UPDATE 5: Irony alert—the Boston Globe reports that South Korean officials are joining the fray on “So Far From the Bamboo Grove.” Old news, actually, but still ironic. (HT to jiwonsi)
UPDATE 4: Congratulations to the Chosun Ilbo for actually mentioning the Simon Wiesenthal Center by name. Don’t expect much enlightenment in the comment section, however.
UPDATE 3: According to a press release by Gimm-Young Publishers (and reported by Yonhap), Prof. Rhie Won-bok sent a letter to the Korean American Coalition (KAC) “deeply apologizing” for the distress he caused. He also said he would correct the problematic sections.
But—there’s always a but—Rhie said his work did not stem from anti-Semitism and he had no intention of slandering Jews when he wrote it.
He also said he hoped that the incident wouldn’t become a burden on Korean American-Jewish friendship and cooperation.
Marmot’s Note: Leaving aside for a moment Rhie’s “I didn’t mean to slander Jews” tripe, or his apologizing for “causing concern” (when he should be apologizing for teaching racism to kids), why is Prof. Rhie sending a letter of apology to Korean-Americans? I mean, he probably does owe them an apology for bringing them into his anti-Semitic rant, but shouldn’t the apology be going to a Jewish-American group? I haven’t read the press release, but I hope it’s something like KAC got Suzanne Scholte’s letter (see below) and kindly asked the good professor, “WTF?” Unless, of course—and I’d hate to imagine this to be the case, so please fill me in if you’re in the know—Rhie is apologizing to Korean-Americans for making those all-powerful Jews controlling the “Great Jewish Wall” angry at them.
PS: The comments at Naver.com, of course, are probably worth reading if you’ve got a strong stomach.
ORIGINAL POST: Finally—a Korean news provider picks up the story. Broadcaster MBC ran a piece this morning on how Jews in the U.S. were protesting cartoonist Rhie Won-bok’s anti-Semitic descriptions in his popular comic book series “Far Country, Near Country.”
The Naver.com comments section (583 so far) is not pretty, of course. The more humorous comments were along the lines of, “But how did the Jews know? It’s written in Korean…” Honestly, though, if I were Naver.com, I might be concerned about some of the commentary, especially the Hitler comments…
UPDATE: SBS is on the story, too. Interestingly enough, it also reports that Defense Forum Foundation President Suzanne Scholte sent an email to Korean-American politicians apparently asking them to condemn Rhie’s comic book as well. Personally, I wouldn’t have taken it that far, although given the kinds of things Rhie was saying (things like Jews keep Korean-Americans down), it would have been nice for Korean-American leaders to come out on their own and condemn the book (not that I blame them for not–as far as I know—doing so. I’d be surprised if more than a hand-full of KoAms have even heard of the book, and at any rate, it’s not like they have a collective responsibility to respond each and every time a Korean-Korean writes something stupid).
SBS also reports that “some people” are calling the criticism an “oversensitive” reaction to descriptions taken out context. I found that particularly rich coming on the heals of the “So Far from the Bamboo Grove” uproar. Nevertheless, SBS concluded by saying that many are pointing out the need to handle this situation with care lest the incident harm relations between Jews and Korean-Americans (read: “Essentially reprinting the Protocols of the Elders of Zion in comic-book form for students really isn’t all that bad—although encouraging students to read books suggesting that Korean communists may have raped Japanese settlers at the end of WW II is—but we need to do something lest the Jews get angry at Korean-Americans. They control the banks and the media, after all”).
UPDATE 2: Prometheus makes the logical comparison between “So Far from the Bamboo Grove” and Rhie’s comic book… and then amazingly misses the point. But can you blame them when so far, the mainstream media has failed to explain what those oversensitive, nationalist American Jews are upset about?
{ 8 trackbacks }
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Regarding those comments at Naver…
Yikes!!! So much for the argument that Koreans are apathetic toward Jews. It’s like Pawi jumped into a swimming pool and spawned a bunch of little Pawi gremlins over there.
Iceberg—It’s a real shame. At this point, you’d think Naver.com might have figured out that some of us CAN read what is being written. I mean, Jesus, if Occidentalism.org is a “hate site,” what does that make Korea’s largest portal site and third-most influential news source?
Now, that being said, I’m loath to draw general conclusions about entire peoples from the character of online discussion. Internet forums tend to bring out the wackos, after all. But I also think the discussion over there has pretty much stuck a fork in the debate over whether anti-Semitism exists in Korea…
You’re absolutely correct. I didn’t mean to imply that all Koreans are like those commenting at Naver. But obviously there is a decent-sized segment of the population who are harboring some serious animosity.
By the way…I used to wonder why, upon learning that I could understand Korean, many Koreans would respond by saying “무서워”. Hmmmmmm.
Oh, I didn’t mean to imply that you were saying that, either. I just wanted to make it clear that I wasn’t tarring the entire population of the Republic of Korea because of bad netizen behavior at Naver.com.
Here is a classic comment from the naver news story you linked.
“필독!!! 미국을 움직이는 유대인들”
A must read!!! The Jews that control America.
LOL.
“It’s not like they have a collective responsibility to respond each and every time a Korean-Korean writes something stupid…” Japan, on the other hand….
Will any Korean media or politician condemn Rhie’s idiotic books? Probably not. No, almost certainly not.
it’s all a conspiracy. naver is controlled by the jews! er…
imo, the fact that mbc and sbs is reporting this a good step forward. the problem with the general commenters, and the general korean population, is that many are shallow thinkers. one, they don’t realize the double standardness of this case and the “So Far From The Bamboo Grove.” i also think many koreans are/were apathethic toward the jews. however, they see this case as jewish people attacking one of their own, and hence, the korean culture, and have to resort to writing the jewish stereotypes to make themselves feel better.
i’ve been in so many conversations with koreans about world issues and they twist and chop arguments in a way that you can never come away thinking at least you opened their minds little bit. i love korea, but people like those commenters just make me shake my head. who the f*ck do these people think they are.
seoulmilk – “who the f*ck do these people think they are.”
The chosen ones?
Correction: The Chosun ones.
I’m not even sure if the reports are a step forward. They certainly don’t criticize Rhie’s claims. And SBS—indirectly, of course—tried to suggest that Jews were overreacting and that the stuff attributed to Rhie was taken out of context, which is bullshit on both counts.
it’s just frustrating to see koreans never accepting faults. i mean, they feel the need to defend a fellow korean even when he’s wrong. the weather is too nice outside for me to get frustrated about this.
When under attack by outside forces you’ll hear no criticism from the hive mind of one of their own.
Were Jews around the world to go down to their local ROK embassy or consulate and start burning flags, fighting with police, cutting off fingers, and calling for a boycott of South Korean products, I’d say they would be overreacting. Strangely enough, I’m not expecting that to happen.
I mentioned Rhie’s comics over dinner to a few of my in-laws – who happen to be extremely nice people – a week or so ago, but they assured me that anything negative contained within couldn’t possibly have any harmful impact on young Koreans because they’re only comic books, not textbooks. I could have argued that comic books and other forms of entertainment likely make a stronger impression (unfortunately) on young people than school books, both in Korea and abraod, but chose – wisely, I think – to have some more galbi and let the conversation drift back to MBC dramas, Lee Dong-guk’s future stardom in the English Premier League, etc.
The rabbi who wrote the letter to the publishing company has a bit of a history with Korea. If you go to the SW website and search “korea,” you’ll find all kinds of interesting links.
Rabbi Cooper was in Seoul collecting information from North Korean refugees about the camps being run in North Korea. The center has also asked the new Korean leader of the UN to try to get it together and bring charges against the officials in North Korea who are responsible for running the “special camps” for the disabled. He was in Japan in 2001 talking with members of the government about opening all of their records from the Second World War, including any and all information related to comfort women.
Too bad the Naver Koreans would never bother to find out the type of people who are reaching out to them.
As a side note, when I was a kid my Jewish friends and I dreamed of working at places like the SWC, because we all wanted to grow up to be Nazi hunters. It never crossed our childish minds that these types of groups might be doing other types of important work.
And then you have dimwits like this (trackbacked to the Naver.com piece).
It’s almost funny…
This seems like the basic injustice in Rhie’s and Bever’s situations. Most people are fine with the ideas that someone stirs up a big AND unnecessary controversy and they get canned.
The injustice is that Bever’s seems to have some documented evidence supporting his claim about those rocks, but his case is ignored and denied (by locals) without any consideration of his arguments’ merits.
And, at the same time, the ignorant, racist libel that Rhie parades as socio-historical fact is accepted by the local without consideration of actual nature of his racist claims. Note that the news is reporting, in effect, that Rhie’s situation is regretable for only one reason. Korean people are bothered by this only because of the possible repercussions on Korean people as a result Jewish people’s reactions.
Western society is focused on educating according to the power of reason. However, in Asia it is instead focused on Confucianism, filial piety and obedience to social superiors.
It’s like Huntington’s clash of civilizations, except in far east Asia.
The injustice of Bever’s case is the flip side of Rhie’s case, that his arguments were/are intially dismissed without an admission that there EVEN COULD be a shred of truth in them.
“cm” said it best: Koreans have not had sufficient time to develop a sense of empathy.
We need to be understanding.
Sine qua non, please don’t drag me into your bullshit discussion of Mr. Bever’s firing, I don’t know him and haven’t said anything about him here.
Sorry, but this sounds like the typical Korean excuse.
“Please, understand North Korea’s situation.”
I do understand. What I understand is that the people here, if they want to live peacefully with other countries, is that Korean people need to get off their lazy asses and look at others with respect.
It’s in the Korean language. Addressing another using the honorific form of the language, essentially, indicates that that people being addressed is superior and thus worthy of receiving my obediance.
Conversely, addressing another using informal language signifies that this other is not worthy of anything from me. And, thus I can do pretty much as my heart desires to this person. Korean people treat each other in this manner.
The problem, and if you are a foreigner and speak the language, you are aware that Korean people generally hold all foreign people as social inferiors, for the only reason that they are foreign and not Korean.
Like I said, I understand Korean people. I understand that they need to deflate their culture-wide over-inflated sense of self-importance.
After all, what has Korean society contributed to world culture in history?
Chinese gave gunpowder; Europe gave scientific study. Has Korean culture ever contributed anything to world society?
P.S. michael, please avoid posting until you can have a civilized discussion without profanity and personal attack. Thank you.
Dogbert: We need to be understanding.
The Fifth Element: Sorry, but this sounds like the typical Korean excuse.
Hey Dogbert please give this tin ear a score so he can figure out what’s going on even though he’s tone deaf.
SBS needs to take a good look at its editorial content.
Sine qua non,
i agree with the gist of your comment, but just because korea has not contributed to something significant does not make them any lesser of a culture/country.
as to koreans holding foreign people as social inferiors, while this may be true to some extent, in many cases, westerners are held as anything but. in fact, one may even argue that koreans’ deep inferior complex is the root cause of bringing down other cultures to make themselves feel equal or better than other cultures.
I don’t know if Dogbert was being serious or not but I can sort of understand the sentiment behind the comment although I have an argument against that.
Lots of nations like to talk about how Americans in particular expect other countries to do in 2 years what America has done over 50 years (civil rights, women’s rights, attacking prejudices, forming tolerance, etc.)
While this is true, I would argue that in America’s case at least, it was setting a well-documented precedent with no other models to follow. (Or if there were other models available for it to follow, perhaps due to the lack of communication technology that we have today, it exerienced slowed progress.)
Perhaps this is a case for Korea. It may have phsysically developed itself at a rapid pace but has yet to mature at that same pace.
I don’t think there is an excuse for Korea this time, however. The world is getting smaller. Precedents have been set for others to follow. Technology has contributed to the convenient spread of accurate education.
As Marmot said, the Korean media could at least take a stand against such ignorance instead of making excuses for it.
Granted this Rhie clown does not represent all Koreans, still it would be great if the media or a politician took him apart for publishing his crappy cartoons.
So they wrote a comic book for kids saying the Jews control the world to the detriment of Koreans in America…..???…..ehhh….
At least it wasn’t Meg Ryan saying something negative about a commercial she made for “some Asian company” that happened to be Korean…..
I mean, come on….
It isn’t like the Korean Jay Leno is saying bad things about Jews on national TV or something…..
That’s a pretty stupid question. Even discounting the intangibles, you’ve still got plenty of inventions and/or technological refinements that Koreans came up with first. And then there’s Snuppy. How dare you forget Snuppy!
I’d prefer to save the discussions of what Korea has or hasn’t contributed to world civilization for some other time…
I was actually being facetious, but I do agree with what Jodi wrote above.
And the plain fact is if you want empathy from others, expect to show it yourself.
If you want others to respect you, show them the respect they deserve.
It’s actually quite simple.
I do too, i think.
But I still wonder about the fact that Korea constantly refuses to be held to account in relation to principle, rather than weaseling out on “the no worse than others, except to the extent we’re trying to catch up” refrain. Very odd, coming from the folks who insufferably celebrate their self-proclaimed history as the only upholders of Confucian orthodoxy.
Globalvillageidiot,
I’m starting to wonder if you really are an idiot, or just playing one.
Chaim Potok, the author of The Chosen, served in Korea during the war.
“He has described his time in South Korea as being a transformative experience; brought up to believe that the Jewish people were central to history and God’s plans, he experienced a continent where there were no Jews and no anti-semitism, yet whose religious believers prayed with the same fervour that he saw in the orthodox synagogues at home. The experience made him question many of the things he had believed in.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaim_Potok
One of his last novels, I am the Clay, is set in Korea.
http://www.lasierra.edu/~balle......clay.html
When under attack by outside forces you’ll hear no criticism from the hive mind of one of their own. sin qua non
the book should be available to anyone who wants to read it. and yes, i wonder why we didn’t see the same kind of reaction to yasukuni or kenkanryu. in my mind, it’s a major contradiction of your alleged opposition to stereotypes. it’s interesting to see how many of you go berzerk about any ctriticism towards jews but won’t do the same when people do it to the people you’re married to. to me, your indignation ain’t so much about the jew as it is your desire to humiliate koreans. that’s why i won’t bring the prof to task. your logic here based on some kind of dark.
‘Korean people need to get off their lazy asses and look at others with respect.’ sin qua non
most of you are treated with the utmost respect in korea and you know it. btw, your telling koreans to get off their ‘lazy asses’ is an example of the respect they could have if they were just like you?
‘Chinese gave gunpowder; Europe gave scientific study. Has Korean culture ever contributed anything to world society?’ sin qua non
are you saying that certain peoples have different worth based on what they didn’t contribute to history? are you a nazi? i think the sw ought to investigate you.
‘The injustice of Bever’s case is the flip side of Rhie’s case, that his arguments were/are intially dismissed without an admission that there EVEN COULD be a shred of truth in them.’ sin qua non
it doesn’t matter whether gerry’s research was sound or not; the university was worried about it’s reputation. you do notice that gerry worked there for 6 years, right? the u only became concerned about gerry’s research when korean netizens started to complain. the school is about making money. it’s under no obligation to become a martyr for the free speech of gerry bever’s.
wake up, tyke.
The Book of Light was also set in Korea… but in I am the Clay, the story is presented from the perspective of the Korean protagonists. Sorry about the omission.
btw, if the koreans were smart, they’d ask to see the translation the EXPAT provided. they should also provide their own translation of the good prof’s book.
pawi,
What was I saying in the other thread? Oh, yeah. Some people bring up Bevers because it clouds the real issue.
pawi,
If you could speak Korean, you’d know the translations are accurate.
Do you have any reason to doubt the EXPAT’s translation, or are you simply suggesting that the EXPAT lacks the proper Korean skills owing to him being an EXPAT?
And, Pawi, you saw enough of the originals here to know that there was some highly offensive material in there. Or were you too busy making fun of the EXPATs to click on Sonagi’s photo collection to actually see what people were getting upset about?
For the record, however, I would like to see, at the very least, the original Korean text posted with the translations over at http://monnarakorea.blogspot.com/. I know it’s a pain in the ass, but it could prove useful/important.
My personal belief is that most expats don’t care that much if there is racism in Korea. Our own societies have the same problem. The issue is this, what does Korea do about the problem? Take a good hard look at itself, debate the issue, develop policies, and solutions, or circle the wagon and claim innocence and blame the outsider.
I can’t comment on how others think, but personally my own opinions are not formed by Korea’s ‘faults’, but by how the average Korean reacts when they are confronted by those ‘faults’. Personally if I witness debate, and reflection upon those ‘faults’ it inspires respect and admiration for Koreans. However if the reaction is to circle the wagon and blame others then the needle on the respect o meter goes down. Koreans are very concerned how foreigners perceive them. I think in Korea the belief is that the best way to ensure foreigners respect Korea is to resort to covering up the dirty laundry (take a look at Arirang). Actually it’s the opposite, most foreigners don’t care that the laundry is dirty, what gets our respect is when an effort is made to clean up the mess. The efforts to cover up the dirty laundry I personally find very offensive and insulting, as it’s saying to me that I as a foreigner am so stupid, that I can’t see through the lies. Please Korea, stop offending me!!!!
Austin, I think you hit the nail on the head. I run into this all the time. In fact, I’ve had Koreans get nervous when I’ve bought books on Korea or mention I’m going to a lecture (like Myers the other night) on Korea. It’s like they want us waygooks to remain ignorant, rather than learn things outside the party line and have a healthy discussion on Korea’s past or current social ills.
I’m sending links about this to every right-wing attack-dog blog out there. Lets get our cartoon jihad on.
I’d hold off on that one.
I think even Confucius said that if Chinese wanted to see how the traditional ways should be, they should look to the foreigner in Korea.
In any event, you can reasonably argue that Korean society did uphold the way with more strength than China. It would be a difficult and pretty much useless conversation about which society is more Confucian today, but it is a historical fact that Korean society held onto its Neo-Confucian conservatism and resisted the reforms brought by Wang Yang Ming.
I am not saying this based on extensive personal research on my part. I’m regurgitating what I’ve read from others (non-Koreans mostly) what have extensively researched Korean and Chinese Confucianism…
On a slightly different track, if you look at some of the things Kim Jong Il and North Korean society has done or elements of their contemporary culture, you can find exact parallels from the Confucian past.
I have no doubt Confucius and later Neo-Confucian theorists would be repulsed by how Kim runs his nation. I am also sure the 12 disciples of Jesus would have been horrified at the Spanish Inquisition……but that doesn’t mean Kim’s way didn’t misappropriate cosmetic points from Korean Confucianism.
‘Korean people need to get off their lazy asses and look at others with respect.’ sin qua non
This is difficult, as we are talking about INTELLECTUAL LAZINESS, something which many supposedly educated koreans have no concept of. For them intellectual achievement in school means being able to memorize hundreds of items of contextless information and regurgitate them on command.
However the intellectual skills necessary to come to terms with inexplicable are neglected. It’s much easier to see the outside world as a series of caricatures, rather than as something three dimensional and living.
And to top it off the very pragmatic south koreans would have to be convinced that there is some economic pay-off to letting go of their stereotypes. But frankly speaking there isn’t- it’s much easier to mistreat foreign workers, for example, when south koreans keep their negative stereotypes about them.
“…to come to terms with the inexplicable..”
Sorry- I left out the all-important article.
“Prof. Rhie Won-bok sent a letter to the Korean American Coalition (KAC) “deeply apologizing” for the distress he caused. He also said he would correct the problematic sections.
But—there’s always a but—Rhie said his work did not stem from anti-Semitism and he had no intention of slandering Jews when he wrote it.
He also said he hoped that the incident wouldn’t become a burden on Korean American-Jewish friendship and cooperation.”
You’re kidding. So, his defense against accusations of anti-Semitism is passing the buck on to the Jews? The guy is playing a dangerous game.
Nope; it was some Han Chinese diehard Ming loyalists some centuries later disgruntled about being ruled by upstart Mongol and Manchrian barbarians from the north and thniking they might get some support from the “cultivate your own garden” (with as much manure as you can steal from tour neighbors’) Koreans.
Concur; the point is that Korean self-congratulatory celebration of their better-than-thou Confucianism is so grotesquely at variance with their actual behaviour you have to wonder why their head don’t explode from cognitive dissonance. [Hint: copious draughts of bad liquor and a deep well-spring of speciesm, ie. they're (fully) human; we're not]].
What’s even more disturbing is some of the comments. Like I said, I don’t want to draw general conclusions about society from Naver.com’s comment section, but at the same time, we’re not talking about just a few comments. Frankly, it’s disgraceful.
Sperwer,
Don’t you think it’s a bit hypocritical of you to,on one hand, criticize Dr. Rhie for his xenophobic books and ,on the other, make blanket statements about Koreans?
It took an Expat to notify the Simon Wiesenthal Center, about this Comic. Now hold on a minute. One would think that Korean mothers who meticiously supervise their children’s education would have seen the racist crap in this comic. So how many Korean mothers would have seen this garbage, maybe 100,000? How many bothered to write to the education board, their local politician, newspaper etc. Probably zilch.
Koreans will not critize the good Professor (Is he REALLY a professor?) because to do so is to critisize themselves for purchasing such garbage, and for not taking any action themselves.
Someguyinkorea – Globalvillageidiot,
I’m starting to wonder if you really are an idiot, or just playing one.
Chaim Potok, the author of The Chosen, served in Korea during the war.
“He has described his time in South Korea as being a transformative experience; brought up to believe that the Jewish people were central to history and God’s plans, he experienced a continent where there were no Jews and no anti-semitism, yet whose religious believers prayed with the same fervour that he saw in the orthodox synagogues at home. The experience made him question many of the things he had believed in.”
Not an idiot, at least for the most part. Was that meant as an insult or compliment? What exactly were you referring to?
In any case, I’m disappointed about the way it has been spun by some sections of the Korean media. Have they translated and published the full text of the letter from the Simon Wiesenthal Center? Has anyone explained what is the Protocols of the Elders of Zion and how the comic book appears to be based on some of its canards?
No.
Has anyone even mentioned the Simon Wiesenthal Center?
No.
No.
Compare this with the way in which “So Far from the Bamboo Groves” was (and still is) sliced and diced.
This is why, in a way, I can’t fully blame the commenters at Naver.com—if they are putting on a display of ugly anti-Semitism, it’s in large part because the media is keeping them ignorant.
It was meant that as a compliment.
Robert,
I couldn’t agree more. Whether they’re doing it on purpose or not, ommiting this crucial information as for effect of keeping their readers in the dark. It clouds the issue.
Robert, why don’t you translate some of the Naver comments? Lets drag those thugs through the public mud. This is the first time I wish I spoke korean..
Apologizes to Korean-Americans?! Too fantastic! Says as much about the man as do his comics.
The most interesting development so far is this question: How did the Jews find out?
I take some pleasure seeing the discomfort this causes. No haven of the esoteric language anymore? More scrutiny to follow?
I hope for his sake the translator of Prof. Rhie’s rubbish is 100% spot on. Not that I doubt he has mistranslated Rhie’s message, but I believe that a minor mistake could allow some to dispute the accuracy of it all.
austin,
A few years ago, while walking with one of my university students, a very bright young man who probably moved on to great things, I remarked that construction workers had left unused bricks on the sidewalk. These bricks had been there for months and no one had made the effort to remedy the problem yet. I inquired about doing something about it because it forced pedestrians to step onto the road. He replied, and I quote, “Nodoby ever bothers to complain about anything because nothing ever gets done when they do. Besides, no one want to risk getting any negative attention from it.” The comic book is one of many discarded bricks on the sidewalk that nobody wants to touch.
Pretty sad (and telling) that this needs to be explained to them. It’s written in their own language. Read a bit of it. Look at the pictures. Not knowing anything about Jews the reader should still understand that the discussed group is being slighted. No heavy lifting required.
Don’t know if this belongs more on the expat blogs thread, but has anyone over there at Naver targeted foreign bloggers – or the EXPAT, in pawi-speak – for their role in potentially making Korea look bad in the eyes of outsiders (not that Prof. Rhie might have brought any of this on himself or anything) or are people fixated, for the moment at least, on a Jewish bogeyman?
Someguyinkorea, Thought as much, but thanks for the clarification. Had a trying ride home on the subway and was feeling a little sensitive. sniff, sniff.
I’ll never forget the first time I encountered open anti-semitism here. It shocked me, largely because it was from a very highly educated businessman.
There seems to be a certain strain in Korean “psuedo-internationalized” society that fancies itself hyper-aware of things in the world. As if spending a semester at Oklahoma State bequeaths a great insider knowledge into America. I suppose this tendency is buttressed by the comic books.
btw, has anybody else, particularly from America, noticed the tendency Koreans have, especially Korean men, for trying to guess which European nation your family name came from?
The tribal thinking is strong in these parts.
“if they are putting on a display of ugly anti-Semitism, it’s in large part because the media is keeping them ignorant.”
AMEN, Robert.
It’s funny, actually. The Naver commenters that have brought it up are generally bewildered as to how ‘dem Jews found out. Now, there are over 1,000 comments on the MBC piece, so it’s not like I went through all of them, but there were at least a couple wondering if the book had been translated and exported. Nobody—again, as far as I knew—had figured out who “leaked” the information (and it’s a sad state of affairs when you feel almost compelled to regard translating a book commonly found in bookstores across Korea as a “leak”). One Korean blogger, in fact, penned a rather long and none-too-pleasant-to-read screed about how the Jews must be researching Korea because the rising economic and political strength of Korean-Americans is threatening Jewish interests.
The rising strength of Koreans? Goddamn some of them are delusional. Only a nationalistic, foolish Korean could think that a Jew might wake up every day concerned about the looming takeover by kyopo.
Nothing surprises me anymore. Maybe only a nationalistic, foolish person (Korean or not) could suggest that Bush, Cheney, and Condi get up an hour early each morning to convene in some sub-basement of the Whitehouse to work on keeping the peninsula divided so as to thwart Korea’s destined rise of superpowerdom, but it has been suggested to me, more or less in such terms, on numerous occasions. These conspiracy theories have generally been voiced to me by intelligent and otherwise nice people – they seldom come across as being malicious in their intent.
Anyway, let’s keep the gang over at Naver guessing as to how those crafty Jews managed this one!
“btw, has anybody else, particularly from America, noticed the tendency Koreans have, especially Korean men, for trying to guess which European nation your family name came from?”
They ask, but they don’t offer any guesses. My name is somewhat common, but my branch of the family still uses the archaic spelling, which doesn’t resemble anything they would have ever encountered. What’s funny is how some can’t seem to get it out of their heads that French and English speakers aren’t segregated, that French and English speakers are free to live anywhere in Canada. I’ve had this conversation too many times to count. It makes me wonder what their social sciences teacher has been telling them about multiculturalism.
“Are you American?”
“No, I’m Canadian.”
“Oh, I heard people speak French and English in Canada.”
“Yes, many do. I can speak French.”
“Really? Are you from Quebec?”
“No, I’m not.”
“But, you speak French?”
“Yes, but people speak French all over Canada. French speakers don’t have to live in Quebec.”
“So, do you live near Quebec City?”
“No, I don’t live in the province of Quebec.”
“Are you from Montreal?”
“No, I’m from another province.”
“Where are you from?”
“….”
“Is that in Quebec?”
This will probably result in a big, second tongue lashing by the
Jewish groups that have already criticized Rhie. With more Koreans then jumping on board to fight back again.. could snowball. Should we start a pool on how far it goes?
I could see Korean netizens/hackers spamming ADL servers or something..DoS attacks or other hacks. If the next Jewish salvo hits the national media here again, how many comments will naver
get? 1000s I imagine. Some Korean politicians could get involved. I could see Korean politicians coming out to defend Rhie much easier than I could see them coming out to criticize him.
Maybe some Korean churches will cancel trips to the ‘holy land.’ The devil in me looks forward to all this mischief.
In the Hilarious Boneheaded Theory category , by the way:
I once had a conversation with a manager from Samsung who told me the proof that Koreans were smarter than most was the size of their heads. I asked him if he had heard of phrenology. No. Good fun, I thought.. I said, ‘Well the nazis agreed with you that skull size and shape determined intelligence and character.” He paused. “I think the German people are very smart,” he said. I continued. “But they used bogus science to justify mass murder. In fact there is no correlation between skull shape and intelligence.”
He asked what bogus meant, and then we changed topics.
relayer,
DoS attacks on the SWC? Ouch. That would be like an alcoholic calling the cops to tell them that he’s drunk driving.
“…the proof that Koreans were smarter than most was the size of their heads.”
There used to be a sign as you entered the first exhibit at the Chonan Independance Hall that made mention of this. It’s that brain to body mass ratio argument that only hold true when you compare organisms from very different species.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B.....mass_ratio
Robert wrote:
“This is why, in a way, I can’t fully blame the commenters at Naver.com—if they are putting on a display of ugly anti-Semitism, it’s in large part because the media is keeping them ignorant.”
Well, that’s partly true. None of the reports provided any background on anti-Semitism to help viewers understand the reactions of Jewish and non-Jewish Americans. I wonder, though, if the reporters are even aware of what the Simon Wiesenthal Center is or have ever heard of the Protocals of the Elders of Zion. The reports did show viewers some of the most offensive cartoons.
“The Naver commenters that have brought it up are generally bewildered as to how ‘dem Jews found out. Now, there are over 1,000 comments on the MBC piece, so it’s not like I went through all of them, but there were at least a couple wondering if the book had been translated and exported. Nobody—again, as far as I knew—had figured out who “leaked” the information (and it’s a sad state of affairs when you feel almost compelled to regard translating a book commonly found in bookstores across Korea as a “leak”). “
Hilarious! You mean that some furiners can speak OUR LANGUAGE?! How did these toads get into our well?
Tambe wrote:
“Robert, why don’t you translate some of the Naver comments? Lets drag those thugs through the public mud. This is the first time I wish I spoke korean.”
How sad that you want to speak Korean only to read hate spew.
Why the hell else would I want to learn it? To get a job at Yaile Hagwon in Bucheon “teaching”? I’ll pass, thanks. What would be sad would be spending time to learn how to speak it only to find out that most everything you now understand is racist, nationalistic, xenophobic, nonsensical, aggrandizing lies. And what would be even more sad would be the look of indifference on the face of a potential employer in the West when you list your language abilities. You might as well learn Klingon.
Someguy:
It should be apparent that I’m not talking about each and every Korean, but the overall cultural construct.
Robert: “The Naver commenters that have brought it up are generally bewildered as to how ‘dem Jews found out.”
What does this tell you? They are more concerned about how the country has been shamed–or at least is getting negative international press– than finding out the truth and doing the right thing by Mr. Rhie.
As much as I strongly believe that everyone should be at least biligual and that any new language learnt is an asset– regardless of how common or obscure it may be–this had me laughing out loud:
“Why the hell else would I want to learn it? To get a job at Yaile Hagwon in Bucheon “teaching”?”
“It should be apparent that I’m not talking about each and every Korean, but the overall cultural construct.”
It should be apparent that it could be understood otherwise.
Robert: “The Naver commenters that have brought it up are generally bewildered as to how ‘dem Jews found out.”
‘What does this tell you? They are more concerned about how the country has been shamed–or at least is getting negative international press– than finding out the truth and doing the right thing by Mr. Rhie.’ (aletheia)
And in the brewing shit-storm no-one has yet come forward to denounce anti-semitism or violence against jews?
Outstanding.
Our korean friends might take the time to consider that whenever a similar incident happens in dear old Europe some people at lest take the time to speak out publicly against racism.
Robert wrote:
“why is Prof. Rhie sending a letter of apology to Korean-Americans? I mean, he probably does owe them an apology for bringing them into his anti-Semitic rant, but shouldn’t the apology be going to a Jewish-American group? I haven’t read the press release, but I hope it’s something like KAC got Suzanne Scholte’s letter (see below) and kindly asked the good professor, “WTF?” “
I wonder why Ms. Scholte sent a letter to the Korean-American organization instead of Mr. Rhie’s publisher or his employer. Korean Americans aren’t responsible for this nut making money poisoning Korean kids’ minds with racist tripe.
I want people to remember what yahoo news message boards were like.
Do you want people to translate that into Korean?
Keep in mind that naver lets you comment anonymously.
When omnipotent world Jewry has you in their sites you are indeed the center of the world. Mission Accomplished.
Warning bells were first raised at Mossad when The O.C.’s lily white Summer took the Korean rapper to the prom to spite Jewy Seth.
This seems like a particularly important reminder for this discussion.
By the way, wjk, do you tend to criticize this society or do you tend to support this society? This blog needs a great many more supportive voices painting the opposite side of the canvas, opposite from the majority here.
It is a shameful demerit that this blog’s commentary forum’s sense of support of this society is so lacking as to be anemic.
In ways, this blog seems similar to the ignorant posters on Naver, except everybody here is jumping on the bandwagon heading in the opposite direction.
For your daily dose of korean-inflected surrealism, I recommend reading the latest on the “So Far from the Bamboo Grove” uproar:
http://www.boston.com/news/loc.....ok/?page=1
tambe wrote:
Why the hell else would I want to learn it? To get a job at Yaile Hagwon in Bucheon “teaching”? “
If Robert hadn’t bothered to learn Korean, he might still be a hagwon teacher.
@wjk,
That’s the whole point. Anonymous message boards bring out the worst in people everywhere. I read the comments that got hundreds of recommendations and noted that the most recommended one (700+ recs) called for an investigation into charges that sections of the book were prejudiced. The second most recommended post (almost 600 recs) suggested publishing a Munnara volume on the Middle East, to expose the slaughter of innocent Arabs, including children, by Israelis. The fourth most rec’d (almost 500) cited passages and asked “what’s problem?” “It’s all true, isn’t it? The fifth and sixth most rec’d (350+) praised Hitler and expressed sorrow that his great humanitarian task of exterminating the Jews was never accomplished.
I used to read the message boards at Yahoo before they were taken down. News items on Korea or China got their share of racist posts, but the posts never got more than a couple of recs. Compare that with 400 Korean netizens cheering on a bizarre ode to Hitler’s genocide of the Jews.
Despite the ugly comments about Jews in particular and hideous praise of Hitler and the Holocaust, I see this as more a typical “단결” response to any waeguks who dare to criticize anything Korean. If the NAACP were objecting to negative depictions of African-Americans, Korean netizens would be spewing “깜둥이.”
Anonymity does not make good people hate; it enables ordinary people to expose their own latent hatred and bigotry.
“This blog needs a great many more supportive voices painting the opposite side of the canvas, opposite from the majority here.”
A lot of the stuff selected and served up by the Marmot is hard to be “supportive” about with logical argument and factual points, which is why we see all the baiting, non sequiturs and unpersuasive counterexamples. Korea has a built-in booster club in the form of the Korean media and a far more unified pack of netizens and expatriates/emigres than most other free societies seem to generate.
Right. And the Korean media and netizens all have the same types of ‘baiting, non sequiturs and unpersuasive counterexamples.’
We need many more REASONABLE supportive voices here.
Read for yourselves the bizarre ode to Hitler that’s got 400 recs so far:
히틀러 폐하께서 눈물을 흘리실 일이도다..
“히틀러 폐하께서 인류를 구원하고자 유태인들을 학살하였으나, 소수의 살아남은 유태인들의 흉계에 의해서
폐하께서는 끝내 대업을 이루시지 못한채 눈물을 흘리며 붕어를 하시옵고, 미래의 후손들이 폐하의 대업을 유지하지 못한채,
유태인들에게 고개를 숙이나니, 이 어찌 폐하께서 개탄할 일이 아니란 말이온가! 아아, 폐하여..
인류와 세계를 지키지 못한 무지몽매한 후손들을 용서하소서.. “
date and time of post: 11 2007/02/15 21:01
It’s not very legible in italics, so I’m posting again in regular type:
히틀러 폐하께서 눈물을 흘리실 일이도다..
“히틀러 폐하께서 인류를 구원하고자 유태인들을 학살하였으나, 소수의 살아남은 유태인들의 흉계에 의해서
폐하께서는 끝내 대업을 이루시지 못한채 눈물을 흘리며 붕어를 하시옵고, 미래의 후손들이 폐하의 대업을 유지하지 못한채,
유태인들에게 고개를 숙이나니, 이 어찌 폐하께서 개탄할 일이 아니란 말이온가! 아아, 폐하여..
인류와 세계를 지키지 못한 무지몽매한 후손들을 용서하소서.. “
wjk:
“I want people to remember what yahoo news message boards were like. Do you want people to translate that into Korean?”
and
“Keep in mind that naver lets you comment anonymously.”
Fair enough about Yahoo boards, but who wouldn’t admit that there are tons of racist idiots in the US? Or China, Canada, Russia, Europe for that matter.
Yet, a racist animated history book gets published in Korea and the media fails to even notice or care for a couple years, racist tripe fills the Naver boards, and yet, the majority of Koreans insist that this is not a racist country. It is this very ‘gap’ that motivates people to be cynical on this and other similar issues.
You seem to partake in it as well. By that last sentence are you suggesting that anonymity makes people say things they don’t “really mean”? If it is, isn’t explaining away the racism too?
last line: If it is, isn’t THAT explaining away the racism too?
Contrast the reactions of Korean netizens and overseas Koreans like wjk with the cooperative efforts between foreigners and Japanese in getting Family Mart to remove from its shelves a racist comic and issue a letter of apology. Read all about it at http://www.japanprobe.com .
Well, to be fair, racist shit gets published all the time and fails to make the news. I think the issue of concern here is more that this particular racist shit became a best seller before it took an overseas organization to point out that it was dangerously close to Nazi propaganda.
And while I think there’s probably a perception about a lack of racism in South Korea (amongst the local populace), I wonder how much of that comes simply because South Korea seems to lack much of the hypersensitivity over racism that more culturally-and-racially-integrated countries like Canada and the US have. Point out to the average person in South Korea that prevailing attitudes about Japan are racist (well, cultural chauvanism really) or that stereotypes of black people (like the golliwog-like pictures on those ‘Mi in black’ snacks they used to make) are racist, and I don’t really think that the average person would argue much. At least, that’s been my experience. There simply isn’t much awareness of racism in South Korea.
Sine qua non is doing his apparent crusade to bring logic to discourse on Korea and reasonableness to online debates a constant and deep disservice with his own misreadings of comments, sloppy reasoning and trollesque off-topic attacks. You got off to a bad start here, attacking Sperwer’s supposed problematic prose and then subjecting us to days of knee-jerk retorts or irrelevant meanderings. If you are going to call for reasonableness, you should be adding to the sum total of that here, not subtracting from it.
Wow.
A bunch of goyims getting hot and bothered by anti-semitism in Korea.
Jesus forgives you all.
Yeah, imagine that, people getting offended by prejudice against other people not of their own ethnicity or religion. What a shocking notion!
Sine non qua wrote:
“In ways, this blog seems similar to the ignorant posters on Naver, except everybody here is jumping on the bandwagon heading in the opposite direction.”
Not even dogbert says stuff like this:
“유태인은 세계의 사악한 민족” Jews are the world’s most evil race.
“포경수술한 놈들은 전부유태인이다” Circumcized bastards all Jews.
“유대인=잡종민족..” Jews are a mongrel race.
“유대인들은 인간 쓰레기들이다!!!” Jews are human trash.
“히틀러는 영웅이죠” Hitler is a hero.
“유대인 쓰레기들을 몰살하라!하일!히틀러” Exterminate Jewish trash! Heil Hitler!
“유태인 학살 유태인도 책임 있다” Jews are also responsible for the Holocaust.
“대대적인 홀로코스트를 다시 한번 해야 한다….” We need another large-scale Holocaust.
The above quotes are all headings for messages on the Naver boards. The last one, calling for another Holocaust, got more than 200 recs.
Sine non qua, don’t you dare compare any comments here to the vicious hate spew of Naver netizens.
now you want to tell the professor how to issue an aopolgy? what nerve! the prof issued a graceful apology and i gracioulsy accept said apology.
contradictions of the marmot:
1. when china was trying to steal korean history, a korean newspaper ran a cartoon of a chinese guy with sterotypical features. the marmot went berzerk whining about korean racism. recently, a similar incident happened the other way around with the chinese promoting stereotypes about koreans. marmot said nothing and actually supported the chinese. this is a contradiction and not a strawman argument*.
2. when a book called ‘kenkanryu’ came out in japan, it was an instant hit. the book is filled with sterotypes about koreans. instead of condenming the book, the marmot remained silent. this is contradiction #2 and not a strawman argument*.
3. the marmot approves of the japanese pm paying homage to class a war criminals. this is contradiction #3 and not a strawman aregument*.
4. marmot defends a bigot (occidentalism.org) who maintains a website designed to denigrate koreans. he compares a web board with a web site. the people who run naver don’t seem to talk about jews or anyone else all day in the same way the bigot talks about koreans day and night. marmot’s refusal to call a spade a spade while calling a spade a donkey means i simply don’t care how he feels about korean racism.
*’strawman argument’ is often used by the expat when he has no counter argument. ‘it’s just a strawman argument!’ they’ll whine without ever proving it. it’s just one of their many deflections. they’ll do just about anything to avoid looking at their own contradictions.
ps the koreans should peruse the EXPAT’S translation because you can’t trust an expat to tell the truth. it’s that simple. i’ll just bet the scum added his own thoughts into his ‘translation’. YOU CAN’T TRUST THE EXPAT TO TELL THE TRUTH.
“Wow.
A bunch of goyims getting hot and bothered by anti-semitism in Korea.”
Yep, and that’s without owing an Jewish friends a favor, even the ones whose namecards I have in my wallet. It isn’t the anti-semitism in particular that has people upset. I think it’s the reaction of the author/netizens to prejudice (i.e. We feel embarrassed now that this has come to the surface, but please be assured that there is no problem here. Except for the one the Jews have made for us, of course). Trust me, if some knob had published such a controversial yet popular kids comic series in America or Canada (though that wouldn’t happen in the 21st century, would it?), a lot of people – the majority of them citizens – would be pissed about it, not apologizing for it. I’d be happy for Koreans to add their criticism to the mix.
“Jesus forgives you all.”
Were you the guy who told me this outside of Bucheon Station last night? I’d heard that one before, but thanks anyway, I think.
I should have said, “It isn’t ONLY the anti-semitism that has people upset.” My mistake.
#78
—laughing—–because you just gotta…
Yes, WJK goes to bat for the tribe. There are a few others that do. But, in the vast majority of cases, they do more to harm the general impression of Korean society than defend it.
They might – well – say something like — the kind of comments Marmot and a couple of others are describing at naver are “relatively” the same as what we get here at the good ole Marmot’s Hole —- that Marmot’s Hole is just a breeding ground and forum for rabid anti-Koreans….
Sure….
And one of the biggest obstacles to this “relativity” justification for actions or thoughts in Korea is that, there are some out here in the Korea blogsphere who have spent years in Korea and/or years learning about Korea – because they didn’t hate the place or the people – but can criticize what deservese criticism…
….and they often end up blasting to smitherens bullshit like saying Marmot’s Hole tends to be another Naver but defaming the Korean race— The expats who have taken the time to get to know Korea (and didn’t decide to shove their heads up their asses) come out with things like:
BAM!!!
That is true.
#89 I think there is a lot in the idea that one reason Koreans don’t get this stuff is that there haven’t been a lot of foreigners in Korean society to lead to conflicts that would generate some of the activity that would provoke deeper consideration. And that is a problem in itself.
#91 My standing offer of a small amount of money for kicking bluejives’ ass is still standing….
Yes, bluejives, poor boy trapped in a land he despises so, I can imagine it is hard for someone like you to fathom how someone of a different tribe can find vile things spoken of another tribe offensive….
….poor little, little boy…..
#94
No, your #3 and #4 are examples of strawmen arguments.
A strawman argument is when you set up a false item/image/interpretation and use it to explode someone else’s point of view.
Find instances where Marmot has approved of a Japanese leader “honoring Class A war criminals.”
Do it…
Until then, those of us who have read Marmot and you for some time now will continue to understand you are using a typical strawman — using your distorted understanding of things (what Marmot has said about the shrine visits and your understanding of what Occidentalism is comapred to what others see in the site) to make claims against people that cannot stand the test of truth.
On your #2, explain why the book should have grab Marmot’s or our attention. I have little connection or interest in Japan. I hardly pay attention to it.
Strawman…
#91 My standing offer of a small amount of money for kicking bluejives’ ass is still standing….
Yes, bluejives, poor boy trapped in a land he despises so, I can imagine it is hard for someone like you to fathom how someone of a different tribe can find vile things spoken of another tribe offensive….
I’d like to ask all of you a question: how many of you (goyims) actually cared that deeply about anti-Semitism before you found out about Rhee’s comic book and before you came to Korea? Answer honestly now. You too USin Korea.
As has already been stated, anyone who puts too much credence in anonymous message board posting is a fool. Any story dealing with white/black relations on yahoo news was immediately followed by *thousands* of (often violent) racist, anti-black sentiment on yahoo’s message boards (since taken down). Does that reflect current race relations in the U.S? Some might argue yes, but I would argue no.
Is “goyims” a word? It’s sort of like you’ve taken the Hebrew way of making a plural (adding an m sound at the end of the word) and the standard English way (adding an s) and used them both on the one word.
Seriously. Where did you find it and who did you hear using it? It’s new to me and I’m curious.
For those of you following the Naver posts: Has anyone written anything about Woody Allen and his young Korean bride? That combination would seem to be every rabid Korean’s wet hate dream.
wjk,
What does the stupidity of others have to do with the stupidity of some posters on Naver?
“Keep in mind that naver lets you comment anonymously.”
As far as I know, it doesn’t. Don’t people have to register before posting, which involves revealing their ‘citizenship number’?
“For your daily dose of korean-inflected surrealism, I recommend reading the latest on the “So Far from the Bamboo Grove” uproar:”
Well, I’m still waiting for a book that speaks of how the Loyalists were raped and murdered during and following the American Revolution or how the deported Acadians were used as slaves in the cotton fields to be made as required reading in the US. I guess that’s ancient history, so it doesn’t count, right?
The Koreans are right to object to the book, although I’m not sure their motives are right. Simply put, the book was written under the perspective of an 11 year-old girl, and therefore should not be read as an accurate historical document. I doubt most middleschool students have the sophistication to understand this, and therefore the book shouldn’t be required reading for them. Highschool, maybe, but middleschool, no. Then again, where’s that book about the Loyalists?
Well, let’s see….
When I saw media coverage of the KKK and/or neo-Nazi groups in the US fighting in court to get permits to march in some cities, I thought 1. They should have the right to march and 2. How glad I was the vast bulk of American society viewed such people with a high amount of illwill and derision.
Any more questions, little boy?
I can’t speak for the American Revolution, but I know in my American history course in high school, we spent more time on the internment of Japanese in the US and the effects of the atomic bombs than we did any other part of the war. It was probably roughly the same amount of attention we gave to Hitler/The Nazis, the start of the war in Europe, and The Holocaust.
104,
No mention of the Japanese POW camps in my Canadian history course, either. I guess we are somewhat making the same point. History courses at school have been sanitized and spun by the school board and the teachers. White-washing history isn’t just a Korean or Japanese thing. It occurs everywhere.
Kind of makes you wonder how Koreans find out about Japanese textbooks, then.
Actually it is amazing how many foreigners I know who speak Korean fluently say they wish they didn’t know the language because of the things they overhear due to the fact that Koreans do not realize these people understand Korean. As more than one person has told me, the stuff they overhear is quite disgusting. Most of these people do not want Koreans to know they speak or understand Korean as a result.
I find this quite sad in a way.
Zonath, #89: Excellent points!
Bluejives (#91):
(1) I’m Jewish.
(2) I love Korea. I am not a putative “Korea-basher” on this forum or any other.
(3) I’m deeply offended by the crap that Lee wrote. Intentional or not, it’s deeply racist and highly offensive.
I think you too can make a naver account today. They give you a foreigner option. No national id needed.
I’m just trying to say these people don’t know any better and most have never seen a Jewish person in their entire lives. What’s the deal also, with focusing on negative comments and dissing any comments from South Koreans that condemn Lee Won Bok?
Are you picking and choosing so you can have a good laugh and condemn all Koreans?
Not sure, but try going on other newspaper message boards concerning the subject, which require real names. Note any differences you see. If you don’t see any, that’s tragic, but I’m guessing there is.
Don’t ridicule me for standing up for South Koreans.
If you were born in South Korea and your parents were born in South Korea, and you can’t stand up for South Korea, you’re a piece of shit.
donnieknutts wrote:
“As has already been stated, anyone who puts too much credence in anonymous message board posting is a fool. Any story dealing with white/black relations on yahoo news was immediately followed by *thousands* of (often violent) racist, anti-black sentiment on yahoo’s message boards (since taken down). Does that reflect current race relations in the U.S? Some might argue yes, but I would argue no.”
I would argue yes and no. Forty years after the Civil Rights movement, there is still latent prejudice towards blacks. Likewise, amongst Koreans, there is latent hostility towards foreigners. The people who scrawl and recommend hateful messages really do exist. How representative those opinions is a matter of conjecture, but there’s just too many to dismiss them as the rantings of a few bigots. The man who wrote the infamous book is a professor and a graduate of SNU. His books have been consistently praised on blogs.
Like Zonath pointed out in post #89, Koreans aren’t sensitive to negative stereotyping and caricatures of other peoples. That’s because there are no non-Koreans to object when Koreans say or write offensive things in the Korean language.
The message boards don’t really reflect hard-core anti-Semitism but rather Korean hostility towards foreign criticism.
Oh, and by the way, Bluejives, in case you hadn’t noticed, you’re a goy yourself, unless your mother is Jewish or you’ve gone through a proper conversion process, which I highly doubt. As a goy who is interested in Hebraica these days, I would hope that you would see that Lee’s depictions are as offensive as much of what some Japanese nationalists or Japanaphiles say about Koreans.
As Koreans are so fond of saying, that was not a “sincere” apology from Rhie and it wasn’t even given to the ones who were slandered.
The guy sounds like an unrepetant asshole who is more sorry for having been caught out than for spewing unexamined bullshit about other people.
Still I do think Rhie owes Korean Americans an apology since he is an untalented “graphic designer” and has tarred people of far superior accomplishments with his “wall of Jews” nonsense.
So if an ethnic Korean is born in the U.S., can he criticize Korea? Assuming Korea is wrong on an issue, of course.
How many generations does it take to firm your loyalty to America? Obviously your generation is problematic.
…Japan*O*philes…
wjk wrote:
“What’s the deal also, with focusing on negative comments and dissing any comments from South Koreans that condemn Lee Won Bok?
Are you picking and choosing so you can have a good laugh and condemn all Koreans?”
Most of the top recommended posts were very negative, wjk. The #1 post, with 700+ recs, was very reasonable – calling for an examination of the book for prejudiced content. The other posts that drew hundreds of recs were all very negative. I did not read every single message, but I did read the top ten. Since you’ve read the boards yourself, why don’t you post and translate some of these messages condemning Rhie Won Bok and tell us how many recs they got?
What’s worse, the Korean commenters can’t seem to agree whether it’s spelled 유태인 or 유대인.
BTW, wjk, the Chosun Ilbo’s comments are not anonymous.
Probelmatic? The Irish did the same. The Italians did the same. I could name every nationality that immigrated to the US. People from Mexico?
To answer your question, I think at least 2.
I looked up reverse engineering, and I strongly disagree with you, dogbertt. But, that’s another matter.
Read more carefully. That’s what I said, go to a non anonymous board.
Bluejives asked,
“I’d like to ask all of you a question: how many of you (goyims) actually cared that deeply about anti-Semitism before you found out about Rhee’s comic book and before you came to Korea? Answer honestly now. You too USin Korea.”
I’m not Jewish. I care deeply about bigotry period. I was one of two white members of my college chapter’s NAACP.
I don’t think it’s necessary, however, for every commenter to trot out their racial qualifications. The stuff of Rhie’s book really is offensive to us, Bluejives, and I think you’ve been in the US long enough to recognize that.
I don’t really know why anyone would be surprised at this stuff. My experience, my wasted time in that racist dump, taught me very quickly that koreans tend to be bitter due to their not being number 1. Like the Yagpa said, “the Amazing race didn’t do well in Korean ratings as Koreans were angered that the race in question wasn’t them” (or similar, can’t remember the direct quote).
korean economic policies resemble a neo-nazi state. Total centralization on real economic power with a concerted effort to always be whiping the eager population in to xenophobic fever about non-koreans and the economic/social/sexual/cultural threat they provide. They are, as Mr. Breen has pointed out time and time again, ethnically mercantilist. The korean mentality tends to regard all foreigners are genetically inferior to “korean blood”. We all know that. Why pretend?
How can you all live in such a barbaric state?
Bluejives: I’ve had Jewish friends throughout my life and never thought twice about it–you know, like most Americans. If you have to ask why people here care you need to turn off your computer, go outside and look at the country you live in.
tambe wrote:
“How can you all live in such a barbaric state?”
I enjoyed my life in Korea very much, thank you. It’s ironic that you spout such offensive views on this thread.
I don’t say this very often, but I think it is an appropriate response to your comments: STFU!
How can you all live in such a barbaric state?” It is difficult here, what with the Wall of Koreans keeping us down
On the plus side, I haven’t been mugged or shot at or had my car stolen as I did in the U.S. I’ll take a little bonehead Korean chauvanism over random freeway shootings anytime.
“I think you too can make a naver account today. They give you a foreigner option. No national id needed.”
That doesn’t make it any more anonymous.
“I’m just trying to say these people don’t know any better and most have never seen a Jewish person in their entire lives. ”
Ignorance is never an acceptable defense if one is unwilling to recognize his faults.
“What’s the deal also, with focusing on negative comments and dissing any comments from South Koreans that condemn Lee Won Bok?”
What comments that condemn Lee Won Bok?
“Are you picking and choosing so you can have a good laugh and condemn all Koreans?”
Nope. I’ve already made that clear in another thread.
“Not sure, but try going on other newspaper message boards concerning the subject, which require real names. Note any differences you see. If you don’t see any, that’s tragic, but I’m guessing there is.”
Not sure what you’re getting at. You mean that the comments on the other newspapers sites are just a virulent as the one’s on Naver, despite the fact that they don’t provide any anonimity to the posters?
“Don’t ridicule me for standing up for South Koreans.
If you were born in South Korea and your parents were born in South Korea, and you can’t stand up for South Korea, you’re a piece of shit.”
Oh, please. That’s just chauvinism. Individual conscience should not be shaped by your membership in a particular ‘tribe’.
by one’s membership…sorry
Sorry about the other typos, too.
someguyinkorea, I think you’re picking a fight with the wrong guy. Why don’t you make a naver id and post there? Might serve some shock and amusment value.
I’m pretty confident that Korean parents and grandparents teach their children/grandchildren in home conversations about how bad the Japanese were/are/will be, but pretty much no mention good or bad on Jewish people.
Also, correct me if I’m wrong, but that Elders of Zion book is published and translated in Europe, Mexico, Japan, but not South Korea. Right?
I think I’ll be writing a part of a new world history book that the Myanmar government will release next year.
“Koreans were once very clever people. They invented a moveable type printing press, an armored ship, and probably the best syllabary for writing their own language…”
“But then they invented the world’s first central heating system, the ondol floor. Unfortunately, even to this day, these floors are prone to leaking minute concentrations of carbin monoxide gas with non-lethal, but terrible consequences.”
“Several hundred generations of Koreans have been raised while exposed to levels of carbon monoxide that have sadly stunted the portion of the brain thought to control what we know as ‘original thought’, or innovative thinking. A view of recent Korean history would suggest that it has also damaged their capacity for rational thought processes.”
“So Korea’s history and achievements in the distant past must be understood in light of the tremendous race-wide mental handicap engendered by the introduction of ondol heating”
-As there is little love lost between Burmese and Koreans, I’m sure my contribution will sail past the censor board.
I’m not Jewish. I care deeply about bigotry period. I was one of two white members of my college chapter’s NAACP.
Negros Are Actually Colored Pollack’s?
To be fair to the Koreans, many of the comments on Naver also finger the freemasons as being the ones that are keeping Koreans down… Freemasons controlled by the Jews, that is. lol.
Interesting how teaching hate is acceptable and prevalent in your opinion. Could this be why people are so indifferent to the problematic messages in the comic?
Hehe…same old diversionary tactics.
Choose your fights. Defending blindly is quite amusing in a patheitic sort of way.
On second thought…keep it up. Tis quite amusing.
WJK, the Protocols of the Elders of Zion was translated and published as “세계 정복 음모” in Korea.
Still waiting for the translations of posts by open-minded Koreans, wjk.
Nonsense.
My family on both sides were immigrants in my grandparents’ generation. Even the men in the original group – grandfathers and their brothers, etc. – almost immediately volunteered to fight for the US against their former countrymen, despite having to leave good jobs in the US as well as their families to do so. Their sons signed up for the next round, etc.
Obviously there are immigrants today, including some Koreans, who do the same – some (also including some Koreans) even join the military to speed their way to citizenship, so one has to be careful making generalizations, but it seems that there has been a dramatic change in the attitude of most immigrants (also including most Koreans) since the period between the late 19th/early 20th century and the 1960s about what it means.
Irrawaddy,
I’m not surprised given the company the Myanmar government keeps.
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/S.....9Ae01.html
“I’m pretty confident that Korean parents and grandparents teach their children/grandchildren in home conversations about how bad the Japanese were/are/will be, but pretty much no mention good or bad on Jewish people.”
No doubt they do teach their children/grandchildren to dislike/hate the Japanese. If young people are indoctrinated with negative stereotypes about one group, is it so hard to imagine they might be vulnerable to negative portrayals – masquerading as history, don’t forget – about another? I think Naver comments reflect this more than deep-rooted anti-semitism.
“Also, correct me if I’m wrong, but that Elders of Zion book is published and translated in Europe, Mexico, Japan, but not South Korea. Right?”
Yes. Published and purchased by fringe loonies for the most part, not the mainstream. Generally regarded as a HOAX. Probably not a great basis for a comic book intended, at least in part, to educate kids, wouldn’t you agree wkj?
Were something like this happening in Canada, I would feel a responsibility to make my disapproval known, not circle the wagons and unconditionally defend the tribe.
I reread your post…That wasn’t the Myanmar government’s text, but yours, was it? Tsk, tsk, tsk.
Where did I say teaching hate is acceptable? Stop accusing me of things I didn’t say and go brush up on your English, Yum-so.
Someguyinkorea, all I can say about that is people in Korea don’t have active interest in it. I’m guessing/defending. Give me some slack.
Sonagi, I’m a busy person. What do you want me to translate and why? Would it be right to translate those old yahoo news message boards, too? Robert can do it, too. So can anyone who authors here. I prefer that it be short and also include something said by a Korean that condemns Lee Won Bok along with a comment that goes the other way, which I think it what you want me to translate. A 1:1.
Sperwer, are you implying you were of German descent? Have you watched the CIA movie directed by Robert DiNiro? Why did that US Catholic General only want WASPS serving in the the intelligence? No offense to your ancestors, but what if they chose not to serve? Did they have a valid option? One thing I’m sure of is that, I don’t see a solid loyalty until the 2nd generation in people of Chinese, Korean, Mexican, Russian backgrounds. I’m just basing it on my encounters.
“circle the wagons and unconditionally defend the tribe.”
You know, this expression could be seen as offensive by Native Americans.
I guessed you missed my point, Someguy. Point is, some dickhead in Korea can write something meant for general consumption by young people, and if he sounds authoritative enough, the most scandalous falsehoods can be palmed off on a gentle readership.
I guess I forgot that satire is dead on this blog; too damned much shrill earnestness. What the pharma companies need to do is not come up with a new anti-depressant, but instead a sort of skin-thickening agent.
I wonder what Mel Brooks would say if he knew about this flap…(BTW, “Blazing Saddles” is still the all-time favorite American movie in Burma, after the “Rambo” series)
that’s because antisemitism results in visible crimes in Canada. I’m not circling the wagons. I said Lee Won Bok is wrong and so are people like him. What more do you want? Bury all Korean people with him? Would you condemn millions of Americans for one man from Idaho firing automatic weapons at Jewish children in California, or all people from Idaho for that matter?
Shaku, for all your LOLs you are enjoying at this moment, I suggest you go ahead and translate your favorties. Also, remember that your friends in Japan have done more or less the same.
Also, your hero (or the victim you put out of work at age 60), admitted that he reached the same conclusion with the same main ideas on Dokdo/Takeshima. Have a lot of LOLs on that.
let me tell you, one hot day in the San Fernando Valley, I heard a lot of sirens and more than one chopper flying by the area I was living in. More than one chopper is kind of weird, so I turn on the tv. LIVE.
Some white man from Idaho named Mr. Buford was shooting automic rifles at Jewish children at a facility that was about 5 miles or so from where I was living. It was the sickest, most disturbing thing I have ever seen LIVE on tv (although no footage was actually shown, just a general view of the location, which I could recognize from driving by), and I was heart broken to hear what this one Jewish lady had to say,
” As soon as I heard on the radio, I knew it was the Jewish community center. (She was crying and trembling), Why can’t those people just leave us alone?!”
If you just read the now defunct, non exisitng yahoo news message boards for any news article, you would get the impression that US is the most racist, hate filled country in the entire world. Is it?
I don’t think it is.
Those were anonymous message boards, by the way.
Lee Won Bok was/is wrong. He deserves criticism and possibly some sort of punishment. I suggest he show full remorse, possibly resign out of his free will from his university, and use most or all of his ill gotten wealth from the book towards more positive things.
I only add the qualifier that South Koreans don’t know any better, their opinions are shaped from school age to retirement age by the 9pm tv news, and most of them don’t have any personal experiences with Jewish people.
wjk,
You truly are a dumbass.
Let’s look at this again. Your opinion was that Korean parents teach hate. Without saying “some” or “a few” or “a minority” you implied that it would be most if not all. If most, if not all parents teach hate in Korea, how could it be anything less than acceptable?
Perhaps my wording was somewhat ‘difficult’ for you. I will try again.
Crap…hitting post was an accident.
Interesting how, in your opinion, teaching hate is prevalent and by extension acceptable in Korea. Could this be why people are so indifferent to the problematic messages in the comic?
wjk,
So that the world’s image of Koreans can avoid further harm, what steps do you suggest be taken to enable Koreans to know better in the future? Because simply explaining that “they don’t know any better” isn’t gonna cut it for much longer.
Reword that…so that Korea’s image in the world can avoid further harm…
That is a very typical korean response, wjk. Despite the glaring racism for that silly little country, all koreans do is point and scream at America or Japan. It is a pathological inability to accept criticism that is far too common in China/korea/russia etc.
In a civilized nation, with a civilized population, we don’t use the crimes of others to lessen the crimes of ourselves. When I came across racism in Canada, I never said “what about the Indian untouchables???”. When good Americans are confronted about the KKK, they don’t jump into a tirade about the treatment of Tibetans by the Han Chinese. We accept the criticism and agree the crimes are wrong.
Time for korean “culture” to grow up and start acting its age.
I agree with that statement, but I would also like to add that not knowing any better isn’t any kind of excuse, nor is it any kind of laudable attribute of a society. It certainly isn’t a ‘cultural value’ of any worth. And it certainly doesn’t warrant a knee-jerk defense when it comes up for criticism.
WJK:
In part; even the ones from that group that stayed behind were honorable, though: von Stauffenbergs (the main branch; our wasn’t entitled to the patent).
I haven’t seen The Good Shepherd; but I assume that DeNiro’s “Sullivan” is supposed to be “Wild Bill” Donovan. The relevance of his alleged bias in favor of WASPs – of which, btw, as an Irish Catholic he wasn’t one – vis-a-vis the question of the loyalties of non-WASP immigrants escapes me. Moreover, I’m leery of relying on movies as a basis for statements about matters of historical fact for which there is so much more readily available and credible real evidence.
As I indicated, my forbears didn’t HAVE to enlist for any reason other than their own beliefs. They lived (and I grew up) in a very ployglot urban environment where, despite the existence of enthnic rivalries, ethnic tension was submerged in the shared goal of assimilation in the melting pot and hence pretty muted compared to the boiling cauldron it’s become since multiculturalism caught on – which is what I think you are seeing today. Of course, serving certainly enhanced one’s claim to having “really” become an American; but not doing so wasn’t a fatal impediment if you nevertheless were doing your part, e.g., on the line at the Chrysler tank factory, and not actually rooting for the other side. Nor was it required to utterly disavow your ethnic roots – my grandmother used to take food to WWII German and Italian POWS who were encamped on a local island, without raising any eyebrows, while her sons were fighting with Patton at the Bulge.
You’ve rather inadvertently confirmed my point about the difference between the way it was and the way it is now. The Russians, Hispanics, Hungarians, Poles, Irish, Italians, English, Serbs and Germans – even the Chinese and American Indians – that I knew growing up – all themselves, if immigrants, just landed or their children – all considered themselves Americans plain and simple (not hyphenated ones) the minute they were admitted (because, I suspect, they came not just for the promise of a big iron rice bowl). Of course, some groups – Asians, Indians – not to mention blacks – had more or less more difficult times, but military service was no more the only valid option for them than it was for poor Appalachian, Oklahoman, scrubby pine country whites or, for that matter, the Nisei of the 442nd and their renowned Korean subaltern. At least, unlike the Japanese enlisted in the latter, they weren’t going to be incarcerated or otherwise harassed – and one can plausibly argue in the case of the latter that even they had the valid option of sitting out the horror in desert, as unplesant as that might be.
goat, I suggest you stop talking to a dumbass, but also stop accusing a dumbass. Ok?
I just described it happens. Plain and simple.
Never said it was acceptable. That’s you. And you alone.
I did quite well on all standardized English reading comprehension exams. Let’s see. They all say 90 percentile or higher.
I can’t explain any deficiency of English skills on this website.
Iceberg, I’ll let someone else ponder about that. Ask your local South Korean friend.
Were something like this happening in Canada, I would feel a responsibility to make my disapproval known, not circle the wagons and unconditionally defend the tribe.
“that’s because antisemitism results in visible crimes in Canada. I’m not circling the wagons. I said Lee Won Bok is wrong and so are people like him. What more do you want? Bury all Korean people with him? Would you condemn millions of Americans for one man from Idaho firing automatic weapons at Jewish children in California, or all people from Idaho for that matter?”
wjk, first and foremost, I would freak out if my kid came home with a comic book like this back in Canada because it is WRONG. Anti-semitism, for the most part, does not result in visible crime in Canada. Sometimes yes, mostly no. (It used to be a more serious problem in places like Montreal in the 1930s, for example. I encourage you to look it up if it interests you. One of many dark chapters in our history I’m not afraid to admit.) I might add that my definition of a true patriot would include acknowledging imperfections in one’s society and working to improve them, as opposed to closing ranks.
I haven’t condemned all Korean people. Most people posting here haven’t either, unless one wants to consider the criticism of one and attack on all Koreans. Korea’s a pretty good place, with generally pretty good people. I just wonder why, instead of being open to criticizing one idiotic comic book author, so many Koreans posting on Naver feel a near-instinctive (well, not instinctive as nationalism is learned, not genetic) need to defend him – or direct their anger towards a people (Jews) they have no real issue with – simply because he is Korean. You won’t find me defending Canadian white supremicists, to give an example, cause they’re assholes who don’t deserve any sympathy. As I’ve written previously, I think there is more ignorance than malice in this example.
Along with a lot of others who post here, I happen to give a shit about what happens here. My wife and in-laws are Korean, my son a dual citizen, and I’ve invested a lot of my life in the place. I don’t throw issues like this in the faces of my parents-in-law, nor rant and rave about them on the subway to perfect strangers, but I feel I’ve earned the right to give an opinion here and there, without being accused of Korea-bashing. I would hope that Koreans in Canada – citizens, residents, or visitors – feel equally comfortable pointing out what they feel are imperfections in Canadian society.
See, that’s the problem. Too many people are all-too-willing to “let someone else ponder about that”. If you truly care about the image of Koreans, which I believe you do, maybe you should lend your voice to those who need to hear it most.
Meanwhile, I do talk about these things with my Korean friends. Some care, some don’t.
“But obviously there is a decent-sized segment of the population who are harboring some serious animosity.”
I’m sure there is, but I’m also sure there would be a decent-sized segment of the Jewish population who are harbouring some serious animosity toward Koreans. Many people seem capable of seeing only one side.
“But obviously there is a decent-sized segment of the population who are harboring some serious animosity.”
That was in response to comments on another post that Koreans don’t give any thought to Jews.
“Many people seem capable of seeing only one side.”
You won’t get any disagreement from me on that one. Now, if you want to use that as a distraction in order to feel better about what’s going on here, well then I guess your hopeless.
stop accusing a dumbass of what? Dumbassery?
You did not only describe that it happens, you were quite confident in that fact. You also implied that it was a general trait. Whether this was on purpose or just through plain ignorance of writing and speaking style differences between Korean and English, I don’t know. I assumed it was the first but in hindsight, I could have been wrong.
As for the acceptable part, I did extend it to that due to the way you formed your statement. If hate is taught from generation to generation by Korean (all? many? most?) parents, Korean society clearly does not see it as unacceptable…no?
Regardless of all of this, you still never addressed the final statement.
Actually…never mind. Go mets, Park for Cy Young blah blah.
Just top stir up the hornets’ nest a bit on Naver, it would be great for someone with a name like Herschel Goldstein to comment: “Now you Koreans have asked for it. The worldwide Jewish cabal will crush you like cockroaches!”
wedge,
It would be far better if some guy named Kim Min Su would log in and post: “Don’t you kids know that Koreans are among the prime targets of neo-Nazi scum in Europe?”
You say that there are comments from South Koreans that condemn Rhie. Where are they? There is no need to translate; the Korean language skills of the commentators here can do the job.
You have been asked this same question three times.
Now, if you actually made this assertion blindly, that would call to mind the assertion you made on an earlier thread that Bevers’ Dokdo claims were plagiarized. However, you failed to support that claim.
This seems like a particularly ignorant comment. The news reports that communicate that Rhie’s racist comments are socially abhorent indicate that the people in this society do in fact know that his racist work is in fact socially abhorent.
sine qua non, why dont you do your own looking around? Did you read anything from that .jp site? There is a Korean translation link.
• 이정훈 (bond89) 찬성하기 6 반대하기 15
명확한 증거없이 심정으로 글을 썼군. WASP 뒤에 유대인이 있다는 증거는 무엇이며 그 유대인의 총본부가 뉴욕이라는 근거는 또 뭔가. 미국의 언론은 유대인의 것이며 유대인의 소리, 그 자체라고 해도 지나친 말이 아니지’이런 주장의 근거는 또 뭔가? 이원복이라는 사람 사고방식이 대단히 부정적이게 비꼬여졌군. 그런식으로 글을 쓸거면 차라리 없는 사실 만드는 소설을 쓰지 그러냐 (02/16/2007 03:52:10)
• 권영성 (rnjs7417) 찬성하기 2 반대하기 11
교수란 자가 어설픈 지식과 사고 방식으로 남의 나라의 일에 부정적인 만화나 만들고 ….그래서 얻을게 뭐가 있나? 이사람도 아마 386인 모양이지. 유대인 만큼 우수한 민족도 지구상에는 별로 없는 듯 하구만 우리가 배울점을 배우는 게 무조건 ㅂ (02/16/2007 09:47:01)
• 윤태인 (tangotango) 찬성하기 5 반대하기 8
9/11 테러같은 대재앙을 유태인때문이라고 단정짓는것은 너무경솔했다.이원복씨가 세계적저명인사였다면 더이상 세계여행못할정도의 대사고였을것이다. (02/16/2007 11:20:34)
• 김창호 (call009) 찬성하기 1 반대하기 8
20세기 초입까지 나라없이 피박과 학대속에 세계를 떠돌며,그것도 최상위계층(정치,경제,과학분야)을 형성하면서 목소리를 돋우는 민족은 유대민족밖에 없습니다.하느님이 선택한 단하나의 민족이라는 개념만 버린다면 흠잡을데가 없는 민족이라 하겠습니다.요즘도 전쟁나면 이나라 사람들은 하던일 멈추고 조국으로 돌아가지요! 부럽습니다! (02/16/2007 05:46:06)
• 하정복 (jungbokha) 찬성하기 7 반대하기 8
개인적인 자리에서의 이야기가 아닌 영원히 보존될수도 있는 도서에 특히 판단력이 완성되지못한 어린이들을 대상으로한 도서에서 유대인을 왜곡되게 표현한 것은 당연히 사과하고 수정되어야 마땅하다고 생각되며 이원복교수의 빠른 사과에 오히려 안심이 됩니다. 우리가 전교조를 우려하는 것도 역시나 이러한 동일한 이유가 아닐까 합니다. (02/16/2007 05:02:45)
무시한 교수 무식한 개티즌 조회 107추천 02007/02/15 16:10
akuma086다른글 보기 IP 121.132.xxx.155신고
그런 머리통으로 책쓰고 글을 쓰네. 한국인들이 정상에 설수 있는데 유태인때문에 안됐다는 소리아냐. 그걸 믿는 바보 개티즌들은 또 뭔데? 진짜 바보냐? 웃기고 자빠졌다. 그럼 최고의 자리에 선 수 많은 일본계, 중국계, 남미계는 뭔데? 뭘로 설명할건데?
유태인들이 개들은 봐주고 한국인만 찍어놓고 패기라도 했냐? 한국인이 못올라가놓고 그게다 유태인탓이라고 하니 욕먹는게 당연하지.
제생각에도 이번 문제는.. 조회 90추천 02007/02/15 16:32
matary2001다른글 보기 IP 211.114.xxx.72신고
교수님이 공식적으로 이스라엘 측에 사과하셔야 할 거 같습니다..다른 서적도 아닌 먼나라 이웃나라라는 중요한 교육서를….
Thanks for posting some representative positive comments, wjk.
Now, can you tell me why it is Koreans are so confused as to the spelling of Jew? They can’t seem to agree on 유대인 or 유태인.
Is that something like “grey” and “gray” or maybe “colour” and “color”?
personal opinion? the former is closer to the real pronunciation, and based on hangul sound of the word. The latter with tae is based on chinese characters fitted to represent the sound. An older version.
usinkorea, marmot posted on the book ‘kenkanryu’. didn’t call on the author to issue an apology. didn’t call on the company to fire the guy. tell me, what’s the difference between ‘kenkanryu’ and mr lee’s book? you condemn one but not the other? there’s something wrong with that. it’s a contradiction. of course, mamrot’s play is to simply not answer these questions. that’s the best way to hide the proof in the pudding.
what’s the difference between ‘kenkanryu’ and mr lee’s book, marmot?
what’s the difference between ‘kenkanryu’ and mr lee’s book, marmot?
one answer would be: while there’s very real discrimination towards koreans in japan, there’s no real discrimination towards jews in korea.
btw, most of the cowboys here don’t give a hoot about jews. they just see this as another opportunity to bash koreans. that’s their passion- bashing the people that give them jobs, booze, and satisfaction for their primitive. tsk, tsk, tsk,
lastly, i’m proud to be an american. are you?
@wjk – thanks for the explanation.
@nulji – the difference is simple, genius: “kenkanryuu” had limited circulation and is not accepted as gospel by Japanese children (not to mention adults). “Prof.” Lee’s 3rd-rate artistry and as one poster above noted, pseudo-internationalism, unfortunately are widely known and read in Korea and serve to reinforce ignorant and incorrect stereotypes not only of Jews, but of other people as well (including Koreans). One can just read his volume comparing Japan, China, and Korea as proof.
And you are not a real American — just because your parents made up some names for themselves does not make it so. Please refer to wjk’s truism.
Firstly, did I ever defend “kenkanryu?” No, I didn’t think so. Another difference is that unlike Rhie’s book, I can’t read the Japanese book. I have to rely on translations done by jeil GYOPO, and you can’t trust GYOPO to tell the trust. It’s that simple (before you get your panties in a bunch, see #94).
I could also point out—although I know you won’t like it—that while Jews have done nothing to Korea to warrant such an attack, I don’t find it all that surprising that a comic book like “kenkanryu” would pop up in Japan when Japan is denigrated almost daily in Korea, often in the crudest ways possible. That’s not a defense of the comic, which I understand was mostly bullshit, and I’m well aware that Japanese can be just as racist as Korea, but yes, after constant exposure to the kind of noxious crap that you see on this side of the East Sea regarding Japan on a regular basis, excuse my failure to be shocked/outraged when fringe groups do the same in Japan. As opposed to mainstream cartoonists and media here. Hey, Pawi, I don’t seem to recall you getting all outraged when I first reported on Rhie’s comic way back in 2004.
Lastly, I don’t live in Japan, ergo I have to rely on Korean news reports to tell me what’s up. And yes, I trust said reports about as little as I trust the KCNA.
Sure, if you say so, Pawi. Although given your previous rhetoric, and the fact that you seem much more concerned with lying EXPATS than criticizing a flagrant act of anti-Semitism, I think it’s fair to say that YOU don’t give a hoot about Jews.
But congratulations on being a proud American, though.
pawikirogi,
“Kenkanryu” didn’t exist until after many Japanese realized the anti-Japanese movements in Korea. Obviously, the author wanted to refute what many Koreans claim about Japan and its history. Don’t expect that every Japanese would put up with Korea’s disrespectful attitude toward Japan. Every country has its racist, hate mongering elements and always will. What’s different in Korea is that for the most part these elements are hardly rebuked or pulled up. In fact, it’s promoted by the media. Even a leading newspaper in Korea publish ridiculous caricatures of the Japanese.
http://english.chosun.com/w21d.....20034.html
But worse is that they don’t see the double standards. They seem to think it’s perfectly ok for them to make offensive cartoons but suddenly become the hapless victims when the same thing is done to them.
I should also point out, Pawi, that I don’t really think Rhie’s university should let him go. I only wish to point out that Mr. Bevers lost his job for doing much, much less. And since we’re discussing contradictions, Pawi, why don’t we start with the most obvious—you defended Mr. Bevers’ university to let him go, while bashing EXPATS for demanding that Duksung University do the same to Rhie. And simply admit why that is, Pawi—because you think teaching racist anti-Semitic ideology to Korean youngsters is OK, but disputing Korean sovereignty over two rocks is an assault on all that is good and holy.
Kenkanryu is not a racist tract. I posted the Korean translation of Kenkanryu, and there was no complaints about it by Koreans.
Pawi, some advice from a long-term lurker:
Begin your arguments by admitting that the comic was wrong, THEN move on to point out the contradictions and double-standards of the dirty EXPAT. Until you take this simple step, all your other arguments are rendered invalid. The marmot criticises Korea, yes; he also often praises it. Likewise, whilst often mentioning positive things to do with the U.S and Japan, he also criticises them when he feels the need.
You, on the other hand, cannot seem to make the very simple, yet very important step of condemning a Korean, when, as in the case currently at hand, condemnation is clearly warranted.
I know, its a Han thing, but no-one ever choked to death swallowing their pride. Go on Pawi – you can do it. Was it wrong or not?
Pawi is as Amrican as orange pie and fresh-squeezed Florida appel juice.
Sorry for the early am typos…
Quote:
Sonagi
Posted February 16, 2007 at 2:32 am | Permalink
Contrast the reactions of Korean netizens and overseas Koreans like wjk with the cooperative efforts between foreigners and Japanese in getting Family Mart to remove from its shelves a racist comic and issue a letter of apology. Read all about it at http://www.japanprobe.com .
————————————————————-
This is simply too rich to pass up, too bad you cannot say the same thing about other issues that are more important:
http://www.japantoday.com/jp/news/399054
POLITICS
‘Comfort women’ resolution could harm ties, says Japan’s ambassador to U.S.
Wednesday, February 14, 2007 at 10:17 EST
WASHINGTON — Japan’s ambassador to the United States said Tuesday the passage of a U.S. resolution condemning Japan for acts of sexual exploitation during World War II could poison Japan-U.S. relations.
In a news conference, Ryozo Kato called the draft resolution censuring Japan for forcing women of other Asian countries to provide sex for the Japanese military during the war “unfounded” in terms of its call on Tokyo to “formally acknowledge, apologize, and accept historical responsibility in a clear and unequivocal manner” for the acts.
“It is not desirable for ties between Japan and the United States to be adversely affected” by demanding Japan do what it has already done, Kato said.
He said the Japanese Embassy in Washington has been lobbying lawmakers and U.S. government officials not to support the draft resolution, adding Tokyo wants to express its view on the matter in due course.
Democratic Rep Mike Honda and some powerful Republicans submitted the resolution Jan 31 urging the Japanese prime minister to offer an official apology for the sexual exploitation, victims of which are known euphemistically in Japan as “comfort women.”
A hearing is scheduled for Thursday in a House Foreign International Relations Committee subcommittee with victims of Japanese sexual exploitation testifying.
———————————————————–
Question is, Does it only count when the Japs bow down to White pressure?
Really, I’m glad RJ is concerned about this whole issue but he doesn’t seem to have any problem linking to racist websites that has nothing but racist stereotypes of Korean People? I’m guessing “that condescending stream of crap” only flows one way, right?
————————————————————-
————————————————————-
Quote:
#
tambe
Posted February 16, 2007 at 1:04 pm | Permalink
That is a very typical korean response, wjk. Despite the glaring racism for that silly little country, all koreans do is point and scream at America or Japan. It is a pathological inability to accept criticism that is far too common in China/korea/russia etc.
In a civilized nation, with a civilized population, we don’t use the crimes of others to lessen the crimes of ourselves. When I came across racism in Canada, I never said “what about the Indian untouchables???”. When good Americans are confronted about the KKK, they don’t jump into a tirade about the treatment of Tibetans by the Han Chinese. We accept the criticism and agree the crimes are wrong.
Time for korean “culture” to grow up and start acting its age.
————————————————————-
This kills me,
“Good Americans?” I suppose that’s why Blacks and Hispanics are still treated like pond scums that are still on the bottom of the economic ladder after 300 years of America’s existence, right? BECAUSE RACISM DOESN’T EXIST IN AMERICA, THAT’S AN ILLUSION!
Why don’t you ask an average Black Joeblow living in America if racism doesn’t exist in America anymore, or why he can’t find a decent cab-ride in broad daylight in NY City in the year of our lord 2007, or why all the major cities in America has a this thing called “ghetto” that looks like a bombed out third world shelter because, God forbid, if anybody ever finds out that Racism actually existed and CONTINUES TO EXIST in America, and that Americans practiced apartheid for the better part of it’s history and that they actually use to lynch Black people over a poplar tree simply because of the color of their skin. God forbid anybody would ever find that out because that’s all an illusion!
Listen, I don’t actually ever remember a Korean lynching a Blackman on a poplar tree but If you can actually find a picture of one let me know, I will stand corrected. On the other hand, there are plenty of pictures of Blackmen swinging from a tree to make one vomit over a lifetime, and this all took place in “good America,” wherever the fuck that is if anyone is kind enough to show me…
Anyway, this benevolent, “Good American” is a fucking myth.
Not even most Americans buy into this crap anymore. It seems to me, you guys are only mad because Koreans dare to diss the White boys, which is a big no-no in your eyes because we all know that “yellow monkeys” are far inferior to Whites, and why, even pure White Trash are far superior to Asians, right?
Your puzzlement and frustration actually stems from the fact that a typical Korean refuses to buy into this horse shit, condescending garbage crap nonsense. Listen White boys, you’re not going to be running much of anything in few years, get use to it. When Europe gets run over by Muslims and America by Illegals, the only place that will be safe for your worthless lily White ass will be in East Asia, not that I ever thought that tambe was ever White to begin with.
Believe me, Koreans aren’t the only ones who are unimpressed:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/comm.....92,00.html
You wouldn’t last a week in Europe.
One thing that Americans are good at is hiding their bigotry.
It does not mean however that their bigotry is any less “barbaric,” or any more civilized. It’s just that they have better taste. They have just reached, shall we say, a more sophisticated level:
As an example, they don’t call a nigger “a nigger” in front of their face. No, they do it behind their back when they think nobody hears them. It does not mean however that it’s not anymore vile or hateful. It’s just more “civilized,” in their eyes. No, they’re not faulting Koreans for their level of bigotry, indeed, they are faulting Koreans for the level of their coarseness in public.
And I suppose, in the end, that’s why George Bush decided to invade Iraq despite overwhelming criticism and world condemnation, precisely because “Good Americans” are great at taking criticism and not blame others, and take the multi-lateral approach and not marginalize Europeans and it’s Allies, and do the right thing, right? LOL.
And I suppose that’s why killing 650,000 Iraqis is something that “good Americans” (whatever the fuck that is) do without even batting an eyelash because, God knows, George Bush and the rest of the fucking rednecks and the Neo-Cons even remotely think of a typical Iraqi as human. They’re just some mud-headed, turban wearing subhuman species. Why even think of them as human, why even bring them into this conversation at all? Right?
Say what you may wanna say about Koreans but I don’t ever remember a stupid comicbook ever killing anyone, but then again what the hell do I know.
P.S.
‘Not wanna buy into conspiracy theory unnecessarily but
you guys may wanna try some Neo-Con websites and open your eyes a bit. This topic may have touched off some nerve because there may be some truth behind all that comicbook crap after all, and since you guys are so intent on marginalizing it, you certainly wouldn’t have waste all this time on it if there wasn’t.
Before you think all Koreans are “barbaric,” which tickles me to no end every time I think about it:
Global Human Epic To Be Filmed
(Posted In Film News )
President Lee In-hyeong of Korean film agency Vision Link Global announced an ambitious international co-production on Tuesday. According to an article published by KBS Global, South Korea, China, the U.S. and France will invest 50 billion won to produce a film tentatively named “Melanie’s Violin” [멜라니의 바이올린] for simulataneous worldwide release around October 2008. The movie, based on a novel by Chinese author He Ning, is about a renowned Jewish violinist who flees to Shanghai to escape the Nazi holocaust. Together with Liu Xiao-Yang, a Chinese pupil, the two bring people faith, hope and freedom through his music. Vision Link, who will plan and produce the film, recently signed a joint production deal with a Chinese corporation. The vice president of France’s Studio Canal also signed a contract late last year, while negotiations with American counterparts are expected to be concluded shortly. The film, dubbed “an Asian Schindler’s List,” may involve a Hollywood director and cast. Director of production Shin Wu-Seong says the script was shown to Roman Polanski in October, but even though interested in the project, the director had to turn down the offer. The filming crew will involve staff members who worked on “Schindler’s List” and “The Pianist.” Korean-American musican Ji Park will compose the movie’s soundtrack. Park’s earlier works include Kim Ki-deok’s films “Samaria” and “Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter and Spring.”
[Source : KBS Global, Cine21 and Film2.0 via Cinémasie]
http://www.twitchfilm.net/archives/008701.html
See, that’s where you’re wrong, Origami. I DID mention the Congressional comfort women issue. Namely, I said the United States shouldn’t be getting involved, and I found it the height of hubris that the Congress of a nation like the United States—which has never apologized for its colonial misdeads—would demand that another country apologize for its colonial misdeads. And since we’re being snarky here, I guess I could point out that I guess it isn’t imperial white arrogance when the pressure is being put on Japan, is it?
Your posts about racism in America may very well be true. I haven’t been to America in 10 years, so you would know better than me. I’m not sure what they have to do with the discussion at hand, but sure, racism in America exists. Did anyone say it didn’t? It wouldn’t occur to me to jump into a discussion of racism against Asian-Americans in the United States by pointing out that Japan, for example, is a highly racist society. Yeah, that might very well be true, but it doesn’t make the United States any less racist. So I ask, what’s the point of your screed about racism in America and Iraq, other than to distract from the matter at hand?
And yeah, a comic book never killed anyone. I guess you’d probably think my criticism of American schools for teaching “So Far from the Bamboo Trees” was misplaced as well, then, right?
This kills me,
“Good Americans?” I suppose that’s why Blacks and Hispanics are still treated like pond scums that are still on the bottom of the economic ladder after 300 years of America’s existence, right? BECAUSE RACISM DOESN’T EXIST IN AMERICA, THAT’S AN ILLUSION!
You are one diluted individual. Blacks and Hispanics are victims of all of the entitlements and give-a way’s they receive for no-good-reason. Proof that when we give things to people they do not earn nor deserve, it corrupts the soul.
And yes, we need to hit the Muslims hard. This is a continuation of the first Caliphate. If you can not recognize this fact, you are either intellectually lazy or just fucked up in the head. By reading your rant I think both.
How many times should Japan apologize for the sins of the father? Should we pay these ladies? Would it make for good compensation for these victims, or back-payment for the johns who skipped out on their bill?
Get the fuck over it. Prosecute the war criminals then move the fuck on, but no, then we would not have warm martyrs to fuel your guilt.
What we got here is a real dandy!!!!!
For the love of Christ, railwaycharm…
Too over the top?
haha, i thought RJ was doing quite well on his own there railway…
As for Origami, you’re kind of getting a bit off topic aren’t you? After all, this is a blog about korean matters and this thread about a particular Korean matter that has little to do with american racism or Iraq. Do you have anything at all to say about the comic?
RE: wjk’s postings of Netizens’ comments
comment #159
The comments are still up at the Chosun Ilbo board. I noticed from your very post that the comments critical of Rhie’s book got twice as many opposition votes as support votes.
comments #160 and #161
I searched in vain for those comments at Naver. I searched by commenter, by title, and by content. Nothing. I believe that you cut and pasted them and didn’t make them up, so the Naver folks must have deleted them. Meanwhile all that hateful rubbish about Hitler and a second Holocaust is still there.
Such selective moderating does not surprise me. Back after 9-11, when Korean message boards were praising Bin Laden and kicking America in the face, a few foreigners dared to post critical comments at the boards, and their comments were often deleted, although the angry Korean responses remained. At least the Yahoo boards were an open forum and no one was deleted.
RE: Origami’s long rant
What does Japanese opposition to the US Congress resolution about comfort women have to do with Japanese people’s attitudes towards racially offensive material?
Yes, events that happened more than 60 years ago are more important to Koreans than what is happening today. If Koreans want to talk honestly about comfort women, why don’t they start confronting their own role in the exploitation of women?
I do. The comic is anything but comical. It is repugnant hate mongering. The worst part of this whole drama is it is purpose written to bend young minds. It smacks of “Daddy’s new roommate” meets Goebbels bedtime fables.
As far as the off-topic I was answering a post on this very thread, yes she was off-topic.
Marmot, for the love of sweet merciful baby Jesus!
Hmm, when I went to check out the Naver comments, I saw nothing but “Rhie should apologize” and “The book should be changed” comments.
Oh wait, nevermind… now they’re back to praising Hitler.
WTF is wrong with those guys?
dogbertt, pawi is a real American who votes, receives govt financial aid for school, pays taxes, and there is no shit you can do about it and if that bothers you lot, I’ll just laugh my head off at you.
Because he’s an American citizen, period.
Thank you for the Korean-language comments criticizing Rhie.
The Koreans who read those particular comments overwhelmingly disagreed with the contents.
O.K. So, to review:
A nasty, racist, anti-Semitic comic book is translated into English.
The Simon Wiesenthal Center protests to the publisher and the media in Korea takes notice of the issue.
The Korean author of the vile libel addresses only Americans of Korean ancestry with an exression of regret. (What about the Jewish people he humiliated?)
The overwhelming reaction from Korean society is a confirmation of a Korean dehumanization of Jewish people, with comments along the lines of:
“유대인들은 인간 쓰레기들이다!!!” Jews are human trash.
“유대인 쓰레기들을 몰살하라!하일!히틀러” Exterminate Jewish trash! Heil Hitler!
“대대적인 홀로코스트를 다시 한번 해야 한다….” We need another large-scale Holocaust.
Hmm…it seems we need more Korean books translated into English.
wow – check out the comments over at the Chosun Ilbo. A lot of jew-hate going on, not much sympathy. Hope its not indicative of general public opinion.
http://news.chosun.com/site/da.....00049.html
I particularly like this one (a very popular comment over there):
그러므로 유태인들은 글로벌화 되어 유럽과 미국의 유태인끼리 네트워크를 구성하여 전세계를 대상으로 약점이 발견되었을시 피에 굼주린 늑대와 같이 공격을 합니다.그예가 1997년 아시아의 금융위기시 미국과 유럽의 유태인들이 서로 짜고 IMF를 이용하여 한국 1개국에서만 월스트리트에 300억 달러의 수익을 거두었습니다.
O.K. So, to review:
How could we ever get by without your tutelage? The pomposity abounds.
This story has been picked up by a couple of Japanese forums:
http://mobile.seisyun.net/cgi/.....71540347/1
http://news21.2ch.net/test/rea.....540347/l50
The story cited in both links is an older Chosun Ilbo version from the 15th, which was not linked here, so I don’t think Matt tipped them off
:
http://news.chosun.com/site/da.....00317.html
Posting from the emergency World Jewry meeting in Jerusalem.
Unanimous vote: IMF II
Now we’re voting on producing a movie about the Korean POW camp guards of WWII. Spielberg seems undecided. I’m frantically writing notes and passing them to Kravis about what being posted at Naver.
This provocative little piece at Chosun’s realname forum is tied for first place in the rec count:
“• 이돈교 (whwqja) 22 5
지금 유태인들이 항의하는 것처럼 유태인이 미국에서 파워가 있다는 것이 사실이 아니라면 지금 유태인들이 남의 나라에 있는 한 외국인 교수에게 압력을 넣어서 굴복시킨 사실은 어떻게 받아들여야 하나? 모순도 이런 모순이…그리고 내가 미국에서 겪어본 바, 유태인들 인간성 아주 개떡같더라…뒤통수 치기는 중국인보다는 못하지만…베니스의 상인이 괜히 나온 소설이 아니다. (02/16/2007 11:01:02)
If this protest by the Jews doesn’t prove Jewish power in America, what does? Now Jews are putting pressure on another country’s foreign professor to surrender. What a contradiction. Judging from my own experience in the US, Jewish people’s humanity is lacking. Their heads don’t stick out as much as Chinese people’s, but their business acumen is legendary.
I wonder what the commenter thinks of VANK’s endless internet attacks on organizations who don’t label that sea properly or of the Korean government sticking its nose into the curriculum of a suburban Boston school district. The nerve of those American Jews, complaining to a Korean professor about a book published in the Korean language in Korea for Korean children!
Well, at least we have to worry about the translation issue anymore…
Oops, forgot to turn off the boldface
Robert,
Can you please delete the above post and this one, so that I can repost without all the boldface shouting?
Thanks.
Fixed it for you.
Has Kushibo come back under a Latin moniker?
It’s so cute when they try to reason for themselves… (netijens, that is). Now, if they could just clean up all the race-baiting, the copyright infringement, the gossip about the latest stars, the awful blinking advertisements (epileptic seizure, anyone?), and the cutesy avatars, South Korean portal sites like Daum and Naver might actually turn into something respectable. Of course, their databases would weigh in at slightly under 1KB each…
I do have to admit to being a bit baffled at the commentators targeting Jews though. Are these people just mindless Internet trolls, or are they True Believers who read Mr. Lee’s (is Korean the only language that uses a silent ‘L’?) book and were corrupted by it? I’d suspect the former, since (as Pawi and Origami show) trolls are legion amongst the netijen hordes, but strongly fear the latter. Of course, I guess it’s still safe to wear the yarmulke out in public in South Korea, since it isn’t as if anyone would know what it was, or even suspect the person wearing one was Jewish. Plus, even if someone did suspect, they’d probably just shake off their suspicions, since the person wearing the yarmulke presumably wouldn’t be built into some sort of masonry structure.
Origami
“Question is, Does it only count when the Japs bow down to White pressure?”
Is it all “Japs’” fault again?
Sonagi, Matt Shakuhachi, why don’t you go ahead and translate what you found on the Japanese board?
Using enjoyjapan.naver.com,
I don’t see much of good behavior from the Japanese, either.
Go ahead. US Expats in South Korea, try it.
http://news21.2ch.net/test/rea.....540347/l50
http://mobile.seisyun.net/cgi/.....71540347/1
The chosun.com board usually will score in the 300s of approve/disapprove. If it is an item of interest such as Noh Moo Hyun, North Korea, etc. Your #1 rated posts, how did they fare on the scoreboard?
Be honest.
Naver, too.
Be honest.
There are a lot more good people in South Korea who are not anti-semitic. Don’t have your private LOLs and hates on all South Koreans over 1000 or so at Naver and less than 50 at chosun.
Ponta, if you want to believe it’s Japan’s fault, you can. I did not say this was Japan’s fault.
It’s Lee Won Bok’s fault.
actually, i think the chosun decided to erase all the comments.
Naver, on the other hand, check out “Choo-Chun”.
Tell me, honestly, approval in the 1000s? 300s? 100s?
Like I said, Lee Won Bok is responsible. He’s the one who was “educated” in Germany for his PhD. He’s the one who wrote the book. He’s the one who made money. Commenters? Not representative of all of South Korea. What is a 1000 people posting anonymously on a message board worth?
The same as posting on a yahoo message board in the US. You could have found every dirty form of racism on the yahoo ones. Representative of the US? Tell me honestly.
Most South Koreans don’t know any better and very few have anti semitic attitudes. Most have never met a Jewish person in their entire lives.
How to change it in South Korea?
Personal opinion?
1st, cut the tie between the Blue house and the 9pm tv news. 9pm tv news has been tailored at least since Lt. Okamoto to shape public opinion. It is still used by Noh Moon Hyun. A relic of the military government.
just so you know on naver, Jo Hwae is not Choo Chun. Jo Hwae, means someone looked at it.
Choo Chun means someone gave a thumbs up.
I think this Jo Hwae has been abused by people here as equaling approval.
Big misunderstanding.
Tell me honestly. Am I wrong?
“Ponta, if you want to believe it’s Japan’s fault, you can. I did not say this was Japan’s fault.”
At least you were polite. Thanks.
zonath, in North Korea, they pronounce it with the L. Lee.
I don’t know how they came to this difference.
Sperwer, I thought your comment was great.
Sorry for posting 4 in a row. Honestly, they don’t all come to me at once.
For this sin of posting 4 in a row, I will abstain from commenting.
@wjk,
The Japanese links I provided are simply Japanese translations of the Chosun Ilbo article.
@Zonath:
The silent L in Lee reflects South Korean pronunciation and spelling. The surname 이 is 리 in North Korea. There are a
number of spelling variationnpatterns of Sino-Korean words and names. The North Korean spellings are consistent and closer to the original Chinese pronunciation.
For example:
영토 領土 ling3tu3 – territory
대통령 大統領 dai4tong3ling3 – president
(in Chinese, “president” is actually 总统 zǒngtǒng)
Notice how the South Korean spelling of the same Chinese character changes according to whether the character appears first or later in the compound word. North Korean spellings are consistent and do not make this kind of change. You can also see from the Chinese pinyin provided that the original Korean pronunciation is closer to Chinese. As I said, there are groups of Sino-Korean words that follow this or similar patterns.
Ethnic Koreans in China used to follow North Korean spellings, but this is changing with the heavy influence of South Korea. Many ethnic Koreans now say they speak “Hangukmal” not “Chosunmal.”
Considering Prof. Lee’s comic book and some of the more virulent comments from the Korean forums that have been copied here, the most bizarre thing of all is this:
I’m sure the same ultra-nationalistic Korean commenters who are taking umbrage at the Simon Wiesenthal Center’s complaint about Prof. Lee’s comic book are also the ones who most feel that Koreans have historically been oppressed and exploited by the Japanese, especially during the colonial period. Well, hello? The Holocaust and Korean colonization (not to mention worse atrocities in other East Asian countries) were both perpetrated by Axis powers! If anything, Korean nationalists should find common cause with those who memorialize the Holocaust. That some commenters can say that another Holocaust, etc., is needed is exactly the same kind of sick and twisted thinking that led to the Nanjing massacre, Japanese biological experiments, and the various issues closer to home that Koreans hold Japan responsible for. The SWC is just asking for the same thing that Koreans plead over and over and over again for from non-Koreans: understanding, sympathy, etc.
And this has nothing to do with Korea-bashing or anything else. For what it’s worth, I’m Canadian and proud to be Canadian, not least because it is such a multicultural country. I live in a metropolitan area that’s at least a good third of East Asian ancestry, and a fifth or a quarter South Asian, and I love it. I’m a third generation descendant of immigrants myself, and I’m aware of it and proud that my ancestors were welcomed into this country. And not always welcomed, either: there used to be laws restricting what Jews could or could not do. There were some things that people of both Jewish and Chinese ancestry were restricted from doing. This country is still imperfect in many ways. There is still racism. It’s disingenous to claim racism doesn’t exist here or in the US. But dammit, we try…a majority—no matter how tenuous—of people of every different colour try to make this society a better place, together, day by day.
Oh, and who the frig cares if Japan is more or less racist or whatever? That’s a red herring. Koreans can clean up their own act, then be a shining light to the world. Japan would then be an embarrassment by comparison.
This is so utterly screwed up. Henceforward, I don’t think I can take seriously any claim against Japan by anyone of Korean ancestry—including some commenters on this forum—who thinks this is a Jewish conspiracy or whatever. If you think that, then you are completely missing the frickin’ point. This is absolutely ridiculous.
wjk wrote:
“just so you know on naver, Jo Hwae is not Choo Chun. Jo Hwae, means someone looked at it.
Choo Chun means someone gave a thumbs up.
I think this Jo Hwae has been abused by people here as equaling approval.
Big misunderstanding.
Tell me honestly. Am I wrong?”
Yes, you are wrong. I know the difference between “Choo Chun” and “Jo Hwae.” The rec numbers I cited were “Choo chun” and BTW, it was the anonymous Naver boards that wiped out those few posts critical of Rhie you cited, not the Chosun boards. They didn’t erase all posts, only a few that criticized Rhie or fellow commenters.
I do not think the Naver boards represent a majority of Koreans, but they do show that more than a few Koreans react in a very hostile, negative, hateful manner to any foreign criticism of anyone or anything Korean just like the Yahoo boards show that racism is still a problem in America.
sonagi, go check chosun.com now. 2 comments.
I’m not wrong.
And, there are Japanese comments on the chosun article.
Check before you say someone is wrong.
(WJK: I was not referring to you, for the most part, although you seem to be going out of your way to downplay this.)
There are two Chosun articles. The later one, linked at the top, has numerous postings:
http://news.chosun.com/site/da.....00049.html
The earlier story, translated by a Japanese news website, has only two:
http://news.chosun.com/site/da.....00317.html
Of the two Japanese websites, one is a news website with no comment section. It is probably the original source of the post at the other website, whose comment section was filled with short posts mostly by one person, whose comments I did not bother to read. Had the comment section contained posts from a variety of netizens, I would have taken the time to read it.
Origami, #174…
I’m neither American nor white.
My people have gone through a genocide of a scale greater than anything Koreans have ever suffered at the hands of the Japanese. So, don’t even try playing the ‘white devil’ angle with me, it’s pathetic.
…and Roman Polanski? Although he’s a good director, I wonder if it’s a wise choice…he has raped a 13 year-old, after all.
http://www.wimnonline.org/articles/hollywood.html
OK, two questions:
Frankenstein. Is he Jewish? Was Mary Shelley an anti-Semite?
Secondly, how do most folks here feel about Shakespeare’s “Merchant of Venice”?
wjk, #200.
Excellent points (except for the ‘Koreans don’t know any better’, that’s a bit of a blanket statement.)
Stop trolling, Bluejives.
There have been some distracting, unnecessary comment, so it would be helpful to re-focus the discussion, again.
1. Rhie Wonbok publishes a book that says, ‘Jews are bad.’
2. Jewish people respond and say, ‘That is offensive.’
3. The overwhelming response from Korean people is to a) stifle criticism of the author and b) amplify the original bigotry by saying, en mass, ‘JEWS ARE BAD!’
If you read a comment on this forum and have an emotional reaction and want to respond, please avoid repetitive, meandering trolling. That is inconsiderate of others and it wastes the time of many people.
If there isn’t a simple, coherent idea to be communicated, please keep your emotional, knee-jerk reaction to yourself. As a helpful suggestion, when you have something to contribute, first collect your thoughts, open MS Word, write your ideas down, re-read them to check that your entire message has been communicated. Finally, add the comment to this forum.
And, if memory serves correctly, Frankenstein was only part Jewish.
Really, wjk? That hurts.
As you seem to point out those comments on Naver and Chosun, there’s more harsh criticisms from Korean towards this issue or any other bad things, behavior, moral issues, politicians than any other expats or foreigners. But any critical information from others, foreigners views, fails to reach Korean ears, and instead the public is bombarded by the domestic media’s and education’s manipulative reporting, which, whether covering these issues, all assumes the same Korea-centric approach. Who would thought, I mean most Korean, that Prof. Lee view on “Monnara Iunnara” that it is written based on anti-Semitism. I might be just stupid to be blind on anti-semitism issue. This issue isn’t directly link to my attention as most Korean than Doko, Yasukuni, Koraen gangsters in LA, Korean prostitutes in Vancouver, “Yoko story” issue or No Moo-hyun. Honestly, I thought it was just a typical stereo-type towards Jewish people right before the moment this issue brought up to the surface. Now I could read, research and gives more thought about it and could draw my own conclusion. But, I think it is also natural that ordinary Korean netizen, including myself, want to defend or stand up any of these issues against different point-of-view from foreigners even if you are so against Korean behavior, culture and any other issues.
Still we need to see, criticise and stand up against any Korea/Korean issues which need to be changed and improved. I mean not to meet 40~80 years old fair-society of Western Standard on any of these matters but to help Koreans and netizens who have 17″ ~ 19″ monitor-wide view points who get an orgasm by others attention on their hatred posts to realize that the real world is much bigger. And why give so much credits on these comments on Naver.com?
If we were educated and we can’t see the forest but only see a wood in front, and judging the forest by narrow perspective, we’re a piece of shit.
“Korean is the only language with a silent ‘L’”? Give me a break.
Burmese has one, too. And a ‘Y’ that becomes an ‘R’ and an ‘M’ that becomes whatever you want it to! And an ‘L’, an ‘H’ and a ‘Y’ that when written all together become an ‘SH’.
This guy sounds completely half-baked. -Did he do his PhD by mail-order?
Slim: Sine qua non = Kushibo/Nora? Was kind of wondering the same–if it is he’s lost his mind
Sine qua non = Stroker Ace
Wow… 3 responses to that silent ‘L’ thing, and all of them seemed to be at least halfway serious. I was actually joking about that, seeing as how one of my pet peeves is how some names get romanized in ways which don’t have much to do with the actual pronunciation of the word (i.e. No –> Roh or Bak –> Park). As you can probably imagine, Irish Gaelic pisses me off to no end.
How about leaving the moderating to those who actually have some control and/or proprietary interest in the blog? Nobody appointed you den mother, so just chill.
Actually, I think the overwhelming response from Korean people was to just shrug and wonder what all the fuss was about. The overwhelming response from a relatively small group of netijen trolls was what you described above. For someone who counsels against making over-generalizations and knee-jerk responses…
Well said, Ji-mong.
Dunno Railway, Sine qua non seems more Jim Nabors than Burt Reynolds
Shazzayam!
On another thread Bopshop had this link to blog in the U.S.:
http://littlegreenfootballs.co.....h#comments
Some of the comments are amusing: “Being that I will be going to Shul this evening, and this is an offensive Cartoon….you can be assured that millions of Jews around the world will be rioting and burning down the Korean Embassies.”
“I hope this is from N. Korea, but I doubt it is.”
Another thing that must amaze Rabbi Cooper is that he went through all this “Koreans just don’t know any better” regarding Jews about six years ago:
http://edition.cnn.com/2001/WO.....orea.nazi/
And they still don’t get it.
In the Gomer Pyle sense or festive Crooner?
“The Holocaust and Korean colonization (not to mention worse atrocities in other East Asian countries) were both perpetrated by Axis powers! If anything, Korean nationalists should find common cause with those who memorialize the Holocaust.”
Excellent point, and I’m sure many do. I don’t think it would incorrect to marginalize the majority of netizens who posted negative comments on Naver as being nothing but stupid teenagers who grew up reading Mr. Rhie’s comic books.
In the “Pyle” sense
Zonath (218) and SomeGuy (222): thanks for putting this in perspective, without downplaying it or pretending it isn’t an issue.
I have never personally encountered anything in Korea that could be construed as antisemitism, but this could be because I can “pass” for a Gentile ethnically, and am a Christian religiously. Neither of those things would have prevented my being herded onto a boxcar if I were living in Poland 65 years ago, though….
Correction, everyone:
wjk was correct. The rec numbers in the hundreds were actually the number of views. The number of recs is far less, but the ones with the most recs are all very negative. I’ll translate the comment titles below:
1. We need another large-scale Holocaust. 15 recs
2. His Majesty Hitler would shed tears over this. 13 recs
3. Having looked at sections of Munnara 13 recs (the commenter says it’s all true)
4. No way should the truth be bent under pressure! 9 recs
5. What if a Munnara volume on the Middle East were written? 9 recs (commenter says the book would expose how evil Israelis murder innocent Palestinian children.
6. Every time I look at this article…8 recs
This last one is very interesting. The writer says they’ve read the book and don’t see anything wrong with it. They complain that as a country with freedom of the press, Korea shouldn’t cave in to foreign pressure. The writer then makes a comparison with the recent speed-skating controversy, complaining that Korea is humiliating itself and not being independent by apologizing.
I disagree with this commenter, but they are not hateful. I think this is an ordinary Korean expressing a view shared by many ordinary Koreans. You can read the original here:
이런 기사 볼때마다.. 조회 131추천 82007/02/15 21:58
sunsurii IP 121.159.xxx.6
정말 우리나라 한심하다는 생각이 든다..
먼나라… 는 나도 봐서 알지만, 매우 건전한 책이고 유대인 비하하려고 쓰여진게 아니다.
설혹 비하하고 있다 하더라도, 언론의 자유가 있는 대한민국이
유대인 말을 들어 출판내용을 바꾸는게 말이 되는가?
이런 기사 읽을때마다 한국이 싫어진다.
한국 빙상 여자 선수들 백두산 세레모니 했다가 중국측에 사과했단다..
중국은 대회 처음부터 백두산이 중국땅인것처럼 온갖 홍보 다한 주제에..
이런식으로 계속 굴욕적인 모습을 보이면,
이를 보는 국민들은, 국가 주체성을 의심하고,
한국을 엿같이 볼 수 밖에 없다.
#205 Sewing: I disagree with the “common cause against fascism” argument. In 1945 France, everyone was suddenly in the resistance. Don’t underestimate the level of support for Germany and Japan in this country during the Pacific War. Of course, since August 1945 everyone has been denying it.
In saying “good americans” I mean the good ones. Not the thugs. That was the point. But none the less, origami displayed the exact response we expect from koreans. Frothing at the mouth hate.
Anyways, I’m the one who convinced the littlegreenfootballs guy to post about this. It is my service to korea. My gift. LFG gets 130,000 hits a day.
sewing,
It’s possible that I would have been sent to a camp, too. I’m pretty sure they would have mistaken me for a Rom.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Porajmos
“#205 Sewing: I disagree with the “common cause against fascism” argument. In 1945 France, everyone was suddenly in the resistance. Don’t underestimate the level of support for Germany and Japan in this country during the Pacific War. Of course, since August 1945 everyone has been denying it.”
Sure, but that doesn’t change the fact that Korean dissidents, the good guys, were often tortured and executed.
“But none the less, origami displayed the exact response we expect from koreans. Frothing at the mouth hate.”
Actually, that’s not the reaction I expect. I’m quite sure that most Koreans, the silent majority, understand, or at least accept, that the book is offensive. Koreans aren’t all the xenophobic/nationalistic fools that you make them out to be.
Sonagi, thanks for posting some of the comments. It’s sounds like a lot of frogs belching from deep inside their little well.
Really it’s not the nutizens that are discouraging, it’s the lack of criticism or even basic understanding from the media and politicians that’s so pathetic. They are the alleged leadership and elite of the country after all.
“it’s the lack of criticism or even basic understanding from the media and politicians that’s so pathetic”
Yes, they are very good at encouraging the silent majority to remain silent.
i said I won’t post anymore, but I feel the urge to, so I will post.
First, I have no beef with you, Sonagi.
I think based on my clicking around here and there, South Korea is under the impression that everything is fine now that Lee Won Bok released an apology statement.
I think something like this will happen again in South Korea.
Shouldn’t be too hard to prevent this with education.
I think when I was in high school, the school paid for a trip to the Museum of Tolerance in Los Angeles.
Shouldn’t be too hard to play an educational video for kids or college students in a classroom setting on a national level with cooperation from the Museum of Tolerance or have the museum provide some exhibitions in Seoul.
Or, I think this will happen again due to someone or somebody and that is not good for South Korea.
I learned so much today. I learned to look before you leap. I learned that…for some reason gentile-looking Christians can still be put in box cars, which is weird. I learned that the Russians put the first man in space. And soon the Russians will put the first Korean in space. And then they’ll put all the Koreans in space. But most of all I learned that prejudice is cunning. Implying that non-Jews are enslaved dupes, and if not for the wall of Jews the Koreans could enslave them too, the book is as anti-American as it is anti-Semitic. Rhie needs to apologize to Korean-Americans for that one too.
WJK, I’ve been to the Museum of Tolerance too–that’s a great suggestion to have the museum do an exhibition in Seoul.
http://www.museumoftolerance.c.....2/Home.htm
Also agree some form of this bigotry will happen again in Korea without education or leadership, which will be especially embarrassing for Korea if it gets international attention now that Ban Ki-moon is heading the U.N.
Semi-related, the author of “Foreigner Underground Crime File” in Japan tries lamely to defend himself:
http://www.japantoday.com/jp/news/399166/all
OK enough from me bye
Someguy (228):
Yes, it wasn’t just Jews: Roma (Gypsies), Jehovah’s Witnesses, gays, political dissidents, people with physical or mental disabilities….
Seouldout (234):
For the Nazis, it was a question of genetics. From their point of view, either one’s blood was “pure” or it wasn’t. I think as long as someone going back in your family at least a couple of generations had some kind of documentation somewhere establishing that person’s Jewishness (maybe records from a synagogue? Maybe it was on people’s citizenship papers? I don’t know…), then they followed a “one drop” rule: if even one drop of blood…. (Geez, sounds kind of familiar….)
Sonagi (225):
Thanks for clearing that up. I should have checked it out msyelf, but I didn’t really want to go there. 15 recommends sounds a lot more reasonable than 300 recs—It’s still scary, but not like what it seemed before.
Sewing,
Don’t forget the myths of the Teutonic knights, their0 runestones, and the supposed Teutonic holy places (North Korean propagandists have obviously studied Nazi propaganda).
baba-booey
Fa Fa-phooey
Did he appologize to the Jews? Some Korean hints that he did, but I was under the impression that the appology was given to Korean-Americans.
I wonder what Rabbi Gottfried thinks of all this.
Korea has to start recognizing that it is no longer just some little pissass country any more and has to start behaving accordingly. I am not aware of a country less self-aware and introspective than Korea. Not kidding.
The Korean media is too busy worrying about what tens of thousands of suburban Boston kids are reading to pay much attention to what millions of Korean kids are reading. Seven Korean media outlets attended Yoko Kawashima Watkins’ forum a few days ago.
chinalawblog,
I can name one: China.
Sonagi,
Self-censorship has been so internalized by the Korean media, so much so that they aren’t capable of recognizing its presence.
@someguyinkorea –
Wrong. I have been doing business with Korea for probably 15 years and going there 4-6 times a year. Not going to claim to be an expert on Korea, but from what I have observed, and this is mostly dealing with businesspeople and lawyers, Korea is about twice as bad on this score as China, and since Korea has been part of the worldwide community for longer, this should not be the case.
I have a Korean friend who would agree with me (not that this makes it true), and he describes it as “shameful.” He actually used that word to describe Korean mistreatment of foreign workers and their utter refusal to draw any linkage to Japan’s treatment of Koreans during WWII.
I’m sure the Uighurs and Tibetans would greatly disagree with you.
By the way, China is far from being a newcomer on the world scene. Canada and many European nations established diplomatic relations with China well over 35 years ago. Oh, and hasn’t China been a member of the UN longer than South Korea?
To say China is new to the world scene is more than a miss-step. Roll the tape back to when they were trading with the Middle East via the Silk Road. The Koreans at least respect human life whereas the Chinese do not. When they execute people in China the family has to pay for the bullet before they can haul off the body. Nice-ahhhhh
Looks like this thread has almost run its course, but I wanted to add a link to a post by Antti Leppanen about Korean author Jo Jung-rae’s comparison of Japanese colonial occupation with the Holocaust:
http://hunjang.blogspot.com/20.....anese.html
There’s a cute little letter to the editor up @ the Korea Times on this issue, where commentator Andrew Bradley shows us all how to avoid sounding like a complete lunatic while making coherent, non-emotional points — by doing the exact opposite. I did like the bit about the Citadel of WASPs, tho.
http://times.hankooki.com/lpag.....054070.htm
I gave up on this thread long ago, but I was bored and came to check it out after seeing it had kept on rolling for so long, and I’m glad I did because I caught Sonagi’s link to Antti’s old post.
I believe I started my spiel in this thread by saying I had run across what I considered bewildering comments from more than 1 Korean intellectual I’ve met who seemed to be jealous at the attention Jews have gotten “thanks to” The Holocaust – jealous to the point of being angry (visibly angry) about it.
Now, we’ve seen it in a popular comic book targeted at teens, and now a highly popular novelist.
……..It’s looking worse and worse….
Also notice in Antii’s comments section how the Korean responding was saying that we should understand the novelists was just speaking to Koreans for Koreans and simply had the aim of making them more proud and appreciative of Korea’s past.
Some with Korean language skills have noted that at Naver one of recurrent themes is “How did those foreigners stumble across this Korean stuff?”
South Korean’s should get used to this. If they remain sucessful in the world as they have been in recent memory, with the growth of the internet, more and more stuff will escape the bounds of the Hermit Kingdom.
And stoking nationalism by attacking The Others might have seemed like a swell idea before the internet generation, but it can create a backlash these days….
And stoking Korea’s sense of nationalism by attacking the amount of attention the Jews get for “their holocaust” is probably one of the bigget items Korea should keep under wraps….
sonagi, why isn’t like the holocaust? hitler’s plan was to get rid of jews. japan’s plan was to get rid of koreans. tell me what the difference is? are you going to say koreans didn’t get gassed by the millions? is that what you would say? tell me, if there were no korean language and culture, would there be a people called koreans? it’s the same thing, and i have every right to say it’s the same thing just as you have every right to disagree. but please don’t spit on me while you do it. ok?
‘korean jealous of jews.’
i’m korean. i don’t feel any jealousy towards jews. and i don’t feel any jelousy about western sympathy for jewish people. you see, i’m not looking for your sympathy with regards to japan’s behavior because i could care less about an expat’s understanding. i’m just looking for you to show me the same respect you’d give to any white person. for example, we got more than a few expats who acuatally try to justify japan’s occupation of korea. our newest bigot is this abiola who informs us that the koreans were willingly occupied. he even uses a book written by a korea scholar to make his point. do a lot of koreans try to justify the holocaust? you get my point?
btw, klansman abioli cited a korea scholar whose name i can’t remember. i believe it’s eckert. anyway, here’s what ‘eckert’ says about the occupation:
‘But context and balance are important. While Yoko’s story is compelling as a narrative of survival, it achieves its powerful effect in part by eliding the historical context in which Yoko and her family had been living Korea. That context, simply put, was a 40-year record of harsh colonial rule in Korea, which reached its apogee during the war years of 1937-45, when Yoko was growing up. While some Koreans fared better than others, many were conscripted for forced labor and sexual slavery to serve the Japanese imperial war machine, while the colonial authorities simultaneously promoted a program of intensive, coercive cultural assimilation that sought to erase a separate Korean identity on the peninsula. comment by korea studies professor on jap occupation of korea appeared in essay re bamboo grove…’
doesn’t seem the author he cites agrees with him.
hate, hate, hate that korean!
“sonagi, why isn’t like the holocaust? hitler’s plan was to get rid of jews. japan’s plan was to get rid of koreans. tell me what the difference is? are you going to say koreans didn’t get gassed by the millions? is that what you would say? tell me, if there were no korean language and culture, would there be a people called koreans?”
Assimilation and genocide are not the same. Shame on you for even suggesting that they are.
Would there still be Koreans? Are Cajuns who can’t speak French any less Cajun?
pawikirogi
No, both are different sides of the same coin. Somewhat believing in a cause and joining the movement but at the same time being deceived and be exploited.
I think we have to understand these both sided properly. That Koreans during the colonial time was sometimes brutaly exploited by the Japanese but also joining (sometimes voluntary) the japanese imperial project.
We should stop to paint all what happened during the colonial period in black and white and try to see more sublty, trying to hearing each voices who experienced this era differently.
Pawikirogi said:
“sonagi, why isn’t like the holocaust? hitler’s plan was to get rid of jews. japan’s plan was to get rid of koreans. tell me what the difference is?”
If genocide was the plan then the japanese sure were smart to arm the koreans and let them join the japanese army.
And it’s mighty polite of the japanese to let those same koreans be remembered at Yasukuni.
Maybe you should check “genocide” in your dictionary, dude…
“I believe I started my spiel in this thread by saying I had run across what I considered bewildering comments from more than 1 Korean intellectual I’ve met who seemed to be jealous at the attention Jews have gotten ‘thanks to’ The Holocaust – jealous to the point of being angry (visibly angry) about it.”
Geez, I come back after several days without commenting, and what do I see? usinkorea still insisting, like he does on other Korea blogs, that Koreans are jealous of Jews. *snore* First of all, most Koreans don’t even give Jews a thought. Second of all, how do you associate a few nutcases’ attitudes toward the entire Korean population so easily?? NOW you understand when I talk about the stereotypical Western expat and his easily made negative generalizations about Koreans. Should I stereotype all white Western expats because of people like yourself, usinkorea? We Korean-Americans who once lived and worked in Korea had to be careful around the white expats we knew because we never knew WHAT would set them off, and we didn’t know what would initiate a diatribe about how Korea had ruined their lives. But should I make a blanket statement about the entire white Western population based on more than a few Western nutcases’ rantings in Korea?
There is a LOT I could say about how Western expats stereotyping Koreans, and, though I won’t say names, there are those Westerners who read this blog who I can tell ARE jealous of Koreans to the point that they obsess over them and their PERCEIVED faults everyday…..even though they don’t live in Korea. I won’t link to their blogs, but many of you know who I am talking about. So should I then make a generalization based on this that ALL Westerners who obsess over Koreans are JEALOUS of Koreans? That may not be far off the mark, you know.
Pawi wrote:
“i’m korean. i don’t feel any jealousy towards jews. and i don’t feel any jelousy about western sympathy for jewish people. you see, i’m not looking for your sympathy with regards to japan’s behavior because i could care less about an expat’s understanding. i’m just looking for you to show me the same respect you’d give to any white person. for example, we got more than a few expats who acuatally try to justify japan’s occupation of korea. our newest bigot is this abiola who informs us that the koreans were willingly occupied. he even uses a book written by a korea scholar to make his point. do a lot of koreans try to justify the holocaust? you get my point?
Well put, Pawi!! I noticed none of the commenters responded to this portion of what you wrote because maybe you exposed their own hypocrisy. Pawi, I wonder if they got what you were saying with the above quote?
“sonagi, why isn’t like the holocaust? hitler’s plan was to get rid of jews. japan’s plan was to get rid of koreans. tell me what the difference is? are you going to say koreans didn’t get gassed by the millions? is that what you would say?”
And YOU ARE NOT JEALOUS??
What you have written above is a pure expression of jealousy!! Writing exposures the writer!
Tomojiro,
If you want to question the accuracy of Pawi’s statement then do so. But how does his statement about Koreans being abused by the Japanese like the Jews being abused by the Germans in any way show jealousy?
Ah yes…
I believe every single Korean on the face of the earth is a horrible bigot and deserves to die!!!
Every s-i-n-g-l-e one!!
All!!
Each and Every!!
All, I tell you……..absolutely all!!
A to the L to the L ALL!!
Each one…
You and you and you and you!!
Each!!
Each and every!
Every one!!
Every drop of Korean blood!
All!
JK
Please say you are making a bad joke. Please say you are not serious.
DON’T YOU GET IT?
But seriously, please say you and pawikirogi are not the average level head korean person.
Well honestly said I think you are both mor…,well.
I was lucky enough to know many Koreans in Japan, well some of them could be sometimes nationalistic, but in general very reasonable and inteligent.
But were the koreans I had a chance to know a rare case?
Please say no!
My tolerance for this canard is getting thin.
I’m getting sick and tired of people defending Korea (or any society) with this tired, bullshit line about “saying all Koreans” think X, Y, or Z.
Please invent some new strawmen…
We have been witness to two different popular authors who show a clear and vile jealousy about the attention the Jewish people have gotten for what happened in WWII and the fact Korea’s plight under Japanese occupation hasn’t become common knowledge around the world.
These books have sold well.
We have not seen the Korean press, civic groups, intellectuals, or anybody rise up to denounce them.
And I have personally met a handful of intelligent, well-educated Koreans who most definately displayed a jealousy about the attention the Jews have gotten.
So I —– goodness gracious —- dare to risk being damned to hell forever ——- by making a —- gasp — generalization!!!
The horrors!!
Let’s try some more…
Americans are too violent. Look at the number of gun-related and other murders that tke place each year.
—-has the earth exploded yet? Can I go on???
Americans like to abuse drugs. It’s a serious problem….
Chicken Little, is the sky falling yet?
American high school students are frequently clueless about the world beyond America’s borders…
My my………what is the world coming to….so many generalizations!!
This is commendable that a rational commentator has brought this back to the topic in focus in this thread.
Now, to review, again: first, in 1994 Jo Jungrae issues disgusting ideas (for which he should hide himself in shame) such as:
Next, in 2007 we see in fuller detail the nature of the anti-Jewish racism in this society:
Perhaps it is appropriate to finish by asking the same question the author with the initial racist comments himself posed to people from Korea:
Tomojiro wrote to me:
“Please say you are making a bad joke. Please say you are not serious.”
I am indeed serious, tomojiro. You made a point that Koreans were jealous of Japanese based on a comment by Pawi. I said that if you wish to question how Pawi described Koreans as being abused then fine but don’t say he’s being jealous just for making the comparison. This was the exchange between you and Pawi:
Pawi wrote:
“sonagi, why isn’t like the holocaust? hitler’s plan was to get rid of jews. japan’s plan was to get rid of koreans. tell me what the difference is? are you going to say koreans didn’t get gassed by the millions? is that what you would say?”
You, tomojiro, then wrote:
“And YOU ARE NOT JEALOUS?? What you have written above is a pure expression of jealousy!! Writing exposures the writer!”
This makes no logical sense, Tomojiro. Hence, I said that if you wish to question Pawi’s assertion about Koreans being abused then fine, but how do you take Pawi’s writing in that particular comment (since you responded to it) to make your claim that he is being JEALOUS? That is a REAL reach on your part, Tomojiro.
Maybe your English is weak, I don’t know, but your reading comprehension is apparently limited if you didn’t understand what I wrote. Plus, you need to keep your cool when debating or writing on these blogs. It will allow you to be more logical.
“My tolerance for this canard is getting thin.
“I’m getting sick and tired of people defending Korea (or any society) with this tired, bullshit line about “saying all Koreans” think X, Y, or Z.”
usinkorea, I could care less what your tolerance is. But you are determined, both at this blog and others, to portray Koreans as jealous of Jews based on, as you say, “a handful of intelligent, well-educated Koreans who most definately displayed a jealousy about the attention the Jews have gotten.” Pray tell what these well-educated Koreans said that showed such jealousy? And BTW, I’ve heard fellow Americans make statements questioning the Holocaust and Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians. Plus, Pat Buchanan’s books have sold well. Can I then make the conclusion that all Americans hate Jews, question the Holocaust, and support isolationism and the preservation of white society, ala Pat Buchanan?? You are making one ridiculous argument, usinkorea.
As for you being sick and tired….get over it. To be honest, I sometimes get sick and tired of Western expats who read a piece of news and then take it to reach a conclusion where they go, “Aha! You see how screwed up Koreans are???? This is PROOF!” Then people like myself read it and say, “Uh, the news is about a whacky Korean writer. How can you draw from that that ALL Koreans feel this way or even give this topic a moment’s thought?”
I think my comments back are reasonable. Apparently, the stereotypical Western expat blows his top and gets exasperated because I question the negative generalization.
But the more I read your comments, usinkorea, the more I am forming my own generalization of Western expats in Korea. Each day, you confirm this unfortunate stereotype.
And the more everyone would loathe you to develop racist attitudes along Korean lines.
What is your opinion about the focus of this thread (i.e., anything related to Japan or Japanese culture is not germaine [and it is regretable that this disclaimer is necessary here])?
“And the more everyone would loathe you to develop racist attitudes along Korean lines.”
Yes, you’re right. Rather than stereotype Western expats, let’s continue on with those racist Koreans who are sooooo jealous of Jews.
Amazing. Get around Koreans when in Korea, and you have to be careful not to critique Korea or the Korean way too much, but get around Western expats in Korea and you have to be careful not to question their negative generalizations of Koreans. Each “tribe” has their rules for debate and they can’t be broken.
Sine qua non illustrates this now.
Okay, Sine qua non, we’ll stick with our generalizations about them big bad Koreans…. That PC enough for you?
You can question any generalizations all you want, sweetheart.
I just asked a simple question about your opinion regarding the main topic of this thread.
Wow, I thought this thread was about that Rhie comic book guy. I think I skipped dimensions after reading 200 posts. I must say it’s been mind scrambling.
Leave it to this Jo Jung-rae dude to turn mass-murder into some kind of competition. Does anybody have approximate numbers on what Japan was able to do in this event? I had my money on the Germans, but four million! That’s at least a strong silver. Plus the thirty-six years. Maybe an endurance event?
why is it so hard to accept that Koreans suffered and died under Japanese rule?
How is it different from any other colonial occupation?
What’s all this shit storm about, when Koreans say they were wronged during colonization?
Some major attitude problems from people who happen to have their ancestors who killed and murdered minorities across the globe and colonized and stole natural resources, forced wars, etc.
And for all you Japanese/Korean/English speakers out there, there is no way to hide that those Japanese folk are just as bad as the Koreans. Go to that link Sonagi provided and translate it on enjoyjapan.naver.com.
Sonagi makes the wrong assertion that one person, one person made all those comments on the Japanese BBS, which is just a tickle off the ice berg. How can one person comment 100 times, with different id’s?
Go check. And don’t discriminate.
And don’t hate.
Don’t hate.
Don’t be like Matt of occidentalism. Twisted, unethical, and fundamentally fucked up.
Look, what people can do to other people is mind-numbing. The problem is when it is perpetuated by the victims it is a lost lesson. Here we are talking about people who had horrible things happen to them, but all I see is it feeding more anger and amplifying our differences which seems only feeds the evil.
There are Jewish and Korean people who don’t want all that suffering to be in vain. There is no way of measuring the lost. Would they have wanted to see it feed more hate?
People have got to see that these two authors only feed the differences which feeds the hate. If we write generalizations about people here on this blog we become authors of hate also. Maybe we have it straight in our heads but the people who read it can misconstrue it to mean something else. Let’s try to avoid that.
People might have gotten bent over my last post. I hope they can recognize the satire. If not, I will apologize right here. Sorry!
wjk,
I checked the Japanese links again just now. The comments on the one news translations have actually DISAPPEARED, so now both links are just translations with no comments. Come back and argue when you learn to read Japanese, thanks.
I checked again. The comments are now accessible through a link. Look at the comment thread and you will see that most of the posts were made by this, um, interesting username:
：（´・ω・｀）（｀ハ´ ）さん
that’s not a user name. Sonagi. That’s a ascii translation of what I presume a face, an icon. Just like naver. Did you bother to notice the id’s? They’re all different.
Sonagi, no offense, but you didn’t do your homework very well.
“You can question any generalizations all you want, sweetheart. ”
Uh oh, should I stereotype all Westerners living in Korea as playing for the other team, based on what Sine qua non said (if Sine is a dude)? (Seinfeldian reference and said totally with sarcasm.)
“I just asked a simple question about your opinion regarding the main topic of this thread.”
You did a little more than that. You also wrote to me: “And the more everyone would loathe you to develop racist attitudes along Korean lines”, which I then responded. Hence don’t say you asked a simple question JUST about my opinion about the main topic when you actually said more. As for my opinion, on another thread I had already said the Korean writer was an idiot.
by the way, that board has at least 999 comments.
As a rule, I don’t make things up.
@wjk
I never said you made things up. I went back and looked at the board one more time. It does appear that there are numerous posters using the same heading: 名前：（´・ω・｀）（｀ハ´）さん. 名前 means “name” in Japanese and さん is the Japanese equivalent of 씨 . I saw a whole slew of posts under the above name and thought that the person was a multiple poster, just like a certain commenter here at the Marmot’s Hole. Most of the comments are posted under the above name, but there are a few that are different. I’m guessing that it’s an anonymous board and most commenters post under the same username.
名前：エラ通信
“why is it so hard to accept that Koreans suffered and died under Japanese rule?”
How has Japan anything to do with an anti-semitic book, I don’t know. Playing the victim card again to get out of this one?
Tell me, why aren’t Koreans demanding why their own government never made any mention of comfort women until the late 80’s? Why is it that nobody is asking the government for the money that Japan paid in 1965 as compensation to its victims? Hard questions need to be asked, but nobody in the media seems to be willing to ask them.
“Some major attitude problems from people who happen to have their ancestors who killed and murdered minorities across the globe and colonized and stole natural resources, forced wars, etc”
Trying to make this a Korea vs. white issue again? Problem is, I’m not white. Worse yet, my ancestors were subjected to a genocide unlike anything Koreans have ever been subjected to during the Japanese occupation. So, please, spare me the BS.
PS. Korean dissident who were killed by the Japanese colonial government were not victim of a genocide, but rather of ‘democide’. If you want to point fingers at Japan, fine, go ahead…but remember that as you dwell on the past, North Korea continues to commit ‘democide’ to this very day, for nearly 60 years and counting–20 years longer than Japan’s occupation of Korea. You can’t bring back the dead to life, but you can most certainly help the living. How? Speak up against the human rights abuses in North Korea. Donate to NGO that help North Korean refugees. Vote for someone who shares your concern during the elections.
I was all into trying to get the real message I have through JK’s thick skull when I ran across a rather much more reasonable statement that is remotely within JK’s position:
This is a reasonable opinion, but I say if you try to outlaw generalizations, you block intelligence. You can’t learn about the world or things without forming — and testing — generalizations.
Human language itself sprung from genealizations.
There would be no knowing the world without them.
It seems to me what is spreading the hate in this thread is actually JK’s determination to win against his debating opponents by creating a false premise that he ascribes to them. I know that is exactly what he has been doing with me.
Generalizations in and of themselves are not bad. It is what the generalization claims that is either good or bad to varying degrees.
Also from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inductive_reasoning
Now, it is all fine and dandy to debate whether the generalization about jealousy of the world sympathy for the Jews is fallacious or not.
This isn’t deductive logic where a conclusion can be absolutely “proven” or not.
But, even in deductive logic, the argument only holds up as well as the truth of the premises hold up.
What JK is doing would explode either deductive or inductive conclusions — because he is ascribing premises to me (and others) that simply do not fit.
The next time I say, “ALL Koreans” believe X, I give permission for anyone to shoot me in both knee caps, pour salk on the wound, cut off my penis, shove it in my mouth, laugh at me with glee, then blow my brains out.
But, look at how desperately JK holds onto his BS rhetoricall strategy:
I go OUT OF MY EVER LOVING WAY in comments #263 and #265 to scream “I AM NOT SAYING ALL KOREANS ARE JEALOUS OF THE JEWS OR EVER SAY ALL KOREANS AGREE 100% ON ANYTHING!!!! PLEASE STOP SAYING I DO!!!’
But he comes back with EXACTLY the same strategy:
Is this Kushibora or a clone of s/heit?
He even capitalizes ALL the letters in all.
It is hopeless, but since it is his primary method of debate, you have to slug away at it.
What he wants is for people to “not give this topic a moment’s thought” to protect the precious image of Korea and Koreans from the onslaught of those dastardly expats.
And he goes about it by using the same stramen arguments again and again and again – no matter how plainly you blast them.
He talks about some lone wacky Korean writer and how he is just on the fringe and not representative of Korean society (meaning a significant portion of Koreans who live in Korea).
Fine. That is a perfectly reasonable opinion to offer in the discussion.
I and others point out that the books by these wacky Korean writers have sold rather well, and we have not seen Korean society speak out against them, and we’ve seen some with Korean language skills talk about the comments at Naver – both about the quantity and quality of them – and some of us remember the Hitler Bar and how Koreans (again – a seemingly significant portion of those Koreans living in Korea) couldn’t understand why it was offensive, and some of us have met an admittedly small sampling of Korean intellectuals who showed jealousy about how the world sympathises with the Jews over the Holocaust…
…and we offer these points as a basis for our inductive generalization about Korean society (again – meaning a significant portion of the Koreans living in Korea)…
which is either accurate or not.
Of course, if someone said that the generalization fit ALL Koreans, their view point would completely fall apart, which is why JK keeps saying and saying and saying and saying and saying and saying that is what I (and others) claim.
But since it isn’t what I claim. And since I have gone out of my way to state it is not my claim – having him ignore that and try to debunk my claim by forcing it back to exactly what I said I do not believe —
I want to grab him by the back of the head and slam his face into the table until the words I actually use somehow filter through his thick skull.
When he says:
I want to continue the head bashing until he admits I am saying the questioning of the negative generalizations is fine – question away – show those making them that the generalization only fits a small portion of the Korean people…
…just stop telling lies and using bullshit rhetorical strategies to “disprove” what others are saying.
Focus on what they say, not some bullshit about how they are saying ALL Koreans think X or behave like Y.
Americans are fat.
Americans take too many drugs.
Americans are violent.
American schools do a poor job of educating their teens.
These are all generalizations I can back up with evidence that gives my position some validity.
But they are generalizations and debatable as to what extent they match X percentage of Americans or whether X percentage is high enough to warrant a generalization.
There is nothing wrong with making the generalizations in and of themselves. The validty rests with how well the generalization fits.
So:
Gee wilikers, JK and I can agree on something – I believe there IS a significant portion of American intellectuals who favor the Palestinians over the Israelies based on how the Palestianians are treated!!
I could even use Jimmy Carter’s recent book as a means of beginning to explore that topic.
But if I start taking Carter’s example and the notes here and there about the Palestianians and said all Americans hate the Jews, may my head explode.
Next — I can deduce from the quote above that JK is saying Pat Buchanan has in his books questioned the validity of holocaust history and demonstrated hatred for the Jews.
I am highly skeptical about that claim.
I can also deduce — well he at least says this part directly – that he is saying Pat Buchanan favors isolationism and preservaition of white society —
– now, we can debate whether “preservation of white society” in Buchanan thought means preservation of Euro-centric Judaeo-Christian and democratic values – or – means stone cold racism –
but I am willing to accept the claim that Buchanan favors isolationism and preservation of white society.
Now, JK asks if, given these premises on what Buchanan actual promotes, and given the fact his books have sold well, can he conclude, “All Americans think that way”?
The answer is obviously – if he could just get it through his head given what I have so plainly said in comments #263 and #265 – No.
But, discussing what Buchanan’s book sales could mean about American society as a whole is a perfectly valid discussion to have about American society.
I would point out Buchanan hasn’t done particularly well in the presidental elections. That would seem to suggest to me that a very sizable portion of the population were not gung-ho for Buchanan’s thoughts.
I would also point out that —– unlike with Korean society and these vile anti-Semitic texts —- there are gobs of people in the public realm who have repeatedly ripped Buchanan a new a-hole for the thoughts expressed in his books.
So, we would need to debate just how much Buchanan’s work is favored or not in American society.
And people would enter and leave such a debate still holding different, opposite opinions on that point — but the debate itself would not be pointless.
BS? someguyinkorea, how do you qualify to say that? Where’s your evidence that it is BS? Japanese before and after photos?
In the Ivory Coast, the capital Abijan has nice roads, French used everywhere, factories exporting to France, and somewhat modern facilities and running water. Do you think that makes them beneficiaries of coloniasm and nothing wrong was done to them. As we speak, the French comapanies are financially funding govt forces who are combatting northern anti-govt, anti-French influence forces. What do you think about that? No one wants to talk about it or mention it, and everyone is content to put egg on Bush and Iraq. I guess because no French soldiers are dying. Only the people of the Coite d’Ivoire.
Your answers about compensation can all be answered with the subject of one man. Lt. Okamoto = Lt. Takaki Masao = Park Chung Hee. Haters or honest critics of this man do ask why individuals were never compensated. Nobody? There’s more than enough. I direct you to an informative, unbiased source, ohmynews.com. Sorry for any humor you may or may not perceive.
South Korea is one of the very few nations that emerged succesfully from coloniasm. With US and Japanese help. That doesn’t mean South Korea lost the right to say what it can say about Japan’s coloniams. It wasn’t because of Japanese model colonial policy that South Korea emerged to the top 20 in the world. That happenned after Lt. Okamoto’s winning of grants, bank loans from both the US and Japan, and after the US spared South Korea from communism. Even with Japanese infrastructure, South Korea was light years behind post 8-15-1945. The difference was essentially what the South Koreans did with the aid and their own credit for turning things around.
South Korea has every right to freely say what it wants to say about Japan. Japan, once in the late 80s was seen as an economic forced that was stronger than America. Interestingly, at this very peak of its power and position in the world, the Japanese had a resurgence of anti-semitism ( I don’t have to link again, do I?), was still in denial of Unit 731, was still in denial of comfort women, was still in denial of Nan Jing. I’d say the Japanese are more worrisome than the Koreans. That’s my opinion.
So, is the Japanese govt lying in the mid 90’s, when they admit to 731, admit to comfort women, and apologize for Nan Jing, when it had a temporary economic minus growth?
Why apologize when things aren’t so hot?
Very worrisome people.
Follow that link that Sonagi has misinterpreted and still misinterprets, and you’ll see that those Japanese posters are clearly anti-semitic, they clearly believe that comfort women were all voluntary hoes, Unit 731 was a combination lie by China, US, and Russia, Nan Jing didn’t happen, China lies, Korea lies, etc. Only Japanese people believe some of those things. Frog in the well for them. Very ironic.
Sonagi brought up the link to Korea vs Japan and Jewish people vs Germany. Not me.
must I remind the world that Japanese infrastrucutre in Korea was heavily focused in North Korea?
may I also add that North Koreans were never compensated by Japan officially and the deal between South Korea and Japan’s exact terms are still a secret by the request of Japan, because Japan doesn’t want to North Korea? What do you think about that?
Japan pursued a 50% off, and a pass the blame to Lt. Okamoto deal.
This is the “Korean society demonstrating anti-Semitism” thread.
Some commentators have consistently attempted to distract from this focus (without, it should be noted, dealing with the topic of the thread itself).
Due to the incoherent, unreasonable rambling preceding, it would be appreciated by most commentators if you did not. Thank you.
Pawi,
Since when does colonialism equate genocide? So, yeah. BS.
Let me throw this back at you, once more:
“tell me, if there were no korean language and culture, would there be a people called koreans?”
Tell me, how much do you know of the Korean language and Korean culture? Does it change the fact you consider yourself Korean?
Once again, many Cajuns have been and are being assimilated for over 200 years, but despite the fact many have lost the ability to communicate in French, Cajun culture still lives on. Simply put, language and culture are not like viruses. They can’t be easily spread or destroyed, which is why Japan’s attempts to assimilate Koreans failed and the Korean culture is still alive and well. (Oh, and check what year the Japanese actually began trying to assimilate the Koreans. That should put things in perspective for you.)
“Some commentators have consistently attempted to distract from this focus (without, it should be noted, dealing with the topic of the thread itself).”
Thanks for reminding that. Sorry for having taken the bait.
PS. Although it’s the ‘Korean book is anti-semitic’, actually.
wjk—Unlike some of your detractors, I actually like most of your comments on my blog, despite you being a Met fan. I also realize this thread is probably helplessly lost, so jumping in now is most likely pointless. Still, I feel compelled to say, please, nobody cares what Japan did to Korea. Not in this thread. When I post on Japan’s colonial history in Korea, feel free to post about Japanese crimes against Korea all you like. Bash Park Chung-hee to your heart’s content, too. But here, Japan’s colonial history is only relevant only in so far as you can relate it to anti-Semitism in contemporary Korea.
Thanks for your cooperation.
Ahh, no. South Korea got the money for North Korea as well. South Korea got it all. The deal was kept a secret by the South Korean government, not the Japanese government.
Stop spreading hate and lies, wjk.
For the link for the above quote, see here.
I just saw Roberts comment. I fully agree. wjk is a monomaniac.
Hey wjk-while you’re at it, please stop posting sequentially, as you have (repeatedly) promised not to do.
i pledge my full cooperation, Mr. Koehler.
“Stop spreading hate and lies, wjk.”
Actually, wjk is right on the nose on that one (notice that the sources of the article are the Korean media).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T.....c_of_Korea
He also made a good point on the development of Korea idea about how the heavy industry was north of the 38th parallel – and much of it was carted off by the Russians.
usinkorea,
Sure deflates the arguement that South Korea was modernized by the Japanese…not that it would matter if it was true since everything but Pusan and a few remote farming and fishing villages was rebuilt by Koreans after the Korean War.
PS. Sorry, Robert (swings arm up and gives a little wave).
Correction…didn’t have to be rebuilt….
PS. (swings arm up and gives a little wave).
But I have also always wondered if the argument couldn’t be less about material infrastructure and more about technological know-how.
It was the Japanese who cut through the lethargy of the old Neo-Confucian economic system of land holding and agricultural based economy that had hampered Korea’s development.
And as South Koreans progressive like to point out, South Korea didn’t purge all its “pro-Japanese” business leaders from the society but actually gave them special positive treatment.
“It was the Japanese who cut through the lethargy of the old Neo-Confucian economic system of land holding and agricultural based economy that had hampered Korea’s development.
And as South Koreans progressive like to point out, South Korea didn’t purge all its “pro-Japanese” business leaders from the society but actually gave them special positive treatment.”
I think Abiola Lapite, citing Carter Eckert’s book, explains it quite neatly.
Peter Duus’ The Abacus and the Sword is also a good read as Won Joon Choe points out.
OK, Tomojiro, just in case you didn’t understand my comment to wjk, allow me to rephrase:
I don’t care what contributions Japan may or may not have made to the development of modern Korea. Not in this thread. If it has nothing to do with anti-Semitism, I don’t want to read it.
The editorial staff thanks you for your cooperation.
usinkorea,
Sorry, but Korea had already begun modernizing its economy before Japan began moving in. Japan’s goal was to exploit Korean natural ressources to fund its own empirialistic expansionism, not to ‘modernize’ Korea (the suggestion that Korea was ‘modernized’ by the Japanese is an empirialistic one as it infers that Korean society and culture was inferior to the Japanese). Any political and sociological ‘benefit’ were a natural consequence of having removed the Korean monarch from power (which is something that Koreans were well on their way of doing on their own) and does not in itself indicate that Japan had more than a self-serving interest in Korea.
PS. Sorry, sorry.
Sorry, Mr.Koehler.
Completly understood.
‘Well put, Pawi!! I noticed none of the commenters responded to this portion of what you wrote because maybe you exposed their own hypocrisy. Pawi, I wonder if they got what you were saying with the above quote?’
sure they get it. that’s why they avoid it. ignoring their contradictions is part of their game plan. that way they can continue to believe their shit no stinky.
‘Once again, many Cajuns have been and are being assimilated for over 200 years, but despite the fact many have lost the ability to communicate in French, Cajun culture still lives on.’ someguy
here we have a non caucasian expat supporting assimilating another people by telling us it wouldn’t have been so bad since the koreans would still know they were koreans. no korean culture no korean people. that’s that.
‘Simply put, language and culture are not like viruses. They can’t be easily spread or destroyed, which is why Japan’s attempts to assimilate Koreans failed and the Korean culture is still alive and well. (Oh, and check what year the Japanese actually began trying to assimilate the Koreans. That should put things in perspective for you.’ someguyinkorea
you whole premise based on time. late into the occupation is only relative to when the war ended.
‘Trying to make this a Korea vs. white issue again? Problem is, I’m not white.’ someguy
the problem is most expats are. and nobody’s trying to make this a race issue since it’s fair to point out the expat’s hypocrisy and thier people’s sorry history with racism. nothing wrong with that.
‘Worse yet, my ancestors were subjected to a genocide unlike anything Koreans have ever been subjected to during the Japanese occupation. So, please, spare me the BS.’ someguy
why are so coy about this? you keep telling us you ain’t no white guy (and yet i still think you’re an a-ho), so what the hell are you? what genocide your people went through? your not telling us simply a way to cut off any examination of your own people. and no, this ain’t just no blog about korea since the expat (which includes you, non white guy) feels free to compare korea with whichever whenever he wants. you notice marmot didn’t admonish sonagi but went thug on wjk?
just another attempt to control what koreans say.
No, but with gyopo like yourself drawing obscene—and make no mistake about it, Pawi, they are obscene—analogies between the Holocaust and the Japanese colonial period, I wonder if perhaps I should start “attempting to control what Koreans say” if for no other reason than to simply protect Korea’s national image. Jesus, Pawi, for a guy who seems quite eager to defend your ancestral homeland against the attacks of the Evil Expats, I’m curious if you’ve considered whether playing an almost caricature role as the “angry gyopo” on this blog might be instead giving ammunition to the Evil Expats you so clearly despise.
And with that we’ve come full circle to comment number one.
Kind of in the vein of anti-Semitism in the Korea (okay, not really)… but did anyone read today’s CHANNEL 막무가내 in the Sports Khan newspaper? A taxi-driving Hitler? ‘Twas one of the odder things I have seen in the Korean newspaper comics.
Hrm. Screwed up the link. Here it is again:
http://news.sportskhan.net/ind....._id=550117
I really want to respond to #304, because it might be an interesting discussion, but I’ll refrain…..
I want my Gravatar back.
I have taken my response to #304 to my blog:
http://usinkorea.org/blog1/?p=355
“here we have a non caucasian expat supporting assimilating another people by telling us it wouldn’t have been so bad since the koreans would still know they were koreans. no korean culture no korean people. that’s that.”
Supporting assimilation? Hell no. Do I have to spell it out for you? Assimilation and genocide are two very distinct things. That’s it.
No Korean language, no Koreans? Well…Are the people in Northern Ireland any less Irish if they can’t speak Gaellic? Are the Cajun (once again) any less Cajun if they don’t speak French? Are Korean-Americans and Korean-Japanese any less Korean if they can’t speak Korean? No, they aren’t. And why is that? Because language is only one facet of culture. In fact, I’d say that these people have a stronger attachement to their cultural identity than the average folk because they have been linguistically assimilated. Why do you think ethnic-nationalism is so strong in Korea? Because of the very Japanese policies that were aimed at assimilating them.
No Korean language, no Koreans? I don’t think so.
“why are so coy about this? you keep telling us you ain’t no white guy (and yet i still think you’re an a-ho), so what the hell are you? what genocide your people went through? your not telling us simply a way to cut off any examination of your own people. and no, this ain’t just no blog about korea since the expat (which includes you, non white guy) feels free to compare korea with whichever whenever he wants. you notice marmot didn’t admonish sonagi but went thug on wjk?”
Okay. Your sweet talking has won me over.
I’m plaid. Green and brown. Yeah, that’s right, I look like a big argyle sock.
It doesn’t matter what I say because no matter who my ancestors were, you’ll find a way to make it seem like Koreans have been victimized by my people (they haven’t, trust me on this one).
To return to the original topic…Did the writer apologize to the Jews for the book? I read on some Korean newspaper that he did, but wasn’t that apology directed to (gasp) Korean-Americans?
I’m beginning to wonder whether some Koreans, Not All, watched the running of the Jews in Borat and didn’t laugh.
I don’t get it. This peninsula is not exactly a hive of Jews. What is the beef? Why the comparisons and where do these comparisons come from?
This guy Rhie goes to the states and some landlord asks for first and last month’s rent and he concludes that there’s a lack of trust in the US. I guess I’m the only one in town paying key-money. Hey, comic book man, why not tell them your doing research bent on slandering an entire race and feeding it to kids who have no other exposure to these people.
I like the way he comes across as having done extensive research on the whole thing instead of sitting in his apartment, reading something by the local Grand Wazoo of the Klan and then speculating. Might want to check his post-graduate work one more time. Particularly the footnotes.
ㅎ ㅎ….
usinkorea, I am busy right now, but I MAY (or may not because in hindsight it would be such a waste of time) respond in detail to your angry comment in 283. For now, I will say this:
I do not pose as others on these Korea blogs. I am only JK. Now, others have posed as me, everytime I criticized occidentalism’s owner, in order to try to embarrass me, but everyone I believe can see through it. When I called out that particular someone and embarrassed him for stalking my blog as Kyopoboy and subscribing to it, someone took my blog ID (not JK) and left an offensive comment at the Metropolitan’s blog pretending to be me. Silly and TOO obvious.
That’s ALL I have time to say for now. Except one more thing: Exactly WHO has the thick skull, usinkorea? Talk about generalizing, you are SOOOOO living up to the stereotype of the angry American expat in Korea who can’t see his own generalizing of an entire race of people. NO Korean I know (and I know a lot of them) have ever said anything negative about Jews.
I used to get sick of such behavior from MANY (clearly not all) of the expats I met, but nothing can be done about it…..when debating with them, I just listen while they go on about Koreans are just bad and that people like me don’t “get it” when we question their generalizations.
#263 and #265 can be dismissed as “angry” – #283 was reasonable including the statement about wanting to use (metaphorical) force to try to get you to quit attributing premises to me I specifically stated I do not hold.
And I would venture a wild guess that it is the reasonablness of that long comment that has you ducking rather than time constraints, but that is neither here nor there.
But you did in fact completely ignore what I actually have to say in that comment just as you completely ignored me when I put more passion in the comment to try to make you stop saying I am saying anything about “all” Koreans.
And what do you dodge with? some stupid comment about the thick head…
Somebody has a thick head when they have to be repeatedly bashed about it before they will listen or get a clue as to what other people are saying.
It is not ethno or gender specific.
So your idiotic comment about “Talk about generalizing” is just – idiotic.
I didn’t “generalize” – I said YOU have a thick skull.
You.
Not Koreans. Not homosapians. Y O U.
It is your personal thick skull I wish I could beat some sense into or at least get you to stop saying I am attributing thought characteristics to each and every Korean.
I don’t know whether to laugh or cry or cry from laughing.
You really don’t have a clue at all, do you?
So, let me get this straight — you just “listen” eh?
But, heck, I think this actually works, because I wouldn’t call what you have been doing with me on this thred “debate” at all. You have to engage what a person actually says in a debate.
You have been consistenly going OUT OF YOU WAY to avoid addressing what I actual have to say.
So – scurry along now…
Take your time.
I am hoping when you come back, you can actually for once address what I have said.
And if you aren’t Kushibora, you need to get in touch with s/heit at U of Hawaii and write a new book about post-modern rhetorical strategies, because like minds working on such a project might get it done.
Or, just become a politician….
I think you’ve had the training for it…
‘No, but with gyopo like yourself drawing obscene—and make no mistake about it, Pawi, they are obscene—analogies between the Holocaust and the Japanese colonial period, I wonder if perhaps I should start “attempting to control what Koreans say” if for no other reason than to simply protect Korea’s national image. Jesus, Pawi, for a guy who seems quite eager to defend your ancestral homeland against the attacks of the Evil Expats, I’m curious if you’ve considered whether playing an almost caricature role as the “angry gyopo” on this blog might be instead giving ammunition to the Evil Expats you so clearly despise.’
first, i’d like you to refer to me as an american as that is what i am. second, caricature is very sharp sighted of you. third, i don’t care what ammunition i give to the angry expat but i’ll let you know when i set up a website designed to denigrate said expat, ok?
you jump all over wkj for bringing up japan but you didn’t say jack to sonagi when she did the same. there cannot be one set of rules for your own and another set for koreans.
lastly, you have every right to feel offended by my comparison of korea’s holocaust to the jewish one. that’s your right. but please don’t spit on me while you excercise that right, ok?
robert, did you ever think you’d see the day where a conservative white guy like yourself would become an agent of all that is PC?
ps
‘MY PEOPLE WENT THROUGH GENOCIDE!’ roared somenonwhiteguyinkorea as he admonished koreans
one last thing, robert. you say that my comparison is obscene. but i gotta ask you, does it ever occur to you that some of the things you and others write here might come off as obscene to a korean? some of the things that you write are offensive to me. does that matter to you? don’t bother with an answer; i already know.
ps klansman abiola writes about me at his blog. interesting his focus is on my calling him a klansman. interesting he ignores the substance of what i wrote. folks, we got another bevers/shakuhachi on our hands. check out the garbage he writes at foreign dispatches with the link above. now, be sure to take a look around. he sure does love occidentalism.
i apologize for doing a wjk. no offense, wkj
robert, did you ever think you’d see the day where a conservative white guy like yourself would become an agent of all that is PC?
Pawi brings up an interesting point here. How is it that conservative white guys, who are usually the sharpest critics of political correctness back home, suddenly become some of the most outspoken, self-appointed vanguard of such in Korea? What accounts for this role-reversal?
To understand this question, we must first understand a concept called “white guilt”. Traditionally, whites, and particularly the conservative white male, has been blamed for such things as racism, slavery, discrimination, police brutality, profiling, sexism, anti-Semitism, and what have you. Multicultural Western societies, in particular the US, the whites have been on the receiving end of the blame-game. This accounts for “white guilt”.
But in a place like Korea, they can be the finger-pointers, and let someone else (ie Koreans) be defensive for a change. Of course, it helps matters not, that the Koreans, for their part, often make themselves such easy targets of this blame game by doing stupid things that a person who was indoctrinated within a regime of political correctness (which is not Korea)would hesitate to do. Whites have a enormous vested interest in proving that some group of people, other than themselves, can do the same exact things that they themselves have been traditionally often blamed for.
Pawi if you spell out what comments you (an American, I note) feel are obscene to Koreans (who must communicate with you telepathically), perhaps some commenters will refrain from making them. (Others of course will double their output of said comments, but that’s the Internet.)
I get the impression from 3-4 years of watching you soil yourself in public that you deeply feel that people without Korean ethnicity are not qualified to discuss Korea, period, and that all criticism of Korean is hateful and obscene. Nothing you’ve ever written could be interpreted otherwise. That, and poor reading comprehension, would explain why you’ve never offered a convincing point in all your maundering under all those different names over the years.
Robert’s right in asking why you make yourself a 24/7 doormat, and I would add to that the question of why you even bother visiting what you define as “hate sites”. Arirang TV and most Korean media (if you skip the ChoDongJong’s comments on the Roh admin) would give you that feel-good, rah-rah urinara buzz you seem to seek, without all the wasted words and ill feelings.
“ps
‘MY PEOPLE WENT THROUGH GENOCIDE!’ roared somenonwhiteguyinkorea as he admonished koreans”
No, not Koreans. You.
“Korea’s holocaust”
You mean how people are being starved and murdered in North Korea and how most South Korean’s are ignoring it?
I grumble at the Stalinist levels of PC imposed by left-leaning academia as much as anyone, but I would put Rhie’s work in the category of crude blood libel rather than merely unPC. Korea and its overseas devotees enforce a brand of PC, but it stands for “Patriotically Correct.”
The Wizard of Oz would be proud of all the strawmen here.
I wrote to Rhie’s publisher Gimm-Young and the Ministry of Culture, telling the former Rhie’s entire series contains offensive stereotypes (because I’ve looked through other volumes) and the latter that “Rhie does have freedom of speech; however, the South Korean government can take the lead and denounce racist publications like his to show the world such views are not shared by all Koreans.” Just so these people are aware that “foreigners” are aware of the spew that comes out of Korea sometimes.
Hey, guys….
You know of my standing offer.
How about this:
I’ll post under a different name.
I’ll say something about “the white man”
and you club Bluejives like a baby seal when he crawls out from under his rock, ‘kay?
“first, i’d like you to refer to me as an american as that is what i am”
It’s a deal! And then you immediately lose any claim to know what “Koreans” think any more than the white expats. It’s funny how you claim to know what “Koreans” find obscene while admonishing filthy, filthy expats for generalizing.
different poster:
“Whites have a enormous vested interest in proving that some group of people, other than themselves, can do the same exact things that they themselves have been traditionally often blamed for.”
Another hilarious generalization. I’m not the least bit interested in excusing my ancestors’ behavior. I know damn well that if the Roman Empire emerged out of Daegu, this fruity argument would just be going in the opposite direction. Asians have an enormous vested interest in proving that the trans-Pacific slave trade, the colonization of Africa, and the genocide of the Swedes could’ve been done by another race. “White guilt” is half-myth (but “yellow fever” is fully real. Lock up your daughters)
Okay, time to take usinkorea to task – again. Like I’ve done here on this blog before and like I did at the Flying Yangban (when usinkorea commented on what I wrote at the Flying Yangban about Gerry Bevers not getting his contract renewed over at Occidentalism).
First of all, usinkorea, I said I was too busy to respond at the time BECAUSE I WAS WORKING. The east coast of the US is 13 to 14 hours behind Korea, so it was my work time. My boss gave me an assignment this morning to do with a deadline for this afternoon. But when I said I was too busy to address all your points, what do you ASSume???
usinkorea ASSumed:
“And I would venture a wild guess that it is the reasonablness of that long comment that has you ducking rather than time constraints, but that is neither here nor there.”
Only someone who has so often made jumps in logic (I’ll illustrate how in a minute) could somehow assume that I should first make my priority to address you on a blog in detail before I complete an assignment that my boss at work gave me. I thought you were lacking in mental faculties before….thanks now for confirming it.
Remember how I wrote a comment at the Flying Yangban about Gerry Bevers not being a martyr and that a university professor who had questioned the 9/11 attacks would lik