The Hunger Strike

It seems everyone is doing it. Akbar Ganji, Guillermo Fariñas Hernandez, and now, Norbert Vollertsen

To some people, it is one of the highest forms of protest, showing you are willing to suffer for a cause. That’s great, but will it acheive your goal? One person that springs into people’s minds is Mahatma Gandhi, but even he only fasts in certain conditions

LETTER TO GEORGE JOSEPH

4.30 a.m., Saturday, April 12, 1924

My dear Joseph,

I sent you a wire (sent on April 11, 1924, “Omit fasting but stand or squat in relays with quiet submission till arrested.”), in reply to yours. Fasting in satyagraha has well-defined limits. You cannot fast against tyrant, for it will be as a piece of violence done to him. You invite penalty from him for disobedience of his orders, but you cannot inflict on yourself penalties when he refuses to punish and renders it impossible for you to disobey his orders so as to compel infliction of penalty.

Fasting can only be resorted to against a lover, not to extort rights but to reform him, as when a son fasts for a parent who drinks.

My fast at Bombay, and then at Bardoli, was of that character. I fasted to reform those who loved me. But I will not fast to reform, say, General Dyer who not only does not love me, but who regards himself as my enemy. Am I quite clear?

…

So would the South Korean Foreign Ministry really care about a German doctor outside of its building? I don’t know, but it does say alot if the foreign ministry is hostile towards a foreigner. But here is something that might work. Imagine, dozens of North Korean defectors outside the Foreign Ministry doing the same thing as Dr. Vollertsen. All the sudden, the government is faced with this question, does it care about North Korean defectors? If so, will they change their ways? I am not encouraging anyone to starve themselves, but I just want to point out that tactics are used to acheive a goal rather than better oneself.