Never have I been so disgusted with the boys I believed in. Not sure what Avery said at the half, but it surely did not work. Dirk, you will take your medicine for years - and deserve it. There is no question that as beaten as you were last summer, Mavs fans, this will be far worse.
A NUMBER 8 SEED BEAT A #1 SEED....
Am I a Rock Star?
I know that is a funny comment but let me tell you why I made the above comment.
A few weeks ago, I was offered some extra overtime and I took it. For 1 week I taught an English Class at the Daejeon girls middle school.
Well you can imagine what happened, here comes me 1.93 meters and the girls just stare at me like, oh s^&%, this dude is tall.
All the time I was teaching I had little girls just come up to me and start giggling and laughing, so I went into princess mode and treated them like royalty, the laughter just ensured. It was interesting to listen to these girls talk about, they hate wearing school uniforms and that they hated to all have very short hair. (in some schools your hair is cut to be uniformity). Over all is was a very nice time that I spent getting stared at.
Now for what has happened a few times already here in Daejeon.
I go to the baseball games here in Daejeon. So when I get a call and I am at the game, no one is really surprised. What I have done a few times is dance like a complete fool while I have been at the game and a few times I have been shown on MBC-ESPN or SBS TV. My Students have even commented on seeing their teacher on TV. Yesterday I went to see TMNT at the CGV and While I was waiting for the show to start, One Korean lady just stopped and looked at me and said Hanwha Eagles? I said yes and she and her friends smiled. They remembered me being shown on the big screen dancing like a fool. The last game I went to a few people waved and said, "Hello dancing man." What else I have noticed is that they are very polite fans, so when I yell at the UMP for making a bad call you can really hear my loud voice, I have even had a few people repeat the exact words that I have used. I'm even cheered for yelling at the ump.
An article published today in the online version of the Korea Herald warns that the Korean film industry faces a serious crisis as a slew of Hollywood blockbusters is poised to hit local screens this summer. After a period of solid growth, the local film industry has seen the share of Korean films plummet and the number of new projects is on the decline.
"Spider-Man 3", released Tuesday in a whopping 617 theaters around the nation, sold 502,000 tickets on opening day alone. By way of comparison, "The Host", Korea's biggest hit, was released in 620 theaters last year. Whether Spidey can sustain this momentum remains to be seen -- in any case, don't expect it to outperform the mutant tadpole.
Other Hollywood productions slated for release in coming months, including "Shrek the Third" and "Pirates of the Carribean: At World's End", threaten to overshadow mostly small-budget local films this summer. In March, the share of Korean films nosedived to 21.6 percent in the metropolitan Seoul area, down from 45.8 percent a month earlier, the worst performance since December 2004 when Korean films eked out a miserable 16.9 percent.
Quarterly figures for January-to-March of this year, when Korean films captured a 48 percent share, are down from 72.5 percent in 2006. American movies, meanwhile, increased their share to 70.5 percent, staging a sharp recovery in the domestic market. This is a dramatic turnaround for Hollywood, given that American films struggled to maintain even a 30 percent share last year. The reason for the steep downturn? According to a survey by SBS radio, the recent decline of Korean movies at the box office is largely due to deteriorating quality. About 44 percent of respondents in the survey cited the lower quality of local films, while 23 percent blamed the slump on the reduced screen quota.
A recovery just around the corner is unlikely given the drastic reduction in film productions this year -- expected to be down around 30 percent from last year's 108. Except for "200-Pound Beauty," there was no major hit Korean film this year, while a growing number of Hollywood movies sell more tickets than expected, regaining their combined market share they lost to Korean rivals in past years.
t was not long ago that Korean filmmakers appeared to be winning the game. A steady stream of well-made films and blockbusters crushed Hollywood flicks at the box office, signaling a new renaissance period for the local film industry.
The solid growth, however, has slowed down significantly in recent months amid a slew of worrying signs. The combined market share of Korean films is plunging. The number of new film projects is also dwindling. Investors remain wary about the commercial viability of Korean films. Worse, several Hollywood blockbusters are poised to dominate the Korean box office in the run-up to the crucial summer season.
Leading the Hollywood lineup is "Spider-Man 3," which was released on Tuesday. This blockbuster secured a whopping 617 theaters across the nation, selling 502,000 tickets on its release day alone.
Given that Korea's biggest hit film "The Host" got released in 620 theaters last year, "Spider-Man 3" is expected to pull off a solid box office performance, threatening other small-budget Korean films like "Adeul (Son)" and "Long Day's Journey into Night." Even if Korean filmmakers manage to survive the attack from Spider-Man, the battle is far from over. A powerful ogre ("Shrek the Third") and pirates ("Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End") are set to join the Hollywood lineup in coming months, casting a dark cloud over mostly small-budget local films.
According to Max Movie, an online film ticket website, "Spider-Man 3" dominated ticket reservations this week, pulling off a 62.7 percent share, followed by "Adeul," a Korean drama that only secured a 19.4 percent in ticket reservations.
This lackluster box-office performance of Korean films came after Korean filmmakers failed to bolster their share in competition with foreign movies. In March, the share of Korean films nosedived to 21.6 percent in the metropolitan Seoul area, down from 45.8 percent a month earlier, according to multiplex operator CJ CGV. The figure marked the worst performance since December 2004 when Korean films combined carved out only 16.9 percent.
Quarterly figures are also negative. In the January-to-March period this year, Korean films achieved a 48 percent share, down from 72.5 percent in the year-earlier period. American movies, meanwhile, increased their share to 70.5 percent, staging a sharp recovery in the domestic market. This is a dramatic turnaround for Hollywood, given that American films struggled to maintain even a 30 percent share last year.
Korean Film Council, a state-funded film promotion agency, said in its latest report that Korean filmmakers introduced 32 movies in the first quarter of this year, up just one from the year-earlier period. The number of moviegoers who chose to watch Korean films declined 41.9 percent. In contrast, 45 foreign films led by Hollywood were released in Korea during the same period, marking a sharp increase from 21 films a year earlier.
In a recent survey by SBS radio, the recent decline of Korean movies at the box office is largely due to the deteriorating quality. About 44 percent of respondents in the survey said the quality problem dragged down the share of Korean films, while 23 percent blamed the slump on the reduced screen quota.
Experts said the dearth of big hits like "The Host" is affecting the overall performance of home-grown films. The odds for a rebound are also low because of sharply reduced film productions this year. Korea produced 108 movies last year, largely boosted by the Korean Wave-led boom. But due to the downturn in the film industry partly sparked by the oversupply, the number of films made this year is expected to be down about 30 percent from last year.
Filmmakers, critics and government officials are now debating whether the slump will last longer than expected or a recovery is in the offing. Except for "200-Pound Beauty," there was no major hit Korean film this year, while a growing number of Hollywood movies sell more tickets than expected, regaining their combined market share they lost to Korean rivals in the past years.
By Yang Sung-jin
A VERY INTERESTING COMMENT..............
Reader Comments
I don't know why people in Korea are all that concerned. They look at the output and are worried, but just how many blockbusters have Koreans produced this year? Very few since Host is the answer. Thus, should they be all that surprised that Hollywood blockbusters are gobbling up market share this year? If Korea wants blockbuster like results, they need to produce blockbuster type movies. Notherwise, stop whining when Hollywood blockbusters come in and take over. You don't get good outputs if you don't start with good inputs!
This will be a very interesting summer to watch movies here in Korea.
A presidential panel this week decided to confiscate land owned by people whose ancestors supported Japan when it governed Korea early last century.
The nine-member Investigative Commission on Pro-Japanese Collaborators Property said the government will seize 250,000 square meters of land still owned by the descendants of nine prominent traitors. A greater portion of land they acquired, but no longer is held by the families, is exempted. Proceeds will go to support the descendants of independence activists.
We may expect more such seizures by the panel, which is reviewing cases of other collaborators.
In pondering this news, please note that the traitors are dead. And please also consider that some of the assets being seized were given as reward for actions in support of Japan taken over 100 years ago. So, clearly the idea is not to punish anyone. But rather it is to _ do what, exactly? As a taxpayer, I’d like some clarification of why innocent people today are being penalized in the interest of clearing an old historic record. I’m wondering whether our tax money should not be spent on nine fine minds focused on the more current matter of real estate prices.
But there is a more important objection than government priorities. There is a basic moral issue here and it may not be the one that people think it is.
Clearly, the panel feel themselves to be ruling from a moral high place. They are vicars in the high church of nationalism. Not only are they clearing the legacy of the Japanese period, but also, by doing so, they are highlighting the nationalistic shortcomings of all previous governments, which failed to do so.
``The confiscation has been made 58 years after a special committee to clear off remnants of Japanese colonization failed in 1949,’’ an unnamed panel member said in a story in this newspaper yesterday. The implication is, of course, that because then-President Syngman Rhee back-pedaled on punishment because he wanted to harness the administrative talents of collaborators, he was morally tainted. He should have purged even if it meant leaving only bumpkins to run the country. Bespectacled intellectuals like it that way, which is why they are so scary when they have political power.
No, the real issue is not nationalistic purity but individual rights.
The owners of the land to be seized will likely file suit. If you believe that democracy is based on the rights of the individual, you should get your headband on and support them. The rightness of their claim has nothing to do with Japan or traitors. If their acquisition of their land, which we may assume they have owned for decades, was legal, the vicars are on shaky ground. They might lose.
If, on the other hand, you believe in blood guilt, that children are responsible for the sins of their fathers, then you should push the panel to clear up all of Korean history. Why stop at the Japanese occupation? What about the military coup of General Yi Seong-gye in 1392? A lot of people benefited from that. Didn’t Seonggyunkwan, the Confucian University that still exists, get free land? How about confiscating it and using the money to support the truly pure and innocent people of Korea, those who will step forward and admit that they are the descendants of slaves (unless they became slaves because of the sins of their fathers in the previous dynasty)?
My point here is not that collaborators should be allowed to benefit from their actions. My point is that the collaborators are dead. It’s too late.
In retrospect, Syngman Rhee should have taken clearer steps to remove anyone who benefited from collaboration. But what do we know of the circumstances for his decision? Korea at that time was suffering from lack of capable manpower. Literacy was under 20 percent. Few had administrative experience, let alone understanding of democracy and human rights. We may not like Mr. Rhee because he was not a democrat. But that is no justification for actions of a government 60 years later that betray the spirit of present democracy.
Resolving the long gone past is no longer a matter for government. It is no longer a matter for the courts. It is a matter for historians. These scholars should decline positions on government bodies and, instead, research and write about the history of the colonial period in an intellectually free marketplace. It is truth that sets the record straight. When government tries to do it, there is always a risk of abuse.
Michael Breen is the president of the public relations agency, Insight Communications Consultants, and author of “The Koreans.”
WOW, THIS WILL BE INTERESTING TO WATCH UNFOLD. DO WE BLAME THE SINS OF THE FATHERS ON THEIR CHILDREN?
Wednesday, May 02, 2007
How do you look for answer when you can not even begin to ask the questions?
Over the last few days I have tried to show allot of different looks at what happened at Virginia Tech. The reason was very simple, I live in Korea and the shooter was American-Korean and I posted the reaction of those voices in Korea and the hate that followed.
When it all went down I was shocked but then I heard that A Korean did the shooting, my thoughts soon went to my students. What would I do if they were threatened? For the next fews days I checked each classroom and checked for all exits and what to do in case. I saw the first cartoon from Korea about the shooting and then I started to see videos on you tube like these 2.
They show the actual cartoons from the Korean newspapers and with the idiot Korean folk singer singing his stoopid song. This sure did not help anything going on here in Korea.
The day after the insanity, I started to hear rumors at Woosong that the students were afraid that their American teachers would hate them and blame them for this insanity. I thought that it would go away but on Friday I heard the rumors for myself and then I made a very interesting decision.
At Woosong we have a noodle that we can post things about teaching and share ideas. I made this post on Sunday night.
Due to recent events in VT, I would like to make a recommendation.
(If I am stepping on anyones toes, sorry that was not the intent)
Navier and other Korea web sites and, sad to say, a few of my students fear that we, The Americans, will blame Korea for the insanity of of person. This need to be addressed to our students starting on the 23rd of April and to put a stop to their fears.
My proposal is two fold....
1. USA citizens. We must tell our students that we do not blame then nor do we blame Korea for the insanity of one person. If they fear that they have lost face, it will make our jobs as teachers harder.
2. For the other English Speaking teachers.... If your students say that America will hate us and if they do not believe you because you are not American, then please point to me and use me as the example....
Tell your students that the very tall teacher 1.93M tall, 350 shoe size, Ex US Army and Ex Police Officer, has told us that he does not blame Korea or any of his students for the insanity and you have seen him walking around Woosong and their is no hatred toward Korea in his heart.
I know, It was a very smart or a very dumb, decision on my part! To me, in the end, it was a very simple decision.
I am the tallest American Teacher here at Woosong, the student know that I am ex-US Army and a few have seen me at the pellet rifle range shoot and hit allot of targets. I know that my students are visual learners, so I told all of the teachers that if they do not believe you then point to me. I got back one very nice reply.
Good man Mike! That's been an issue already in a few of my classes...some students even interrupted their own exams (orals) to ask about how Americans now feel towards Koreans.
I've done my best to assure them that Cho Seung Hui's "Korean blood" is of no importance at all to Americans, or anyone else. That in fact they (the Korean people) have made much more of it than anyone else is indicative of how differently ethnicity is viewed...and how far reaching Korea's "group above individualism" culture extends. It's a huge tragedy for the families involved (Cho's family included!), let's all try and limit the guilt feelings of our innocent Korean friends.
Happily CNN, BBC and even Korean TV stations are starting to broadcast messages from around the world specifically refuting this concern. I just hope that it can be the more quickly passed over by the media here. To linger too long on whether Korea has (rightly or wrongly) a collective guilt might appear a slightly insensitive usurpation of the sympathy that should be focused on those who lost and suffered directly.
Again thanks Mike for noting this as a potential issue for our students and teaching.
To be honest, At first I really was not going to post anything but then I remembered what history had taught me, that when evil come to you, you show it and you warn others that they might be ready to face it and to destroy it.
I may post more about it later but for now let me end by stating this.
A nation cries for 32 souls and ask why? When this happens again, will we be ready to stop it or will we keep making the same mistakes over and over again?
April 29, 2007 -- The following are facts. Make of them what you choose.
On Sunday night, April 15th, 12 hours before Cho Seung-Hui began his killing spree on the Virginia Tech campus, "Dateline NBC" devoted its entire show to telling the story of psychotic murderer Robert Hyde.
Hyde was a bright young man from Albuquerque who began to suffer a steady mental deterioration until, one day, in 2005, at different locations, he shot and killed five people.
Beyond the murders, the NBC show stressed that Hyde was a time bomb who was released from police custody and hospital care despite frightening episodes and warnings from many, including his family, that eventually there would be hell to pay, that eventually he would kill.
Hyde's story, it turned out, was roughly the same as Cho's life story, except for the killing part. Cho hadn't killed anyone, not yet.
The morning after NBC's show aired, Cho, described by schoolmates as an all-night TV watcher, shot and killed two people.
He then returned to his dormitory to mail a parcel to NBC. It included a note from Cho that began, "You forced me into a corner."
Then he traveled to a different section of the Virginia Tech campus, where he shot and murdered 30 more people.
Surely, Cho's diseased mind was prepped and primed to commit mass murder, at some point. But did NBC's show, the night before, serve as his prompt? In his afflicted state, did that "Dateline" installment push him over the edge? It's unlikely that we'll ever know.
Yet, the numerous similarities between the Hyde and Cho stories are inescapable. So is the timing. Cho's rampage began fewer than 12 hours after NBC's episode about Hyde ended. And Cho interrupted his rampage only to send NBC a you-pushed-me-to-do-this missive.
But even if it's all just a matter of bizarre, chilling coincidences, those coincidences seem too great to ignore or dismiss. They're worthy of your attention.
My heart goes out to all of you. The shocking nightmare of the ordeal that you have experienced is truly tragic and I can only imagine how scared you all must be. Your collective strength, dignity and maturity in the wake of this tragedy has been truly inspiring. And despite your relative youth, your humanity humbles all of us.
As both a parent and as a Korean-American man, this tragedy hits close to my heart. And although those two roles are very important to me, they certainly don't mean anything to you. And it's all of YOU that I keep thinking about.
I'm not old enough to be your dad nor young enough to be your peer. Nor do I have any professional background in therapy or grief counseling. But I think maybe sometimes it's helpful to hear the advice of a random stranger to give you some perspective on the horror that you've all just experienced.
Maybe I can help.
See, back on September 27, 1990, I too was a young college student. I was far away from home attending college at UC-Berkeley. College was a blast. Life was good. I was a happy young man.
Or at least I was until that night.
On that night back in 1990, I'd been studying at the library for a few hours. Afterwards, I joined some buddies at a bar to celebrate a friend's birthday. Suddenly, out of nowhere, a deranged madman burst into the bar and started spraying dozens of shots from a Mac-10 machine gun. Mayhem ensued. Both the friends standing immediately to my left and to my right were shot. Twelve inches in either direction and I would have been shot in the back of the head.
In the initial rampage, one student was killed. Seven others were wounded. For almost 8 hours, the gunman held 33 of us hostage. The killer was clearly psychotic and, at more than one point, all of us inside were unsure whether we'd ever make it out of there alive. Thankfully, the entire ordeal finally ended when the SWAT team raided the bar and fatally killed the gunman.
Aside from living in NYC during 9/11, nothing in my life has ever come close to the sheer terror of that experience. Hopefully, nothing else in your lives will ever come close to what you have just experienced.
And although our experiences are different, maybe they're not so far apart. So, with a grain of salt, I want to offer you my advice and tell you what you may expect in the near future. I hope that this, in some small way, helps you.
* The nightmares will be terrifying. You'll have a hard time sleeping for a long time. Every time you close your eyes, you're going to be reliving those horrific moments. I needed to drown myself in Jack Daniels before I could even think about falling asleep every night. I wish I could tell you a better way to avoid the nightmares but I can't.
* For a long time, the everyday sounds of life will have a much greater effect on you. Whenever you hear a car backfire, you'll hit the floor in sheer panic. The sound of breaking glass will make your heart jump out of your body. This will all be so instinctive that you are sure that it will never end. It will. It took me over a year. It took some of my friends even longer.
* You will find solace only with those with whom you shared the same experience as you. It's natural to develop a sort of "band of brothers" survivor mentality. And trust me, it's going to be extremely therapeutic for you to discuss your feelings with those who shared your experience and can appreciate the tragedy on a personal level. But don't shun friends or family because you think they just don't "get it." They love you and are trying to be empathetic. Allow them in.
* You may use alcohol and drugs to numb the pain and dull the memories. Be careful. I consumed more alcohol in the weeks following my experience than I had my entire life. I thought it helped but the healing really didn't begin until I stopped drinking and confronted the pain.
* See a counselor. Join support groups. Get professional help. Although I'd been through therapy before and was aware of its benefits, I had several friends who, prior to our ordeal, were not big believers. Trust me. Speaking to a trained professional can be immensely cathartic.
* Stay away from all members of the press. They often lend a sympathetic ear at a time when you could gratefully use one. Don't trust them. They do not have the slightest regard for your best intentions. In incidents like this, they will live up to their reputations as bottom-feeding scumbags.
* Turn off the TV. Forget about the newspapers. Don't surf the internet for stories related to the tragedy. You need some distance to process everything. The media coverage is only going to make you angry. People are going to use this incident to push their political agendas, voice their individual opinions, and attack their personal enemies. Ignore the vitriol. Those people don't care about you and you've got to take care of yourselves.
* Get away from it all. Grab some close friends and go camping. Take a vacation. Having friends with you will help you deal with what happened but putting some physical distance between you and the university will help also.
Your feelings of fear and anxiety are going to last for awhile. This is completely normal. Try and be proactive and address your feelings now while you're in the moment. Otherwise, you'll find yourself spiraling in depression months later. Trust me. I've seen it.
Ultimately the incident can serve as a learning experience. You're lucky to be alive. Be grateful for that. Maybe it will give you more insight into how precious life is. Maybe it will spur you to live your life in a different manner. It will affect all of you in different ways. Just try not to let the experience be a destructive one for you.
My thoughts and prayers are with all of you. Stay strong, Hokies.
Love, Pierre
RESPONSES TO ABOVE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I'm graduating from Tech in only a few weeks. All I can say is that the past week has just been surreal, almost like it hasn't hit me yet even though I've seen hours and hours of coverage on CNN. I knew three people who died and two who were wounded, and it just floors me how supportive and caring people have been. Have you seen pictures of the candlelight vigil? It was simply amazing how many people came out in support and seeing pictures of it later, it was a beautiful thing.
Honestly, the best thing that has helped me was Nikki Giovanni's poem she read at convocation. When I saw/heard her saying it at convocation, I just broke down and cried. It's an amazing poem written by an amazing woman that just summed up everything perfectly. (http://filebox.vt.edu/users/news/convocation_giovanni.mp3 if anyone wants to listen)
Like Laura, I'm a VT student also. Thank you for posting this. It HAS been hard talking to my parents and sisters about all of this. They say the right things but I feel more comfortable being with my friends right now. I'll try to remember not to push my family away. Thank you.
I've been reading your blog for a couple of months now but have never commented until now. i want to thank you so much for writing this piece. i have had a heavy heart since Monday and I've been able to cry for the first time after reading this. i really hope that Va tech students also get to read your piece to give them some comfort in their pain.
this tragedy has hit me close to home. I immigrated to the US as a child, grew up in northern Virginia, and went to college close to tech. I've been overwhelmed by emotions after this tragedy. most of all i feel pain for the victims and their families, and their lost potential and innocence, but i feel sorry for the family of the assailant. when i read the media coverage, I get confused at why they keep referring to this kid as a Korean, when he is a Korean American. and it's also upsetting that Korean people are apologizing for the actions of this mentally ill individual just because he's of the same ethnicity. while i understand that Koreans come from a collectivists culture, i feel feel frustrated that they feel they should apologize for him. i'm originally Iranian but i'm not going to apologize because of the actions of that schizophrenic Iranian man just as it would be crazy for Irish Americans to apologize for timothy mcvey's actions. in any case, thanks for sharing this. i know that it will bring others some comfort.
Here is a cartoon from Naver that was linked to by a commenter at the Marmot’s Hole that I found interesting. My Korean skills are limited but here is my translation, native speakers let me know if I’m off. The top frame has the American tank running over the names of the two girls killed and GI crimes while above it, it says the US has a culture of excuses in regards to these issues. In the bottom frame it says that the US is a culture of condolences after the Cho shooting at Virginia Tech.
Of course this cartoon is nonsense because USFK made apologies for the 2002 armored vehicle2002 accident and made restitution payments to the families involved. Additionally US president George Bush made an additional apology to the Korean people over the accident. Now lets compare that to when US Army Major David Berry was murdered in Itaewon in 2000 by a Korean man, no restitution was made, much less an apology from the President of Korea.
Additionally absurd is that for every GI crime that happens apologies are made from the chain of command even before the offender has even been convicted of anything. Perfect example is with the recent taxi cab related incident in Kunsan. The base commander apologized to the victim and locked down the camp before anyone has been convicted of anything. Heck when I was in 2ID I can still remember when the Assistant Division Commander, General Martz went to apologize to the mayor of Uijongbu for a taxi cab related incident.
WOW A HUGE KOREA BLOG LINKED TO ME..................
This blog post needs wider play, especially when you scroll down to some disturbing post-massacre YouTube videos, which are a compilation of anti-American sentiment in Korea in the wake of the mass murder.
NB: The above-linked blog post is actually a smorgasbord of links to (and lengthy quotes from) posts you may or may not already have seen elsewhere.
I'VE JUST BEEN TRYING TO POST ALLOT OF DIFFERENT INFORMATION FROM ALL OVER ABOUT THIS SAD EVENT.
After reading several quotes from V-Tech students about what happened last week in Norris Hall, the question I asked myself repeatedly is; why didn’t they fight? I’m not judging, and I think this is a legitimate question.
Perhaps because Cho’s style was somewhat different than, for example, the Columbine shooters, it didn’t occur to them. In this case, Cho went from classroom to classroom, and some of these students realized what was happening, and that their classroom was next
But putting myself in those shoes, I think I would have at least tried. Hiding behind a door and waiting for him to enter. Indeed, Professor Librescu knew what was happening and sacrificed himself for his students. If they had waited form him and thrown books, chairs, whatever they could find, and rushed him, things could have been much different. Again, I’m not judging or blaming, and perhaps that would be impractical. I don’t know what the classrooms look like, so I can’t say for sure.
After 9/11 it became much less likely that passengers would allow a plane to be hijacked, so perhaps the same is true of classroom shooting like the one in Virginia Tech’s Norris Hall.
Two side notes.
* A member of our church has a son at V-Tech. He was at class when the first two murders took place in his dorm, and was supposed to be at class in Norris Hall later, but someone (erroneously) told him that class was canceled, so he went back to the dorm to sleep. In that way he avoided both kill zones. * A 2002 shooting at the Appalachian School of Law, also in Virginia, saw three people get killed, but the shooter was stopped by two students who retrieved firearms from vehicles.
Hopefully in a few days I can write my take on this.....
Foreigners cite nationalism, discrimination as barriers to life in Korea
In wake of Virginia Tech incident, Korean society called on to accept its own immigrants.
A 30-year-old foreign woman, who gained South Korean nationality last year after leaving her home in a central Asian country to marry a Korean, wept on April 20 as she talked to a Hankyoreh reporter. Her bloodshot eyes were mixed with anger and chagrin. Her anger centers on how her 10-year-old son is treated in school, where he is a third-grade elementary student. "Fourth and fifth grade students beat my son because he is different in appearance. Despite my appeals to the school, the matter hasn’t been resolved.” Because of the matter, she transferred her son to another school, but the situation did not change. "My son is scared of going to school," she sighed.
***
A 36-year-old Mongolian woman came to South Korea in 2003. Though she received Korean nationality last year, she has seen no difference in her poor treatment. While she received a Korean identification card instead of a foreigner’s one, and while her appearance is similar to that of Koreans, these do not help her. "When I go to a restaurant or a store, people use polite expressions to greet me. But when they hear my pronunciation, they begin to talk impolitely to me." She plans to change her name to a Korean one because her five-year-old son would otherwise be discriminated against at elementary school, which he begins next year. Even in kindergarten, students ask the teacher whether her son, Min-su (not his real name), is Korean or not.
***
Given this atmosphere, how would South Korean society react if an immigrant committed a crime similar to the Virginia Tech massacre?
In the wake of the tragedy caused by a South Korean immigrant, some critics pointed out that South Koreans should reflect upon their attitude toward foreign immigrants such as Southeast Asian workers and others. In particular, as some foreigners who have gained South Korean nationality still suffer from widespread discrimination and prejudice, racism in South Korean society is under close scrutiny.
The central Asian woman said, "While the U.S. is a multiracial society, discrimination and prejudice are much more rampant in South Korea because Koreans think of themselves as a homogeneous people." The Mongolian woman said, "When I talk with my Mongolian friend on the subway, I am surprised by the coldness seen in the reactions of Koreans around us." She said her Filippino friends were told by other Koreans they were being noisy when they talked in their mother language.
Lee Cheol-seung, head of a foreign labor consultancy in South Gyeongsang Province, said, "Typically, Koreans treat immigrants as expatriates because they aren’t ethnic Koreans. If one were to commit a crime similar to that of Seung-hui Cho, ethnic Koreans would consider him as a non-Korean, as still being a member of the society from which he initially came," Lee said.
Kim Yun-jae, a lawyer who emigrated to the U.S., said, "Most Koreans see the [Virginia Tech] tragedy as a cause for shame and guilt, instead of considering it an incident caused by structural problems in American society. In light of this attitude, most Koreans are likely to treat immigrants and naturalized Koreans in the same way [they treated the Cho incident]," he added.
Kang Seong-hye, head of an emergency call center for immigrant women, said, "To resolve the matter of Koreans’ nationalistic exclusivity, we should figure out ways to reshape the community, and teach this in schools in order to share it with society. Services are also needed to help immigrants adapt to being Korean," Kang said.
Seung-hui Cho’s shooting spree left Americans and Koreans in shock. The biggest dilemma Koreans feel is the question of whether Cho was Korean or American. They think the answer will determine how much responsibility they have to feel for what happened. In fact, the only reason we distinguish this recent shooting from the occasional similar incidents like the Columbine High School shooting is that Cho, as a permanent resident of the United States who holds Korean citizenship, is a member of the "1.5 generation" immigrant generation, going over to the U.S. as a child.
The reason most of us Koreans felt shame or were so sure the event would lead to the spread of prejudice against Koreans when we heard the shooter was a Korean citizen is worrisome, because it stems from the kind of thinking of a society so occupied with nationality and bloodlines that they fail to take into account that he was in fact a member of the society in which he lived.
Cho may never have given up Korean citizenship, but if he grew up there since the third grade, he is, in terms of mindset and cultural association, at least over 50 percent a child of American society.
I am not trying to distort matters here in order to "free" South Korea and its citizens of "responsibility." Hines Ward had an admirable Korean mother, but I think it was American society that raised him to be an admirable citizen. If he had been in Korea, where there is racial prejudice and discrimination based on bloodlines, would the care of an admirable mother have been enough to make Ward the same man he is today? We need to stop going on about bloodlines and how great the "Korean race" is while getting so excited with joy or sorrow at the successes and failures of overseas Koreans. We need to begin working on eradicating our society from its racial prejudice and discrimination against foreigners. Today Korea has hundreds of thousands of migrant workers and their children living in its midst. International marriages account for roughly 12 percent of all marriages, and the number of so-called "mixed-blood Koreans" is rising rapidly.
We need to see that it is how we handle the cases of Seung-hui Cho and Hines Ward that will determine whether we raise someone of mixed racial background in our society into a Hines or into a Seung-hui. We need to raise a generation of these children with warm feelings toward Korea instead of hatred that can lead to violence.
I do not mean to say that overseas Koreans do not need our consideration. We should help them settle abroad, and we should support them in maintaining Korea’s language and culture and avoiding discrimination. This is something needed for Korea, overseas Koreans, and for everyone living in the countries in which those of Korean descent reside. Helping them maintain their cultural identity and respecting that identity is a very important condition for their ability to live with pride as global citizens. Cho reportedly had close to no interaction with the Korean community; had he had more interaction with people like the Korean students association and had more cultural pride, he may have been more mentally stable. Had that been the case, he might have contributed to both Korean and American societies.
Back when I lived in the United States, the cultural and linguistic differences and the new environment led to a massive amount of stress, and for a while I went to psychological counseling. It was through that experience that I learned quite painfully of how outsiders need our consideration. Helping immigrants settle in their new countries is something the countries they emigrate from and the countries they settle in both need to work toward. This would be one way to reduce tragedies like this recent event. The victims of the shooting and their families are surely in great agony, and the shock felt by Cho’s parents and siblings is surely no less severe. I can only hope there will never be another tragedy like this one.
Is what Kim Dae-joong claiming, that your childhood was ruined by coming to America, true?:
The children led their lives apart from their parents and roamed the streets. Living in blue-collar neighborhoods, the schools the children attended were often prone to crime and offered a poor educational environment. Not all of them, of course, but the children of many Korean emigrants, lived lives without pride or community consciousness, and eventually ended up on the wrong side of the tracks. In the end, many Koreans who went to America for the sake of their children’s education saw their children ruined by it instead.
I don’t think it is true that all these Korean-American kids are ruined by coming to America and Kim Dae-joong is just overreacting to one isolated incident of violence from one emotionally disturbed person. However, I am interested in hearing opinions from those who live in the community.
ONE RESPONSE.......
CPT KIM Apr 24th, 2007 at 7:26 am
GI,
Kim Dae Joong is idiot and he never experienced being a 1.5 Gen KA. Sure, in the beginning is never easy. I had to struggle to learn English and trying reach adolensce same time. I got into so much fight due to racism with White kids. I was enrolled in lower track classes due to my poor English skill. But we all over come it and assimilate into American life. Vast majority of us do succeed in life by graduating from college and have professional jobs. Just look at James Sun from the Apprentice. He is also 1.5 Gen.
Many non-Koreans keep on telling me that recent VT event has nothing to do with Cho being a Korean. But it was the same cultural background that we grew up which prevented him from getting treated for his mental illness. Korean parents do their best to hide their skeleton in the closet by not seeking professional help for any mental illness that their children might have. They all felt shame if local small Korean community found out about the illness. As long as Cho was not committing crime and he was studying hard in school, his parents have thought that the problem will just go away.
My 2 won-cents
BTW, I will be attending Mary Read’s Wake tonight in Annandale, VA. Her funeral is Tuesday.
I am a twenty-six year old Korean-American female. Considering I was born in the States, I suppose that makes me a rounded 2.0, but adding in the caveat that I was born in the epicenter of Korean culture in the US, Los Angeles, perhaps I should deduct a couple of points, a -1.0?
I stumbled on your blog because I've been voraciously reading up on the Virginia Tech tragedy. It hit a nerve with me, especially because Cho was Korean-American - yes, yes, he was technically a "resident alien," but please, let's not argue semantics. He arrived in the US when he was 8, and he lived here for nearly two decades, he was Korean-American, and truth be told, those two cultures mesh poorly.
I've been waiting for someone to bring up race in an intelligent way, not the ridiculous, ignorant Fox News garbage you hear, e.g., "why don't they deport THESE people?!", but in a thought-provoking, well-reasoned, and equitable way. I think you've done an admirable job and I thank you. I agree with everything you've said in this post. I cannot begin to imagine the kind of intolerance, prejudice, and flat-out hatred you must have (and continue to ) endured as half Korean and half black (or African American, your preference). It has been my experience that Koreans (fine, MOST Koreans, not ALL) hate everything black. They hate all races, including other Koreans, but they're most scathing vitriol is directed at blacks. I suppose the LA riots didn't help - and I speak from experience. My parents' grocery store was looted. My father was indeed one those badass Korean men in a vest, gun in hand, on the roof of his store, firing shots into the sky. Thankfully, no one was killed, but the hatred lingers. That you even continue to identify yourself as partially Korean is testament to your generosity of spirit, because quite frankly, as a "pure" Korean, I get fed up with Koreans.
As to Seung Cho, I don't want mainstream media commentators like Anderson Cooper, Wolf Blitzer, Brian Williams, or Greta Whats-Her-Face, to discuss the race factor, because as understanding as they might want to be, they will NEVER understand. And in their well-meaning, hard-hitting, white-journalism way, they'll oversimplify what's going on and fuck the whole analysis up, because it's a ratings game. And then the ignorant white masses who watch these shows will take these simple analyzes as gospel truth and do stupid things like vandalize Korean owned stores and assault Korean Americans.
I want US, Korean-Americans to talk about it, because something is indeed rotten in Denmark, or Korea, or Korean-America, whatever. The funny thing is, a friend and I, another Korean-American (a male, by the way, who despite his parents best efforts managed to turn out okay), were discussing the shooting, and the first thing both us said was it was totally his parents.
Here's the profile they don't talk about: 23 year-old UNDERGRADUATE SENIOR at VIRGINIA TECH with a history of MENTAL ILLNESS. His older sister is a graduate of PRINCETON and works in some private subsidiary of the State Department. Look, my parents made it very clear that college lasts FOUR years, i.e., you finish at 21, because you go in at 17, if not earlier, and you have approximately ten choices of college - Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Stanford being the top four - and allowances will be made for schools like Columbia, U Penn, Williams, Cornell, UC Berkeley, UCLA, and that's about it - VA Tech, while I'm sure is a fine institution in its own right, was probably akin to community college to Cho's parents. Before anyone complains that I'm stereotyping and generalizing, please, don't even start - you can't bullshit a bullshitter.
Why is it that when a Korean-American high school student makes 1600 (or 2400 now) on the SATs it is on the friggin FIRST page of the Korea Times (LA Edition)? Can you imagine any mainstream American publication, e.g., LA Times, NY Times, writing an article like that (and I'm not talking about those self-aggrandizing, voluntary "announcements" these papers have in the back celebrating weddings and the like). And add insult to injury, Cho had psychiatric problems - to my parents depression = not studying hard enough. Fine, I don't really know what went on in his house, I can only make assumptions and educated guesses, but I'm thinking his parents weren't all that supportive, loving, and actively seeking their son help. More likely than not they probably called him a dumb shit on various occasions asking him why he couldn't be more like his sister. So he withdrew into the voices in his head. He became delusional, and progressively more violent until he decided to shoot up thirty-two innocent students and himself.
Let me be clear, what Seung Cho did was hideous and inhuman - he took thirty-two innocent lives. What he did was wrong. He was an adult, and as such he is entirely responsible for his actions. I do NOT absolve him. But you know what, I don't absolve US either. By "us" I mean the Korean-American society at large this includes our parents and it includes their children - my generation, 1.5s, 2.0s, 1.73s, whatever - WAKE UP. There is something very wrong with Korean-American and we are in deep denial. We pretend we don't see our fathers smacking around our mothers, we pretend that it's somehow okay to be told you're stupid because you only managed to get an B+ in AP Calculus, we pretend it doesn't hurt when our parents wave around some article in the Korean newspaper about the latest Korean-American whiz kid and demand to know why we're not like that - yeah, I'm generalizing and stereotyping, but I dare anyone who says that they're Korean-American to tell me that their childhood wasn't littered with episodes like that. I have several Korean American friends, probably because they grew up exactly the way I did, and we laugh about our childhoods. Our non-Korean friends look at us with confusion and at times, something akin to horror. But my Korean-American friends laugh hysterically, because what is the alternative - despair, depression, withdrawal?
And I'm pissed off with all of these Korean people apologizing for Cho's actions. What exactly are you sorry about? That he killed thirty-two people? Or are you really sorry that he brought SHAME upon our good name? Those are two different things. And words without actions are meaningless. The candlelight vigils, the trusts in the name of the injured, the tears, the mea culpas, blah blah blah . . . worthless. If we want to truly show remorse, we need to take a hard look at ourselves. Why is it that domestic violence runs rampant in Korean America? Why is it that so many second generation Korean American females avoid their Korean American male counterparts like the plague? Why is it that college students would rather hang themselves in their dorm rooms than face the scrutiny and castigation from their parents at poor grades? And why is it that we don't talk about it . . . EVER?
And for anyone who wants to challenge the assertion that Korean and Korean-American culture is mysoginistic, sexist, and often abusive, stop lying to yourself. And I don't just blame the abusive SOBs, I blame the women too. Why? Because ladies, we take it. Our mothers take bullshit from their husbands, and then they pamper and baby their sons. And for the most part, their sons turn out just like their fathers, and their daughters turn out like their passive-aggressive mothers. Yes, there are exceptions - I KNOW, okay?
I'm not just angry at the "Korean" side of Cho. There's a lot that's screwed up with mainstream American culture too. The violence, perversity, and profanity (God, I sound like Bill Cosby - pull up your goddamn pants!!!) that pervades contemporary America probably played a large role as well. Yes, most serial killers, mass murderers, people on welfare, are WHITE. I know. I'm not saying that they're somehow not involved. Of course they're involved. But Cho, like me, like so many of us, walked that fine line where he wasn't just Korean, or just American. He was both, and unfortunately, it seems like he absorbed the shittiest characteristics of both cultures.
I suppose my post doesn't make much sense. It's not particularly organized or well-composed, but Seung Cho raises many turbulent and unsettling questions within me. It makes me scrutinize my upbringing, my parents, my heritage (like, I wasn't already doing that). And don't misunderstand me, while there are many things I dislike intensely about Korean-ness, there are many things I adore. I love the fact that we're family oriented and we believe in community. Honestly, maybe what bothers me most of all is that Seung Cho is all of us, Korean, white, black, Latino, old, young, male, female - we are all capable of great evil, and most of us, thank god, resist the temptation to succumb to the darkness, because we have the moral compass and support systems in place that bolster us during our most emotionally tempestuous times.
I don't know if you've seen the picture where he's smiling. His face is not facing the camera and he might be in a car, but he's smiling, and if you didn't know it was the same person brandishing guns and knives and hammers in other pictures, for a second, he just looks happy. As an older sister to a younger brother, as a fellow Korean-American, as a blasted fellow human being, it hurts to think that somewhere along the line this kid was destroyed and in being so destroyed he caused such senseless violence.
Final thought: How do you honor the dead? By doing right by the living. We come from a determined people - it's hard as all hell to come to a foreign country and make a decent living when you don't speak the language (seriously, what morons invented English - it is the most illogical language in the world), and yet, most of our parents managed. Think about what we could accomplish if we set our minds to improving not just our financial pocketbooks, but our mental/emotional ones as well.
Immigration reformer Craig Nelsen, who normally focuses purely on issues of population size, not of cultural compatibility, sent out this shockingly hard-hitting e-mail.
In the wake of the Virginia Tech shootings by a South Korean immigrant, the South Korean immigrant community held a church service to pray there wouldn't be a racial backlash against all South Koreans in the United States, and even though there hadn't been a single incident reported anywhere of any such "anti-South Korean backlash" occurring, the South Korean government had the chutzpah to issue a statement warning against an anti-South Korean racial backlash.
I'm insulted, frankly, at the nerve of this crappy little country.
In 2002, when a U.S. military vehicle accidentally struck and killed two school girls walking on the shoulder of a highway in South Korea, it unleashed months of "racial backlash" against all things American. Americans were attacked. American businesses were attacked. American military installations were attacked. The tightly controlled South Korean press failed to report the American military's apology, it failed to report the handsome monetary gift to the girls' families (paying off a victim's family is a disgusting and widespread Asian tradition), and massive riots were stoked by the Korean government. Never mind that our military, at great expense to the American people, are there to protect that crappy little country from the Korean whack job to the north in the first place.
Oh, did I mention that the deaths of the two schoolgirls was an accident? That the soldiers of the unit involved built a memorial to the two girls and held a candlelight vigil for them?
Compare that to the methodical murder, the intentional murder of 32 Americans by the South Korean killer at Virginia Tech. Did the South Korean community apologize to the families of the victims? Did the South Korean government express its sense of grief at the heartache one of their own had unleashed? No, not a word to that effect. And despite not a single whiff of any anti-South Korean sentiment anywhere, press coverage that took pains to describe the killer as "coming from our area (his immigrant family lived in northern Virginia)", the despicable South Koreans dared warn us against any backlash! It almost makes one want to do a little backlashing.
Here's a proposal. All Americans in South Korea, get out. Come home where you belong.
All Koreans in America, get out and go back to Korea, the crappy little country where you belong. Then you can all engage in all the anti-American demonstrations you please and no one will notice, because no one will care what goes on in your crappy little country. In fact, you can demonstrate right up to the point when WhackJob Ill-in-the-Head Joong takes over and throws you all into NK uniforms and shows you what anti-American demonstrations are supposed to look like.
If we'd thrown all you corrupt ingrates out a year ago, 32 of us would be alive today.
How dare you warn us!
Howard Sutherland writes:
Good job posting Craig Nelsen's comment about Korean gratitude. It is naive in the extreme to expect gratitude, but that's no reason not to resent Korean hostility. Did you see my Korean comment below? We'll see how this plays out, but I think the two-party state will close ranks to preclude any discussion of the immigration aspect of these crimes, while seizing on the Blacksburg murders to push confiscatory federal firearms legislation. If the Pelosi-Reid Democrats pass federal legislation further restricting firearms ownership, my bet is that Bush would--all the while reciting some platitude about the Second Amendment--sign it.
As for the comment Mr. Sutherland refers to, in an e-mail exchange two days ago, he had said that that the Second Amendment would be repealed. I said, "Please" (meaning, come on, don't be ridiculous), and he replied:
Hyberbolic, perhaps. But how do you think this latest atrocity will be spun? Despite Bush's throwaway line yesterday, I would not look to the mainstream GOP for any defense of Americans' rights under the Second Amendment. As for the Pelosi-Rodham Dems, they probably would criminalize private firearms ownership despite the Second Amendment, betting that federal judges will back them up.
The press is pointedly ignoring Virginia Tech's campus firearms ban which, however well intentioned, meant there was no-one around who might meet this crazed Korean on anything like his own terms. Just as they are trying hard to ignore his being a Korean alien in the first place.
Korean immigration has been a sore spot with me for a while. GIs, including yours truly in 1982 and 1987, have been keeping South Koreans safe from their own Communist countrymen since 1950. A lot of Americans have died for South Korea. Since America is, rightly or wrongly, in the business of making South Korea a safe place for Koreans to live in, why do the feds let any South Korean who feels like it move to America? After the Mexicans, is there a group of aliens more adept at scamming Uncle Sam? What really sticks in my craw is Korean (not only Koreans, but they are Exhibit A) "birthright tourism" taking advantage of the feds' misinterpretation of the Citizenship Clause of the 14th Amendment. Korean-owned companies based in Korea and, usually, California fly heavily pregnant Korean women to the United States so little Cho or Kim can be born here in Korean-owned and operated hospitals and collect that invaluable U.S. passport and California birth certificate before returning to The Land of Morning Calm. Whenever the Cho or Kim clan feels like relocating to America, they have their anchor ready...
RG writes:
I couldn't help but enjoy Craig Nelson's letter. I had the same reaction yesterday when I heard the South Korean government issue a statement dangerously close to warning Americans about any possible backlash against their people in our country. What nerve!
For several years now, they have almost continuous anti-American rhetoric spewing in all their major media and they've gone absolutely ballistic when there's been an occasional traffic accidents involving South Korean civilians and I mean ballistic!
Americans should send some choice comments to the South Korean embassy in Washington DC and also do our best to avoid purchasing South Korean goods, including their vehicles.
Edward D. writes:
Thank you very much for this posting, Mr. Auster. I see I'm not the only one who has a negative view of the Koreans. When I was in college back in the early 90's the dormitory in which I lived had numerous Korean students, and for the most part, they were distant, cold, and held a certain level of contempt of Americans. A constant theme running through my head when I dealt with Korean students (both foreign students and permanent resident immigrants) was 50,000 Americans gave their lives for these a*******? An uncle I never had the opportunity to meet was one of those men.
From what I've been told, this anti-Americanism is largely absent from the older generation, especially those Koreans who themselves fought in the war. But Korean youths are something else. And soon the older generation will be no more.
A few years ago during the 2002 Sal Lake City Olympics and the World Cup, it became crystal clear to me the sentiment the Koreans have towards Americans. Friends of mine who never spent much time with Koreans could not understand the boos from South Koreans toward the American World Cup team that year. It seems Americans are largely in the dark about Korean attitudes towards us.
MP writes:
I'm a regular reader. I had a few comments about the "If Koreans are Our Friends..." post. They may or may not be interesting or relevant, but I thought it might be worthwhile to send them, anyway.
Mr. Nelsen states that Koreans and Korean Americans haven't apologized, but only warned of a race-based revenge attacks in the U.S. This isn't true. There have been various apologies and expressions of condolence from individuals and representatives of the South Korean government. A Kor-Am senator, Paul Shin, said the following (from an article in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, here.
"It hurts me deeply, knowing what happened to Korea and how much the U.S. helped," said Shin, an orphan who was adopted by an American soldier after the Korean War. "This is not the way to pay back the blessings we received."
Also, Lee Tae-shik, the Korean ambassador to Washington, made an apology himself, and said Korean-Americans should try harder to fit into mainstream society in the U.S.
Rho Mu-hyon, the president of South Korea, also expressed official condolences, and there was some talk of candlelight vigils in Korea (though only from the Korean Right). There have been other apologies as well, though these and the ones I cited seem to be only reported in the Korean media.
Certainly, mixed motives may play a part in this. These apologies and condolences may be intended to reduce some imagined backlash. Even so, they're still apologies and condolences. It seems natural to me that some Koreans would worry about being attacked, regardless of how unlikely it may really be. Korean cultural attitudes also play a part in this. There is a strong sense in Korea that one's group is responsible for one's actions, good or bad. The bad actions of one person shame the whole group. Fortunately, this isn't transferable to American culture, but it does explain why some Koreans would worry about a violent backlash. That's almost certainly what would happen in Korea if an American shot 32 Koreans.
Mr. Nelsen's description of conditions after the schoolgirl accident is accurate. I had friends who were there at the time, who endured a lot of that, and worse. Still anti-Americanism is not the defining feature of South Korean politics. The 2002 "movement" was led by the Korean Left, which tends to be either passively or actively pro North. The Right, though part of their motivation may be simple self interest, is very strongly, even viscerally pro American (complicated by the fact that much of it is associated with past military dictatorships). The Left has led the national dialog for the past decade or so. When I was in Korea myself though, I had occasional problems with stupid students, but I was thanked (unnecessarily, of course) far more often.
In any case, this isn't intended to be a pro-Korean email. Also, it's not intended to say anything about immigration (though I think there are some implications). I just thought Mr. Nelsen was not telling the whole story. I also apologize for the length.
P.S. If you're interested, a good blog to read on Korean matters is One Free Korea. It advocates the withdrawal of all U.S. forces from Korea and renegotiating or abolishing the alliance. I agree with both of these points.
Stephen F. writes:
The Koreans are certainly exploiting the absurd "backlash" idea. But I don't completely blame them for doing so. I think they believe it to an extent--it's the way they'd respond themselves. And the American media is constantly pushing the fantasy that a bunch of white people wielding pitchforks and torches are ready to descend on any minority whose members do something wrong.
For another perspective, an article in the Korea Herald details what I think are genuine expressions of sorrow from Koreans. Note that it's the Americans quoted in the article who feel the need to assure Koreans that we're not a "racist" society.
We need to understand their thinking. Koreans see themselves as a people, a race. That's why they can act like "ugly Koreans" when in America. Notably there have been no comments coming from Korea to the effect that Cho is "not really Korean" because he grew up in the U.S. Therefore they feel a collective remorse and shame that Americans would not feel in the reverse situation. It is precisely because they blame Americans collectively for any misdeeds against Koreans, that they fear a "backlash" against themselves.
Doesn't all of this show for the millionth time that "good fences make good neighbors"? We station our military in Korea--of course they resent it. We protect them--of course they're ungrateful. We invite them to our country--of course they come. Korea has an ancient culture and warm people--if you visit them THERE, as a guest. Again, it's American "invade the world, invite the world in" policies that lead to friction and hatred. (Now the headlines are saying Cho was teased at school--good grief! I was teased at school too!)
LA replies:
Very well put.
Van Wijk writes:
It should also be noted that servicemen stationed in Korea marry Korean women on a very large scale, after which the new wife and her immediate family follow the serviceman back to the U.S. The town I live in has a very prominent Koreatown, and when I go to work I have the privilege of listening to them (and the Filipinas) babble at each other for hours in a language that is like an assault on the ears. When they do have to speak English, it is generally to refer longingly to their home country, which they have no intention of ever returning to.
Russell W. writes:
I knew the JAG defense attorney who successfully defended the driver of the large mine clearing vehicle that was driving on the highway that day at his court martial for negligent homicide. The facts revealed at trial showed that the driver couldn't see the girls from his vantage point and didn't know they were there because his headset was faulty and he didn't hear the spotter's warning. The girls, because of the noise, were walking with their heads bowed and had their fingers in their ears, so they didn't notice the vehicle coming towards them. In other words, it wasn't his fault.
Despite this, there were widespread claims in the media among popular commentators that the US soldier cheerfully aimed for the girls and was laughing afterward. Because of the violent protests in the country, during which the mobs often called for the man's execution by local Korean authorities, he had to leave the country in fear for his life.
His JAG attorney had kept in touch with him for several years, and revealed that he was still struggling with the guilt he felt over the incident, and some real fears that the US government would decide to bow to Korean political pressure and have him handed over to authorities there, where he would surely be imprisoned for life, if he was lucky. Right now (or at least the last time I heard), the guy was something of a mess of a person.
Despite the very astute comments about Koreans' belief in group responsibility, these facts still make the warnings from S. Korea about a backlash in America incredibly galling.
Ed L. writes:
I think that your piece about Koreans--and particularly the rant by Craig Nelson--is over the top and off track.
Attached is an apology statement that a friend sent me yesterday. I told him that it struck me as sincere and genuine (except for the one statement "because many of 2000 Korean-American professors...", which seems a bit off); I don't see any reason not to accept the statement graciously at face value. Nothing about it struck me as opportunistic or sly. The same cannot be said about apologetics of any kind coming from Muslims. The contrition that most Koreans have expressed, to their credit, is the complete opposite of the reaction from the Arab street after 9/11.
I think that such distinctions are paramount, and that by being ungraciously hard on Koreans, you unwittingly make yourself vulnerable to accusations of: "There, ya see, Auster's a crank about all foreigners, not just Muslims!" Unlike with Muslims, there's no creedal driving force that fuels terrorism and mass murder. Unlike Mexicans in this country or Muslims in Europe, Koreans aren't present in large enough numbers to pose any kind of demographic menace (If I'm factually wrong about this, let's discuss further.)
LA replies:
I thought Craig Nelsen's angry e-mail was worth posting. It put things in a different perspective and brought out something that many people were not aware of, the fact that a people most Americans think of as our friends and allies, actually dislike us and have been stunningly nasty to us, even as we keep opening our country to them and calling them model minorities and all the rest of it.
Here is the statement that Ed sent, from the Korean-American University Professors Association:
To the families and friends of the victims of the deadly rampage at the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University and the University community
On behalf of the KAUPA (Korean-American University Professors Association), I would like to express my deepest and sincerest condolences to the families and friends of the victims of the deadly rampage occurred at the Virginia Tech campus on April 16, 2007. It is such a shocking and horrific event that is traumatic to not only the people who are directly involved in the rampage, but all of us who are in higher education.
We believe the university should be the institution for personal growth and social cohesion as well as for the discovery of knowledge. For these purposes, the university campus should be the arena that everyone feels safe, free and nurturing. The fact that the perpetrator was a Korean-American student gave particular sadness to us, because many of 2,000 Korean-American professors across American colleges and universities interact with about 250,000 Korean and Korean-American students quite frequently. We pledge that from now on we will be more vigilant to the emotional as well as scholarly needs of those students.
Our heart and prayer goes to the loved ones who are suffering from this unspeakable tragedy.
Pace Ed, this letter does not disprove what people in this discussion have been saying about Korean attitudes toward America. Of course people are shocked and saddened. Does Ed think that commenter's were saying that all Koreans and Korean-Americans dislike America, and that they dislike America so much that even the Korean-American University Professors Association would be unwilling to write a letter of condolence after this atrocity?
The revelation that the Virginia Tech shooting was carried out by a South Korean citizen must have been a dream come true for some in the Japanese language blogosphere. It wasn’t long before Japanese blogs began posting links to postings on Korean websites that pre-dated the announcement that the shooter at Virginia tech was South Korean. Some of the postings were just comments from random netizens assuming that a Chinese or Japanese was responsible. Others, such as an anti-American political cartoon about the shooting from a Seoul newspaper, were higher profile (the cartoonist responsible for one of the comics has since apologized). Not suprisingly, the ugliness has spread to YouTube.
One YouTube, user, going by the name Fuckorean1, has uploaded a video to YouTube which focuses on anti-American political cartoons that appeared in South Korean newspapers after the shooting occurred:
The video has been viewed over 52,000 times and is now near the top of the most-viewed videos on YouTube for today, and its comment section is a truly ugly mess of hate [Update: The video has been removed by YouTube. I assume it is because they banned “fuckorean” for having a user name like that, since the video itself was no worse than thousands of other videos on the site. As a consolation, I’ve added two similar video clips in its place, to give you an idea of the original video’s contents.]. Judging from the awkward English used in in the English translations in the video clip (and the visibility of those comic strips on Japanese blogs), it’s not unreasonable to assume that the creator of the video was probably Japan. In between the usual “Fuck you Japs” and “Korean are ugly” comments, there are a bunch of comments from users identifying themselves as Japanese netizens who are embarrassed that a fellow Japanese has uploaded such a video to YouTube (other commenter's have accused them of being Koreans pretending to be Japanese). We can probably expect a lot of similar videos in the days and weeks to come, but I doubt any of them will get as many views as this one has…
A Student’s Letter Home by Bryan Schamus April 20, 2007
To my loving family and friends:
We continue to heal in Blacksburg. I look at the calendar and I see it's only been four days. It feels like months.
The outreach has been tremendous, especially at the Newman Community, Tech's Catholic Campus Ministry. We got the word out that we were providing a sanctuary for the students to come hang out. Take a look at our website for everything we are currently offering. ((www.catholic.org.vt.edu) We continue to receive food, drinks, priests, counselors and people in need all the time.
We have eight priests in residence right now and they take shifts to be in the house for whomever might need help. Some people come in and just need to watch a movie. Some need to talk to a priest. Others just need a big hug.
The Bishop of Richmond is traveling to Blacksburg to say Mass on Sunday.
The convocation on Tuesday was the most moving event I've seen, and might ever see, in my life. Put all politics and personal opinion aside, President Bush was in our basketball arena to be with the Hokie Nation. He spoke from the heart and brought tears to many. Governor Kaine was “right on" with his speech as well, as he described his experience with the Hokie Nation. The ceremony ended with a now famous poem from world renowned poet and English professor here at Tech, Nikki Giovanni. This was her poem:
We are Virginia Tech.
We are sad today, and we will be sad for quite a while. We are not moving on, we are embracing our mourning.
We are Virginia Tech.
We are strong enough to stand tall tearlessly, we are brave enough to bend to cry, and we are sad enough to know that we must laugh again.
We are Virginia Tech.
We do not understand this tragedy. We know we did nothing to deserve it, but neither does a child in Africa dying of AIDS, neither do the invisible children walking the night away to avoid being captured by the rogue army, neither does the baby elephant watching his community being devastated for ivory, neither does the Mexican child looking for fresh water, neither does the Appalachian infant killed in the middle of the night in his crib in the home his father built with his own hands being run over by a boulder because the land was destabilized. No one deserves a tragedy.
We are Virginia Tech.
The Hokie Nation embraces our own and reaches out with open heart and hands to those who offer their hearts and minds.
We are strong, and brave, and innocent, and unafraid. We are better than we think and not quite what we want to be.
We are alive to the imaginations and the possibilities. We will continue to invent the future through our blood and tears and through all our sadness.
We are the Hokies.
We will prevail.
We will prevail.
We will prevail.
We are Virginia Tech.
The crowd of 12,000, with 20,000 watching in the football stadium on the video screen, responded with resounding cheers and applause which led to the most spirit-filled "LET'S GO HOKIES" chant ever to fill Cassell Coliseum.
It was my first Hokie cheer ever. Since first coming to Tech, I've worked at every home football and basketball game in a "professional" capacity. I've never cheered with my fellow Hokies. I always dreamed about one day being able to cheer from the stands but I never wanted it to be like this. It was bittersweet. But I will always remember it. LET'S GO HOKIES!!!!!
We hug everyone we see. There is so much good happening here right now. But I would give anything to go to class to listen, take notes, without a worry in the world.
My good friend Theresa lost one of her best friends in one of the classrooms in Norris Hall. I can't even imagine. When she walked out for the ceremony next to President Bush, I didn't even know what to think.
Today I was interviewed by "Religion and Ethics", a television show on PBS.
Check your local listings to see when it airs, as it is different everywhere. They also filmed me singing Dona Nobis Pacem with some of my Newman singers.
Never, not three years ago or three days ago, could I have imagined what 4/16/07 would bring us. But in the aftermath of this tragedy, I’m reminded of all the reasons why I love with this place with all my heart. There is no other place on the face of the earth that could have dealt with such a loss in the way we have. As I told PBS today, when we gathered on the drillfield with candles and chanted, "LET'S GO---HOKIES", that was our prayer. Our ecumenical prayer as a united Hokie Nation. Thank you, Frank and Lisa McGrail for dragging me to Blacksburg three years ago. This is where I needed to be.
It will take many more days and months to heal. But I know all of you are praying and thinking of us. I apologize for not being able to return every phone call and e-mail, but please know that I read and listen to every one of them and they mean so, so much.
And I really hope that someday before I graduate, those of you that I'm writing to many miles away, can visit this campus and see what it's like without the world watching. Without the blood. Without the crime scene tape.
And without the sadness.
I am so proud to be a Hokie and I hope you are too. You all are Hokies. Wear your maroon and orange on Friday!
Please, please take a look at who this was sent to and send it on to others I may have forgotten or to those who would enjoy reading it. It's 1:30 a.m. and I'm running on fumes, so I am bound to forget people.
Keep the e-mails and calls coming and, of course, your prayers. I love you all.
HOKIE HOKIE HOKIE HI TECH TECH VPI SOLAREX, SOLARAH POLYTECH, VIRGINIA RAY, RAH, VPI TEAM TEAM TEAM
Original Post: I’m going to leave the psychology of all the talk about Koreans and Korean-Americans fearing backlash to others. I just wanted to share a few headlines:
Of course, none of this would be complete without a word from the Angry Asian Man.
So, the next time you hear someone state his fear of a backlash over the VT killings, take him by the hand, lead him aside, give him an empathetic look in the eyes…
…and bitch-slap him.
Hopefully that will shake the silliness out of him.
While I have little doubt that there will be a relatively small group of idiots who will respond in a stupid way to what that "nutjob" did at VT, there will not be protests in the streets against resident Koreans in the USA. Korean-Americans will not be banned from restaurants and shops. If anyone writes anti-Korean songs, most people will never hear them.
The BacklashTM is just not going to happen.
I am sure will see reports of taunts against Asians and some fighting in schools. Kids tend have a natural tendency to pick on those who are different and will go after red heads, fat kids, kids of different races and others (Children must be taught not to hate.). When kids want to pick on someone else, they use whatever reason they can find and the VT shooting is a ready-to-use excuse.
I do worry that some nut job will decide to attack a Korean church instead of the local post office. The body count would be the same but the racial angle will make it big news over here.
I also know that any incident that occurs is going to get hyped by people who want to play the “Asian-Americans as victims” card.
The fact is that most people in the US these days see non-first-generation Asian-Americans as just folk. In fact the interracial marriage rates for American natives of Asian decent show that they are integrating just fine. If and when East Asian immigration slows down, a lot of the difficulties between Asians and other groups in the States will diminish. Ethnic Asian American natives are not the model minority (a term only used by people who deride it), they are an integrated part of American society.
This is not just academic for me. The college where I work sends over a hundred students to the States to study every year. In fact, another group of about 25 (including about 10 from my department) is going there next week. If there was a reasonable chance that they would be attacked, we would not send them.
A similar message is getting out in the Korean media. Last night, among other reports, MBC news had a piece with interviews of VT students, all of whom said that what Cho did was not a reflection on ethnic Koreans.
Let’s hope that the same logic prevails among everyone.
My good friend Adrian Hong of LINK fame has ended the debate on the anti-Korean backlash (that never was) with this piece in the Washington Post.
Korean Americans do not need to apologize for what happened Monday. All of us, as fellow Americans, feel tremendous sorrow and grief at the carnage. Our community, as it should, has expressed solidarity with and sent condolences to the victims, and as Americans, Koreans certainly should take part in the healing process.
But the actions of Cho Seung Hui are no more the fault of Korean Americans than the actions of the Washington area snipers were the fault of African Americans. Just as those crimes were committed by deranged individuals acting on their own initiative, and not because of any ethnic grievance or agenda, these were isolated acts by an individual, not a reflection of a community.
I would add that even a crime based on an ethnic or religious grievance only reflects on a larger group to the extent that the criminal’s views reflect the larger group’s views. Now, my favorite part:
Further, it is inappropriate for the Korean ambassador to the United States to apologize on behalf of Korean Americans and speak of the need to work toward being accepted as a “worthwhile minority” in this nation. While the Korean ambassador represents the interests of Korean nationals in the United States, and the interests of the Republic of Korea, he does not speak for naturalized Koreans here.
Absolutely. Adrian deserves kudos for dethroning Ambassador Lee from his imagined dominion over everyone of Korean ethnicity within our borders. I once met Lee briefly — though not enough to make much of an impression — but just about everything Lee has said this week has succeeded mightily at pissing me off, from his public expressions of concern that Americans would react with discrimination and violence, to this. For a guy whose job is to represent his country favorably, Lee Tae Shik could use a semester of remedial charm school.
The Korean claim to guilt and shame on behalf of Cho Seung Hui is well-intentioned but misguided. We are Americans first. While we share an affinity with Korea and appreciate and respect Korean culture, at the end of the day we are Americans. Our president is in the White House, not in the Blue House. And our response to this crisis should be as Americans, not as Koreans.
Read the rest on your own.
Finally, here’s an opposing view. The writing style of the commenter called “Wolmae” is as distinct as a fingerprint. There is only one person I know who writes like this. I won’t tell you who he is, but I will say he’s someone I respect very much, and whose views generally align closely with my own. He doesn’t happen to agree with me this time, although I think the passage of time is proving — thankfully — that there isn’t much of a foundation for his fears. Just the same, don’t miss it.
I'm single. I believe in God and am a member of the Church of Christ. I have 2 kids, Claudia and Sean McStay. Hopefully one day we can be reunited. I miss you 2 so much, you are growing up without me.
