are (mostly) intelligent people tackling a problem with the small number of facts at hand. Your statement then becomes self-referential, because by posting it to this thread, you add nothing to the discussion.

Re: Satellite Images of North Korea Prison Camps Find 200,000 Living as Slaves

#176

Post by guelo »

bluekeybox wrote: post #123
jacoblyles wrote: post #97

It's interesting to see reddit's America-hatred spread here. We can't condemn atrocities anywhere in the world without first holding America up as a paragon of all that is evil. The failure to recognize the good in America, indeed the many ways in which it still leads the world, and see the difference between a free country with perhaps too-strict sentencing guidelines and one which enslaves and kills its people for…

There is a particular sentiment (I call it politics of resentment) that aims to portray anyone who is in power as evil, disregarding the question of whether a power change would really be productive. Those in power (whether good or bad) unavoidably have to play a power game to maintain said power, and the politics of resentment will always try to portray any such game as being played for an evil/unjust/immoral purpos…

Real tldr: trust our dear leader, nothing to see here, move along.

Re: Satellite Images of North Korea Prison Camps Find 200,000 Living as Slaves

#177

Post by viraptor »

zedshaw wrote: post #131
jacoblyles wrote: post #97

It's interesting to see reddit's America-hatred spread here. We can't condemn atrocities anywhere in the world without first holding America up as a paragon of all that is evil. The failure to recognize the good in America, indeed the many ways in which it still leads the world, and see the difference between a free country with perhaps too-strict sentencing guidelines and one which enslaves and kills its people for…

Having actually worked for the penal system collecting and analyzing statistics on prisoner abuses and policy enforcement, I can easily tell you that you are wrong (assuming your confusing deconstructionist prose means what I think it means). In general, Europe has some of the best prisons, and some of the worst prisons. France, Italy, Turkey, and Russia have horrendous prisons where in many cases prisoners don't sur…

> The difference between American prisons and this one in N.Korea is the size of it and the blatant attempt to keep it secret from the rest of the world.

While the scale of this issue is completely different, the US does have the tendency to use secret prisons - in different countries. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_site#Suspected_black_site...

What really bothers me about those sites is that they don't seem to be monitored by local government at all. The US is many times accused of torturing the prisoners in countries which don't allow such practice.

Re: Satellite Images of North Korea Prison Camps Find 200,000 Living as Slaves

#178

Post by sedachv »

jhamburger wrote: post #155
CWuestefeld wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If we drew the line so it included the US, then we would also be including Russia, China, Mexico, and the vast majority of world nations. It's not nearly so simple. If we drew the line according to what portion of our population we imprison, then the USA would be standing shoulder-to-shoulder with North Korea, with the rest of the world nearly an order of magnitude lower. Consider https://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/23/w…

The problem is that a lot of those people belong in prison. I mean release the pot dealer serving 25-to-life, fine...but you'll still be left with a lot of 'real' criminals out there. And sure there are a lot of unique systemic failures in America that led to this situation, but they can't all be fixed by a few shifts in gov't policy.

"The problem is that a lot of those people belong in prison."

Why do you think the situation is different in North Korea?

Re: Satellite Images of North Korea Prison Camps Find 200,000 Living as Slaves

#179

Post by kongqiu »

chillax wrote: post #145
michael_dorfman wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My money's on Scandinavia.

This is one started up last year in Norway: Ten years and 1.5 billion Norwegian kroner ($252 million) in the making, Halden is spread over 75 acres (30 hectares) of gently sloping forest in southeastern Norway. The facility boasts amenities like a sound studio, jogging trails and a freestanding two-bedroom house where inmates can host their families during overnight visits. http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0…

Is that on airBnB yet? :)

Re: Satellite Images of North Korea Prison Camps Find 200,000 Living as Slaves

#180

Post by run4yourlives »

Jun8 wrote: post #169
run4yourlives wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is a totally valid feeling. Of course these are just extensions of our own personal hatreds and prejudices. The best way to change them is to change these feelings within yourself.

This I totally disagree with. Saying there's no evident solution for a problem is one thing, stating that the problem is actually "imagined" or just has something to do with our perception is a totally different thing. I believe in cultural relativism only weakly, I firmly believe there are well-defined wrongs: female circumcision is wrong ( http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/12/opinion/12kristof.html?_r=... ), putting y…

Um, I didn't say the problem was imagined. I said the problem on a macro scale is just the extension of behaviours on a micro scale.

In other words: the best way to change the world is to change the person looking back at you in the mirror. The extension of your hatred, your desire for revenge, your jealousy, your moral outrage is all these things you are complaining about.

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