Capt-jack Loc: Home

A North Korean defector said she viewed the US as a country of free thought and free speech – until she went to college here.

Yeonmi Park attended Columbia University and was immediately struck by what she viewed anti-Western sentiment in the classroom and a focus on political correctness that had her thinking “even North Korea isn’t this nuts.”

“I expected that I was paying this fortune, all this time and energy, to learn how to think. But they are forcing you to think the way they want you to think,” Park said. “I realized, wow, this is insane. I thought America was different but I saw so many similarities to what I saw in North Korea that I started worrying.”

The 27-year-old told The Post that she couldn't believe she would be asked to do “this much censoring of myself” at a university in the United States.

“I literally crossed the Gobi Desert to be free and I realized I’m not free, America’s not free,” she said.

Yeonmi Park fled North Korea at age 13 in 2007, a voyage that took her and her family to China and South Korea before she went to school in New York in 2016.

Her professors gave students “trigger warnings,” sharing the wording from readings in advance so people could opt out of reading or even sitting in class during discussions, Park told The Post.

“Going to Columbia, the first thing I learned was ‘safe space,’” she said.

“Every problem, they explained to us, is because of white men.” Some of the discussions of white privilege reminded her of the caste system in her native country, where people were categorized based on their ancestors, she said.

In one class, a teacher discussing Western Civilization asked students if they had a problem with the name of the topic – most students raised their hands, according to Park. Some, she said, mentioned issues with the “colonial” slant of the discussion.

And classes often began with professors asking students for their preferred pronouns, with the use of “they” becoming scary as she feared being socially penalized for not being inclusive enough in her vocabulary.

“English is my third language,” she said. “It’s very hard for me to say he and she sometimes, I misuse them.”

She said that she also was chided for saying she enjoyed the writings of Jane Austen.

“I said ‘I love those books.’ I thought it was a good thing,” Park told the network. “Then she said, ‘Did you know those writers had a colonial mindset? They were racists and bigots and are subconsciously brainwashing you.’”

Park said North Korean students were constantly informed about the “American Bastard.”

“I thought North Koreans were the only people who hated Americans but turns out there are a lot of people hating this country in this country,” she told The Post.

And we pay a lot to have our kid's brains washed and filled with Marxist BS and then wonder why our kids
hate America! Good GOD people, wake up.

Milosia2 Loc: Cleveland Ohio

Taking over the schools is happening at this moment. It isn’t who you think it is though.
It’s an appointee of trump to head up the national school board .
It’s Betsy DeVoss, destroying schools for her private “pay for” schools.
Collecting government money that had once went to operate public schools.
The money now being used to create Private Schools.
What could go wrong there ?
Oh, don’t have enough money to send your kids to private schools, well, I guess he’ll be forced child labor because they got rid of all those stupid laws.

bylm1-Bernie

When I read stuff like this, it makes me very pessimistic at the prospects of educating America.

microphor Loc: Home is TN

there is something seriously wrong with you! Half the time, I don't even thing you know what the he!! you're ranting about.

WinkyTink Loc: Hill Country, TX

If you can swing it, the best thing to do for your children is get them the hell out of public schools as fast as you can.
Keep them away from the entrenched, tenured, largely ignorant scum that makes up their administration and teaching staff.

bylm1-Bernie

Very sage advice!

Milosia2 Loc: Cleveland Ohio

And rightly it should. This isn’t new.
Texas-book companies have been rewriting books for 20 years now. Why should high school books only have 1 paragraph about the
President John F. Kennedy Assassination ?
1 paragraph. Not much about the industrial revolution. Or Union organizing.
Why?

microphor Loc: Home is TN

There you go again, non-sense!

Carol Kelly

Drop Trump!

saltwind 78 Loc: Murrells Inlet, South Carolina

Capt., In every county of this country, the people elect the officials that make policy, run the school system day to day, hire teachers, and develop curricular. If the voters don't like the school system, they can vote the rascals out!

lpnmajor Loc: Arkansas

Where are the weak and ineffective conservatives, while all this is going in in front of their faces? Oh, right - daydreaming about their newest conspiracy theory.

WinkyTink Loc: Hill Country, TX

Many are in congress. State and Federal. Unwilling to do the work of the people.

bylm1-Bernie

They don't have anything else to hit on.

Milosia2 Loc: Cleveland Ohio

That’s right ! Give Betsy a call. she’ll set you right up. Education the easy way. Money.

Milosia2 Loc: Cleveland Ohio

You do know who Betsy deVoss is , right ?
Retraining America.
To suit the rich.