It’s an old meme, sir, but it checks out.

porn mags would immediately disappear from shelves

Nah, dude, immediately back to sneakernet. But way more porn now.

The PRC has the political weight to make others pick a side, at least openly.

The DPRK, on the other hand, absolutely does not.

It depends some on where you are.

Where I live, driving is absolutely a basic skill. It’s just not realistic to get anywhere via any other means in a reasonable timespan. So you either have to drive or be driven basically anywhere. The scale involved isn’t kind to biking, and public transportation is nonexistent. It would take hours to get a taxi that would be egregiously expensive, uber isn’t even an option last I heard.

And this is from the perspective of someone that hates driving- it stresses me out because of the exact reasons you’ve mentioned. I’m in charge of a ton or more of plastic and steel sometimes moving at 70mph, and ignoring the physics based implications, these things are fucking expensive.

I’ve heard of them having newbie games scheduled on certain days. I don’t know how welcoming general games would be to a complete beginner, though.