Note to self: never EVER mess with Korean labor protestors

[General Ludd]

Looks like they've got their **** together. We could use them here.

[Flubber]

Originally posted by chegitz guevara
Korea is an authoritarian state with the corporations firmly in control, even if moderate-left-wingers win the elections from time to time. Yeah, I feel bad for the draftees, but when you stand against freedom, I'm not gonna feel too bad.

hmm-- che were you being deliberately ironic in appropriating the republicans linking of almost anything with "freedom"??

I don't know the details here but usually don't the police get involved to stop a wholesale rampage??

[chequita guevara]

At this point, could be, since violent labor battles with police are a tradition since Japanese times. They've only been somewhat democratic in the last decade or so, and the state is still extremely authoritarian. I'm not in a position to know if labor demonstrators would be peaceful without the police-thugs present, but there's 100 years of bad blood between them.

Even if we just limit ourselves to post-colonial rule, South Korea was a vicious state, where former Japanese colaborators and Korean fascists were handed power by the United States, overthrowing an nascent Korean republic. They slaughtered over 100,000 Koreans in the 1950s, sold 1000s of children to the West to finance their start-up capital, and cracked heads and disappeared people up into the 90s.

If these same videos were coming out of the North, no one would even question me for my solidarity with the protestors.

[Bosh]

Hmmm, those photos are of some of the wussier labor protestors too. When they really mean business they get steel pipes instead of big sticks.

[Winston]

Originally posted by chegitz guevara
If these same videos were coming out of the North, no one would even question me for my solidarity with the protestors.

Correct, supposing there'd be any.

[Combat Ingrid]

They do it slightly different in Ukraine

[laurentius]

http://dolby.dyndns.org/upfoo/mov/1111677575718.wmv

Warning, graphic images of SK police brutality during protests.

they are pretty much savages

[Drake Tungsten]

Man, if I was a cop, I would totally shoot anyone that tossed a Molotov cocktail my way...

[laurentius]

more:

mms://ohmyvod.ohmynews.com/ohmytv/vod/2700/demiango77_050711_2.wmv

mms://media.cast.or.kr/kndic/movie/05_0710_pt5.wmv

http://vod.hhi.co.kr/ace/bbs/20040228.wmv

[Winston]

Don't have an orgasm here, laurentius.

[laurentius]

um, okay I wont.

Do you have something else you want to share? Do you get orgasms from watching people getting beaten up by the authorities?

Nevermind. You would probably like to be ass-raped and pissed on by the police. Rightist scum...

[techumseh]

Some years ago, I attended a photography exhibit which included some shots of the protests against the construction of the Narita airport in Japan. The various left factons involved had their own color helmet and scarves and all had shields and batons. They faced similarly equiped riot police in a face to face confrontation. Except that the police had regulation length batons and the protestors had added half meter extensions to theirs. So the cops were swinging at air, while getting whacked by the protesters.

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by Drake Tungsten
Man, if I was a cop, I would totally shoot anyone that tossed a Molotov cocktail my way...

I'd do that even if I wasn't a cop.

(Assuming I had a gun handy.)

[OzzyKP]

Protesters or rioters?

I dunno... I'm all in favor of protests, and all in favor of labor rights, but those pics look like a bunch of violent folks with sticks making a scene.

[self biased]

duly noted.