Choe Sang-Hun reports in "South Korean Law Casts Wide Net, Snaring Satirists in a Hunt for Spies" (2012) that the National Security Law, which "makes it a crime to praise, sympathize or cooperate with North Korea if such acts threaten national security" (p. 2, ¶ 4), continues to be used in a seemingly arbitrary way, which the United Nations Human Rights Commission and other rights groups argue violates the rights of South Korean citizens. As Sang-Hun explains, the dangerously vague wording leads not only to injustice, but absurdity, for example in the case of Park Jung-geun, whose satirical work, obviously making a joke of North Korea, led to the seizure of his computer and repeated interrogations by police, for art work which he describes as "obviously harmless to anyone who’s not language-impaired" (p. 2, ¶ 11).
As I've already suggested, apart from the immorality of such laws, I can't understand why the South Korean government does not want it's citizens to be able to have any well-founded, well-balanced and well supported opinions about the situation in North Korea, which is so truly awful that solid, tested opinions would almost certainly be even more negative than most already are. On any objective evidence, North Korea is a disaster, and of course, it also shows the results of censorship and the denial of free speech. North Korea is an economic disaster because decisions are based not on evidence, reason or healthy argument and disagreement, but by ideology. North Korean law does not allow its citizens to access different opinions or to state different opinions; the certain result is that errors, mistakes and wrong opinions cannot possibly be corrected, and the results are obvious: disaster for the North Korean people, economically, socially and politically as they worshipped their "Dear Leader" until recently and now his son. I am sure that the opinions of North Korean's about their despotic leaders is sincere, but sincerity does not make any opinion true, or right. And the opinions of North Koreans about their legally protected leaders are largely false and worthless. And this worthlessness is a direct result of the censorship the protects them from any criticism: it also protects opinion about them from truth or reasonableness.
I think South Koreans can be trusted to realise these truths about the situation in North Korea, and if some disagree, surely it is better to have that opinion openly stated so that it can be addressed and rebutted. The same is true for the laws in Germany that prevent people saying that the Nazi government did not legally kill millions of Jews. Such opinions are very offensive, vile and generally disgusting, as well as being false, but it seems to me much better to let people say them, present their evidence, and be proved wrong, again, and again, and again. Just because an idea is insulting, offensive or vile is not a good reason to ban it. Those are very good reasons to argue against it, but if it can't be openly and peacefully stated, how can anyone argue against it, and thereby persuade people that it's wrong?
The opinions and actions of the Westboro Christian church in the US, who make anti-gay protests at the funerals of American soldiers killed fighting for their country ("Even Hurtful Speech", 2011; Liptak, 2011), are extremely offensive, I think they are a hateful group of religious people, but I also agree with the decision by the US Supreme Court last year that US law must allow them to preach their ugly message of hate, intolerance and unreason. And the historical evidence is clear: it's commitment to protecting the right to free speech of its citizens from government interference has not destroyed the United States of America: long the most powerful nation the world has ever known, and also pretty well off economically to the benefit of its residents.
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References
Even Hurtful Speech [Editorial]. (2011, March 2). The New York Times. Retrieved January 11, 2012 from http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/03/opinion/03thu2.html
Liptak, A. (2011, March 2). Justices Rule for Protesters at Military Funerals. The New York Times. Retrieved January 11, 2012 from http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/03/us/03scotus.html
Sang-Hun, C. (2012, January 7). South Korean Law Casts Wide Net, Snaring Satirists in a Hunt for Spies. The New York Times. Retrieved January 11, 2012 from http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/08/world/asia/south-korean-law-casts-wide-net-snaring-satirists-in-a-hunt-for-spies.html
Hi,Peter.
ReplyDeleteThank you for being interested in Korean society and I understand what you mean. I feel ashamed, because I don't even think that the issue is right or wrong as a Korean. Even if I had seen this article before you wrote this blog, I wouldn't have focused on that article because it is an usual Korean authority's practice about North Korean(NK)problems for several decades.
Although I am not interested in Korean politics and don't know much about the situations of NK, I would like to say something, to make the others who will read your blog understand that Korean issue.
Democracy started in Korea 60 years ago just after the Korean war between NK and SK. At that time, everything surrounding all Koreans was destroyed, especially people's hearts.From that time, almost all South Koreans(Korean) have had in mind that NK is our public enemy. For this reason, every government has used NK when they want to get the political power. Of course, It has worked, because there are many Korean families who still remember the war. Moreover, In 2010, there were two tragic attacks by North Korea. One is bombardment of Yeonpyong island which was the first direct attack toward citizens and the territory of SK. The other one is one Korean warship had been sank by a torpedo which is one type of bombs used in water.(Even though there is an opposite opinion about the warship attack, the attack by NK is a mainstream in SK.) Because there are many Koreans who don't believe what NK says and still they are afraid of NK, this issue controlling people who are favor of NK is naturally accepted by many Koreans. As a result, if some people express their pro-opinions about NK, they can be investigated by the authority.
Peter, you mentioned free speech, right?
After the war, from 60s to 80s, there wasn't any free speech including NK issues, politics, economics, and even songs and novels and so on in SK. However, from 90s when civilian governments appeared, they guaranteed civilian freedom including free speech. Plus, Nowadays, thanks to the development of communicative devices, Koreans are expressing their opinions freely about anything even though they are very controversial issues or completely opposite ideas against the authority.
But, this is true that the issues about NK is strongly banned and excluded from the freedom of speech. However,I don't think this is totally wrong like your thought. I think these problems are in the last step which Koreans have to solve to realize genuine democracy. As I wrote before, Korean history of democracy is about 60 years and the situation divided as two parts is very different from America. You took an example of the Westboro Christian church in the US. Though these two cases are important examples when they come to pursuing real democracy, I think they come from different roots. While the American issue is from self-respect of people, Korean Issue is from self-respect of the nation.
Actually, I can't express exactly what I have in mind and I know that you have a lot of things to say about my comment. However, what I really want about this issue is that the authority permit its citizens to speech about NK issues like you, which means that Korean citizens are capable of judging what's wrong or right about them.
Sunny,
ReplyDeleteYou write that "while the American issue is from self-respect of people, Korean Issue is from self-respect of the nation" (¶ 5), which sounds like an important distinction to make. I think I understand your idea well enough.
Can you give another example to think about which might also address the idea you have in mind?
Some countries, such as Thailand, have laws making it illegal to damage, destroy or insult their national flag. These laws generally have popular support. In the US, surveys regularly show that a majority of Americans would like similar laws to protect the US flag from insults such as public burning in protests, which actions are deeply offensive to most American citizens. However, no US politician has ever dared to propose such laws, although George Bush talked about it occasionally.
The reason is, again, that such a law, although very popular, would never pass the Supreme Court, and everyone knows that. Were such a law against flag burning to come before the Supreme Court, the nine Supreme Court justices would find it unconstitutional on the same free speech grounds that protect the deeply offensive, insulting and ugly protests of the Westboro Christian group.
The First Amendment to the US Constitution provides very strong legal protection to the right of American citizens to honestly say what they think in a peaceful manner, however much many other people might hate what they are saying.