In contemplating freedom today, just now even, after a brief trek around some of my virtual haunts (various mail, news and news group sites, youtube links), my inner guru (voice of conscience) prods me with one of those gentle reminders one best not treat (or tread upon) lightly.
"Be not shocked by anything within the full spectrum of human behavior."
Saddened, appalled at times, yes.
Shocked?
No.
As we live in an age of travel opportunities unbound (well, almost) and where vast amounts of information abound, that is, quite simply, extremely difficult.
With all that in mind, something, if not shocking, perhaps a little bit surprising, can be found here.
June 2003
In the forests of southern Siberia, workers are still working as serfs in the Gulag, paying off North Korea's $3.8 billion Cold War debt. Kim Sung Chol came to work at a North Korean Logging Camp in Siberia on a three-year 'contract'. He never received a single ruble.
[Don't let the 2003 date fool you. The "debt" will likely never be paid as long as certain regimes remain.]
And more of what many already know:
"It would have been difficult to design a path out of communism worse than the one that has been followed."
-Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn (1918-2008)
No comments:
Post a Comment