Over the past several years, North Korea has been ramping up efforts to stop the import and distribution of foreign culture.
The country’s authorities have been harshly punishing people who watch or distribute illegal videos since the adoption of the law to eradicate “reactionary thought and culture” in December 2020 and conducting ideological crackdowns on young people since the adoption of the “Youth Education Guarantee Act” in September 2021.
In addition, North Korea adopted the “Pyongyang Cultural Language Protection Act” during the Eighth Meeting of the 14th Supreme People’s Assembly this past January, launching a heavy crackdown on the use of South Korean speech and foreign words.
North Korea is thus intensifying crackdowns while enacting legislation to prevent foreign culture from entering the country, but what do North Korea’s youth think about this?
Daily NK recently interviewed three young North Koreans in their 30s — one in Sinuiju, North Pyongan Province (A); another in Chongjin, North Hamgyong Province (B); and one more in Hyesan, Yanggang Province (C) — about the recent adoption of the Pyongyang Cultural Language Protection Act.
The following is a Q&A with the three young North Koreans.
Daily NK (DNK): North Korea recently adopted the Pyongyang Cultural Language Protection Act. What was the reason for adopting the law?
Sinuiju (A): Recently, the authorities have been emphasizing the active use of noble, cultured Pyongyang Cultural Language, but the use of South Korean speech or foreign words, or the watching of illegal films like South Korean movies or TV shows, is nothing new. It’s no exaggeration to say that capitalist culture has taken deep root among the young. I think because even the state recognizes this, it has begun cracking down by making laws. To put it another way, we could say the state created justification for new forms of restrictions to control the people.
Chongjin (B): Nowadays, the authorities are conducting their propaganda campaign calling on not only young people but all of society to use our noble and beautiful Pyongyang Cultural Language more intensively than ever through every organization, along with TV. At the same time, they are intensifying crackdowns and restrictions on the use of South Korean speech and foreign words, as well as capitalist culture. The Pyongyang Cultural Language Protection Act also aims to eliminate remnants of South Korean culture.
Hyesan (C): From the time I was a kid in kindergarten through high school all the way to when I entered society as an adult, I’ve had it drilled into my head to love and use our language, our noble and cultured language. Even after the adoption of the Pyongyang Cultural Language Protection Act, the authorities have especially stressed the active protection and encouragement of Pyongyang Cultural Language along the same lines. Seeing how they had to even create a law to restrict language, doesn’t it mean that capitalist culture is really deep rooted in our country?
DNK: Will the law be effective? Have the attitudes of young people changed even a little since the law was enacted?
A: Just like if you spank somebody too much it no longer hurts, we’re used to it because we’ve been living with crackdowns and restrictions since birth. Because of this, I think it won’t matter even if they create laws and intensify restrictions. Still, if there is a change, it’s that we are being more careful. Now friends habitually speak in South Korean style when they gather. That habit won’t change overnight just because the authorities are cracking down on it.
B: People are just a bit more wary now. When you gather with your friends, if you don’t talk about South Korean films or use South Korean speech, you have nothing to say. Out of pride, you can’t say you couldn’t eat before you left because there’s no rice at home, and talking about politics is even more dangerous. If you say the wrong thing, you could destroy three generations of your family, so you don’t say a word. However, what you can do is talk about South Korean films or dramas or talk in South Korean style, even if you have to dodge crackdowns to do it. The nation is using all means and methods at its disposal to intensify crackdowns, but people are responding in kind, so I think the law won’t be very effective.
C: No matter how much they create new laws and strengthen punishments and intensify crackdowns and restrictions, people just pretend to comply and continue talking as they like and seeing what they like. In fact, if they try to bind the public’s people’s hands and feet, blindfold them and cover their ears, people just fill up with discontent.
DNK: Are the authorities actively cracking down on foreign culture?
A: Agents from anti-socialist and non-socialist behavior crackdown units are barging into people’s homes without knocking to inspect people’s possessions. My parents think these officials can enter any home any time they like, but young people like me fight with them. In fact, when agents barged into a friend’s house without knocking, he yelled at them and fought back, screaming, “You knock on even the bathroom door to see if anyone’s in there, so how can you enter a person’s home without knocking?” With the agents acting so unethically in the name of crackdowns, it’s causing a backlash. So young people complain that they don’t understand why the state is cracking down like this over films and speech.
B: Inspection officers are stopping passers-by to check their mobile phones, and they are even climbing over people’s front gates at night like thieves and standing in front of their doors listening for sounds of South Korean films. I was even scared out of my senses when I went outside in the middle of the night to use the outhouse and came face-to-face with an inspection officer who had snuck into the yard. When I yelled, he said he was an inspection officer and that he had jumped my gate because he heard strange sounds coming from my home and thought I was watching a South Korean film. He said it was his job and asked me to understand, without saying sorry. When inspection officers are acting in this way, who wouldn’t resist?
C: Inspection officers are entering people’s homes and inspecting their possessions closely, as if it were a search and seizure operation, and treating people like criminals. The inspection techniques are similar to years past, but perhaps I should say young people’s understanding has changed? In the past, if they told you to sit, you sat, and if they told you to stand, you stood, but now you fight with them. Now we’re so sick of the inspection officers that we mutter that if they randomly appear, we’ll fight rather than lay down and take it.
Translated by David Black. Edited by Robert Lauler.
Daily NK works with a network of reporting partners who live inside North Korea. Their identities remain anonymous due to security concerns. More information about Daily NK’s reporting partner network and information gathering activities can be found on our FAQ page here.
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