student protesters unilaterally raided by police
A friend let me know about this struggle, and I felt compelled to pass it along.
” I don’t know if you’ve already heard about this, but these days in Korea there are candle demonstrations’ being held in downtown Seoul almost every night, against the government’s recent agreement with the U.S. on the import of American beef that has high risk of transferring mad-cow disease. 10,000 people, at least, to 60,000 at most gather at the place called Cheong-gye which is, ironically, the current president’s most well-known accomplishment as a former mayor of Seoul of turning the old and dirty place into a modern, water-streaming, river walk sort of facility where young people hang out and enjoy their nights. Now it’s a place of grassroots opposition, against the president who boasts his career with Cheong-gye.
The candel demonstrations were first seen back in 2002 when two U.S. military tankers ran over two school girls, either by mistake or on purpose, but the officers and soldiers responsible for the accident were aquitted by the U.S. military court over which Korean police and prosecution has no jurisdiction. Citizens voluntarily took to the streets holding up candles and demanding the trial of those responsible by the Korean court, which of course did not happen.
The interesting and, more importantly, different thing about the candel demonstrations taking place now from those of 2002 is the composition of the people gathered at Cheong-gye: they are mostly middle and high school girls, yes, not boys, but girls. In 2002, though the majority were grassroots, it was mainly political groups and activists who led the demonstrations. Let’s say, the former started it, the latter took it over. The demonstrations were eventually labeled anti-American, pro-North Korean propaganda, losing popular support. The candels of 2008 are enormously different: it is just too hard to imagine that 13, 14, 15 year-old school girls have any sufficient knowledge and understanding of the medical science associated with the transfer of mad-cow disease, nor would they have serious ‘political’ motivation behind their uprising. What promoted them to rise?
Many thinkers, both liberal and conservative, are trying to interpret their behavior, the former saying that youngsters are siding with the left and the latter saying the kids are propagated and organized by anti-American leftists. But none of them seems to have come up with the right analysis. Why students, not from universities but from middle and high schools? Why more girls than boys? Do they know what they’re doing?
Having studied in Cleaver’s class, it seems to me that the students are refusing not (only) mad-cow disease but what’s been suppressing them: the capitalist organization of life in which they’re forced to study like souless zombies and become productive workers. Those now in their teenage have been notoriously exploited by their parents who, ironically, are the generation that resisted military dictatorship and capitalism in the 1980s.
Having realized the importance of having stable, highly-paid jobs during the asian economic crisis in 1998, their parents forced their children to study more crazily than any other generation in Korea. News reported for the last 10 years the lives of 8, 9 year-old kids who studied until midnight after school.
But they now realize, seeing my generation in their mid and late 20s, that even if they win the capitalist competition in school and enter good universities, they will experience the same thing that my generation is experiencing: unemployment. Why study crazy and win over their friends, if their future will be no more different than what they see with us now? I came to this conclusion having heard the criticisms made by some people that the students don’t know shit about mad-cow disease but they just want to quit studying and goof off. Yes. Precisely. That’s what they’re doing. They’re posing a productivity crisis. In fact, students do really make speeches against detention and excessive studying in school. As they say: “we study crazy trying to enter good universities, but we might die eating american beef provided through school meal service. Even if we don’t die, we’ll be unemployed after graduating from university.”
You know, I used to ask my self why my generation does not have the willingness and power to resist, and submit to capitalist competition more obediently than any other generation seen on this peninsula. Part of an answer could come from the fact that when we saw Korea in economic crisis in 1998, we were already in high school and thought that studying hard is the only way to be successful and avoid unemployment. So we did but the result is more serious unemployment. Teenagers know this. Two days ago, the peaceful candle demonstrations partly turned violent after participation by older generations, including university students and activist groups. 37 people were arrested, one of whom was a high schooler. Where is all this going? What is going to happen? I don’t know. It just started taking place this month. I’ll have to keep watching. “
Make sure you check out the pictures on iReport @ http://www.ireport.com/docs/DOC-26354
