Psy, the south Korean megastar, is once again making headlines again for his controversial actions. This time he didn’t do any drugs, nor did he call for the deaths of American soldiers.
This time, he kicked a traffic cone. From allkpop.com (bold text In Between Soju)
A KBS representative revealed, “In the beginning of the ‘Gentleman’ MV, one of the scenes show Psy kicking a ‘no parking’ sign. Due to the display of damage to public property, it was deemed unsuitable for broadcast. Artists’ music videos normally air at the end of variety shows, but because Psy’s ‘Gentleman’ MV has been banned, we cannot air it.”
Here is the “offending” video
This action, taken by KBS – one of the largest media groups in South Korea, has heads spinning, but mostly spinning with bemusement.
This place is definitely not Japan
South Korea still remains a by and large socially conservative country. This attitude is easily viewed by the importance placed on family relationships, filial piety, deference to superiors and elders, mixed with with a serving of inherent distrust of non-Koreans. Korean national pride is quite strong. Of course, none of these things (except the tacet racism) is by itself a bad thing, and of course South Korea has the right to cultivate and retain whatever values it deems important. But on the ground level, the discrepancy between what is permissible in day-to-day life and what isn’t flies in the face of what you would expect living in a socially conservative country.
Take the above video for instance. Here is a list of things that one might find offensive (if we’re getting really particular here) grouped into a few categories:
- Tons and tons of pelvic thrusting (sex)
- Beating kids at soccer, and celebrating with more pelvic thrusting (being a jerk to kids, sex)
- Knocking women down (misogyny)
- Trying to take a girl’s top off (sex)
- Ga-in from 4minute enjoying that sausage on a stick way too much (sex)
- Spraying beer everywhere (beer)
- Ga-in poledancing with a traffic sign (sex with public property)
- “Mother-Father gentleman” (you’re not fooling anyone in the English-speaking world with this gem, Psy)
Hmm.
Double Standards
For a country that wishes to remain a strong moral fiber, South Korea is an oxymoron unto itself.
This is a country where people people are fully employed in the dual occupation of work hard/play hard. Alcohol consumption is glorified, and is the only hobby that a lot of people have due to the incredible hours they are expected to work. Being drunk in public, if not totally acceptable, is something viewed as completely normal and not noteworthy in the slightest. Because convenience stores never close, alcohol sales never cease. Most bars and clubs are open until at least 6am, with many staying open later than that. 24-hour restaurants are an actual thing.
Attitudes toward sex are intriguing as well. In a nation where arranged marriages were still a thing in some parts of the country 50 or 60 years ago, South Korea is not nearly as sexual liberal as other Western countries. It’s still a bit taboo to talk about, and people are still a little uncomfortable discussing it. Yet with the influence of Western media and other points of contact with the outside, non-Korean world, Korea is becoming more sexually liberated. The blatant sexual messages in K-pop attests to this. In a recent, conservative backlash to this growing sexual liberalism, South Korea has worked to ban online pornography. One might expect this reaction from a country attempting to maintain its conservative image, excepting for one obvious massive minor caveat:
Prostitutes are everywhere in Korea, and everyone, including the police, seem totally content with pretending like it’s not there.
It isn’t even like one needs to go into a back-alley, or a shady part of town to find prostitution. Houses of prostitution are barely hidden from the public eye, and require about a five minute walk from major nightlife areas. They aren’t as ubiquitous as normal bars and nightclubs, but there’s certainly a lot of them, and in places such as Suwon and Pyeongtaek there are whole Amsterdam-esqe districts of them with women advertising themselves in windows. In the case of Pyeongtaek, this district is immediately adjacent to the main train station and shopping mall in town. In the case of Anseong, a countryside town in the south of Gyeonggi-do, the brothels are literally next door to the police station.
It’s hard to read comprehend exactly what this society finds acceptable and what isn’t. You can’t watch porn at home, but you can go get a prostitute. Or, barring that, you can go to a “sexy bar,” where you buy drinks at outrageous prices in nice, comfortable bars served by women who are paid to entertain, and you can pretend it isn’t prostitution. You can go get drunk in public on a weekday, come into work hung over, and as long as you’re able to do your job, nobody cares. It’s viewed as just what people do.
But God help you if you kick a defenseless traffic cone in a music video.