Gay-hating lawmakers; slut-shaming 'Slutwalk'

Saenuri Party's Hwang Woo-yea, left, and Democratic Party's Kim Jin-pyo lead a list of anti-gay bigots at the National Assembly. / Korea Times

By Kim Tong-hyung

Here's your midweek update on the stories in entertainment and media you might have missed because your life is a lot more fulfilling than ours.

How long can we tolerate intolerance?

When Ban Ki-moon became the secretary general of the United Nations, an ecstatic Korea declared him as a beacon of national pride. Then it spent the next seven years blithely ignoring whatever he did in New York.

Stop arresting Jehovah's Witnesses for refusing to serve in the military? Silly advice, U.N. Don't you know the Korean military duty is "sacred," so much so that it comes before the freedom of conscious and religion? And please, shush a little on the speechifying about us needing anti-discrimination legislation. Gay folks might listen, you know?

So maybe Ban cringed again last week as Korea's social backwardness hit a new low, thanks to some lawmakers from left and right united in their passion to spread homophobic hatred.

In an unexpected news conference, the National Assembly Morning Prayer Meeting, a group of Christian lawmakers led by Hwang Woo-yea of the governing Saenuri Party and Kim Jin-pyo of the supposedly liberal Democratic Party, demanded "immediate correction" of high school textbooks they believe are "encouraging" gay sex.

"Homosexual activity is subject to judgment about what's right and wrong. We believe the government's approach to the issue, which normalizes homosexual behavior and ignores the opinions against homosexuality, is truly wrong," said Hwang, insisting that school books should be "balanced" with arguments that homosexuality is immoral and also describe why gay people live "unhappy" lives.

"The current textbooks are teaching distorted ethical values to students and increasing the possibility that they become homosexuals," he said.

Seriously, you can't make this stuff up (unless you work for the Onion).

This newspaper in recent months has published a series of articles on how conservative politicians and the over-powered Protestant church are derailing the country's attempts at having an anti-discrimination law. It's difficult to expect things to change soon when the hideous dome of the National Assembly continues to prove as a time capsule.

Debate over dress-coding ‘Slutwalk'

It was in 2011 when a Toronto policeman's ill-judged advice to women students to "avoid dressing like sluts" sparked an international protest movement now known as the "Slutwalk."

Thousands of people have marched in cities around the world — some dressed casually, others more provocatively — with the aim of highlighting a culture in which the victim rather than rapist or abuser is blamed.

These protests have had significant meaning in Korea, where police officers continue to blatantly blame sex crimes on scantily-clad women. A survey of police officers by the Korea Women's Development Institute earlier this year showed more than half of them supporting the view that women who wear revealing clothing are culpable in any attacks on them.

There's nothing unpredictable about the police accused of being regressive and obtuse about sex crimes. However, a Slutwalk organizer being accused of "slut-shaming" is an interesting development.

A Slutwalk march in Seoul in 2011

Planning a Slutwalk for Busan on Saturday, DON'T DO THAT, a sex-crime awareness group, triggered ridicule after it proudly announced that its protestors will be dressed decently.

"Unlike previous Slutwalks, we will not wear excessively revealing clothing or chant slogans," DON'T DON THAT wrote on its poster for the event. For some reason, the same poster showed a big photo of a woman in a leotard.

The group tried to be more specific about its dress-code in an online message board. While overly provocative outfits are a no-no, miniskirts, short pants, and cropped T-shirts will help "convey the message," it said. It also said that male members of the "Today's Humor" website will participate in the march to "protect" the female protestors from "possible incidents and accidents."

Twitter erupted in sarcastic cackle, while other Slutwalk organizers like Slutwalk Korea expressed discomfort about being grouped with DON'T DO THAT in collective thought.

"We wonder why DON'T DO THAT is using the Slutwalk term at all ... Through our protests, we have been trying to get the message through that women should not be discriminated in any way for the way they look and the way they dress. On the other hand, DON'T DO THAT doesn't seem to be criticizing this culture of prejudice in anyway," Slutwalk Korea said.

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