Opinion Yeonmi Park is on JRE but her North Korean story is full of many inconsistencies. Is she a grifter?

[TheGreatA]

It seems like she was part of a family that prospered, but eventually fell out of grace with the Kim regime and lost everything. I'm sure that's a fairly frequent occurrence in the regime, the competition at the top can get brutal, and people can lose their privileged position very quickly.

No doubt she hates the Kim regime for taking everything away from her and her family, and I wouldn't put it past her to embellish certain things in order to make the Kims look as bad as possible. Who wouldn't, in her place? There's no more incentive for her to be fully truthful about the Kim regime, than there is for the Kim regime to be truthful to the North Korean population. The whole country is a web of lies, and it's hard for even the people who live there to discern where the truth actually lies.

I'm sure you'd hear similar stories from the people who used to serve and prosper under the Saddam/Gaddafi/Al-Assad/etc. regimes, but then got kicked to the curb. This is what tends to happens in countries where a small clique holds all the power, and remaining a part of that clique is totally dependent on the fickle temperament of a tyrant. To the people who are pushed aside, that tyrant becomes the very personification of everything wrong and evil with the world. Because unlike the rest of the population, they got to be part of the "elite" and enjoy the lifestyle that comes along with that, until it was all taken away from them.

 

[Zazen]

What she was saying is corroborated by other sources, her publisher did their due diligence speaking to others who escaped with her so as to ensure the story was factual enough to avoid being sued.

The only three reasons I can believe people might publicly disbelieve her story are:

1 they are useful idiots for China

2 they are woke and dislike her lack of lip service to their ideology

3 they are edgelords.





Memory is constructive, meaning every time you remember something you are rewriting the memory off of a skeleton of data points. This all shifts with time, eyewitness testimony is known to be almost entirely unreliable.

It's entirely known and understood. Whole courses are taught on the subject in psychology.

If what you say is true why is her mother on record for giving a different account and why have other defectors denied her claims?

She had a rough life but I don't believe rats are going around eating everyone up. A lot of her stories are sensationalized because the media outlets she goes on want to compare USA to communism. Earlier on in her life, she actually attempted to give people a real image of North Korea. Compare the way she acted on South Korean media versus right-wing media in the USA.

All you need to do is watch the videos I posted. If you come out if thinking that is perfectly acceptable than fine but the point of these videos is to show that these inconsistencies show that she may be intentionally embellishing stories for fame and fortune.

 

[Bald1]

Reminiscent of Ayaan Hirsi Ali.

[

Exactly the treatment I thought she'd get while listening to the podcast.

What do young women who escape oppressive societies have in common? They get shat on when telling their stories because it clashes with the narrative that the west is a racist patriarchal shithole. Predictable.

No wonder Penguin Books lawyers did their due diligence in verifying what they published.

 

[ultramanhyata]

First I will post the JRE video and then post some videos (time marked) which counter a lot of the claims being made.



If you guys don't know who she is, Yeonmi Park is the most famous North Korean defector. She has been on many youtube channels telling her tragic tale of escape. This all sounds like a really sad story but when you do some digging things start to get real fishy.


1. On South Korean television she presents a different self, she and her mother say that they are like the "Paris Hilton" of North Korea. She comes from a wealthy family.

2. She says that she escaped the border into China with both her father and mother. She then later makes a speech and tells a different story. This time she says it was only her mother who crossed the border with her.

3. She makes the claim that she watched a person executed in public for watching a foreign film. Sometimes she says it is James Bond other times a South Korean film. Other North Korean defectors have also said that public executions were stopped several years prior to that date.

I'm sure that North Korea is a really shitty place but is there perhaps a chance that this young lady is being used by political organizations to fearmonger?

What do you guys think? Is she telling the truth or is there an agenda at play here?

Stories about crossing boarding.



On South Korean TV

I don't need to fact-check her bio to know she's a right-wing grifter. When she says things like the democratic party reminds her of the WPK and she's scared for America it's crystal clear she's a grifter.

 

[MoparOrNoCar]

Joe Rogan is short.

Had to be said.

 

[Poser Caust]

Lol you people would call Jesus a right wing grifter for saying all men are equal

 

[Wadtucket]

Joe Rogan is short.

Had to be said.

5'1 AT BEST

 

[DespicablePeep]

Living in North Korea must be a mental fuck up, can´t blame her for being inconsistent

 

[cincymma79]

Living in North Korea must be a mental fuck up, can´t blame her for being inconsistent

Plus she was a teenager when they left with 0 education.

 

[Orgasmo]

She tells stories that reaffirms things South Koreans and Americans believe about North Korea, and in doing so she makes a living.

 

[panem-et-circenses]

She tells stories that reaffirms things South Koreans and Americans believe about North Korea, and in doing so she makes a living.

it’s a bit more than that at this point. There isn’t much of a market for NK talk. I can’t recall the last time I even saw a story on the country; therefore she has expanded her talking to include what I would consider to be click-bait bs. The DNC is like NK, college is brainwashing, America is turning into NK, Asians vs. black people, etc. She is another goof slagging off America by benefiting from living here (see Khabib for more examples).

 

[Jesus X]

Joe Rogan is short.

Had to be said.

he is 5'1"

 

[Wadtucket]

it’s a bit more than that at this point. There isn’t much of a market for NK talk. I can’t recall the last time I even saw a story on the country; therefore she has expanded her talking to include what I would consider to be click-bait bs. The DNC is like NK, college is brainwashing, America is turning into NK, Asians vs. black people, etc. She is another goof slagging off America by benefiting from living here (see Khabib for more examples).

I support deporting ungrateful subversive immigrants like her, Stephen Crowder, Trevor Noa and Ilhan Omar

 

[Zazen]

Lol you people would call Jesus a right wing grifter for saying all men are equal

You think so? I think there is actually a higher chance of the complete opposite happening. I genuinely believe if Jesus came back he would be called a communist. The most radical evangelicals have politicized the religion so much that they have lost sight of his teachings. Look how mad he got at the temple yet you see all these preachers with boats and planes. Completely fucked. He also didn't treat the poor like crap.

 

[Holic]

1. On South Korean television she presents a different self, she and her mother say that they are like the "Paris Hilton" of North Korea. She comes from a wealthy family.

Unless she's explicitly saying she's poor in other appearances, I don't see the contradiction here.

2. She says that she escaped the border into China with both her father and mother. She then later makes a speech and tells a different story. This time she says it was only her mother who crossed the border with her.

Families don't always cross together, hell they don't even immigrate together legally all the time. Again, not necessarily a contradiction.

3. She makes the claim that she watched a person executed in public for watching a foreign film. Sometimes she says it is James Bond other times a South Korean film. Other North Korean defectors have also said that public executions were stopped several years prior to that date.

Could be she changed the movie to an international title she knew foreigners would be more familiar with. As for public executions...when you have those in place already I'm not sure why you would bother stopping them. But even if they did, its possible the people carrying out said execution did so of their own accord or acting out the will of a specific official.

I'm not saying I believe her 100% but there's some pretty simple explanations for these inconsistencies, not exactly the most damning evidence ever.

 

[Poser Caust]

You think so? I think there is actually a higher chance of the complete opposite happening. I genuinely believe if Jesus came back he would be called a communist. The most radical evangelicals have politicized the religion so much that they have lost sight of his teachings. Look how mad he got at the temple yet you see all these preachers with boats and planes. Completely fucked. He also didn't treat the poor like crap.

Well that's already happened and has been for awhile but I don't think Jesus would support and form of authoritarianism left or right.

 

[Poser Caust]

Her. Communists ruined my life and my country. I came to America to be free only to see the grip of communism taking hold.

So is it possible to speak out against communism without being a grifter ?

How many times can the millions of dead, victims of communism roll over in there graves upon hearing the constant advocating for the communists reset before we have some massive tectonic shift in the Earth's crust

 

[The_Renaissance]

What she was saying is corroborated by other sources, her publisher did their due diligence speaking to others who escaped with her so as to ensure the story was factual enough to avoid being sued.

The only three reasons I can believe people might publicly disbelieve her story are:

1 they are useful idiots for China

2 they are woke and dislike her lack of lip service to their ideology

3 they are edgelords.





Memory is constructive, meaning every time you remember something you are rewriting the memory off of a skeleton of data points. This all shifts with time, eyewitness testimony is known to be almost entirely unreliable.

It's entirely known and understood. Whole courses are taught on the subject in psychology.

2.

It's 2, mate. You only have to look at the posters in question and their history. Wokeists hate Asians, it's obvious nowadays, they dont try to hide it. Asians destroy every narrative they have - ethnic minority groups who have made a success of themselves, and do not commit much crime either. They hate them to their core.

It's 2.

 

[The_Renaissance]

If what you say is true why is her mother on record for giving a different account and why have other defectors denied her claims?

She had a rough life but I don't believe rats are going around eating everyone up. A lot of her stories are sensationalized because the media outlets she goes on want to compare USA to communism. Earlier on in her life, she actually attempted to give people a real image of North Korea. Compare the way she acted on South Korean media versus right-wing media in the USA.

All you need to do is watch the videos I posted. If you come out if thinking that is perfectly acceptable than fine but the point of these videos is to show that these inconsistencies show that she may be intentionally embellishing stories for fame and fortune.

You are a repulsive, anti-Asian racist. Repugnant person.

 

[jeremyemilio]

Those certainly are inconsistencies, but they don’t really strike me as grifter-style embellishments. Yeah, mom & dad vs. just mom is strange but I’ve heard bigger whoppers from people who have relived traumatic events.

I wonder if some of it was lost in translation if these other places you’re telling me she said other things were from some other medium than video.

are there any other examples?

This is my impression.

Trauma brain memory + Language barrier + Being a Child when it all went down + Growing up in a country where literal mass brainwashing is the norm is going to = Some inconsistencies when a story is repeated.

But I've not seen anything to the level of someone trying to get away with making up a crazy story from whole cloth.