vaticanhotline

First off, I'm confused as to why you conflate ethics with money; one really has no bearing on the other, and when they do collide, it's often to the detriment of morality. To be sure, the North Korean government would hardly notice if Westerners stopped visiting, in part because there are roughly five times as many Chinese tourists as Western ones, but the point of a boycott is not simply to starve a company (or country) financially.

Secondly, why do you think that Western tourists visiting North Korea will improve the lives of the people there? If you look at places like the Phillipines and Thailand, tourism has manifestly not improved the life of the average person, and in fact has actually made the place worse in ways; for example, endemic prostitution and environmental destruction are just two very grave issues that face these countries. Further, it can be argued that tourism has actively harmed these countries, as people seek a way out by marriage or hope to make easy money from gullible tourists (this is particularly the case in Bangkok with the tuk-tuk drivers). As well as that, doesn't tourism to North Korea validate the existence of the government? They can point to the people visiting and claim that they have come to see the working of "this great country".

You know, I did take a look at that AMA, and what's interesting is that it's basically a platitude: "Oh yeah, tourism is great, because people can see foreigners, and foreigners means the borders aren't closed, which is also great." Keep in mind that the people who actually do interact with foreigners in North Korea have to have clearance to do so-they are directly employed by the government and what they say is carefully monitored and controlled. Even the hotel in Pyongyang that they stay in is an island with only one road leading to it.