In 1984, George Orwell wrote of a world where the only colour to be found was in the propaganda posters. Such is the case in North Korea. Images of Kim Il-sung are depicted in vivid colours. Rays of yellow and orange emanate from his face: he is the sun.
Interpretation
The quote highlights the use of propaganda in totalitarian regimes to create a glorified image of leadership.
Barbara Demick's quote draws a parallel between George Orwell's depiction of a colorless world dominated by propaganda and the reality of North Korea, where vivid imagery of its leader, Kim Il-sung, is used to reinforce his cult of personality. The use of bright colors symbolizes the distorted reality that governments can create to manipulate and control their citizens, illustrating how imagery can be employed as a powerful tool in political propaganda.
In practice
In a discussion about the role of propaganda in authoritarian regimes.
In 2012, a five-year-old girl in Shandong province described to me how ten officials had chased her six-months-pregnant mother through the fields to prevent the birth of the family's second child, a boy. She died during the procedure.
If you look at satellite photographs of the Far East by night, you'll see a large splotch curiously lacking in light. This area of darkness is the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.
Nicaragua dealt with the problem of terrorism in exactly the right way. It followed international law and treaty obligations. It collected evidence, brought the evidence to the highest existing tribunal, the International Court of Justice, and received a verdict - which, of course, the U.S. dismissed with contempt.
It is hard to feel individually responsible with respect to the invisible processes of a huge and distant government.
Your proposal raises the greatest mischief that can befall my country. You could not have found a person to whom your schemes are more disagreeable. Let me conjure you then, if you have any regard for your country, concern for your self or posterity, or respect for me, to banish these thoughts from your mind, never communicate, as from yourself, or anyone else, a sentiment of the like nature.
See, in my line of work you got to keep repeating things over and over and over again for the truth to sink in, to kind of catapult the propaganda.
It doesn't matter where we begin the personal/political circle, but it matters desperately that we complete it.
The object of government in peace and in war is not the glory of rulers or of races, but the happiness of common man.
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