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Jason Lim

Jason Lim is a Washington, D.C.-based expert on innovation, leadership and organizational culture. He has been writing for The Korea Times since 2006.

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Jason Lim

Korea's forced marriage

By Jason LimForced marriage usually refers to the tradition whereby a young man and woman are arranged to be married to each other without regard for their personal preferences because of advantageous family ties. They don't even have to know each other. Most likely, they wouldn't meet until they were sitting across from one another during the marriage ceremony. In fact, until Korea's modern age post-1945, this was the mainstream means to marriage, especially for the upper class.Well, Korean courts recently handed down a ruling that gives forced marriage a new definition. Hong Sang-soo, a well-known movie director, has been in a years-long, very public extramarital affair with a famous actress, Kim Min-hee. They met on the set of some movie they worked on, and the rest is history. A director having an affair with the lead actress isn't exactly shocking. What's surprising is that they have gone on to make several more movies together and are apparently together and still very much in love. So, this state of affairs would naturally lead Hong to want to officially end his marriage and,

Jun 21, 2019By Jason Lim
Jason Lim

Lee's everywhere in golf

By Jason Lim So, Hank Haney must feel vindicated now that a Korean “Lee” won the LPGA's U.S. Open tournament. It just goes to show that Haney still doesn't think he did anything wrong when, prior to the tournament, he said on his SiriusXM PGA TOUR radio show that a Korean player with a surname of “Lee” would win. He was suspended for his remarks by SiriusXM at the request of the PGA TOUR.On the surface, he turned out to be correct. Jeongeun Lee6 won the U.S. Open. Ironically, there is a 6 appended to her last name to differentiate her from other Lees on the tour. All this led to Haney proclaiming he was just playing the odds when he said a Korean “Lee” would win the tournament. But as with everything, it's the context that counts. He predicted that a Lee would win after declaring, “I couldn't name you, like, six players on the LPGA Tour.” It's pretty clear he was being dismissive of the women's tour and generalizing the whole Korean player contingent into a faceless group of indistinguishable and undistinguished players. Just because he

Jun 7, 2019By Jason Lim
Lee's everywhere in golf
Jason Lim

SAT adversity vs. diversity

By Jason Lim Admitting that parents' wealth, education levels, home locations, etc. are better indicators of SAT scores, the College Board has announced the implementation of an “adversity score.” It's an index score based on several metrics which purports to represent the amount of adversity a student would have faced. Colleges have the option of taking this score into consideration when selecting applicants for acceptance. The score would give colleges more context to gauge an individual student's test performance in light of their background. According to TIME, “The adversity score ― which will be shared with colleges and universities along with a student's SAT performance ― is based on 31 data points that, according to research, are correlated with academic achievement. They include factors associated with an applicant's neighborhood (such as the percentage of adults with less than a high school diploma) and those tied to a student's high school (such as the number of Advanced Placement courses offered).”Let's be honest. This is basically reverse―affirmati

May 27, 2019By Jason Lim
SAT adversity vs. diversity
Jason Lim

Democratize deplatforming decisions

By Jason LimIt's called deplatforming when social media giants such as Facebook and Twitter ban certain individuals or groups from using their platforms to engage with followers or friends. Facebook recently deplatformed InfoWars' Alex Jones, ex-Breitbart News editor Milo Yiannopoulos, white supremacist Paul Nehlen and anti-Islamic activist Laura Loomer. It also banned Louis Farrakhan, the Nation of Islam leader whose fiery rhetoric was controversial long before social media was a thing. In a statement, Facebook said, "We've always banned individuals or organizations that promote or engage in violence and hate, regardless of ideology… The process for evaluating potential violators is extensive and it is what led us to our decision to remove these accounts today."Conservatives, including President Donald Trump, accused the tech giants of having an anti-right bias. Donald Jr. tweeted the following on May 3:“The purposeful & calculated silencing of conservatives by @facebook & the rest of the Big Tech monopoly men should terrify everyone. It appears they're taking t

May 12, 2019By Jason Lim
Democratize deplatforming decisions
Jason Lim

Sri Lanka and social media

By Jason LimThe day after the Easter Sunday terrorists bombing that killed over 250 people, the Sri Lankan government shut down popular social media platforms such as Facebook and YouTube for fear of fake news and conspiracy theories that could incite further violence. This was largely met with support and even relief from the international community. Writing in the New York Times, Kara Swished said, “So when the Sri Lankan government temporarily shut down access to American social media services like Facebook and Google's YouTube after the bombings there on Easter morning, my first thought was 'good.' Good, because it could save lives. Good, because the companies that run these platforms seem incapable of controlling the powerful global tools they have built. Good, because the toxic digital waste of misinformation that floods these platforms has overwhelmed what was once so very good about them. And indeed, by Sunday morning so many false reports about the carnage were already circulating online that the Sri Lankan government worried more violence would follow.”What a di

Apr 28, 2019By Jason Lim
Sri Lanka and social media
Jason Lim

Roe vs. Wade Korea style

By Jason LimSouth Korea's Constitutional Court ruled that the current abortion law wasn't consistent with the Korean constitution and will have to be amended by the National Assembly by end of next calendar year. There seems to be a widespread support for this shift, especially since there really hasn't been enforcement against abortion for the last few decades. In fact, when I lived in Korea in the late 1990's, I was surprised to hear that abortion was illegal since the social norms seemed to regard it as perfectly acceptable. I think it became an issue recently as the birthrate plummeted to the lowest among OECD countries, driving some to view the illegality of abortion as a forcing mechanism for women to have more babies. Not surprisingly, such arm twisting didn't find much resonance in today's Korean society, leading to this showdown that was won by the pro-choice groups. What I find interesting in this decision was how the Constitutional Court judges framed the right of women to have an abortion. They pointed to Article 10 of the Republic of Korea Constitution that states: &ldqu

Apr 14, 2019By Jason Lim
Roe vs. Wade Korea style
Jason Lim

Korea's original sin

By Jason LimAfter being promoted from a provincial-level park to a national park, Taebaek National Park authorities are pursuing a policy of cutting down the Japanese larch trees and replacing them with indigenous Korean trees. Currently, they estimate that there are about 500,000 Japanese larches in the park, consisting of 11.7 percent of the entire tree “population.” Starting in 2021, the park plans to spend about U$4 million for this project over 5 years. A park spokesman is quoted as saying that it's only appropriate, especially since Taebaek is considered a “holy” site for Koreans, to get rid of any foreign trees and replace them with Korean ones. This also is in line with the overall national park policy. Let me translate. A Korean national park is cutting down a tree because it's Japanese. I didn't realize that a plant could have a nationality, but here we are. Seoul Metropolitan Government recently introduced an ordinance that would prohibit the city government and Seoul's Office of Education from buying goods made by “war criminal” firms.

Mar 31, 2019By Jason Lim
Korea's original sin
Jason Lim

Captain Marvel and my little boy

By Jason LimLast Sunday, weather in Washington, D.C. was still cold and foggy; March, after coming in like a lion, had calmed down somewhat, but was still growling menacingly. Tired of being cooped up, my family decided to brave the weather. So, we drove down to Georgetown, thinking that we'd have a quick breakfast in the city and then stroll along the waterfront. Then we ran into a movie theater that was showing Captain Marvel. My 7-year-old boy got super excited and wanted to see the movie. Amazingly enough, he stayed still and paid attention throughout the two-hour long movie: this, from a kid who usually resembles a human pinball as he bounces from one toy to the next YouTube video to the screeching game on iPad. Afterwards, he asked tons of questions about the intricacies of the Marvel Universe, and how he couldn't wait until Captain Marvel kicked Thanos' butt in the next Avenger's movie. Other questions included the differences between plasma vs. lasers, breathing in space, power stones, and all hosts of details that only make sense in the Marvel Universe. But he didn't ask one

Mar 15, 2019By Jason Lim
Captain Marvel and my little boy
Jason Lim

Sequencing will not work

By Jason LimHand wringing over the sudden end to the much-anticipated summit between President Trump and Chairman Kim in Hanoi follows several well-worn paths. The most common one blamed the Cohen hearing that sucked the media energy out of what was happening in Hanoi and Trump's reluctance to announce anything that would be buried in that Cohen avalanche. An expansion on this argument is what I call the “Who shot JR?” version. Trump-Kim is a ratings-getter, the thinking goes, but it happened to go up against the “OJ White Bronco chase” this time around. It was just bad luck. So, hold off on moving the plot forward to some unsatisfying conclusion. Rather, leave it on a cliff-hanger with a sense of heightened tension to prime the ratings for when the show comes back for the next season. In this version, additional North Korean provocations and twitter threats by Trump could actually add to the narrative tension that would be dramatically resolved by a third summit. More seasoned North Korea watchers mostly blamed the inherent complexity of the negotiations

Mar 3, 2019By Jason Lim
Sequencing will not work
Jason Lim

Cardi B is 'ajumma'

By Jason Lim A Facebook friend posted, “I just realized Cardi B actually reminds me of a Korean ajumma. She has an ajumma spirit.”This post got me thinking about those words in one language that really have no equivalent in another. For Korean, the first example that pops into mind is the word, “Han.” Many attempts at translation have been tried, but all are unsatisfactory. Han is less a word than a shared sense of Korean zeitgeist. If I had to convey the meaning, it would be something like, “a collective melancholy shared by all past, present, and future Koreans over historical tragedies and victimization as a people but tinged with poignant pride over having endured and the will to inevitably endure.” It's very optimistically pessimistic. Of course, this is my own personal take on the word. Everyone will have a different take on it yet understand when I use the word in a Korean-specific context.And that's the nature of language. A single word can convey a shared understanding of a common experience. Further, a word reflects the evolving nature of

Feb 17, 2019By Jason Lim
Cardi B is 'ajumma'
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