Juche and Me -entry of Martin KFA UK member to the KFA UK Literary Competition

Juche and me

Where to start. Sometimes you think of doing something interesting to express yourself a little and to fill a bit of your day in, then you sit down to do it and you don't really know what to do. When, via email, I saw the competition, I saw it mainly as a small challenge or invitation to express Juche to myself a little and to see what I actually thought of it. Deep down. Behind the study, the documentaries, the books and even the propaganda.

To sum it up, very briefly, Juche to me means various things, but mainly a sort of rebellion, "the other way" as it were. Not the empty childlike rebellion of being a "rebel without a cause", but a deep rebellion against everything that is wrong with the world. Phrases like "everything that's wrong with the world" indeed may even just slip off the tongue sometimes or simply just pass us by, but I mean it quite literally.

The utter greed, self-centredness and total wickedness of the world is defied and even mocked in essentially every aspect of the Juche idea. Everything that from childhood I have seen as being wrong with the world, or certainly the nation I live in, is turned upside down and then shaken a up a little bit more by Juche.

You look at the world through the lense of politics and you see and spout all the usual rhetoric. They are all the same. They are all you-know-what's. Thieves. Evil. And on. And on. The media wraps you up in this glorified and never ending sports game of red v blue and left v right. Another way isn't possible. They are all the same.

We read history books of Nations in their youth, we dream of the English village where the community and people pull together, know each other, live for each other and help each other.

This other way is possible. The way where we can rely on each other, work together, maybe, who knows, even love each other and serve in the community, this is actually possible. We don't have to look at our leaders with discuss and disdain. Feel our voice isn't heard. Watch as millions are beaten, abused and murdered in our name.

The other way is Juche.

For me, Juche represents that back straight, stiff lipped and sleeves rolled up way of life. Juche says to me we can rise above how the western world says we must act, think and what we must look like. What's more is it does this in outright defiance. Despite all the sanctions, all the lies and all the outright fairy tales told of the DPRK. This is what makes it so much more impressive and appealing.

73 years of ups and downs, but, most importantly, the survival of the Juche idea shows that Juche is the other way.

Martin