Comments on: Peace In Our Time?

By: baduk

baduk — Wed, 10 Aug 2005 17:10:47 +0000

And, speaking about Starbucks,
link

I guess 1,000 Starbucks he has yet to visit are all in Korea. I saw a Starbuck in every block while I was in Seoul.

By: baduk

baduk — Wed, 10 Aug 2005 15:45:39 +0000

That 60Minute segment on “Anti-Americanism in Korea” about two years ago was so one-sided. The reporters came and only covered anti-American activists. (10% of Koreans. F***ups).

And, that stupid general (Gen. Campbell) cried on the live TV. A army general crying in live TV. What was he thinking?

Talk about media manipulation!

By: baduk

baduk — Wed, 10 Aug 2005 15:34:40 +0000

I have recently visited Korea. Kangnam area had a hiphop club called “Brooklyn” near the Kangnam subway station which was blazing HipHop music and many foreigners walking around with Korean girlfriends. Nobody said nothing. Actually, many Koreans were welcoming these foreigners.

Everybody was smiling. That stupid incident about school girls were long forgotten. Now it is passe to be pro-North. Only losers support NK regime.

Korean people are changing fast. Two years are like a decade in the States. They are becoming more pragmatic. The U.S. military presence is necessary, but Koreans are not going to beg for the U.S. forces to stay. Americans are welcome to do as they please.

This should be the way. The U.S. should not play a “princess”. Koreans want to meet Americans in equal footing. This is cool for Americans. True Americans want to play equal partners, not manipulators.

By: baduk

baduk — Wed, 10 Aug 2005 15:19:51 +0000

Joshua,

Visit Hongik U. in Seoul. Koreans are pro-American. The 2003 anti-American wave is over. Koreans are going GaGa over American movies, American culture, American look(plastic surgery) and especially over Starbucks.

By: Joshua

Joshua — Wed, 10 Aug 2005 05:57:09 +0000

Kushibo, Do you have any statistical data or other evidence to back your assertion that Koreans are pro-American?

Antti, I have written to the HRC inviting them to correct the record if Don Kirk’s report is wrong. I’ll publish their response in full if I get one, but Don Kirk is a very seasoned Korea reporter, and I have no basis for believing that he got this one wrong.

Just for moral clarity’s sake, I also asked them to opine on statues of Kim Il Sung.

By: foreigner

foreigner — Wed, 10 Aug 2005 05:51:37 +0000

You guys are probably correct–that’s one less idiotic pronouncement the commission has made.

By: The Marmot

The Marmot — Wed, 10 Aug 2005 05:49:29 +0000

Let me second Antti’s comment (#33) — I have yet to find anything indicating the Human Rights Commission issued such an opinion on the MacArthur statue, and if it had, I’m 100 percent certain every major conservative paper in the country would have run editorials denouncing it. The apparent lack of said editorials leads me to believe that an error was made in the CSM piece.

By: foreigner

foreigner — Wed, 10 Aug 2005 05:45:28 +0000

Kush, I think Korea’s anti-Americanism is fundamentally its insecurity over its self-determination, and quite different from a few lefties in Japan who don’t like Bush or whatever. I’ll grant you that it might seem more feverish these days than it “actually” is because of the current government (in Korea).

By: Kushibo

Kushibo — Wed, 10 Aug 2005 05:31:14 +0000

Foreigner (#34), I brought up the Japanese because I’m so sick of hearing all this griping about Korea’s anti-Americanism based on some things (like the stat about what percent believes the U.S. is the greatest threat to security) that are not all the different from Japan, which is touted as very pro-American. It’s a selective reading, or a misunderstanding, of both countries.

By: gbnhj

gbnhj — Wed, 10 Aug 2005 05:19:15 +0000

Kushibo, all of what you write speaks of pragmatism, not love. Come, now - ‘the American market is the ideal place to sell one’s products’? Surely this is related to profit, and not amity. American-style English is not taught here out of love, but out of a sober, reasoned choice made long ago to use the de-facto international language of commerce, and pragmatism continues its practice. And, love them or not, American movies do not draw the crowds here as they used to, yet for pragmatic reasons, Korean filmmakers do desire a screen quota.

I won’t continue, for I’m going to bed, but love would seem to have little to do with it.