When a shirtless runner becomes a police matter
A friend of mine was eating a pork cutlet when his phone rang. It was his landlord calling.
Assuming something serious had happened, he picked up. A barrage of questions followed. His Korean was not good enough to comprehend everything, but the urgency in his landlord's voice was unmistakable. Had there been a fire? Had someone broken into his apartment?
He hurried home and found several police officers waiting outside.
Then one of them explained what had happened.
An older man in the neighborhood had called the police after seeing a man walking around without a shirt. My friend was that man.
What the caller failed to mention was that the runner was wearing running shorts, carrying a water bottle and sweating in the middle of the day. He had just finished running and had taken his singlet off just meters from his home.
The police explained that seeing a shirtless man walking around a residential neighbourhood in Korea might have people assume he is drunk, behaving like a "pervert" or otherwise causing trouble.
Having lived in Korea long enough to become familiar with some of its social norms, I can understand that reaction. Social norms differ between countries and behavior considered ordinary in one place may be considered unusual in another.
But the incident raises a more interesting question: When does something being unusual justify intervention?
There is an important distinction between behavior that is illegal, behavior that is socially unacceptable and behavior that is simply unfamiliar. Legally, running shirtless appears straightforward. Socially, the answer is much less clear.
Korea's Minor Offenses Act previously contained a much broader prohibition on excessive exposure in public. In 2016, however, the Constitutional Court found the provision unconstitutional. The law was subsequently revised so that the relevant offence concerns exposing major parts of the body, such as the genitals or buttocks, in a manner capable of causing embarrassment or disgust. Simply running without a shirt is not, by itself, prohibited.
However, legality and social acceptance are two very different things.
What about places specifically associated with running or exercise, such as the Han River? I have seen shirtless runners along the Han River and in beach areas, so the practice certainly exists. Discussions online suggest that it can attract criticism even in these settings.
This raises an interesting contradiction. A man can spend hours without a shirt and attract little attention at an outdoor swimming pool or beach, yet the same man showing exactly the same amount of skin while running along the Han River may draw disapproving looks. If the amount of exposed skin has not changed, what has?
Perhaps the discomfort is less about exposure itself and more about context. There seems to be an unwritten expectation about where being shirtless is considered appropriate. But given that the Han River is one of Seoul's most popular places for running, cycling and exercise, it is worth asking why a shirtless runner on a sweltering summer day should be considered so out of place.
The contrast becomes even more noticeable when viewed from abroad. In countries such as Australia, runners routinely take their shirts off when exercising in the heat, whether along beaches, through parks or on suburban streets. People understand someone is exercising and trying to stay cool.
In Korea, however, the same behavior can be interpreted very differently.
Koreans do not have to embrace shirtless running simply because it is normal elsewhere. Public spaces are shared spaces, and cultural expectations about appropriate dress deserve consideration. At the same time, social norms are not fixed, nor does behaviour outside those norms automatically pose a problem.
Context is important. A shirtless man stumbling through a residential neighbourhood late at night and disturbing people is one thing. A sweaty man in running shorts, carrying a water bottle and walking home on a sweltering summer afternoon is another. Likewise, someone behaving indecently in a public park is very different from a runner taking off his shirt while on a running path.
Perhaps this is where the distinction between discomfort and harm becomes important. Something can look strange, feel unfamiliar or even make someone personally uncomfortable without necessarily causing harm to anyone else.
As Korea becomes increasingly international, encounters with different ideas of what is considered normal will inevitably become more common. But this question extends beyond interactions between Koreans and foreigners. Even within the same society, people have different ideas about what is appropriate in a shared public space. Social norms also change over time as lifestyles, generations and attitudes change.
Living together successfully does not require everyone to agree on what is normal. It does require willingness to consider context and to distinguish between what is harmful and what is unfamiliar.
Sometimes, after all, a shirtless man carrying a water bottle is not drunk, threatening or indecent. He is simply a runner, drenched in sweat after exercising in the intense Korean summer, trying to cool down on the short walk home.
Geoffrey Chen (gywchen@gmail.com) is a former corporate lawyer from Australia currently studying Korean at Korea University in Seoul.