Embrace the earth pig inside

By David Tizzard

My original article for this week was a defense of boy band BTS, which has recently been charged by the writers of the Korea Expose and online feminists with promoting misogyny. After realizing I didn't want to start my new year likely angering both of these groups, I deleted all of the topical content and left just the moral pontificating that surrounded it. Nevertheless, I await your further criticisms of what follows.

Education provides an antidote to self-importance, self-pity and selfies. It enables us to break free from the notion that our world, the zeitgeist, is the culmination of everything. It reminds us that the next Trump tweet, the next inter-Korean summit, the next yearbook photo or iPhone release will not necessarily result in either unprecedented prosperity or unparalleled catastrophe.

We do not stand on the precipice of a yawning chasm waiting to either swallow humanity whole or embrace us in a heavenly swathe.

It is important for us to escape such narrow and provincial self-aggrandizing ways of thinking. And the cure, as always, is perspective, combined, of course, with a good dose of history and reading.

It is, indeed, a great liberation of the mind and spirit to acquire perspective. It is reassuring to realize that every age and every generation is confronted with problems of the most subjective urgency. Yet, beyond this, an objective classification of the disasters or fortunes that await us remains impossible.

Through history and education we learn that moral predicaments, opportunities and threats have been lived through and experienced by people before. And, moreover, they will be lived through by people after us.

Yet for some today, democracy has seemingly passed and the rule of the majority has been replaced with emotions. Feelings now supplant reason. Emojis are our constitution and we face trial by Kakao. In the Kingdom of the Blind, retweets are assent.

Values are shouted as slogans. Political commitment now means liking a page on Facebook. Moreover, when opinions are asserted they are at the same time seen as being beyond examination or refute. This is dangerous.

Feminist Ayaan Hirsi Ali recently therefore described our age as an “emocracy.” A rather cromulent moniker all things considered.

Emotions are not inherently bad, however. A moral society is an important one. Human beings are not random encounters. We are living, walking, thinking and feeling manifestations of culture. These are important for us to nurture because they promote exchanges of ideas and knowledge, the very things that produce progress rather than stagnation and suppression.

Diversity is also crucial for both individuals and nations. With an ever-globalizing world, many of the world's most pressing issues will only be addressed successfully if they are done in chorus. Democracy is a transnational conversation representative of international society and inclusive of many people.

And all of this will require a diversity of the most important kind: ethical diversity.

Ethical diversity may be a difficult concept for some because, at its extremes, it seems to promote the acceptance of barbaric behavior. But that is neither the essence nor the idea behind it.

Recognition of the “other” is a fundamental part of the decent life. However remote our kinship, however large our cultural differences, however varied our thoughts on what constitutes an ideal partner or emotive song lyrics, there is an underlying responsibility for us to recognize each other as human beings.

Human nature is in fact human natures ― plural. We demonstrate a remarkable ability to live differently according to time and place, making concepts such as sovereignty and self-determination vitally important.

We should therefore be less offended by the words and images others use. Indeed, true diversity presupposes the acceptance of ideas and thoughts that are contrary to our own, otherwise it is not diversity but something far, far different.

With a South Korean society that is demonstrably improving in terms of political, cultural, religious, and sexual freedoms and expressions for both majorities and minorities, the possibilities for its role in Northeast Asia and the broader world are vast.

So let us encourage the people of the country to find unity in diversity rather than unity in conformity. For such a thing to take place, it is incumbent on us to seek communication with those whom we disagree and diffuse anger wherever possible. And I encourage you to start today so that there might be a better tomorrow for those who are yet to arrive.

Embrace your inner earth pig, dudes and dudettes. Happy New Year.

David Tizzard (datizzard@swu.ac.kr) is an assistant professor at Seoul Women's University.