Are all Koreans created equal?
Image from Unsplash
By Amanda Price
You do not need to be a psychologist or a counselor to understand that North Korean refugees arrive in South Korea often deeply scarred by their experiences. Human compassion and simple logic would suggest that they would be met by fellow Koreans with understanding and kindness. No doubt there are cases where this occurs. Unfortunately, these are the exceptions, not the rule. If there is such a thing as a “rule” in responding to North Korean refugees, it is to treat them as if they are Korean, but not quite as Korean as they should be.
Much is written of the common problems that North Korean refugees face regarding employment, education, language and learning how to survive in a thriving metropolis where consumerism is the key and class systems still exist. Less is written of an underlying belief among many, that the refugees are, by virtue of the above, a rung below South Koreans ― South Koreans whose political freedoms and educational opportunities have lifted them above their new and less fortunate neighbors.
These differences have all been man-made. Not only man-made, but enforced, sometimes brutally, on North Koreans who previously never questioned their ethnicity. Even in the ruthless, oppressive Kim Jong-un regime, North Koreans thought of themselves as Koreans in every sense. When escape became the only option and the opportunity became (barely) possible, North Koreans left their homes hoping to find a world in which “all men were created equal.”
Equality is the cornerstone of democracy. Equality is what led the student revolts that eventually freed Korea from occupation. Equality is a word used by every modern politician hoping to stay in or gain office. If the fictitious Inigo Montoya responded to the “equality for all” campaigners, he might be likely to repeat that famous line, “You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.”
For far too many North Korean refugees the word “equality” does not mean what it is supposed to mean.
“Where is their gratitude and appreciation?” some may ask. “Isn't the government already taking steps to help them assimilate and conform to this new society?” Others argue that their focus should be on fitting in to South Korean culture and learning how to be, well … how to be less North Korean and more like everyone else. The underlying message is the same ― as yet they are not equal to their new neighbors and fellow citizens.
Being “not enough” when one has already known the shame of being “not enough,” is a cruel irony for the refugees. For some, it is more than they can bear. Finding the words to explain these feelings, without sounding ungrateful, only results in further anxiety.
Responding to South Koreans who see North Korean refugees as “Koreans by geography” alone can be just as difficult. From the 1960s to the 1990s, the message spread by those who needed anger to control the population was that the average North Korean was “the enemy.” Communism was a plague and North Koreans the rats that spread it. For those influenced by the message of this time, their prejudice can run deep.
On the other side of the parallel line, the message was even stronger. At the time both governments saw the benefit in creating unbreachable chasms between the two Koreas. Both sides appealed to a greater ethnic purity and ancestral advantages. Both sides claimed to have a more accurate understanding of Korea's origins. Both sides were utterly wrong. All Koreans shared a common history and ancestral lineage. The real challenge seemed to be who was able to denigrate the other most effectively.
But North Korean refuges are not of this ilk. They have chosen freedom of thought, mind and body over the claims of North Korean supremacy. Essentially, North Korean refugees bargained with their lives in the hope that equality really did exist outside North Korea.
For those still not convinced, the most common arguments for North Koreans' inferiority can be looked at one by one.
1. The first is language. Despite popular belief, the overwhelming majority of the refugees say they have little trouble understanding South Koreans. The differences in their dialects are minimal, estimated at 15 percent. Understandably there are new words that North Korean refugees come across, but they are all able to be learnt.
The people of Jeju-do do not speak a Korean dialect. Their language is distinct from Korean, yet no one questions that the inhabitants of Jeju-do are Korean, despite the significant gap in language.
2. North Korean refugees also face discrimination as it is often assumed they have deserted their families to escape North Korea. I find this hard to imagine myself, but I have since found out that there is no one answer to this dilemma. One mother reasoned that the chances of being caught and imprisoned, or worse, were astronomically high. She told her two sons to tell the authorities that she had deserted them, knowing that this would put them in a good light with their patriotic father. After a year she had earned enough to pay a broker to rescue her children and bring them to South Korea. The stories why some refugees leave vary enormously, but almost all of them are heartbreaking.
3. Though few would admit it openly, a pernicious attitude exists among some who believe that North Koreans are less intelligent than South Koreans. The first problem with this attitude is the false assumption that only one type of “intelligence” exists (see Gardner's “Frames of the Mind”). While a lack of educational opportunities and a lower standard of schooling cannot be denied, what should be equally remembered is that most North Korean refugees have a skill that few of us need, the skill to survive. Among the refugees are stories of plans to escape that require immense discipline, coordination and often ingenuity. Secretly earning money, knowing who to trust, reading the signs and then knowing how to survive the arduous journey out of North Korea all testify to their intelligence.
Unfortunately, many arrive in a land of “book intelligence,” where academic knowledge, often the least used in everyday life, is held in disproportionate regard. Refugees with skills and master's degrees can be found driving delivery trucks, while middle-aged executives can find themselves working long hours in a corner shop. There is no justification for disregarding the skills and levels of education that North Korean refugees arrive with, even though that level of education may need to be updated or improved on.
There is also no justification in paying North Korean refugees less, insisting they work longer hours (if they can find a job at all). It is almost as if they were paying some debt to society for crimes they had not committed. Thankfully, there are employers that have found this belief to be false and treat their employees with equity and fairness, regardless of where they are from.
Whether adapting to a new language, deciphering a new culture, coping with loneliness and family separation, it is essential to be aware that these issues are simply that, issues. They do not define the North Korean refugees. They are challenges and hurdles, not a reflection of nature or character.
North Korean refugees are the most vulnerable sector of Korean society. They are, by their own choice, no longer North Korean citizens, but, by no choice of their own, they are often not considered equal to Koreans from the South.
The refugees regularly deal with post-traumatic shock, depression, anxiety, insomnia, recurring nightmares, fear of being kidnapped, displacement and loneliness. To have the further burden of being treated as if they are “lesser Koreans” adds insult to injury. Sometimes it is the straw that breaks the camel's back. A horrendous past and a present lack of acceptance will do that to anyone.
North Korean refugees need not be treated as people to be pitied, but as Koreans, equal in their ancestral heritage, equal in intelligence and generosity, and perhaps even more determined in their desire to learn.
North Korean refugees are not a threat. The threat is what they have escaped.
What may be wanting for some North Korean refugees can all be learned, especially when they are educated with respect and without judgment. Nothing is set in stone, least of all people. We are made to be creatures of change. What is already evident in North Korean refugees is that they have a will to live and to live as citizens, created equal in every sense to their fellow Koreans.
Amanda Price is the former Director of Hillcrest College's International Student Department. She is the founder of Griffith University History Readers and now writes full time. She can be reached at amanda-price@bigpond.com.