North Korea, the British Empire, Babylon, Persian Empire, Rome; All of these were or are at various points in time tyranny filled nations. And like all tyrannical nations, they’ve begun to corrode and decay. Now you might be thinking that Great Britain is still doing, well, great; that said, the empire isn’t really an empire any more, and in the height of its tyranny, it started to crumble beginning with the American Revolution. A bigger question then would be how is North Korea decaying when it’s still a global issue that the entire world is addressing, after all they spend around $3.7 billion on their military a year (that’s the lowest estimate by the US State Department) so clearly they’re doing well, right? Not exactly, even military wise they’re not especially great, sure they have nuclear access and over a million soldiers, but even with all that, their armies are under-equipt and lacking in many of the utilities befitting an army. This isn’t even mentioning how desolate and poverty stricken the inhabitants are.
Similar to how cubes of sugar dissolve when in contact with water, tyranny dissolves itself when met with time. However, if one was to continually throw sugar into the pile then while it dissolves there will always be more sugar in its place. This is how North Korea is still such a prominent threat despite the fact that the majority of the world refuses to trade with them or placing heavy tariffs in the few cases they do. Well, there are a few exceptions, such as the source of the sugar, China (as well as Russia.) who trade with each other, even reaching up to $6.86 billion in 2014 between North Korea and China. Yet with all of that, North Korea still stands as (according to the Borgen Project) with a 60% poverty rate, with many stuck in concentration camps or prisons not being included as records of their existence don’t exist outside of the nation they reside.
Yet even with this trade, and the forced labor North Korea is still failing, sure it isn’t falling quickly, but like every tyrannical government before, it’s made war against its own people and just like how a house divided against itself cannot stand, neither can a country raging war against its own people, the very thing that keeps it existing. So what remains for us to do, certainly not sit back and do nothing, for while it is in the very nature of tyranny to corrode itself into destruction, so is it also in human nature to seek power, and by extension build tyrannies. So not only is it left for us to make sure we don’t build tyrannies of our own, but we can’t just expect the tyrants to disappear on their own, sure they’re destroying themselves over time, but even still, sugar dissolved in water is still sugar water, it might not be as firm or as strong, but it will always remain unless we get up and do something about it. And sure, there isn’t much we as individuals can do, but at the very least we can spread awareness and at least understand how we can prevent it.
