By Kim Heung-sook
Korea was ranked 15th on a list of the ``Best Countries” that Newsweek wrote up recently based on a survey of 100 countries. How come? Is the world outside Korea so bad that the nation could reach such a high position in spite of all its problems? Did Newsweek get the relevant information from the right sources?
I am asking these questions because I don’t think Korea meets the criteria of a ``good country,” let alone ``best country.” For the survey, Newsweek reportedly looked into five categories of national well-being ― education, health, quality of life, economic competitiveness, and political environment.
In my opinion, the simplest way to measure a good country is to see the quality of life of people who don’t have any power. If the powerless are happy, the country is a good one. Korea is a country where the powerful, not the powerless, are happy and that is why I can’t appreciate the survey result and I am not alone in this.
By age group, it is generally believed that the young ones below 20 and those over 60 have less socio-economic and/or political power than those between 20 and 60. And those young and old ones happen to be having the hardest time surviving in the nation.
Last year, as many as 202 elementary and secondary school students committed suicide, recording an alarming 47 percent increase from the previous year. It was the first time student suicides surpassed 200. A hundred and forty suicides (69 percent) were high school students, followed by junior high school students (28 percent) and primary school students (3 percent).
Among the 202 suicides, 29 percent or 59 students were thought to be the last to choose to end their lives prematurely, as they fared well with classmates and others and were not poor performers academically. They didn’t give any hint of self-destruction, the officials at the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology said. They opined that the young ones killed themselves impulsively and that they often died in a pact or by copying others who committed suicide.
The officials’ comment is disturbing, to say the least. Happy youths don’t die on impulse. A teenager commits the real act of killing him- or herself impulsively only when he or she has harbored the wish to die. That 29 percent didn’t give any hint at suicide means the majority of 71 percent did, yet they were not saved. A ``Best Country” wouldn’t allow such a thing.
If I were an 11-year-old living in Seoul now, I would think of killing myself more frequently than I did in my time. I wouldn’t be able to survive the heavy load of studying, the heated competition and the lack of freedom. If I were an 11-year-old of a poor family, I would be even more tempted to die. When I was young, lives of the rich and the poor were not so different. Now, they are as different as heaven and earth. Living as a poor person often means a struggle against an unbeatable foe for young hearts.
When it comes to suicide among the elderly over 60 years of age, the situation is truly worrisome. The number shot up by 3.5 times from 1,165 in 1998 to 4,029 in 2008. As people age, they tend to take their own lives in increasing numbers. In 2005, the average suicide rate of OECD (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development) member countries was 14.5 per 100,000 people for the age group between 55 and 64 years, and the figure grew to 16.3 people for the group of 65~74 years, and to 19.3 persons for those over 74.
In Korea, not only was the overall rate astoundingly high but the growth was also overwhelming. The rate was 42.7 for the 55~64 age group and it leaped to 81.8 for those aged between 65 and 74 years, and to 180.4 for those over 74 years of age. No wonder Korea shows the fastest increase of elderly suicides among OECD members.
People may think suicides among the elderly deserve less sympathy than the younger deaths, that they should be more responsible for their lives than the young ones. Well, you can say so easily if you are young or if you, though old, are living elsewhere. In Korea, particularly Seoul, where life rushes at full speed, old people’s lives are an uphill battle.
Under these circumstances, I think my question of how Korea was ranked 15th on Newsweek’s list is legitimate.