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Calling Un a "dictator" in the first sentence of the article is unwarranted, biased, and unsourced. This verbiage should be removed, especially as the position Un holds in the DPRK is both elected and has less powers than the US President, so unless we want to add the same verbiage to all past US presidents and most western leaders besides, please remove this glaring and obscene bias from the top of the article. ZeromusMog (talk) 22:44, 13 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

If you ctrl+F "dictator" you'll find plenty of sources that use this term. It's not biased if it reflects the sources, and you appear to be repeating NK propaganda. — Czello ^(music) 10:28, 14 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

He has the power of life and death over every NK citizen, so if you consider that "less power" than a US President, you must evidently support changing the description of every US President to something like "Barack Obama is a former dictator". Adonnus (talk) 08:13, 30 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Firstly, his surname is Kim, not Un. His first name is Jong Un (or Jong-un according to the South's transliteration). Secondly, the issue is has been argued about over the years (see the Talk archives) ad nauseum. Personally I think we should avoid calling him a "dictator" because the question of his "absolute power" has been debated by scholars. The popular press may label Kim a "dictator", but serious scholars have questioned the actual power that Kim wields within the bureaucracy: see the relevant section of the article. However, it is clear that Kim has consolidated power over the years and has put his stamp on government policy. Personally I suspect Kim is not really a dictator, any more than Maduro is. If Kim dies he will be immediately replaced, perhaps by his little sister or even his daughter! With true dictators such as Julius Caesar, Oliver Cromwell, Stalin, and Hitler, their regime falls apart when they die. However, the evidence gleaned from the deaths of Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il (grandfather and father) suggests that the regime will remain stable after Kim Jong Un's death because Kim Jong Un is actually part of a collective leadership, albeit it a totalitarian one.--Jack Upland (talk) 05:25, 7 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

File:Kim Jong-un 2024.jpg (pictured to the right) is a high-quality image and would work great as a replacement for the portrait. The current image is over 6 years old and is lacking in quality compared to this.
TheodoresTomfooleries (talk) 22:09, 13 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Kim Jong Un has not changed significantly in appearance since 2019. There should be another reason cited from MOS:IMAGEQUALITY, but I disagree that the proposed image is better because he is facing to the camera's right but looking to the left with a rather casual(? not sure that's the right word) expression. Yue🌙 04:01, 14 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]

"Casual" here is incredibly subjective, and his expression here compared to the current portrait is already extremely similar: compare the two.

I also seriously doubt that the fact that Kim's facing towards the right but looking towards the left is much of an issue: his face is still clearly discernable, and I would argue even more so than the present portrait: it's simply better lit and better framed. TheodoresTomfooleries (talk) 17:44, 14 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I disagree with "better framed" – the proposed image isn't a portrait crop (which is the de facto standard across politicians' articles), but that isn't the fault of the uploader because below the cropped part are flowers. To be more specific about what I mean by his expression, because of where he's seated in the original photo, Kim is looking to the bottom left of the image (his bottom right), so it gives the impression of dismissiveness (a look of "I don't care"). Subjective yes, but I can't be the only one who thinks so? Willing to concede as possibly the minority, but my critiques aren't based on personal preference. Yue🌙 01:56, 23 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]

• Support change. Six years is a long time, we should be showing up-to-date views. And anyway, the proposed image looks better to me, it has better contrast and shows Kim as he is.  — Amakuru (talk) 08:56, 14 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]
• Oppose change — in the 2024 photo Kim has a strange expression on his face.--Jack Upland (talk) 05:12, 22 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]

  Strange expression in what way? I could apply that to the 2019 infobox image as well. TheodoresTomfooleries (talk) 19:12, 22 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I changed the photo to 2023 version. Roman Kubanskiy (talk) 15:39, 28 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

What is the proper way to title Kim on articles? Supreme leader? General Secretary? North Korea's leader? NK makes this particularly daunting as they change the titles for each leader and have made his grandfather eternal president. ← Metallurgist (talk) 05:23, 17 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Good question. Note Supreme Leader (North Korean title) confusingly mentions it only being awarded to Il Sung and Jong Il after their deaths, but also takes it upon itself to describe a possibly fictitious de facto role that was founded with the country and held during their lifetimes. It might not be ideal to link to that article as that article stands, in the first line. General secretary is likely worth linking in the first line too and probably has more de jure but less de facto power. It probably isn't helpful to link dictator in the first line, which we don't do for Xi, Putin, Khamenei, etc, but it would be worth including "authoritarian dictatorship with a cult of personality" in the lead. Doeze (talk) 17:18, 17 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

What do RS say? Slatersteven (talk) 17:20, 17 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Doeze I am referring more to other articles. I was working on one and ended up just going with North Korean leader, and while I didnt look at the source, that is in fact what it said. ← Metallurgist (talk) 02:27, 19 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

It is a good question. They do change the titles all the time. His official role is now Supreme Leader, and that should be used in the introduction. However, I don't think it's markedly different from politicians in the Western world who change their titles quite regularly; for example, Kevin Rudd, Keir Starmer, Nicola Sturgeon, etc...--Jack Upland (talk) 05:29, 7 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]