The Marmot’s Hole

2 Comments

1. virtual wonderer
   Posted December 17, 2004 at 6:12 am | Permalink

   Very interesting speech by Hong that Orankay posted. I thought Hong was very “right-on” until I read, “There is no question that the United States did not help temper this anti- American sentiment.”
   I can agree with this if it wasn’t for the fact that Hong continues, “U.S. government’s position of treating this accident…. from the Korean point of view expressing sincere sympathy, understanding, and remorse…” I think all the netizens are savvy enough to know that those kids with candles wanted nothing less than the execution of the two U.S. servicemen in question–that this is what Hong probably means when he says, “expressing sincere sympathy, understanding, and remorse…” This talk about SOFA is just a sugar sprinkled way of saying, “Yankee Go Home.”

   Well, I still have to hand it to Pres No for actually putting a media man as an ambasador. All that talk of Jo-Joong-Dong vs. No was depressing. Funny thing about OhMyNews that Hong is attributed to say. I wonder if the New York Times journalist would have said all those nice platitudes about OhMy if they could read it in the original Korean.

2. slim
   Posted December 17, 2004 at 2:16 pm | Permalink

   It is worth remembering from 11/02 that the outpouring of nationalism and mob psychology was so strong than no Korean media outlet could withstand pressure to put jingoism before journalism. Thus all poured fuel on the fire, failing to report the accurate details of the June accident, distorting the easily checkable facts about the SOFA and continuing to demand U.S. apologies after many were given. Some of the mainstream outlets, perhaps Hong’s JoongAng, started regretting (although not acknowledging) this media malpractice AFTER it began having negative ramifications for South Korea-U.S. ties. But nothing I’ve seen or read since gives me confidence that it couldn’t happen again.