NPR had a report this morning about the South Korean reaction to the shooting at VT - a collective guilt hangs over the country. A similar reaction was observed for Korean stem cell scientist Hwang Woo-suk when he was exposed as a dipshit. On the flip side, prior to the Science paper being discredited a collective national pride was the zeitgeist. This sort of behavior gave the impression the general populace were right next to him in the laboratory and that the national IQ had increased 20 points.
From a cultural sociological view point, it is very interesting to observe the consequences of such coat tail riding behavior on a national level. As a personal aside, I saw this growing up with Koreans in college and high school. Individual success in their community was viewed as collective success. This sort of life view led to hilarity often. I heard this type of rationalization multiple times, a variant being, "I got a 2 in organic chem, but John Park from my church got a 9." One wonders if this sort of behavior and thinking is an outgrowth of the Korean church, which has a vastly different set of values from the traditional Anglo-Saxon Calvinist institution.
Bottom line is, fucking Koreans again fucking it up for all other Asians. Hey LT, tell all your Korean friends to read this entry.
Thursday, April 19, 2007
Korean collective guilt and pride
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5 comments:
Most insightful AFYBYA post yet. Collectivism seems to be the norm in most Asian cultures, religious or not.
Good? Bad? Discuss.
Another speculation I have is Korean relations with the other pacific rim countries pre and post WWII. Korea has alway been in a state of being invaded, threatened or occupied. I wonder if such collective behavior is the unfortunate by-product of a national inferiority complex.
It is easy to play arm chair sociologists. What we need are experiments.
I suppose you could substitute "Korean" with just about any Asian race. Since these countries all consist of a single people, I'd say culture = nationalism. Maybe that would be the source of collective pride or embarrassment? The country as a whole feels responsible for each accomplishment or setback. I can easily see a country Japan respond in the same manner if this incident involved a Japanese guy.
Look at a multi-cultural country like Canada. Due to the mish-mash of different identities, culture is mutually exclusive to nationalism. Success/failure is localized to each cultural group like it was pointed out with Koreans failing or passing. On the other hand, when the country wins a gold medal at the Olympics, there's a collective pride in the accomplishment like any other country.
As for the Koreans fucking it up for all the other Asians, I'd say their embarrassment is their own. Just like how I'm embarrassed every time i see a Chinaman spitting on the streets.
Perhaps this shame was magnified and made collective because the young man was an immigrant to the US. He was a green card holder, an assimilation, not natural born. That seemed to be the fact that networks stated the most. This may have hit home for the Korean nation - a product half influenced/cultivated by the motherland.
I found this blog through Dan's Facebook page. I used to go to high school with him. Anyways, this kinda hits close to me because I happen to work for a Korean company here in NY and have a lot of ties and experience with the Korean community here. Not to mention, I spent four months there a few years ago.
The reaction to this event within the Korean community was two-fold: you had some who were really ashamed that someone from their own could do such a thing and then there was flat-out denial. My boss happened to be of the latter camp. I was shocked that he suggested this was one big conspiracy theory and there was no way a Korean could do such an awful thing. He happens to be an ultra Korean nationalist, which explains his views. I’ve never once heard him say anything negative about his native land.
Koreans have a tendency to have an explosive temper. They have such huge pride and as soon as someone infringes on it just a little bit, all hell breaks loose. And don’t you dare say anything critical about the culture, food, pollution, etc. You’ll be met with such huge hostility or sometimes denial, which sometimes can escalate to a physical nature. Actually, I mentioned once that the worst spree-killing that ever happened was in Busan, Korea. Some off-duty cop went on a drunken rage after fighting with his girlfriend and killed at least 75 people (nobody knows the official estimates). Seems to me that nobody I work with ever heard of this guy, even my boss, who should have known about it about that time. Maybe he just didn’t want to admit that he knew.
I have to agree with what one of you guys said about Korea and them not really being their own separate nation since the end of WWII. Some would still argue that that North and South are still pawns of greater powers, but that’s another discussion. Regardless, it definitely has affected the national psyche. Point is that these guys have been on their own for a short time and don’t really know how to deal with it. They might be an old culture, but they’re a new nation. They’re also a fast growing nation and have not been able to deal with growing pains in a mature fashion.
Also, have any of you guys ever heard Korean music? It’s pretty depressing. All songs seem to be somber. I asked my co-worker about this and she explained that because they’ve always been conquered and occupied by everyone else, they’re sad and it reflects on their music. I guess that’s why they eat spicy food to perk them up!
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