Becoming a human rights activist takes a great deal of courage and skill. In many instances, a potential human rights activist must be willing to endure a great deal of hardship and even ridicule as they attempt to make the world a better place. Many human rights activists realize this risk and yet they still choose to stand up and help the world be a better place. They realize that in doing so, they can often make a huge difference in the world and even get other people to join in their quest for change and a better world.
The isolated nation of North Korea has been the subject of a great deal of understandable criticism. Someone who has helped add her voice to such critics is Yeonmi Park, a brave young woman who grew up in this nation and has stood up to tell the world what is really going on here. Park is one of a few people who lived in this nation as a native and have been able to leave this part of the world. She and her mother had to plan carefully in order to be able to leave this nation. They were initially part of the elite, an elite that consists of only a handful of people here allowed to have any kind of freedom or access to the outside world. After her father’s conviction, Park and her mother were left to live as ordinary North Koreans, a group of people who have been victimized by the state and often left to callously starve to death.
Growing up here for Park mean being of nation where famine is common and food is often very hard to find. Many North Koreans have been confined to having only a single meal each day as the nation’s leaders saw their economy collapse after the fall of the Soviet Union in the 1990’s. The collapse of the former Soviet government led to the collapse as well of the nation’s economy in this part of the world as the nation had enjoyed favorable trade rates. Since that time, the nation’s leaders here have done little to alleviate the hardships that people like Park suffered as a result of their mismanagement of the economy. Many North Koreans lead lives that are controlled by the state and involve intensive supervision by local area communist leaders.
Park and her mom left North Korea. Her mother tragically passed away but Park has been able to leave this area and make her way to the west. In the years since leaving here, she had repeatedly spoken out to tell the world what is is happening here and how the nation’s leaders brutalize their own people. She has spoken out on yeonmi.net about the daily human rights violations visited on North Koreans by their leaders on many media including youtube and nationally prominent newspapers in the western world. She has also written a book about her experiences in this part that shares her former world with them.