Contemporary Gender-related Issues in Korean Society

So Youn Chung

#99902181

ASIA 367 – 002

Word Count: 3270

Introduction

The gender issues are happened in everywhere, but some countries still do not realize the issues are serious. South Koreans recently realize how the gender-related issues are serious now. In particular, Korean women are facing gender-related issues which are gender discrimination in workplace, sexual abuse, and the victimization from violence. However, Koreans do not know well how to cope with these gender-related issues because Korea is one of strong patriarchal societies, so traditionally, those gender-related issues are accepted implicitly. For redressing the wrongs, women recently start movement for their rights, and men are thrown in confusion. However, there is a problem because some women ridicule men seriously, even though men do not know the exact reasons why women laugh at. Therefore, to solve this problem between women and men and to give a good notion of gender-related issues, one of famous Korean drama, “Live” (2018, tvN, Kim Gyutae), clearly shows the issues that can arise in the lives of Korean women. This drama emphasizes women’s common experiences in Korean society, so it can lead male viewer to think of what the problems are faced for women. Thus, for this paper, I argue through the gender issues raised in “Live” such as gender discrimination, sexual abuse, and spousal violence, the actions and attitudes held by the male police officers provide a new lens for perception of gender issues for the male viewers.

Gender Discrimination towards Women

In 21^st century, equality has come to a level where men and women are almost treated identically, but the gender inequality is still easily found in any societies and leads a global issue. The major issue of gender inequality is female participation into workplace. In workplace, both men and women cooperate each other for better results and efficiency. However, people, especially men, have a stereotype towards women, which is their role is a mother as a supporter of their husband or children in home (Patterson & Walcutt 2013:86). This stereotype is applied to most women, so due to this stereotype, many women struggle to find a job or to promote. Moreover, some people think that women cannot complete the works with great results. For example of western society’s gender inequality, Silicon Valley which technology related jobs are concentrated invests a lot of money for better female conditions (Mundy 2017). However, people have a stereotype that technology related jobs are male-dominated jobs, so women are treated unfairly (Ibid.). They eventually leave technology industry and this rate is 2 times higher than men (Ibid.). As this example, gender inequality towards women in workplace is occurred. Particularly, many Korean women experience gender discrimination in workplace because Korea is one of strong patriarchal societies which is closely related with Confucian ideology (Stainback & Kwon 2012:219). According to Stainback and Kwon, “Women have been required to follow the Confucian virtues of subordination, endurance, and restriction from participation in social activities, and they are regarded as inferior to men in social status” (2012: 219). This Confucian ideology supports Korean society to become a strong patriarchal system, and this system undermines women. This common gender discrimination in workplace are depicted well in the drama, “Live”.

The drama, “Live”, clearly shows that gender discrimination towards women in workplace through the main character, Han Jeong-O. In episode 1, Han Jeong-O wanted to become a career woman in the future. However, in reality, she could not find a job, and realized that being a woman is a problem in workplace. The reason that she felt is when she interviewed, the male interviewer kept asking discriminative questions such as “Are you going to take care of a personal matter such as babysitting if you are asked?” and “are you going to keep working after getting married?” (Live, ep. 1, 11:10-16). On the other hand, the male interviewer asked the personal questions such as military service or academic background to a man which drew the bond of sympathy, so he was eventually accepted to the company (2018, tvN, Kim Gyutae: ep.1). As Live (2018, tvN, Kim Gyutae) shows, Korean women usually receive non-related and discriminative questions during the interview, whereas the man interviewees are asked the personal questions for knowing the common experiences which make them feel comfortable and can encourage them. This uncomfortable questions during interview towards female are studied and found that women usually receive 60% of the questions related to family planning and 30% of the questions about childcare, while men only receive 10% of the family planning questions and 5% of the questions about childcare (“Most Job Applicants” 2017). Based on this news, the stereotype which is created by the patriarchal systems and the interview questions to women are related because the organizations consider women’s traditional role and have a doubt about their work ability.

On the other hand, male police officers in “Live” do not discriminate women. In episode 2, the characters are trained before they become a formal police officer. O Yangchon who is a police officer, however, do not accommodate women, even though the training is very harsh and required great physical strength. They both women and men receive equal training because he wants everyone to become a good police officer without the gender discrimination. Through this harsh training, the drama implies that women can do things, which men do, too and breaks the gender bias towards women that women are weak, so they may not complete the harsh training. Especially, from 53:20 to 54:02 from episode 1, O Yangchon looks the woman as a police officer before she is a female (2018, tvN, Kim Gyutae). Also, in episode 2, Gi hansol shouts to all rookies, Han jeong-o, Yeom Sangsu, and Song Hyeri, “The last rookie to take the squad car will be killed” (Ep 2, 1:10:10 to 1:10:17). This statement does not contain any gendered discriminative words and divide the gender roles that sometimes undermine women’s work ability. Furthermore, in episode 4, Han Jeong-o tried to make a cup of coffee for O Yangchon, but O Yangchon scolded her that “you are a cop, why do you serve coffee continuously?” (ep. 4, 21:45-21:48). This scene tries to convey using the character, O Yangchon, that serving coffee which is invisibly one of female role in workplace is understandably not a women’s job in the workplace. Like these examples from the drama, “Live”, male police officers treat women equally as a co-worker and police officer as male police officers treat men. They do not look that women are weak due to the gender bias and stereotype.

In addition, Koreans highly regard their appearance (Elfving-Hwang 2013:1), so Korea has higher rates of receiving plastic surgery (Lee et al 2017:2). Most women are considered their appearance in workplace, especially airline related jobs, service jobs or broadcasting jobs, as important as their work ability (Malos 2007:98). The organization usually judge applicants using resume before interview, so when the organization hires people, they highly consider how they are fit into the organization. Due to this purpose, Korean companies require to put applicants’ picture on the resume before they interview to know how they are fit into the organization. However, judging appearance by the picture is applied more towards women than men, and this leads gender discrimination towards women in Korean workplace. A reason of judging appearance by the picture is more applied to women than men is that most men are positioned higher than women which means they have more power than women in the hierarchy (Stainback & Kwon 2012:220), and male interviewers proceed interview and give offers to applicants, which are also shown in episode 1 from “Live”. According to Holliday and Elfving-Hwang, Korean women exchange their beauty such as slim body and beautiful face with the offers from work (2012:75). This finding supports that female workers are trying to be fit into ideal beauty images for the male workers who are high positioned. Besides, some jobs such as flight attendants, broadcasting journalists, or restaurant servers have specific appearance criteria for women such as heights, weights, hair colour, or makeup (Malos 2007:98). Furthermore, Elfving-Hwang states that appearance an important factor for gaining offers in the customer-oriented workplace, and gaining ideal appearance through plastic surgery can lead success (2013:4). Through some other articles’ findings, female workers are discriminated in workplace due to their appearance, unlike men. Therefore, Korean women receive the plastic surgery for the chance to gain the offers from the work and to succeed in the workplace. These makes women think of their appearance importantly in Korean society and workplace

The drama, “Live” shows differently about this discrimination. To become a police officer from South Korea, people should pass the test beforehand. They do not have to send in their resume, so due this system which is more fair than sending in resume, the male police officers cannot discriminate women, and male police officers including O Yangchon do not care how female police officers look. Rather, they want their rookies to do their work well. O Yangchon repeatedly told to their rookies, Han Jeong-o, Song Hyeri, and Yeom Sangsu, that “do your work well”(“Live”, 2018, tvN, Kim Gyutae). Also, O Yangchon got married with An Jangmi who are older than him. An Jangmi is a very respectful person in the police station because she does her works very well. Due to this reason, O Yangchon likes An Jangmi and respects her as a co-worker. Through O Yangchon’s attitudes towards women including female rookies and An Jangmi, the male viewers reconsider the female workers because he does not care the appearance and discriminate women due to the age, but he cares having great work ability. The male viewers can have new perceptions towards women that they are also same workers like themselves, and men can be learned from a respectful female worker.

Female Sexual Abuse

            The drama, “Live”, shows that women participate into the sex-related works. Women are often used as a sexual tool which can be related to patriarchal system (Yang & Hu 2017). In particular, Korean women prostituted from Joseon Dynasty, and they were called “Gisaeng”(Cho 2004). This job was continued until 1980s, but it was practiced differently with Joseon Dynasty. In 1970 and 80’s, Korea was popular as a prostitution which is called “Gisaeng tour” (Kwon 2015: 119). Many male foreigners visited Korea to experience sexual tour because at the time, Korean female sex was a kind of tourist goods (Kwon 2015: 120). Due to these tour, the prostitution from South Korea was promoted, and the women are still selling their sex illegally until now. For example, Korea has some red-lights district, and among these, Yongsan red-light district is oldest (Cheng 2013:35). Although this red-light district is evicted now, women display their sexuality through window in the red-light district (Ibid.). However, ironically, in 1990s, women who prostituted were required to receive health checkup to prevent sexually transmitted diseases (Ibid.). This can be understood that women as a sexual tool are accepted. In “Live”, in episode 8, many women were sexually abused, but they prostitute by force. The police officers eventually caught the culprits and saved female victims. Han Jeong-o worried because this cases were occurred frequently, but the male police officer, Choi Myeong-ho modified her thoughts positively. He said that “Do not think why there are so many bad people in the world. Instead, we catch the bad people and help women who need help” (Ep. 8, 25:11-25:20). Through Choi Myeong-ho’s attitudes towards Han Jeong-o, the male viewer can think of the prostitution again because “Live” notices that how prostitution is bad, and the prostitution can harm women both physically and mentally. In addition, the sexual magazines such as Playboy or Maxim and pornographies present women and make women be a sexual objectification, so men are more likely to watch it than women (McCormack & Wignall 2016: 976). On the other hand, in the “Live”, O Yangchon told his son that “If you watch pornography again, I will beat you” (Ep. 11, 1:07:27-1:07:33). O Yangchon as a police officer stops his son to watch pornography because pornography is one of female sexual abuse, so most pornography with presenting sexy women is for male sexual desires (McCormack & Wignall 2016: 976). His negative attitudes on pornography leads male viewers to consider that pornography contains female sexual abuse which are implicitly accepted traditionally, but it is wrong and should be changed. Furthermore, pornography can make women be a sexual objectification, and they can realize through his attitudes that the sexual objectification of women should not be happened.

Female Victims

Women are mostly weaker than men physically, so some men use their power to women which can lead violence. Women can be a victim everywhere such as family, workplace, or school. However, in reality, the report rates are lower than the actual incidence rates. According to Jang and Kim, women who experience violence within family are not likely to report, so Jang and Kim find that the actual report is lower (2005:2). There are some reasons that they are not likely to report is that they want to resolve their conflicts within family and to endure the violence due to their children (Ibid., 13). Also, women who are victims of family violence fail coping with the violence, and their husbands block the help from other family or friends (Ibid., 14). Moreover, many women do not think that police officers cannot resolve the family violence because Jang and Kim do research and figure out that only 4% of women who report to police officers satisfy with police officer’s treatment (Ibid., 18). The family violence is also shown in the drama, “Live”. In episode 9, a woman did not report her husband’s violence because her husband is a father and financial supporter, and she thought that if she reports him, the husband might harm her children (Ep. 9, 35:21-36:33). In this scene, O Yangchon asked for reporting him and advised her to ask for help to other organization. Through O Yangchon’s attitudes towards the female victim, he treats her as a person, not as a police officer, and it conveys to viewers that even little help can be a great help for the victims. Also, he let implicitly the viewers know that reporting to police officers is always not an answer to resolve the conflicts.

Furthermore, sexual violence towards women is an issue globally (Leclerc et al 2016). Women are usually a target of sexual violence, and South Korea is one of having high rates of sexual assault (Lee et al 2010: 1201). It can be related to patriarchal system and women’s participation into sex work because Korea is a one of the strong patriarchal society, and the patriarchal system invisibly undermines women’s authority, whereas men are superior to women (Stainback & Kwon 2012). Therefore, traditionally, men who live in patriarchal society, tend to think women are a tool of reproduction (Yang & Hu 2017). Due to this traditional system, Korean women experience sexual assault, but they are not likely to report it, so the unreported cases are still high (Lee et al 2010:1201). Besides, women are still harassed in their workplace directly and indirectly today (Kim 2001). However, many women do not report it because they are afraid of dismissal or having a problem in workplace, so they keep silence about the harassment (Ibid.). But today, many Korean women who experience sexual harassment reveal through the media, which movement is called “#metoo” (Kim 2018:505). The #metoo movement was spread globally, and South Korea’s #metoo movement was started in 2016 with the disclosure of Film industry’s sexual harassment (Ibid, 506). This disclosure promotes women to reveal their experience, and through this movement, people could realize how women are undermined and used as a sexual objectification.

The drama, “Live”, shows many female victims from sexual assault. In episode 9, a woman was raped from a man (Ep. 9, 50:33-51:42). However, the woman did not want to report it to police officers because she had a fiancé, but she thought that if fiancé knew that she was sexually assaulted, he might hate her (Ibid.). In this scene, Han Jeong-o comforted the female victim and the male police officers, O Yangchon and Yeom Sangsu, suppressed the culprit. The male police officers did not directly comfort the female victim, but they gave a time to relax and did not rush her to give testimony. Many police officers sometimes make a mistake in the process of gaining evidence, but the male police officers from “Live” think of the victims first. This minor action and attitudes towards women provide a new perception to male viewers. Moreover, the drama reflects the society’s fact that men sometimes react negatively towards the female sexual victims. For example, Gu Hara who is a Korean celebrity had a scandal recently, and her boyfriend threatened her with the sexual video (“Gu Hara Case” 2018). Gu Hara begged not to expose the sexual video because she thought that the video made her life destroy (Ibid.). Through this issue, women are more suffered physically and mentally, even though it is not their fault and they are a victim. It is also shown in the drama, “Live” from the female main character, Han Jeong-o who was a victim of sexual assault in the past. She had an abortion illegally because she could not tell anyone that she was a victim of sexual violence. She firstly told her secret to Yeom Sangsu in episode 14 (Ep.14, 21:20-22:02). However, Yeom Sangsu did not hate, instead he said “I am so sad” when she asked “how did you feel when you hear my sexual assault experience?” (Ep 14, 42:30-42:45). Yeom Sangsu’s attitude and action towards Han Jeong-o makes the male viewer think again about the female victim because through his action and attitudes, the male viewers realize that the victims are needed to be cared and shared the pain together.

Conclusion

In Korea, women’s authority is still undermined, so the gender-related issues are still happened often towards women. The drama, “Live”, depicts the gender-related issues which are commonly happened in Korean society. Firstly, women commonly face the discrimination in workplace. Women are more difficult to promote than men because the patriarchal systems establish stereotype that the women’s roles are mother and supporters of their husband and children in home. Therefore, women’s work ability is not greater than men. Also, women are usually discriminated by appearance, unlike men. Due to not having a good look, some women rarely have a chance to be hired, so they receive plastic surgery. However, through the male police officers from “Live”, they do not care how women look, but they want them to become a good police officer. Besides, they do not discriminate gender, so they treat female and male rookies equally, even in harsh training or cases. These actions and attitudes of male police officers build a new perception towards women that female workers are not different with them, so they can do their works successfully and some women are respectful, so men can be learned from women. Secondly, women are sexually abused, so many women still participate in sex work and sell their sex to men. The male police officers’s attitudes and actions on prostitution and pornography make male viewers think that how prostitution is bad and due to forced prostitution, women are harmed mentally and physically. In addition, the male viewers realize what the problems of pornography is and why men need to stop watching it. Lastly, through the victimization of women, the male police officers convey that female victims are needed a little help and sympathy, not having hatred and prejudice towards female victims.

Bibliography

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              Korean police with weak authority, use of force and being disrespected

Myoung Gyu Cho

92058882

Asia 367 section 002

Dr.Saeji

December 3^rd 2018

Argument essay for Asia 367

December 03, 2018                                                                                               Myoung Gyu Cho

92058882

            The drama Live, it shows how weak the Korean police’s powers are. Both in the drama and reality, the law enforcement in Korea are treated poorly to not only the civilians but to the Internal Affairs and Prosecutors (Higher ups). What I also find strange is the fact that many laws in Korea are favorable for civilians, especially women and minors and barely any that supports or protects the police whatever the circumstances are. The rules for utilizing weapons for the police are speechless in terms of being awful and how the rules are not in favor of the officers in a dire situation. Because of the low level of authorities in Korean police, people tend to be disrespectful to the officers. The police protect civilians and laws. Therefore, I believe that the police should have enough or more than enough power, laws, and rules that support them in order to execute their jobs. In this paper, I will be arguing about the law enforcement/authority, level of respect towards officers and the use of force in Korea and how opposite it is compared to Canadian police officials. Through the articles and drama, the fact that police officers do not have a lot of power of authorities and are disrespected will be argued.

Police are disrespected by the rich and commoners/minors

First of all, Korean police are considered as forces that only take peoples tax money and as a social workers. Therefore, people tend to look down on the officers who are protecting people from crimes and harm. It may be similar with other countries but I do not think it won’t be as worse as Korea. “Koreans are well known for possessing one of the most elaborate honorifics systems in the world’s language” (Brown 2011, 107). This article states about the honorifics in Korea and how important it is. However, some people do not show the politeness to the police officer in Korea, because of their status and wealth. For example, in the drama episode 8, when the minors were caught red-handed for obtaining cigarettes, one of the student, who is the son of chairman was talking back to the police officer in anger saying “Fuck… this is totally ruining my day, let it slide” (ep. 8, 33:38). The student also spits on the officer’s face. This shows how the hierarchy system in Korea creates classes over age and how the people with higher status does not show respect to the elders. Another example would be that in episode 6, a guy who is at fault for using violence shows inappropriate attitude and does not use any honorifics towards Ban Jong-Min who is interrogating and is older than the guy. He says to Ban Jong-Min that he is going to sue him and other cops who comes from nothing and also tells him to know his place (ep. 6, 10:02~10:08). Also in episode 11, despite Lee Sam Bo explaining that Man Yong was responsible for using severe violence on him and that Lee Sam Bo is going to take this incident to the court. However, Man Yong’s father who is in a high position at work and his secretary tries to let this incident slide by, and as soon as Lee Sam Bo forces his will to take it to court Man Yong’s father says “we’ll see you in court. Don’t you know who I am?” (ep. 11, 15:12). All these examples lead to one factor and that is the abuse of wealth and power from the people with “gold spoon”. Especially in Korea, people with wealth and power seems to overuse their power to slip through incidents that can affect their business negatively and most of the times threatening to the police and/or to the law itself. Also people with money and power tends to not use honorific, look down on officers/ verbally abusing them and only care about status of a person. For example, in Han Kook il-bo, a lady says that “did you graduate from Police University? If not, you’re not needed, get lost” (2018). Not only does the rich shows disrespect to law enforcement, but the regular civilians also does not show respects as well. “People not only ignore legitimate police orders, but they also sometimes assault and threaten police officers” (Lee and Pak 2016, 276). This shows how the citizens are not scared of police, how weak the police authority is in Korea and how this may or may not relate to the issue about the lack of political trust. “The risk of violence by suspects is regarded as an inevitable element of police work, the level of citizen violence against police officers in South Korea is beyond the typical parameters” (Lee and Pak 2016, 277). One other factor is that because the criminal laws do not affect minors that are under 14, students use this rule in their favor to commit crimes or to disrespect officers and elders. For example in the drama Live, one of the officer states to the minors that are at the scene by saying “you’re aware that you’ll be protected by the law even if you commit a crime because your under 14 [and cannot arrest or question them because they have to go back home before midnight by the law]” (episode 11, 2:13). By observing the statistics in table 4, it will give awareness to how many civilians are interrupting the police officer by using violence and “the risk of violence by suspects [that] is regarded as an inevitable element of police work” (Lee and Pak 2016, 276). However, not all civilians are disrespectful to the officer. There are people with kindness. In the Korean news article NocutNews shows how one of the civilian who is from the protesting group helps an officer who is helplessly struggling from the effect of the tear gas. The civilian takes out his water bottle and aids officer to wash away the remainder that are on the officers face. Another example is that there was a case where a civilian helped officer to catch the culprit that was doing a getaway by driving a stolen car (YouTube). There are many other cases where civilians helps officers in Korea, but I think that the number of people that detests the officers and look down on them are more than the ones that aid the officers and looks upon them. I want to argue that “police officers are no different than the civilians” (sedaily, 2018). When they take their badge away they are the same as normal people. Being an officer does not make them a superhuman that always works to people’s expectations and someone to order around, blame or to be disrespected.

Korean police with weak law enforcement and authorities

Secondly, in the previous, I have stated about minors committing crime due to the law protecting them from being arrested. I strongly believe that the other main issue to minors acting this way is because of the weak law enforcement in Korea. The reason why civilians take lightly on police officers is that Korean police is one of the lowest ranked for authority and power. “According to the KNPA, Korean police authority is ranked 27th, out of 30 OECD countries” (Lee and Pak 2016, 272). This shows how the “police officers are less confident with using their powers [and authorities], even in situations that require the proper and firm actions of law-enforcement officers” (Lee and Pak 2016, 272). In the drama Live (episode 16, 46:08), it shows the scene where the officer is scared to take the gun because of the false, propaganda information about the cops and their use of guns on harming innocent people and the people’s negative perspective on it. One example of the media hiding the truth is shown in the drama Live. In episode 17, officer Eun Kyung-Mo states how “Yeom Sang-Su is caught in the power struggle between the police and prosecution” (ep. 17, 9:11). He further explains how “the police force lost the public’s trust due to the recent incidents” (ep. 17, 9:22) and how the higher-ups wants to use Yeom Sang-Su’s case to bury all other cases through the propaganda of the media. “[The] low public confidence hinders legitimate law-enforcement activities and weakens the organizational capacity for the maintenance of security” (Lee and Pak 2016, 272). The law enforcement is a system that ensures that no one breaks the rules of their country. Therefore, it is one of the important jobs that are given to the police and the reason to why the power to take force/actions are necessary at all times. For example, because of the weak law enforcement and the law that protects minors from being charged with murder, many young students are utilizing these laws to their benefits and create violent crimes that even adults would not dare. In 2017 September in Busan, a middle school girl was severely injured from the immense beat up from 5 girls some that are in middle school and some that are in high school. By reading the news the five perpetrators looked like they are a psychopath because they do not realize how serious of a crime that they have done. In the news, it stated that despite the students creating this crime they “were acting without guilt” (Lee Gayeong, 2017). In fact, they were showing the picture that they took of the scene and shared with their friends. There were several more cases very similar to this all happening within 2017 fall. I believe that the main issue of why many minors are creating crime is due to the current juvenile law in Korea. “The juvenile law prevents minors of between 10 and 14 from facing criminal charges, even for serious crimes” (Koreajoongangdaily, 2014). In the US, “A minor convicted of murder or felony murder in a juvenile court faces a maximum sentence of 20 years or 10 years in prison” (Janoski, 2018). Compared to Korea, in the US they charge fairly about the crimes he or she has made despite being a minor or not. I strongly believe that this is how it should be with law juvenile law for Korea. “Weak law enforcement in South Korea is often cited as a critical impediment to national development. South Korea’s crime-reporting and satisfaction rates are the lowest. These low rates mean that people are much less likely to be reliant on the police authority in South Korea and that they are less satisfied with the performance of their police officers regardless of the high level of security” (Lee and Pak 2016, 274). Unlike US or Canada, I think the Korean law enforcement is not executed swiftly and properly, which impacts negatively for police authorities. One example would be a recent issue that has been going around in Korea. Early November in Gyeongnam-si Geoje city a 20 years old man has stabbed 50 years old woman and has killed her. This incident was already making many people upset, but what made it even more upset is the fact that the police is going to charge the criminal with use of violence and not with the use of murder. The reason behind is that the criminal does not remember what he did because he was drunk and the police think there is enough credibility to not charge with murder (Dispatch, 2018). After the media released this on the news, citizen’s trust in law enforcement and the law in Korea became feeble. Table 3 in (Lee and Pak 2016, 276) shows the trust in Canadian police and distrust in Korean police. Through this chart, it shows how satisfied and reliable the police force in Canada is to the perspectives of the citizens compared to police force in Korea. “The public’s distrust of their police authority in South Korea has even led to weak support for legitimate police-enforcement operations, and it eventually caused the collapse of police morale” (Lee and Pak 2016, 278). However, it is changing nowadays. For example, there were cases where the officials of law enforcement taken into custody for charges (Yeonhapnews,2015). Normally in these cases, the higher-ups would try to hide this fact through the use of media or use of black money. Despite the changes that are happening nowadays, it still has long ways to go in terms of having strong law enforcement and authorities.

Korean law vs police use of force/ little authority for pressing situations

Lastly, Korean law enforcement has little authority for using force in the pressing situations which is very frustrating in crucial situations. The title in one of my sources, “If shot excess suppression, if not failure to respond” (Chosun News, 2011), explains the little authority/power in Korean police have when pressing situations and can visualize the problem without reading the article. Compared to US or Canadian police force, Korean police have very little authority in using weapons for pressing situations and the departments or officials or affairs will not be supporting the officers. For example, “If the civilian is injured by the use of gun from the police, the officer is fully responsible and could get fired” (Chosun News, 2011). This shows how the Korean law, which is one of the officer’s weapon is being used against them. Even if the police did make the right choice to use a gun or using a gun was the only option available to protect civilians and the law, the law enforcement, and people judge them negatively. This causes problems such as police being afraid to use their tools or take action to solve crimes and help civilians. In the drama Live, one of the cops talks about how the manual not being practical enough and how the higher-ups should revise the protocol in order for it to suit the needs (ep. 15, 3:20). In Korea police using weapons will put harm to themselves rather than using it to protect them or the citizens. The other way to say is that “when a cop uses a gun, it’s not the suspect who dies, [the cop] will die from the penalty” (ep. 13, 18:55). While watching the drama, I have noticed that unlike here in Canada, if the cops in Korea use a gun or even a taser gun, that person’s situation will become troublesome rather than being encouraged or comforted by the fellow cops or to the citizens.  The statement above is also illustrated in the drama live. In episode 6, the division thinks that Han Jung-O has made the right decision to shoot the Taser gun in order to prevent further crime. However, she did not give a warning and did not realize that she shot a pregnant lady in the shoulder. Therefore, because she did not follow the protocol properly, “if the husband sues Han Jung-O the whole division could be at stake” (ep. 6, 13:33). It’s very likely that Korean “citizens expect cops to fight without weapons” (ep. 13, 19:05). Which is very absurd and I would like to argue to why I think it is absurd. First of all, to prove my argument, I will be comparing the police force in Canada with Korea. “The [Canadian] Criminal Code says police officers are allowed to use as much force as is required, provided that the force is necessary for the purpose the officer is using it for, and that the officer is acting on reasonable grounds. In addition, cops are able to use up to lethal force if they need to use that force to prevent the commission of an offense” (CBC News, 2015). Because Canada has one of the strong law enforcement and is trusted by people, Canadian police are able to take actions without a doubt. I think another way to say this is that their actions in a necessary situation are the law and enforcement. Also, unlike the Korean officer being blamed for injuring civilian while using the force and could lead to the possibility of being fired. “[Canadian] Police are rarely charged and even more rarely convicted, and even more rarely still sentenced to significant time in jail” (Chosun News, 2011). The Han Kook il-bo states that “In America, if the officers are being assaulted, they could instantly use force and arrest that person. The level of disciplinary punishment for interfering is severe as well” (2018). Even Japan, Britain and Canada are similar to America, but Korea’s level of disciplinary punishment for interfering is too low. However in Korea, even if the police are being assaulted by people who are drunk, an officer could only give warnings that they could get arrested, but in reality “all they can do is to hold and hope that he or she goes home” (Han Kook il-bo, 2018). This portrays the sad reality of the level of Korean law enforcement and the limitation of actions/force from the police. Also in Korea, the guns that police uses are different from the ones used in America or Canada. “ the first round is empty, the second round is only a warning fire, and the third round has the real bullet” (Chosun News, 2011). Also, Korean police are limited to short legs and arms despite how dangerous the situation is because if the cop shoots the criminal other than legs or arms, that officer will likely to lose his or her job. One officer said “if they use the manual for firing the gun, even if they are holding the gun, the officer could be stabbed by the criminal. This also shows the law enforcement limiting the use of force and how the law could put the Korean police’s lives on stake.

All in all, though the drama Live and articles and news about Korea portrays the insufficient strength in law enforcement, use of authority, use of force in pressing situations and how the people shows disrespect and distrust to the police. And through the articles and news about American and Canadian police use of force in pressing situations, strength in law enforcement, use of authority and people’s respect to the police shows the contrary. Through this comparison or my counter argument further specifies what is lacking in Korean police authority and how it causes various problems to law enforcement. After viewing this paper, I wonder if the others will agree or disagree on my argument.

word count: 3056

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https://youtu.be/PJJ-CO8OUJs

Introduction

South Korean citizens are notorious for their distrustful views of police. While many officers undoubtedly make life-threatening and societal-harming mistakes, civilian complaints over small actions hangs over the heads of officers, forcing them be overly cautious at all times. But why is it that citizens are so distrustful towards police? One common belief is that, due to South Korea’s collective societal values, “a single negative experience with the police can … lead to collective dissatisfaction and distrust of the police” (Boateng 2016: 291). While a major incident seems to justify distrust, further research has found that in South Korea specifically, small things such as “the failure to provide social services, and slow police response times were major elements in police dissatisfaction” (Ibid., 293). This puts police in a very tight position – ridiculed for large discrepancies as well as small and unavoidable mistakes. This added pressure of community oversight forces the police officers to always be alert and professional, so as not to make any small mistakes that could lead to further distrust among civilians.

In an attempt to convince the viewership to be more understanding of the pressures on police, Live, aired in 2018 on the Korean channel tvN and directed by Kim Gyu-tae, shows the ways in which filed complaints and civilian oversight of the police can effectively ruin the livelihoods of officers – whether it be their personal or professional lives. Live utilizes situations such as emotional burnout, awareness of low pay, and possible job loss, as well as highlighting the corruption within the Internal Affairs review process, as a way to encourage its viewership to be more understanding of mistakes and discourage its views from filing complaints against officers.

The Policing Past 

South Korea’s policing past has left its mark on the memory its civilians, leading to understandable distrust today. From enforcing the Japanese colonization, to routinely supporting suppressive regimes, the police in South Korea have continually supported the groups associated as “against the South Korean people.”  Initially, under Japanese occupation, the police acted as a form of quazi-military, suppressing any opposition (Boateng 2016: 292). This not only left a deep hatred and distrust towards the police, but an innate fear, as well. Post-colonization, a new issue emerged as suppressive political regimes rose as South Korea new ruling powers. These regimes often relied on the police, again, to suppress any opposition, and often led to corruption within the police force itself, assigning duties based on loyalty to the regime (Moon 2003: 131-133). Once again, Korean fear was revived, and new distrust emerged as corruption spread throughout the police force.  With these memories very much on the forefront of South Korean perspective, it is understandable why such ostracization and hatred remains towards the police today.

In light of this negative history, the Korean National Police Agency took on a new set of reforms in the 1990s in order to transform its name into a more transparent and trustworthy institution. Titled the “Grand Reform,” Lee Mooyoung, the Commissioner General of the Korean Police, declared “fundamental changes to the system, culture, and practices of the police” (Ivkovic 2012: 77). This new “revision” of the police implemented greater civilian participation in police oversight, attempting to give citizens a newer, more exalted voice in the accountability of police (Kang 2011: 178). Looking at Live, despite this community-based modernization and revamp of the police, there still exists a high level of civilian distrust and an attitude of apathy employed by the police in civilian interaction. In many ways, this new strategy shifted civilians from fearing the South Korean police, to feeling empowered to directly express their dissent. This led to a shift in theoretical police power, from disregarding the civilian perspective to orienting police actions based solely on civilian reaction and complaints.

Officer Burnout

From simply being reluctant to take calls to the possibility of losing one’s job, police burnout is a common theme pursued throughout Live. Though this representation is fictitious, it is very much factual in nature – many South Korean police feel unsatisfied with their jobs, whether it be about inadequate pay, miniscule chance of promotion, or emotional exhaustion (Kwak 2018). Live pursues this theme through illustrating the emotional burnout officers feel, both on- and off-shift, in an attempt to awake South Korean society to the demands on police as a way to encourage citizens to rethink their complaints and distrust towards the police.

South Korea’s relatively new switch to Community-Oriented Policing has led to an increase in police burnout and apathy, due to their necessary community involvement. As South Korea transitioned to this new policing style, the roles and responsibilities of all ranks were changed, and all officers were expected to immediately commit to this new policing style (Lee 2011: 716). Although seemingly positive, Community-Oriented Policing places significant focus on community interaction and visibility, which has significantly led to one of most contributing factors to police burnout – frequent citizen interaction (Kwak 2018: 238). This, coupled with the need to remain exclusively ambiguous in the face of the public, has been an extremely high factor in the emotional stress harbored by police officers in South Korea (Ibid., 225). Countless scenes throughout Live show the continuous issue with the relationship between the police officer and civilian. From civilians barging into the station and complaining that “the customer service at the station sucks,” to officers being constantly reminded that “the safety of the police equals the safety of the citizens,” the officers in Live are constantly bombarded with the reminder of the citizen as number one (Ep. 17, 43:22, 12:04-12:13). As each officer is responsible for nearly 4,000 civilians (Ep. 13, 20:01), the emotional toll on officers is understandable. Live seeks to represent this invasive struggle officers face with the requirements of this new policing style to its viewers, to highlight the increased civilian focus within the police force.

A common issue with Community-Oriented Policing is lack of dedication to upholding this policing style as “community service is often perceived negatively as taking officers away from their Number 1 priority – fighting crime. Role conflicts may occur when officers become frustrated because of a lack of emphasis on ‘real’ law enforcement matters” (Ibid., 227). It is not that the officers lack the ambition to connect with the community, but rather that officers find their interactions with the community as ingenuine. In a briefing to a local PTA, Senior Officer Choe Myeong-ho and partner Kim Han-pyo complain about the civilian interaction, saying: “‘Gosh this is annoying. We have a lot to do. Can’t we just leave?’ ‘This is part of our job.’ ‘Why even bother asking if they’re not going to listen’” (Ep. 14, 11:03-11:52). Here, Senior Officer Choe’s complaint is two-fold: 1) their interaction with the community is taking away time from other, seemingly more important policing work, and 2) the community does not value the interaction, and likely won’t consider what the officers suggest. As officers are aware of this, their dedication, understandably, will dissipate as they fail to see the benefit in the increased community focus. Despite the fact that many civilians fail to listen to the suggestions officers have, it has been noted that the implementation of Community Oriented Policing directly affects the perceived effectiveness of the police themselves (Savage 2013: 887), so despite the apathetic attitude both officers and civilians is not enough to discontinue this new system of policing. It is no question that the officers in Live feel apathetic towards their community responsibilities. But this apathy stems, not from not wanting to connect with the community, but from feeling a lack of genuine connection with the community and hence, a waste of valuable time.

When considering further representation of police apathy and burnout in Live, Assistant Inspector Kang Nam-il stands out as one of the clearest examples of this common issue. It is easy to write off his reluctance to take calls while patrolling, hesitance to take a pay cut due to a complaint, and his overall apathetic attitude as signifier of a poor sense of duty. However, this reluctance is not due to a poor conscious, but signs of systematic and severe police burnout. Initially, Assistant Inspector Kang is represented poorly as an officer who spends his time assigning parking tickets, rather than aiding his fellow officers in routine calls. Without any background on his life, he is easily antagonized as a lazy police officer, looking for the easiest way out. However, in the middle episodes of the series, viewers are given an inside look into Assistant Inspector Kang’s life – running a pizza shop in his off hours to support his growing family of five. After this realization, viewers no longer ostracize him for his laziness, but begin to feel empathetic towards his life situation. His moments of ticket writing and watching others take calls suddenly seem more like attempts for him to rest from his busy life outside of the police station, rather than a poor sense of duty. But why is it that Assistant Inspector Kang, like other officers, must work extra hours or an extra job just to make ends meet?

In researching average police officer pay, it was found that only “16 percent [of officers] feel like they are being paid an adequate amount for the work they do while nearly half of them disagree” (Kang 2011: 184).[1] This inadequacy of pay is reflected in Live after an incident threatens Kang Nam-il, Ban Jong-min, and Kim Min-seok. After losing a highly sought-after suspect, one officer must take the blame, resulting in a three month pay dockage. Among all three officers, the pay dockage will result in harm, Assistant Inspector Kang telling his wife “Jong-min and Min-seok’s situations aren’t any better than ours. One’s having a kid, the other’s getting married, supporting his sick mom, and they don’t own their own home” (Ep. 8, 1:06:59-1:07:07). All three of these officers are living relatively normal lives with small financial setbacks, yet cannot afford a deduction in order to make it through the following three months painlessly. These pay deductions can certainly be harmful, ranging from 30-50% while still requiring the officers to work full-time (Ivkovic 2012: 79). But even without this pay deduction, some officers, like Assistant Inspector Kang, must dock extra hours outside of their work as police to make ends meet.

Officers may also face burnout and apathy due to the large discrepancy in promotional possibilities. The Korean National Police Agency is largely hierarchical – the majority of power being centralized around very few hands (Boateng 2016: 303). In order to be in an administrative position, one must attend, and graduate from the Korea National Police University or, alternatively, pass the notoriously difficult national civil service exam (Morash et al 2008: 232). This centralization of power leads to an apathetic and cynical attitude towards officers when considering promotion. It has been found that “two-thirds of [South Korean police officers] disagree that their chance of being promoted is fair, and only 9 percent of them believe they have a fair chance for promotion” (Kang 2011: 184).[2] This attitude is likely lead to police apathy, as perceived chances for promotion are incredibly low. In Live, though promotion is little discussed, the common fear of complaints shows how high-stakes promotion really is. When Officer Han Jeon-o receives a threat of complaint, she is told “formal complaints are messy. You’ll be questioned by Internal Affairs all the time and it’ll hurt your career. We’re only probationary officers” (Ep. 14, 20:52-21:17). Here, along with many other times throughout Live, not only is promotion unreasonable, but a single complaint threatens an officer’s entire career. South Korean police officers’ careers are extremely vulnerable, balanced between little professional mobility and losing one’s job due to filed complaints.

From finding Community-Oriented Policing as useless, extreme emotional stress, little pay, and no outlook on promotion, Live shows how South Korean police officers are stuck in their seemingly tiresome positions. As these officers are a key part in the upkeep of a well-running community, the demands on them are undoubtedly high. With this in mind, Live shows the intimate emotional struggles of police officers as a way to discourage the use of complaints by society. By seeing the background stories of officers and understanding the ways in which the increased focus on the community can lead to emotional burnout, viewers walk away with more education on the personal side of policing they do not see.

The Effect of Complaints

 With adverse social pressure on police and a bleak outlook on possible promotion, along with low pay, severe emotional distress in police officers is a common and understandable side effect. Further, as briefly discussed earlier, commonly explored throughout Live is the effect of complaints on officers. The effect of these complaints, either about excessive use of force or other seemingly non-routine actions, can range from a cut in pay to losing one’s job, and in some extreme cases, may result in severe depression. By showing the many effects formal complaints can have on police, as well as the corruption within the Internal Affairs review processes, Live attempts to reveal to viewers the true outcome of their complaint, as a way to discourage South Korean civilians from unnecessarily complaining.

In the beginning episodes of Live, the trainees are routinely ridiculed by their mentors for small mistakes as a way to ensure that seemingly inconsequential missteps do not add to the large pool of civilian distrust. Confirming the fact that small mistakes can have major impacts, Inspector Oh explains to the trainees, “you could have been accused of police brutality and ended your career here” (Ep. 4, 4:30). As it is known that police officers represent a form of symbolic power – their presence is often a public signifier of the “right” and “wrong” (Kwon 2014: 80), this role of public significance is often a large reason for officers to be complicit with the rules, as any mistakes they make are publicly visible. This constant reminder of losing one’s job due to civilian complaints and always conducting oneself in a professional manner is a common theme throughout the series, used as incentive for the officers to act according to the law, and always hold the civilian above one’s self.[3] Even in situations where officers work to protect the safety of society at large, civilians still complain. In attempting to apprehend a drunk driver refusing to take a sobriety test, threatening the lives of numerous civilians, the driver screams out “This is an excessive use of force. Please help me. The police officer just touched my body” (Ep. 18, 3:19-3:25). Although it is obvious that she is only looking for attention, hoping that the officers will let her go, a bystander comments “six officers are here to suppress one woman. That’s ridiculous,” and further question why they are grabbing her head, to which Officer Kim Han-pyo responds “If we don’t, she might get hurt,” attempting to justify these routine police action to a group of civilians who see it as excessive (Ep. 18. 3:27-3:35). Often, civilians are not aware that police officers are trained to use excessive force in some situations (Baker 2017: 684), but while six officers to apprehend one woman may seem a bit overly cautious, viewers know from the previous episodes, that the Hongil Patrol Unit had recently seen another officer shot, and hence calling on extra officers for increased safety seems quite understandable. In this situation, Live attempts to influence their viewership to be more understanding towards the actions of officers, as not only are officers reprimanded by their superiors for small mistakes early on, but the background and justification for the action is hardly known by those being apprehended in the moment.

When looking at the complaint process, it is first important to note that many complaint review bodies consist of both civilian and police force individuals, causing criminology scholar Stephen Savage to ask the question “how ‘civilian’ is civilian control” (2013: 889)? In the final episodes of Live, viewers watch Officer Yeom Sang-su’s job be put at risk through a complaint filed by an individual apprehended for attempted murder. Though unable to be seen on the bodycam footage, the suspect reaches towards Inspector Oh’s gun in an act to harm Officer Yeom, who is attempting to apprehend the suspect. The two shots Officer Yeom fires, though notably in self-defense, completely risks his entire career, as he is accused of using excessive force. The review committee in Officer Yeom’s disciplinary hearing is made up of a mix of individuals: current Korean National Police Agency employees, some neutral civilians, a retired police officer, and a human rights advocate. Ultimately, the committee rules in Officer Yeom’s favor. In sighting Prenzler and Ronken, Savage notes that “police should not investigate police,” yet also refutes this statement by sharing that “cultural proximity between those being investigated and those carrying out the investigations is… an important tool” as too much civilian interference can lead to stinted outcomes (2013: 888, 896). However, in Officer Yeom’s situation, it is only thanks to the civilian oversight on the review committee that he is not fired. Thus, given the previous experience with complaining civilians, it is surprising that the civilians on the review committee are the ones most understanding of Officer Yeom’s situation.[4]

This attempt to vilify the Internal Affairs review process and committee members is further ostracized by Live, as the two Korean National Police Agency employees on Officer Yeom’s disciplinary hearing committee are described as “vipers [who] desperately wants Sang-su gone” (Ep. 18, 49:39). While it is logical that civilian oversight tends to come with a “more critical perspective on the police” (Savage 2013: 897), Live shows that not only are the citizens increasing critical, but Internal Affairs itself is responsible for much of the action taken against officers. In considering Officer Yeom’s position, Senior Inspector Eun Gyeong-mo and An Jang-mi admit that “Sang-su is caught in the power struggle between the police and prosecution,” and may even receive a criminal charge for saving Oh Yang-chon’s life (Ep. 18, 7:05, 9:33). This fear is immediately radiated throughout the entire police force, the other teams at Hong-il Patrol Station employing fewer guns during their patrol shifts because “they think that saving lives will only cause trouble” (Ep. 18, 17:01). This strategic use of words allows Live to remind its viewers than many officers are simply trying to keep the community safe – not intentionally harm individuals. Complaints filed against officers for excessive use of force is even labeled “the police jackpot” (Ep. 15, 16:59), showing citizen awareness of the power of complaints, as their complaints only call on Internal Affairs investigations, who are increasingly critical of police actions.[5]

In a further critique of Internal Affairs, An Jang-mi claims that the “enemies of the police officers aren’t annoying civilian complaints. It’s our country that spits us out after using us” referencing a seemingly corrupt and severe reprimand by her superiors (Ep. 15, 48:45-48:53). While noting that civilian complaints are indeed responsible for much of the hardship officers face, An Jang-mi highlights the lack of protection officers feel they have under Internal Affairs is radiated throughout the series. Complaints are described as things that “dictate” the careers of officers because they are “powerless,” and that “all [Internal Affairs] care[s] about is the manual” rather than their emotional wellbeing and personal safety (Ep. 14, 18:39, Ep. 15, 21:16-21:22). This awareness of a lack of emotional understanding and support from Internal Affairs is further represented by An Jang-mi, who comments on the high suicide rate of police officers,[6] stating “now that I’ve been burned by my own people, I can understand how those statistics came to be” (Ep. 15, 48:11-48:45). This widely accepted understanding displayed by officers illustrates the heightened potential of a disrupted career and negative mental toll through not only civilian complaints, but by the failure of fair representation through Internal Affairs.

In showing the many ways these complaints can affect police officers, Live uses the commonality of filing complaints throughout many episodes as a way to show the harm it has on officers. In many of these situations, Live is careful to ensure that the viewers are able to see the justification of the use of force, so that they sympathize with the officer when a complaint is filed. In most cases, the use of force throughout Live seems somewhat justified, even if it resulted in severe harm to the receiving party. In a further attempt to discourage complaints, Live also shows the corruption within the Internal Affairs review process, attempting to show viewers that their complaints can have a much more negative effect once it is sent for review. With this, Live hopes to encourage its viewers to be more understanding in complaints of excessive use of force, as often, the use of force is not only “justified” but also can have extreme emotional and professional tolls on the officers.

Conclusion

 The popular Korean TV series, Live, employs a number of examples and common experiences held by South Korean police officers as a way to provide background information on the common complaints many South Korean civilians may have. By using emotional burnout, awareness of low pay, possible job loss, and the corruption of Internal Affairs, viewers are asked to sympathize, not only with the fictional officers in Live, but with the real South Korean police officers as well. Viewers are reminded that officers carry a number of stressors and are yet still required to function at an extremely high level to ensure the safety of their civilians, and hence, citizens should be more understanding of mistakes officers make. By filing complaints, viewers are reminded that the effect on officers is likely much larger than they anticipate – and even if the actions taken by officers are routine and justified, their careers can be completely threatened once the Internal Affairs review process takes place. Through highlighting this reality, Live hopes to discourage its viewership from filing complaints, and hence, adopt a more understanding attitude to the officers who work to keep society running smoothly.

Word Count: 3,829

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Ivkovic, Sanja Kutnjak. “Police Integrity in South Korea.” Policing: An International Journal of Police Strategies & Management 35, no. 1 (2012): 76-103.

Kang, Wook, Mahesh K. Nalla. “Perceived Citizen Cooperation, Police Operational Philosophy, and Job Satisfaction on Support for Civilian Oversight of the Police in South Korea.” Asian Journal of Criminology 6, no.2 (2011): 177-189.

Kwak, Hyounggon, Susan McNeely, and Sung-Hwan Kim. “Emotional Labor, Role Characteristics, and Police Officer Burnout in South Korea: The Mediating Effect of Emotional Dissonance.” Police Quarterly 21, no. 2 (2018): 223-249.

Kwon, Jong Bum. “Forging a Modern Democratic Imaginary: Police Sovereignty, Neoliberalism, and the Boundaries of Neo-Korea.” East Asia Cultures Critique 22, no. 1 (2014): 71-101.

Lee, Chang-Hun. “Factors Affecting Strategy Commitment to Community-Oriented Policing (COP) Among South Korean Police Officers.” Policing: An International Journal of Police Strategies & Management 34, no. 4 (2011): 713-734.

Moon, Byongook. “The Politicization of Police in South Korea: A Critical Review.” Policing: An International Journal of Police Strategies & Management 27, no.1 (2003): 128-136.

Morash, M., D. Kwak, V. Hoffman, C. Lee, S. Cho, and B. Moon. “Stressors, coping resources and strategies, and police stress in South Korea.” Journal of Criminal Justice 36 no. 3 (2008):  pp. 231-239.

Savage, Stephen P. “Seeking ‘Civilianness’: Police Complaints and Civilian Control Model of Oversight.” British Journal of Criminology 53, no. 5 (2013): 886-904.

Footnotes

[1] This data is not representative of the entire South Korean police force, but rather a small sample of officers.

[2] This data is not representative of the entire South Korean police force, but rather a small sample of officers.

[3] For interesting statistics regarding what South Korean police officers regard as “excessive force” and acceptable punishment, see: Ivkovic, Sanja Kutnjak. “Police Integrity in South Korea.” Policing: An International Journal of Police Strategies & Management 35, no. 1 (2012): 76-103.

[4] Though notably, it was due to a civilian complaint that Officer Yeom was put in this disciplinary situation in the first place.

[5] Though ironically, it has been noted that the Community Oriented Policing model arose out of complaints with the “lack of robustness associated with the internal affairs approach” (Savage 2013: 888).

[6] Police officers commit suicide more than any other civil employee, and their average lifespan is about 63 years. (Live, ep. 15, 48:11).

Contemporary Views on Pornography in South Korea

Lucius Kang

21903142

DEC. 5, 2018

Word count: 3299 words

INTRODUCTION

Entering the new millennium era, existence and importance of Sexual Explicit Material (SEM) are becoming increasingly common and change is in need more than ever, and adolescents residing in an old fashioned country like South Korea, are no exceptions (Zurcher 2017). South Korea’s old fashioned and non-progressive attitude towards pornography reduces the chances of creating a society that is safe to love. In the paper, in discussion of SEM, we are focusing on pornography, also content of sexual materials can be assumed as discussion of pornography.

The reason why we state South Korea as an old fashioned country that remains conservative is that in Korea, there are number of topics that are refrained for discussion in the society even to this day. Some of these topics include, use of drugs, gambling, and pornography consumption. It is interesting to take note of the fact that the commonality of these 3 examples of morally forbidden topics in Korea is that they are all prohibited in Korea. The Constitutional Law of Korea and the Korean government forbids SEM and this is shown by the Korean government making an attempt to even regulate SEM in social networking site, for example Tumblr (Cho 2017). Perhaps the reason is because it is prohibited in the country, minor population in South Korea are open to propose the topic for discussion (Zurcher 2017) neither at outside with friends nor in inside with family members. There are more consequences of illegalization of pornography and will touch more on those possibilities later in the paper.

Live is a 2018 South Korean television series that tells stories of police officers in South Korea. We found our phenomena watching an episode from Live. In episode 11, as Oh Yang-chon, a police man and a father of a family, walks out speechless from an intense conversation with his son, all of sudden, he finds something to berate and warns his son “if I catch you watching porn one more time, I’ll beat the crap out of you” (ep. 11, 1:08:00 ~ 1:08:08). Although it was short and no huge emphasis was on the scene, the scene caught another student in his youth because rise of pornography exposure and standardization of pornography is something we have gone through growing up as well.

The father’s reaction and his situation are equally as informative as the quote itself. Few seconds before the quote, the two family members were having an argument, and the quote was spoken at a moment the father ended up speechless because how the son proposed an argument, there were no good counterargument. Not only the timing, but after the quote, Oh Yang-chon also quickly left the site as if he was fleeing the area. Although this was a quick scene, we found this interesting to explore and in our opinion, these proposed many evidences of problems in contemporary views on pornography in South Korea.

The quote from episode 11 in Live, suggests the viewers three notable areas of problems of image displayed on pornography in South Korea. Action of the father figure Oh Yang-chon fleeing the site of discussion portrays problems of parenting on pornography in the country. And because Oh Yang-chon said the quote at the moment he found himself speechless, this implies that the intention of the quote was to add a comment on the son’s wrongdoings. This hints us how SEM are displayed and how adolescents in South Korea are educated about pornography. Lastly the quote itself clearly shows the culture in the society and exemplifies a possible consequence of not obeying the cultural norm.

The main purpose of this paper is to explore the modern views on pornography and discuss what and how the views are created, and why the views are either beneficial or not for the adolescent living in the country, with emphasis on three areas: parenting, education and culture of South Korea.

PARENTING

With increase of normality of pornography among youth, parenting is the most important and most influential factor shaping attitudes of adolescents. In the life of an adolescent, there are limited number of relationships that affect their opinion and mindset. We think the critical relationships are parents, teachers and friends. However teachers may not be suitable in the discussion for influence on a Korean student due to low chance of ending up with the same teacher two or more consecutive years is unlikely, especially in a small country with concentrated population like South Korea. Friends, as well as teachers, are not as likely as parents to affect an adolescent’s behaviour since there are many peers around an adolescent in Korea and it makes sense to assume low chances of maintaining one long-lasting friendship enough to have effect on the individual. Accounting for limitations of the two relationships, parent-child relationship is the deciding factor for an adolescent’s viewpoint on a topic, in our case on pornography.

Then the question becomes what do parents think of pornography? It is not difficult to assume that parents, in particular to traditional and old fashioned country like South Korea, do not favor the existence of pornography for their offspring. A researcher named Jessica Zurcher organized a study to obtain information about pornography in parental perspectives. Even though rate of exposure of pornography is increasing and age of first exposure is decreasing, some parents still believe “the perception that pornography is a forbidden topic to discuss” (Zurcher 2017). On top of this, there are other parents that wish to not discuss the topic because they felt pressured to address the topic of pornography with their children subsequent to the study. On the other hand, there are also groups of parents who acknowledged the increase of exposure and normality of pornography, but which many of them share the “not my kid” attitude (Zurcher 2017). Overall fear, discomfort and lack of sexual communication are shown among the parents and their child. Because this exampled study was conducted in a country that legalized SEM and online pornography, we are able to retrieve some information of how parents in a country that illegalized SEM and pornography content, view on the topic.

The Korean drama Live could also provide hints for us about parent-child sexual communication level in South Korea. In the short encounter on the topic, the father Oh Yang-chon and his son do not make eye contact while on the topic (ep. 11, 1:08:00 ~ 1:08:10) and the way the father brought up the topic imply that the very moment is the first time discussing on pornography. We should also note that the son is almost old enough to enter high school. This brings another significant factor in determining an adolescent’s behaviour. Not only on what is projected but also when an idea is projected is equally as important. South Korea has now become a society that 80.3% of male students have watched porn, also of which 69.2% of those had first encountered porn in late elementary school or early secondary school years (Kim and Lee 2010).

Assuming that many and majority of parents in South Korea have negative views on pornography, we enquire why the perspectives of parents matter for their adolescents. Watching internet pornography can lead to increase in sexual impulsivity (Kim and Lee 2010). This finding can only contribute to support the movement of banning SEM; however, we are aware of the fact that the rate of exposure of pornography and normality of pornography are also increasing. Nevertheless, as parent-child communication increases, rate of internet pornography decreases (Kim and Lee 2010). Although watching internet SEM positively correlates with sexual impulsivity, parental communication with the child negatively correlates with usage of internet SEM. Hence, parent-child communication is important and is crucial enough to guide young adolescents to develop their ability to categorize on what is right and wrong.

In addition to non-existence in parent-child communication, disruptive parent-child communication also drives negative effects on the youth. As there are parents who initially wishes not to engage in topic of pornography with their child, some parents react with emotions such as “anger, horrified and explosion” (Zurcher 2017). Their parenting may become more strict, and subsequently deliver more harsh punishments on pornography consumptions. However, suppressive and strict parenting could increase the probability of males engaging in more coercive sexual practices (Simons 2012). This is meaningful for the parents in South Korea in particular, since Korea is one of the countries that practice physical punishment in households (Son et al 2017). It is more than urgent for the people in South Korea, especially the parents, to be mindful of the analysis. Increase rate of males in coercive sexual practices also generates increase victimization of females in coercive sexual practices (Simons 2012), and this is just one example of importance of appropriate parenting. This kind of parenting is clearly demonstrated in Live also in the scene by the father Oh. He directly states that future consequence is whipping as the punishment once the son is caught in action (ep. 11, 1:08:00 ~ 1:08:10).

As clearly illustrated in the scene of Live, the contemporary Korean society is highly exposed to pornography. Simply prohibiting pornography to reduce wrong idea on sexual intercourse has now become ineffective. In fact, parenting is more in need than in past since “Even with exposure to SEM, if an adolescent maintains a healthy communicative environment with the parent, probability decreases for chances of deviational sexual impulsivity, as well as dangerous sexual behaviour” (Kim and Lee 2010).

EDUCATION

Before fixing the problem, one must acknowledge the presence of the problem. In South Korea, the ministry of education remains ignorant on increase in normality of pornography usage among adolescents, and the need for proper education that allow adolescents to fully understand the reason of existence of pornography in the first place.

Improper education on SEM can easily generate improper awareness on SEM. People in this modern era, especially younger generations whom grew up with technology surrounding them, can retrieve information online with ease. No exception is given even in a country that prohibits pornography. And when young users encounter those sexual contents online, whether first time or not, it is more likely that they will start to believe what they are seeing. Perhaps if the first sexual videos encountered incorporate violence and threat, it is more likely that the viewer treat violence and threat as part of sexual intercourse. In fact, paraphilic SEM users were found to overlap between pornography and sexual myths, as well as marked higher average score on the sexual compulsiveness scale (Štulhofer et al 2008). If one was accustomed to paraphilic sexual contents, we can anticipate the one to have higher level of sexual boredom. These are some of impacts of lack of proper education that leads to adolescents to ‘believe what you are seeing’. To prevent any more effects like these, the South Korean government “need to improvise a method that incorporates contents that would increase media literacy and assist young people in critical interpretation of pornographic imagery” (Štulhofer et al 2008).

While improper education lead to alternative genre like paraphilic sexual content, it could also impact an individual on his/her ability to deduce his/her own right and wrong. Without proper sexual education, an adolescent’s logic could adapt to other negative contents and become impaired to reason rationally on their own standard. The problem arises on surface as youth sexting, in addition to problem of increase in sexual impulsivity, has also become significant in the online society in South Korea (Song 2018). Rate of increase of young Koreans taking part in sexting community is disastrous demonstration of lack and the need of sexual education, not even the foundational education about importance on themselves.

Since online pornography are widely and conveniently available, instead of putting effort to prevent confrontation, we can help shape SEM as a learning module for the adolescents. Although some of SEM engage wrongdoings such as child pornography, rape, or violence, teachers in the country and the ministry of education can utilize pornography videos to teach “awareness and acceptance that sex can be pleasurable” (McKee 2010). After all, what pornography consumers desire on consumption is to feel relaxed and enjoy the pleasure about sex. Nevertheless there are flaws on using pornography as educational purposes. Pornography is excellent to teach the beauty of sexual intercourse and understand their attitudes towards sexuality. However, pornography fails to teach about safety about sex. Sexual education in South Korea is still insufficient, not solely because of the ministry of education of Korea but also with tendency of many adults in Korea to avoid the topic, which includes group of teachers. Therefore, the general public and the ministry of education should focus their attention to discover a new solution to address missing components of SEM for educational purposes, instead of simply prohibiting pornography.

Rather than simply punishing an adolescent on engagement in online SEM, people of South Korea, particularly people associated with the ministry of education, should assort pros and cons of pornography. If properly used, this model can infer adolescents to enhance both an understanding of the beauty of sexual intercourse and an awareness of safety in reality.

CULTURE

Aside from parenting and education, we suspect culture to account vast remaining of effects on adolescents’ view and interpretation of pornography. We will discuss cultural influences in three separate categories. One, being relationship with peers and second, societal problems in modern trend for students and lastly, South Korea being a country that practices collectivism.

“Like attracts like” (Ball 2012) is a perfect analogy for peer relationships among adolescents. A peer relationship is built when two or more share common ideas and the relationship strengthens when the peers share common interest. South Korea is known as one of collectivistic cultures (Morling et al 2008); the trait is also prevalent in schools. Small minority, particularly in youth than old, feel fine alone, outside of a peer circle (Abou-ezzeddine et al 2007). It is difficult to adapt to a new way of thinking, yet it is much easier to adapt to a new habit. Consequently, adolescents become adapted to surrounding peers’ habits. In a discussion of pornography, adolescents who befriend delinquent boys (also known as Bi-hang-cheong-so-nyun) are more likely and are easily exposed to SEM (Yang 2016). Not only this, an adolescent who lacks in bonding ability with other peers is more likely to remain exposed on pornography (Yang 2016). This behaviour can be interpreted as an adolescent’s own way of desire to fulfill the sense of belonging.

Similar to adolescents approaching pornography to fulfil their minimum human interactions, pornography is also a way of escape for the system of modern Korean society. For the people in South Korea, the most important event as students is the college entrance exam. Focus on the exam has shifted to its maximum severity in the modern society, and such culture minimizes other realistic interactions such as hanging out with friends. Consequently, adolescents return to the online world and online pornography to find a pleasure in their lives (Yang 2016).

Other than peer cultures in an adolescent’s life, the societal culture, collectivistic culture carry effects on child’s interpretation of pornography. A collectivistic culture Widely known collectivistic country, South Korea, practices a trend to “abide by the norms and conform to community standard” (Lo et al 2010), which is to disapprove internet pornography, along with pre- and extra- martial sex. South Korea has long history of sacrifices of sexual pleasure: cases also referred to as wianbu (Lie 1995). Wianbu had to unethically serve Japanese, American, and even Korean soldiers during and after the Japanese colonial era (Lie 1995). We think that one of theoretical reason as to why South Korea still tries to regulate porn and sex industry may be to express country’s recognition of the Wianbu and to put on mourning for them nationally. As demonstrated above, South Koreans practicing collectivism can result as either increase in pornography to behave collectively with others or decrease in pornography to conform with the norm that internet pornography is detrimental.

South Korea is a collective society that have sympathy for its history on sexual intercourse, and is more likely to disapprove internet pornography to better conform with surrounding culture. Nevertheless, relationships among the people in the country have adapted to isolation and online interactions. Hence, culture displays how people in South Korea still need therefore search for online pornography.

DISCUSSION

This paper explores the phenomena of modern views on pornography in South Korea by examining some of causes and effects of SEM exposure. Three areas that are examined are parenting, education and cultural influences.

Findings of this paper can be summarized as follows. First, pornography exposure has increased and normality of pornography has also increased in Korea. Second, negative and ignorant parenting can make child to become unfavourable in relationships due to exposure to pornography. Third, adequate parenting reduces the possibility of child become someone not favored as stated in the second finding. Fourth, without proper sexual education, chances of adapting not favored characteristics in paraphilic SEM increases significantly. Fifth, with addition of few awareness, pornography exposure can become one of sexual education. Sixth, number of humane relationships negatively correlates to probability of exposure on pornography.

The cultural aspect of the examination is used to determine the likeliness of pornography consumption. Traditionally, the nation is collectivistic and hence is assumed to disapprove SEM along with others. Nonetheless, South Korean society deprives more human relationships as time elapse (Yang 2016). This results in increase of desire among adolescents to find elsewhere to fulfil the lacking comfort, and urgently capture any chances to fit in, which often requires share of common interest like pornography.

The educational aspect of the examination states to understand the capability of pornography as an educational purpose. It is clear that sexual education is essential to comprehend sexual activity appropriately to reduce likelihood of destructive behaviours. Destructive behaviours include sexting, sexual compulsivity and all others that harms safety of oneself. One idea we may suggest is that use of pornography can be beneficial for adolescents as it already portrays that “sex can be pleasurable” (McKee 2010). With address of few safety concerns, adolescents that are surrounded by exposures of pornography may better understand the beauty of love.

As it is the most influential factor of three areas of comparison, parenting proposes its role and its effects. With more than three quarters of students in Korea are engaged in pornography, it is also crucial to remember the positive correlation between sexual impulsivity and SEM. Not only are rate exposure to pornography increasing, but age of first exposure to SEM decrease. The society consists of more than half of adolescents to encounter pornography before junior year in middle school. Additionally, the fact that increase in parent-child communication connects to negative correlation with both the rate of SEM and paraphilic impulsivity is crucial. Because first exposure and rate of exposure is increasing and happening sooner, people in Korea, especially the adults and parents, need to begin to stop being ignorant and become open minded for change on views on pornography.

Even though it is significant that parenting is the most significant factor in shaping the perspective on online pornography, the remaining two areas contribute significantly to enquire the need for change in the Korean society. Live is a television series that reflects modern problems occurring in South Korea, and it provides insight on reality of contemporary parenting, as well as education and culture on pornography. In the drama, Oh Yang-chon’s reaction and attitude toward pornography is the old fashioned Korean. If people in South Korea start by acknowledging than to ignore, if they begin to explain than to punish younger generations unlike Oh Yang-chon, and if they initiate respect for another, we believe the South Korean society can become more safe, stable and trustworthy.

Bibliography

Abou-ezzeddine, Tania, Schwartz, David, Chang, Lei, Lee-Shin, Yoolim, Farver, JoAnn, Xu, Yiyuan. “Positive Peer Relationships and Risk of Victimization in Chinese and South Korean Children Peer Groups.” Social Development vol. 16, no. 1 (2007): 106-27.

Ball, Philip. “Like Attracts Like?” Nature, 2012. https://www.nature.com/news/like-attracts-like-
1.10698 (accessed 12/05/2018)

Cho, Mu-Hyun. “​Tumblr Rejects Korea’s Porn Deletion Requests.” ZDNet. September 25, 2017.

https://www.zdnet.com/article/tumblr-rejects-koreas-porn-deletion-requests/ (accessed 12/05/2018).

Kim, Bo Hwa, and Lee Jung Yoon. “The Relationship between Adolescents Pornography Contact and Sexual Impulsivity: Moderating Effects of Self-control, Parents-Adolescents Communication and School Adjustment.” Korea Journal of Counseling 11, no. 3 (2010): 1221-236.

Lie, John. “The Transformation Of Sexual Work In 20Th-Century Korea.” Gender & Society 9, no. 3 (1995): 310-27.

Lo, Ven-Hwei, Clement Y.k. So, and Guoliang Zhang. “The Influence of Individualism and Collectivism on Internet Pornography Exposure, Sexual Attitudes, and Sexual Behavior among College Students.” Chinese Journal of Communication3, no. 1 (2010): 10-27.

McKee, Alan. (2010). “Does pornography harm young people?” Australian Journal of Communication, vol. 3, no. 1, (2010): 17-36.

Morling, Beth, and Marika Lamoreaux. “Measuring Culture Outside the Head: A Meta-Analysis of Individualism—Collectivism in Cultural Products.” Personality and Social Psychology Review, vol. 12, no. 3, 2008, pp. 199–221.

No Hee-kyung, writier. “Live” In Live, directed by Kim Kyu-Tae. TvN. 03/10/2018.

Simons, Leslie Gordon, Ronald L. Simons, Man-Kit Lei, and Tara E. Sutton. “Exposure to Harsh Parenting and Pornography as Explanations for Males’ Sexual Coercion and Females’ Sexual Victimization.” Violence and Victims 27, no. 3 (2012): 378-95.

Son, Heimi, Lee Young Ae, Ahn Dong Hyun, and Doan, Stacey N. “Maternal Understanding of Child Discipline and Maltreatment in the United States, South Korea, and Japan.” Children and Youth Services Review, vol. 82, (2017):  444-454.

Song, Juyoung, Tae Min Song, and Jin Ree Lee. “Stay Alert: Forecasting the Risks of Sexting in Korea Using Social Big Data.” Computers in Human Behavior 81 (2018): 294-302.

Štulhofer, Aleksandar, Vesna Buško, and Ivan Landripet. “Pornography, Sexual Socialization, and Satisfaction Among Young Men.” Archives of Sexual Behavior 39, no. 1 (2008): 168-78.

Yang, Sook-Ja. “The Effects of Parenting and Peers on Pornography Media Engagement.” The Journal of the Korea Contents Association 16, no. 8 (2016): 729-42.

Zurcher, Jessica D. “Exploring Descriptive Norms of Parent-child Communication about Pornography among Parents of Middle-schoolers in the US.” Journal of Children and Media 11, no. 4 (2017): 381-98.

Synopsis:

In the last episode of Live, the media has portrayed the actions of the police, specifically Sang Su, as an act of violence and danger to the public. While the media has intentionally opted out significant details of the incidence and the upper ranks prioritizing public relations,  justice was bestowed and Sang Su’s actions were declared as rational and fulfilling the duties of the police. As the story was approaching its ending, things turned out well for everyone and Oh Yang Chon returned to the police force being fully recovered.

Discussion:

The issue of being framed through the media exists in every part of the world. While these act of framing may be through the utilization of fake news, it can also happen, just like in Live, by leaving out essential information about the situation. It was said through one of the actors in the drama that “people aren’t even interested in things like that,” (ep. 18, 37:50) and that what only concerns the public and media coverage is the end result. News broadcasting agencies were primarily established todeliver and inform the public about issues but as capitalism became more dominant, the main priority of news agencies became viewership, even if it came to using phrases or words to frame people to be murderers when they are actually heroes.

As citizens and people tend to believe what they see and hear in the news to be fully true, the rate at which these information travel in Korea is extremely fast and during the travelling period, what was spoken as a “could be” turns into a fact with a negative connotation. Canada is about a 100 times larger than the size of Korea but ironically, Korea has approximately 16 million more people. We can imagine how fast information can travel in such a densely populated area.

One example which demonstrates this is the case of Youtuber Yang Ye Won and the owner of the photo studio that caused numerous uprisings and debates. To summarize the incident, the Youtuber filed a suit against the photo studio owner that she was sexually abused and forced to take nude photo shoots. However, messages exchanged between the two showed otherwise. While this story was one of the hottest topics during the summer of 2018, news travelled extremely fast and the media took part on what was only interesting and information that could bring more viewership to their channels. Being framed as a perverted freak, the owner of the photo studio committed suicide with a will that reportedly vented his frustration about the investigation in his letter. He claimed that it will not be fair to him and that the police and the media only want to listen to the victim (Rapir, 2018). It is too early to conclude whether who’s the real victim as the trial is still ongoing ,but Yang’s statement about the incident did not match the evidences so far.

According to a study by professor Wedding from University of Missouri-Columbia, one of the main reasons for people who consider suicide is due to being victims of bullying (Wedding, 2008). From the previous example, it is still not concluded that the owner actually did what he is being accused of; yet, people around him and the whole country hated him the day after the incident went viral, from a single statement, not a fact. The hatred that not only the owner had to endure, but also his friends and family that were also being bullied by the country.

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Discussion Questions:

1. Do you think framing comes from a biased viewpoint or are done intentionally to draw public attention?
2. How can we educate the public that not everything they see in the media/news are true?

Bibliography:

Wedding, D. (n.d.). Commonalities Between Suicide in Korea, Japan and the United States. Retrieved from https://dmh.mo.gov/docs/mentalillness/wedding.pdf.

Rapir, J. (2018, July 10). Yang Ye Won Sexual Harassment Case Update: Studio Director Involved In Case Commits Suicide, Leaves Will. Retrieved from http://en.koreaportal.com/articles/45952/20180710/yang-ye-won-sexual-harassment-case-update-studio-director-involved-in-case-commits-suicide-leaves-will.htm

Synopsis:

In episode 16 of Live, the Hongil Police force is shocked from the incident of an officer being shot in the head by a criminal. Another stabbed victim is found lying on the streets. An unmarried woman abandons her child in a box and reports to the Hongil Police force.

Discussion:

Parenting is difficult, but making the life changing decision to become a parent is even more difficult. In episode 16, aside from all chaotic situations for the police officers, viewers are introduced to a new supporting character: a lady and her newborn. The way she is presented ties back to modern contemporary issue for many women in Korea; she is first portrayed as an unwed mother who is abandoned by her boyfriend, or her newborn’s father, and is scared of her future because of the situation she is in.

In her introduction, we are able to sense the difference in perception among couples in Korea. In her call with someone who seems to be the father, we are able to retrieve 3 information about the father: whereabouts, state and his opinion on the newborn. First, where he is right now is unknown. The father and the boyfriend of the unwed mother appear to have ran off, or jam-soo-ta-da without telling the partner. Second, we know that the father did not want the baby and is understandable that he is scared but nonetheless irresponsible for he also took a role in creating the baby. Most importantly, the phone call infer us about the father’s view on the child in contrast to the mother. I think it is fair to assume that the father ran-off because the baby might change their whole lives, more likely in a bad way. Whereas, the mother seems to feel her motherly dues and her responsibility on the matter; she wants to try at least.

I see the father figure as a metaphor for the modern remaining patriarchal society within South Korea. Raising a newborn before marriage comes not only with much responsibilities but also with much more criticism, especially in Korea because it hints others that the couple has disregarded the social norm such as ‘sex before marriage’. As a result of negative social perception, additional problems, such as abandonment of newborns become apparent. Unfortunately, later in the episode, we encounter the “baby box” (ep. 16, 1:00:35). Baby box is the box that made it possible for parents to anonymously abandon their child (Chang and Cavicchi 2015).

While problems of being a single mother rise potentially due to the stress of negative social perception, it is also the potential cause of newborn abandonment. But it doesn’t end there as some of the orphans are adopted in a secret, once again due to negative social perception (Evans 2015). As this seems to be a cycle of negative influences, Korea as a society need to work toward becoming a individualistic society for them to ignore and handle situations in their own way, instead of conforming with the standard norm.

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Bibliography:

Chang, Paul Y. and Cavicchi, Andrea Kim. “Claiming Rights: Organizational and Discursive Strategies of the Korean Adoptee and Unwed Mothers Movement.” Korea Observer, Vol. 46, No. 1, Spring (2015): 145-180.

Evans, Stephen. “Taking on South Korea’s Adoption Taboo.” BBC News. January 06, 2015. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-30692127. (Accessed 11/9/2018)

I ask you to consider:

1. Some research has shown that even 45% of the homes in America are fatherless (); yet, South Korea is in top 5 countries that send out orphans to other countries. What do these numbers imply as to the difference in two cultures and how they deal with social perception?
2. The Korean law was changed so the unwanted children of unwed Korean mothers had to be registered before adoption. What are your thoughts on this change? Consider how adoption or views on adoption has changed in Korea.
3. What are your thoughts on the “baby box”?

Synopsis:

The drama starts with Song Hye-Ri helping his dad at her home. She asks her dad why he continues to work, despite severely injuring himself from the work and also asks if he is not scared at all. His father replies saying that he is scared, but if he runs away his life will be over and being scared is not a bad thing but something that helps one to be cautious. Later the scene portrays An Jang-Mi being used as a scapegoat for the higher ups to avoid getting disciplinary actions. She shouts in anger telling them that they are cowards who hide behind a woman’s back to keep their positions. After the scene moves to Min Su-Man who is trying to commit suicide by burning himself in the car. Ki Han-Sol and Lee Sam-Bo who are his close friends, tries to calm him down so that he does not take action. However, Min Su-Man does set himself on fire, but Yeom Sang-Su and Oh Yang-Chon manages to put out the fire and rescues him. Kim Min-Seok is in a similar situation as Min Su-Man and the person who is obviously lying that he got injured because Kim Min-Seok pushed him to the ground is asking for 50 million Won as a settlement price. Later in the story the officers tries to help Kim Min-Seok by doing a fundraising campaign. Near the end of the episode a man barges into the convenient store and starts drinking. The worker tries to stop the man but the worker gets beat up. Oh Yang-Chon and others along with the other officer from the Myeongu department shows up to the scene and tries to stop the culprit. However, the other officer gets shot in the head and the episode ends.

Discussion:

In the drama live, viewers are introduced to the hardships of old people and people with disabilities living in Korea. Min Su-Man a former officer who is disabled due to accident from his work as an officer, Ki Han-Sol who has cancer and Lee Sam-Bo who is trying to pass the exam to become a heavy equipment operator after retiring from his work as an officer shares one common thing and that is poverty. “With rapid aging, many of the elderly suffer from poverty and high healthcare needs” (Ito, Jeon, Kwon, Noguchi and Tamiya 2017, 175). In Korea, many people that works for the government such as police officers are forced to continue working to earn and save up money despite being retired from the old job. This is due to earning minimum income [they do not get enough pension for their retirement plan] and at the same time, their healthcare price increasing (Ito, Jeon, Kwon, Noguchi and Tamiya 2017, 175). For elderly with disabilities are in worse situation than a normal elderly person because they “are not protected by both income and health systems for the policies of the disabled and those for the elderly are not mutually linked in many social security areas” (Ito, Jeon, Kwon, Noguchi and Tamiya 2017, 176). I believe that Korea is one of the countries to have a bad healthcare and pension system for people who are over 60 and especially for people with disabilities. For example, Canada has great health care system and pension plans for people that are old and for people with disabilities and because of that, they are living in stable life compared to people in Korea. Also Korea is one of the countries for strongly discriminating people with disabilities. “Microaggression refers to diverse discriminatory acts that are incessant, often gratuitous, and subtle offenses to certain categories of human beings because of their ethnicity, culture, sexual orientation, or disability” (Park 2017, 919). In Korea they are people “who have been isolated and excluded in South Korea” (Park 2017, 919). Many news and articles are stating that Korea’s negative views on disability people are changing rapidly for the better (Park 2017, 918). However, I believe that it will take tremendous time for Korea to accept people with disabilities and elderly people with poverty like the other developed countries. In conclusion, Korea is a country where people with disabilities and elderly with poverty are not suitable to live in the cruel society, unless a proper action is taken for those people to survive the cruel society in Korea.

Questions:

1. How are the pension systems and health care systems in Canada or any other countries compared to Korea? Are they better or worse?
2. Why do you think the discrimination for disabilities in Korea are this serious? Why can’t the society accept them?
3. How is the discrimination in North America? Do they treat people with disabilities equal to other healthy people?

Bibliography:

Park, Jung Youn. “Disability Discrimination in South Korea: Routine and Everyday Aggressions toward Disabled People.” Disability & Society 32, no. 6 (2017): 918-22. doi:10.1080/09687599.2017.1321223

Jeon, Boyoung, Haruko Noguchi, Soonman Kwon, Tomoko Ito, and Nanako Tamiya. “Disability, Poverty, and Role of the Basic Livelihood Security System on Health Services Utilization among the Elderly in South Korea.” Social Science & Medicine178 (February 14, 2017): 175-83. Accessed September 27, 2018. doi:10.1016/j.socscimed.2017.02.013.