https://kotaku.com/in-south-korea-gamers-stage-an-inquisition-against-fem-1825398846
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On March 26, a top game development studio in Korea released an unusual statement about one of its employees: “The woman was mistaken in retweeting a tweet with the word ‘hannam,’” derogatory Korean slang for “disgusting men.” It continued, “In the aftermath of this incident, I promise that we will create preventative measures, including education, in a timely manner.”
A swarm of gamers had unearthed and publicized the Twitter profile of an artist at IMC Games while looking for feminism-sympathizers in the South Korean games industry. The artist hadn’t hurt anyone, hadn’t even set her bra on fire. All she’d done was follow a few feminist groups on Twitter and retweet a post using the slang term “hannam.” In response, her employer, IMC Games founder and CEO Kim Hakkyu, who is regarded as one of South Korea’s most influential game designers, launched a probe to investigate her alleged “anti-social ideology,” promising to remain “endlessly vigilant” so it wouldn’t happen again. The investigation, he explained, was a “sa sang gum jeung,” a verification of belief—the same word South Koreans used in the Korean War to verify a citizen was not a communist.
For two years, vigilante swarms of gamers have been picking through South Korean games professionals’ social media profiles, sniffing out the slightest hint of feminist ideology. Anything from innocuous Twitter “likes” to public pleas for gender equality have provoked harassment from these hostile freelance detectives. It doesn’t end at hate mail and online pile-ons; jobs have been put in jeopardy.
In 2016, the gaming company Nexon fired voice actress Jayeon Kim, who worked on the massively multiplayer online game Closers, after discovering she owned a shirt that reads, “Girls Do Not Need A Prince.” The shirt, and Kims’ employers’ response to it, sparked a controversy that echoed across the world. It wasn’t the women’s lib lingo that spurred the whole ordeal. The shirt was sold by affiliates of a controversial feminist website called “Megalia,” which, two years later, is still central to the ideological inquisition that’s consuming the South Korean games industry. Since the beginning of this year, anti-feminist gamers have tracked down and outed at least six other South Korean games professionals—both men and women—for allegedly aligning themselves with the radical feminist community that formed around the now-defunct website. The Korean Game Developers Guild claims that a total of 10 women, mostly illustrators, and 10 men have been under fire for these allegations.
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Although Megalia’s userbase has dispersed, its reputation for radical, man-hating feminism seems to have overshadowed other pockets of feminist thought in the country. A lot of Megal advocacy is nothing out of the ordinary—posting signs reading “NO UTERUS, NO OPINION,” advocating against hidden camera pornography, and raising money for single mothers. A grassroots Megalia campaign helped shut down a child porn website.
That’s not what gets people talking. More radical users have also advocated for women pregnant with sons to get abortions and allegedly outed gay men married to women. A Megalia user’s post about a teacher who said she wanted to rape a kindergarten boy went viral. These users’ governing principle was to exact on men the kind of oppression they believe men have exacted upon women throughout history, so-called “mirroring.” Megalia’s reputation in South Korea is widely considered antisocial and radical. Uniting all affiliates is the Megalia logo, a hand with fingers separated by just an inch, mocking Korean mens’ penis sizes.
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Nonprofits and human rights organizations have long noted South Korean women’s struggle for equality. The World Economic Forum’s Global Gender Gap index ranks Korea 118th on a list of 144 countries (the United States ranked 49th). Of 38 nations surveyed by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, Korea has the largest wage gap between men and women. Women who receive abortions in Korea can be sent to prison or fined over a thousand dollars. After noting this, Human Rights Watch’s World Report on South Korea reads, “Discrimination against women is widespread in South Korea. Gender-based stereotypes concerning the role of women in the family and society are common—including widespread social stigma and discrimination against unmarried mothers—and are often unchallenged or even encouraged by the government.”
Nice Duff Post story here. Gender war intense in SK.
This post was edited by Skinned on Apr 20 2018 10:19pm