• 10 Posts
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Joined 2 years ago
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Cake day: July 7th, 2023

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  • Why does this story magically no longer become interesting because of a group that helps defected NKs?

    There is nothing magic about it. The organization that’s cited isn’t the problem. The problem is the BBC cites that org as proof that this person’s claims are true. But neither that org nor the BBC have said, “we have corroborated Jin-su’s story.” On the contrary, the BBC just admits they didn’t or couldn’t corroborate the story themselves. So in my mind I may as well have read this article on any rando’s blog post, or in the NYT in 2001 under a Judith Miller byline. It lacks credence.

    I wouldn’t have had anything to say if BBC said that they reviewed some documents that showed Jin-su’s claim. Maybe a few of the “hundreds” of fake IDs that he used, for example. But instead they just read another testimony from PSCORE. Was that other testimony verified? They don’t bother explaining. So they just use an unverified testimony from PSCORE and pass that off to make the reader believe that that’s good enough in place of actually verifying Jin-su’s testimony!


  • Would you expect a news outlet to be able to somehow verify the testimony of a prisoner of war before reporting on it?

    “If the circumstance were different would you expect something different?” is what you are asking me. The interviewee isn’t a POW, but a defector. And not an escapee, because according to the article he was already sent abroad, so it’s not like he fled with merely the clothes on his back and a story to tell. So I would presume he would have a bit more evidence to share with the BBC than just a story, just as many of the people responding to me seem to presume that because it’s been reported by the BBC it’s prima facie undeniably true.