North Korea

For many years when people ask me what scares me I always tell them heights, snakes, and North Korea. They either scare me because I don't understand them or can't control them. If I fall from a height, I don't have aerodynamic control to land safely. Snakes just freak me out, I don't understand why they don't have legs and can go days without eating and then eat a giant meal.

Then there's North Korea.

I don't understand it and I can't control it. I think it's so scary because nobody in the world can understand them or control them. Good information is hard to come by and there seems to be no logic on why they do what they do. They do not behave normally in the international community. They don't have a free and open press. The information that flows into the country is heavily censored.

Every news article that I have read, that I know about independently of that article has had some form of error. That's ok. The main points are usually close and if there are competing news agencies, the whole story will eventually be told. Unfortunately, in North Korea, that isn't the case and it's scary.

It doesn't appear that the national leadership is accountable to the population but I really don't know. If you are not accountable to the population there is no reason to make decisions that best benefit the people that live in your country. This is scary.

We don't know the true credentials of their leader. We don't know exactly why he was deemed worthy. We don't know much of anything and this is scary.

There has been a lot of sabre rattling lately. There has been a lot of anti-western rhetoric as well. We don't really know why. Maybe we really don't want to know why. All of this is scary. We don't know what they will really do.

It may seem a bit strange for a pilot to be afraid of heights but I'm only afraid if I don't have aerodynamic control during my descent. It is perfectly natural to be scared of North Korea. We don't really know anything about them and can't control them.