22-year-old netizen publicly executed in North Korea for listening to K-pop music

A North Korean man, 22, was publicly executed for consuming and disseminating South Korean music and movies. According to The Guardian's report, the evidence of an anonymous defector claimed that in 2022, the 22-year-old young man from South Hwanghae province was publicly hanged for having seen three South Korean films, listened to 70 South K-pop songs, and distributed them.

The case saw the light of day on June 29, 2024, after the testimonies from 649 North Korean defectors were compiled into a study demonstrating Pyongyang's harsh suppression of Western influence and information flow into the isolated nation. This data was published in the 2024 Report on North Korean Human Rights by the South Korean Government on June 27, 2024.

To protect its people from the "malign influence" of Western culture, North Korea—officially known as the Democratic People's Republic of Korea—outlawed K-pop, and the 22-year-old breached that rule. A new legislation that forbade "reactionary ideology and culture" was passed by the nation in 2020, significantly tightening it.

Young men using the internet on a computer in the Grand People's Study House, Pyongan Province, Democratic People's Republic of Korea. (Image via GETTY/Eric Lafforgue/Art in All of Us / Contributor)

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North Korea's brutality gets revealed by South Korea's Unification Ministry's report

The Guardian reported that the 649 testimonies from defectors of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea were described in depth in the 2024 Report on North Korean Human Rights, which was made public by South Korea's Unification Ministry on June 27, 2024.

The research described the nation's authorities' concerted attempts to restrict foreign information flow, with a particular focus on youngsters.

As per the Democratic People's Republic of Korea's new legislation that forbade "reactionary ideology and culture,", other deemed "reactionary" behaviors that are penalized include sunglasses, drinking alcohol from wine glasses, brides wearing white gowns, and men carrying their bride.

The Guardian reported that at the Seoul briefing, a woman in her early 20s, who is also a defector of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, stated that after watching South Korean dramas, she would rather die than live in that country. She said,

"The speed of South Korean culture influencing North Korea is seriously fast. Young people follow and copy South Korean culture, and they really love anything South Korean. After watching Korean dramas, many young people wonder, ‘Why do we have to live like this?’ … I thought I’d rather die than live in North Korea."

The article claimed that North Koreans often have their mobile phones inspected for slang phrases, idioms, and misspellings of contact names—an influence from watching South Korean content and music.

According to reports, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea believes that allowing popular culture from South Korea to infiltrate their society might be dangerous for the ideology upholding complete allegiance to the Kim family.

The nation's supreme leader, Kim Jong-un has ruled since 2011 and has been the leader of the Workers' Party of Korea since 2012. His family has been in control of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea since its founding in 1948. Another defector stated that the effect of South Korean culture, especially recent television dramas, seems inevitable despite such tough measures.

On June 29, 2024, The Independent reported that Human Rights Watch talked about Kim Jong-un's nation in their world report in 2023 and remarked,

"The government does not tolerate pluralism, bans independent media, civil society organisations and trade unions, and systematically denies all basic liberties, including freedom of expression, peaceful assembly, association, and freedom of religion and belief."

Reports stated that the Democratic People's Republic of Korea has publically executed people in the past in towns and prison camps. However, it ceased staging executions close to its borders and at locations that are visible from satellites, and it has been avoiding carrying out executions in densely populated residential areas.

North Korean supreme leader Kim Jong-Un. (Image via GETTY/AFP Contributor / Contributor)

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Since the 1950–1953 Korean War concluded with an armistice rather than a peace treaty, the two Koreas are still officially at war. The Independent reported that on June 27, 2024, South Korea aka the Republic of Korea, vowed to resurrect anti-Pyongyang frontline propaganda broadcasts after the Democratic People's Republic of Korea sent over 600 trash-carrying balloons to the South.