Well, my reaction to this one is suspicion that it sounds a little too perfect and either the farmer is idealizing his life or the journalist has taken editorial liberties.. so, maybe?

You mean if there was a strong implication that there wasn't a genuine choice, but an adaptation to hardship brought on by human rights abuses and an authoritarian government? Call me hypocritical, but no. I don't think I'd have the same reaction.

> two pieces of fish, one big onion, an egg, baked beans and a few biscuits at the end. For lunch I have a pear, an orange and four sandwiches with paste. But I allow myself a bit more variety; I’ll sometimes have soup if it’s cold.

This would be a great meal for a North Korean farmer. If I read this same article by a North Korean farmer, it would either involve a different food listed, or they'd probably be lying about being a North Korean farmer.

> A UN assessment found North Koreans had been surviving on just 300g (10.5 oz) of food a day so far this year.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-48150205

I remember traveling around some islands with a new acquaintance on his own journey. I remember him saying, "It's amazing and romantic. Most of the folks here have never left. All they need is right here."

Fast forward a day.

"Americans are idiots because they never leave America. Most of them don't even have a passport."

Okay.

I would believe a North Korean farmer even more, that he was content with this life. A North Korean farmer who has eaten the same dinner every day for the last ten years is doing pretty well - it would mean they have avoided many of the North Korean famines and prison camps.

No because he can leave if he wanted to. He stresses that- if someone gave him $2 million he would stay.

People have a range of “happiness” - in other words they can look at X and say “I think I could be happy doing that” and hold that the person truly is happy.

But if it is outside their range they will adamantly refuse to believe the person could truly be happy.

Given my own take[1], I was confused as you explained your thought experiment because I think I’d trust its sincerity more from a North Korean farmer.

Edit to clarify: not because I’m dismissing the oppressive dictatorship but because I think it’s more likely a rando person farming in North Korea likely has less exposure to a larger world that might make them happy, and less motivation to justify their self-isolation with denial.

1: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27083285

I've seen people have the exact opposite reaction to this same article. ("If this was a foreigner from a poor country, would you still think he was boring and sad?") So much of our lives are just the stories we choose to tell about them.

It seems weirder to me that someone in a country like the UK would do this then someone in a country with less availability of foods but I don't see that as an issue of enlightenment or brainwashing.

I have been listening to an audio book, Man’s Search for Meaning, written by Viktor E. Frankl a neurologist, psychiatrist and Holocaust survivor.

Like many books written of experiences involving extreme suffering and trauma it’s extremely powerful and I tend to have to stop just to contemplate and dwell on certain passages or just sentences. I like your “thought experiment” as it’s not unlike how I go about reflecting on these kinds of books.

Frankl talks about being on a train being moved from one camp to another, and upon seeing there were no chimneys at this new camp there was a silent celebration among the prisoners. For whatever inhumane reason, that night the newly arrived prisoners were made to stand (I believe naked) throughout the whole night in the freezing cold. Yet they were all still greatful not to be at Auschwitz or another camp with chimneys. There is a separate passage where he describes the types of prisoners, the last he describes are those who had lost all meaning, spirit and would walk up to and grab the electric fence.

I can’t tell you how much heart it gives me to think of the human spirit in these conditions that can’t be broken. It’s very similar to some of the slave narratives I read, and on occasion coming across passages with descriptions of slaves on a plantation celebrating the opportunity to sing and dance together around a fire at night. I have shared with others I wish if push came to shove I’d have that type of spirit, to your point about brainwashing, I’ve received similar responses that I am romanticizing it and even that my mental impressions reflect racism, but The reality is I could have pointed to many other counter examples from my readings like the prisoners that lost meaning and grabbed the fence, but for better or worse that doesn’t lift my spirits and it’s not the examples I tend to pass on.

I often ask myself what I think I would do in a camp or on a plantation, what actions would make me the most proud and if I would have the courage and spirit to make them, but I never pretend to know what I would actually do and I’d never once judged the actions of any of them...even the most deplorable acts, like the prisoners that worked on behalf of the guards for the slightest of comforts. Even more challenging is trying to put myself in the shoes of some young German or Southerner born into and inheriting the evils of these situations, it’s a lot easier to say what I hope I would do, but just the same I have to admit no one knows what they would do, after all how many people do you really encounter that are willing to go against the grain rather than fall in line much less when it means death?

Of course I wouldn't have the same reaction.

North Korea is a brutal dictatorship. What are you trying to imply with the question? That brutal dictatorships are not so bad an we've been lied to? Do you live or have you ever spent some time in one? Cause I do and I think people defending dictatorships deserve a swift kick in the nuts.