In his recent Slate review of B.R. Myers’ book The Cleanest Race: How North Koreans See Themselves and Why It Matters, English-born writer Christopher Hitchens refers to North Korea as a nation of racist dwarves. I’m not paraphrasing; the title of his article is A Nation of Racist Dwarves.
If you’re unfamiliar with Hitchens, he frequently contributes to Vanity Fair by waterboarding himself and declaring that women aren’t funny.
I’m not disagreeing that the regime in North Korea is one that is indoctrinating and killing its people, but I can’t help but think there’s some Western privilege at play by referring to North Koreans, the people, in such a pejorative way. Particularly since many of these “racist dwarves” are essentially prisoners in a country whose borders, government, and ideologies were not of their choosing. I also find the use of ‘dwarf’ to describe the malnourished to be wrong on multiple levels.
In stating his contempt for a cruel regime who, according to Myers, is utilizing a national racist ideology, Hitchens degrades an entire nation’s people and apparently fails to see the irony.
Learn about humanitarian efforts for North Korea:
Related Articles
FOR ONLY $28!
Featured Event
One of the the biggest Asian cinema events to hit Southern California opens on May 10. The Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Festival, presented by Visual Communications, features the latest works by established and emerging filmmakers, along with seminars, panel discussions and symposiums on topics relevant to Asian Pacific cinema.
Opening Night features “Shanghai Calling,” directed by Daniel Hsia and starring Korean American Daniel Henney, who plays a Chinese American expat lawyer navigating his way through the mean streets of Shanghai (the picture above also indicates he is a raisin smuggler). But does he take off his shirt? Go watch the movie to find out! read more
LINKS
Featuring Recent Posts Wordpress Widget development by YD
“South Korea’s recent dismissal of Washington’s bid to boycott the Iranian crude. Korea wants to go against the United States. Fake allies are more worthless than an enemy. The Koreans are like the traitors who will do anything and side with any to get their whims, kthen they betray you
Koreans if you refuse to support sanctions for Iran’s oil than that means you are siding with Irans and are commiting atrocities agaisnt the people of Israel”
And what humanitarian cause are the sanctions supporting? This isn’t some human right violation that the U.S. is protesting, but just a means to enforce its own status quo on the rest of the world. The U.S. has nuclear weapons and so do other countries. What makes the U.S. and Israel so much better than others? What gives Israel the right to kick out the Palestinians and create their own country? Israel wasn’t even founded by Jews, but by the British and powers that be that decided to take sympathy on the victims of the Holocaust and give them their own land. If the Brits or Americans felt that much sympathy, they should have welcomed ALL of the surviving victims and not just a portion of them. What gives anyone the right to take over another land? Last I heard, when the Palestinians proposed their own state to the UN, many Israeli diplomats walked out. Yes, Israel does not want peace, just to take over the Middle East as can be seen in its takeover of parts of Jordan and other Arab countries. Its goal is an expanded Israeli state. They don’t want peace. They just want to take over. If Jews are so beautiful, why do so many get nose jobs and try so hard to look Anglo? Why must the rest of the world get dragged into the political chess of the U.S., and Israel? You tell me that. Until Israel truly shows itself to be for peace, there will continue to be tensions in the Middle East. When you don’t allow for peaceful resolution, what other options are there?
South Korea’s recent dismissal of Washington’s bid to boycott the Iranian crude. Korea wants to go against the United States. Fake allies are more worthless than an enemy. The Koreans are like the traitors who will do anything and side with any to get their whims, kthen they betray you
Koreans if you refuse to support sanctions for Iran’s oil than that means you are siding with Irans and are commiting atrocities agaisnt the people of Israel
You’ve seriously got to be kidding me here, right? Some guy like this seriously has the nerve to call an ENTIRE nation a bunch of racist dwarves? Personally, I have to disagree with Hitchens. I don’t think racism is a western idea. I feel that in the western world it is more prevalent, but the idea of separation by appearance and skin color have been around since the beginning of time and is self-created. We as humans tend to stick around people that are similar to ourselves and stay away from people who are radically different from our own. Thus, racism is a self created idea from our own human nature, not some region based idea. This is why we have Asian American activists that strive to push for equal rights for Asians in America. Ever heard of the Paper Tigers article by Wesley Yang? It sums it up pretty well and has a few ties to this guy’s article. Check out an interesting view on it here http://www.abcsofattraction.com/blog/asian-american-paper-tigers-by-wesley-yang-jt-tran-response-to-new-york-magazine/
Park said:”Racism is a western invention and not something native to the Korean mind.” and then again: “While South Korean women debase themselves by opening their legs even for black American GIs, North Korea charts a proud course of independence in this world.”
why “EVEN” black american GIs? are they lesser humans? this slip exposes who is actually racist. there are many white americans who have married a black. can a korean promote a marriage between a korean and a black african? the fact is that that entire peninsula is racist – they cannot stand the black people.
Also I find it really insulting that so many people ascribe these negative things to North Korea, that they are racist or some such. There’s no evidence that Koreans can hold such negative traits. Racism is a western invention and not something native to the Korean mind. The North Koreans might indoctrinate, yes, that’s true but I find it refreshing that you at least do not openly say the North Koreans are racist or anything so negative. I don’t think they are at all. Anyway, its so unfair to judge North Koreans as a collective, to refer to them in a collective manner. If there are bad people in the North, it’s Kim and a few others, the rest are just following orders to speak but I’m sure they all have good Korean hearts.
Well said. People like Hitchens are so judgmental of North Korea, but the real racism is coming from them. If anything, I think North Korea deserves some credit for keeping itself so pure from foreign ideals and influences. While South Korean women debase themselves by opening their legs even for black American GIs, North Korea charts a proud course of independence in this world. Meanwhile they (North Koreans) get judged in racist and insulting ways by the rest of the world as payback for daring to stand up to the rest of the world. Little racist white men like Hitchens are frustrated they know they can never get a North Korean woman, they see women of every country as should be open to them.
This was a very helpful blog post, and I thought Stephen’s comment was also right on the mark. Thanks for taking the time.
Caricaturing and demonizing people can be a form of reductionism, or describing
complex issues in terms of phenomena that are less complex than they actually are.
Why do that? Well if all of North Korea can be seen as a group of ‘racist dwarves’ who
are dangerous to the global community (as Hitchen’s hints) black and white lines
distinguishing ‘them as evil’ and ‘us as good’ are established.
Once you’ve subscribed to these moral distinctions, you can wage war with less difficulty.
It’s much easier to be an extremist and wield a Kalashnikov against ‘infidels’
than it is to be civil and empathetic when it comes settling human vs. human conflict.
Because the latter approach requires we take the time to understand all the different and difficult issues that spark and fuel human conflict, many of us opt for the quick and most apparent solution. War.
But they do so neglecting the myriad of factors involved which will probably better equip their quest for substantive and lasting solutions, war aside. These factors include but aren’t limited to socio-political issues, racial/ethnic issues, cultural issues, historical-cultural issues, and religious issues.
Sadly, men would rather make war than sweat for peace. At least it seems that way.
Extremist ideologies (and their cousins “caricaturing and demonizing”) present themselves as keys to armed conflict,
keys that our leaders are constantly wearing out.
I think Hitchens uses racist generalization to characterize the North Korean people more as bait to elicit attention to his article. In a larger way I read the article as just another example of depersonalizing North Korea. We in the west seem to have this strange desire to characterize the North Koreans and Kim Jong-il in particular as freaks. Why is this?
You may attempt to protect our fellow brethrens in South Korea, but let’s face it. We are one of the most racist nation in the world. Hundreds of years of oppression at the hands of foreign powers have understandably left Korean xenophobic. But that’s no excuse for the way we were dressed in “African savage” costume and ran around in the field, or the way we were encouraged to pick on bi-racial Koreans at school.