Don't trust your men, Madam!

By Shim Jae-yun

Former presidential spokesman Yoon Chang-jung has become a symbolic man who rose to stardom then suddenly fell to the lowest level. Physical greed seems to be what drove him to his demise. Such desire may have grown because he thought he deserved it, given his seemingly powerful status as the mouthpiece of the head of state. The Bible says greed yields sin, which culminates in death.

What caught the public off guard and made them even more disgusted was his attitude in defending himself in a childlike way, desperate to read the face of his mother after misbehaving. Some critics even said his course of action was typical of that adopted by sexual offenders.

It is mean of him and shameful to try and pass the buck to the Korean-American intern and others while brazenly claiming his innocence. Many ethnic Koreans in the United States were deservedly upset over his “wayward” and “arrogant” way of dealing with a Korean-American who was helping him.

Yoon’s act of drinking until midnight in the middle of the head of state’s first visit to the U.S. is unimaginable, not to mention his alleged sexual harassment of the intern.

I vividly remember the time I covered Cheong Wa Dae in 2004-2005 during the late former President Roh Moo-hyun’s stay in office. At that time, Roh’s spokesman Yoon Tae-young was always near the pressroom, poised to answer questions from reporters covering the president’s overseas trips.

President Park Geun-hye looked very depressed during a meeting at Cheong Wa Dae on May 13, amid the escalating dispute over the sex assault case. The Yoon affair has darkened her otherwise successful visit to the United States. It also raised severe doubt as to her ability to lead the nation.

In a sense, she is to blame for pushing ahead to name Yoon as her press secretary despite fierce opposition from many, only relying on her own records in her “diary.” Some say Park is too naïve when it comes to selecting “her people.”

In July of last year, I had a chance to meet Park face-to-face during her debate with political editors of major new outlets in the lead-up to the presidential election. I had time to throw a question at her, raising the issue of the then National Assembly’s failure to approve a motion to arrest Rep. Chung Doo-un on charges of being connected with a corruption scandal.

My query focused on the reason she was absent from the Assembly’s plenary session despite the need to deal with the significant motion. It was a litmus test to determine whether lawmakers were willing to comply with the people’s growing call for them to discard their privileges, including the right to avoid arrest during a session. My question went further to touch upon her younger brother Ji-man, who was involved in similar charges years ago.

In response, she said she had never dreamed the lawmakers would act the way they did (rejecting the motion), and added she trusted them 100 percent. It is my great concern that Park, who has relatively little experience of men, might have also trusted her Cheong Wa Dae people completely. Simply put, I would like to advise Park, our president, not to believe her staff, especially the men, who are easily prone to wielding power for their own selfish desires, including sexual ones.

When Psy was at the height of his popularity, a critic said he saw a male-narcissist nature in the rapper. Standing aloof on the stage looking down on an audience that was singing along and dancing to his music, he said performers may feel a sort of ecstasy, equivalent to that acquired through the extreme happiness of intercourse.

Males are supposed to continuously tout themselves to make others pay attention as a means of satisfying their hidden desires. Such temptation grows when they are stars or in a powerful position. What is the difference between Psy and Yoon? While Psy is exercising his male nature to make others happy and joyful, Yoon made the grave mistake of attempting to fulfill his private desires at the cost of another. The result was his plunge into a bottomless pit.