By Like I said before, I didn’t think these clowns would draw a 100,000 people to their protest:
The participants in the 119th anniversary of May Day, including the bereaved families of Yongsan crackdown victims, march towards Yeongdeungpo Station from Yeouido where they held a celebration ceremony. Photo courtesy of Yonhap News Agency
Thousands of South Koreans took to the streets Friday, demanding jobs and denouncing government policies in mostly peaceful May Day protests.
Police said about 16,000 people converged on a park near the National Assembly to mark the international labor day. They waved signs and chanted ant-government slogans under clear skies. Some called on South Korean President Lee Myung-bak step down.
“I am here to be with the people screaming for jobs and kicking and screaming to keep their jobs,” said Kang Ki-kab, leader of the progressive Democratic Labor Party.
South Korea’s economy has been hit hard by the global economic slump as demand for the country’s exports has waned, though large-scale job losses and layoffs have so far been avoided. Still, the country’s unemployment rate has steadily risen and reached 4 percent in March. [Associated Press]
They drew only 16,000 people which just shows they were able to only mobilize their core professional protesters who many are paid and do this for a living. Also notice how they decided to change the rally to protesting the 2002 Armored Vehicle Accident and the Yongsan Fire issue to now protesting about the economy. These leftists ar schzophrenic in their efforts to come up with anything to bash the United States of Korean President Lee Myung-bak with.
10:51 am on May 2nd, 2009 1
Living in the yeouido area I happened to drive through this march not knowing it was going on. The picture shows the usual idiots in the front but the groups I saw were ALL highschool and college kids laughing and joking carrying their school flags. Didn't look to extreme to me.
12:10 pm on May 2nd, 2009 2
Politics sucks for the average Korean. Sure, Korea Leftists are idiots, but can anyone with a straight face say that the Korean Right is any better?
One the one hand, you have a bunch of Leftist idiots who just like to have demonstrations all day. On the other hand, you have Crony-State Capitalism, with incestuous relations between gov't and business, and just general nepotism/insider dealing.
Anyone that thinks that because the Leftists are stupid, the Korean Right must be all about "freedom" and "free market" and "strong national defense" is either delusional or just plain ignorant.
And the Korean Left is nowhere near as destructive as American liberals/leftists have been.
For the average Korean, both sides are despicable.
10:06 pm on May 2nd, 2009 3
The "freedom fighters" got a little more intense on Sat. night, invading the Hi Seoul! festival at City Hall and actually forcing the ordinary citizens enjoying it there off the pitch.
Check out a few "Oscar-worthy" performances here:
http://www.hani.co.kr/arti/society/society_general/35303...
Lol!
5:29 am on May 3rd, 2009 4
May Day — I missed that in the first post about it before it happened. So, it was an anniversary thing…
For May Day – given union involvement – 16,000 is about what you'd expect. The unions can always muster sizable protests at the drop of a hat.
It used to be the same with the university student union, but not for a few years now, which is a positive sign.
#2 — Not to defend the right wing in Korea, but I'd have to say the left wingnuts are clearly worse – due to the fact they are apologists for NK and even do NK's bidding in South Korean society.
7:56 am on May 3rd, 2009 5
Its funny I was downtown yesterday near city hall and thought to myself "how lovely!" I just don't understand why protestors are so vicious here.
Just the other day I was down in Insadong and there were these policemen holding up Free Hugs signs. I asked my Korean friend what did the signs say (besides the obvious English Free Hugs) and he said the police were trying to show the public that they aren't these big bad meanies that the leftists try to portray them as. It was an interesting method.
King Baeksu – Can you give a little detail about the video? I see they are in Myongdong, but were the police trying to help hurt civilians or were they arresting them?
1:23 pm on May 3rd, 2009 6
"King Baeksu – Can you give a little detail about the video? I see they are in Myongdong, but were the police trying to help hurt civilians or were they arresting them?"
AmericaninSeoul, the whole point of these kind of protests, at least in Korea, is to become martyred by the police and create "inflammatory, radicalizing propaganda" for the liberal media, so to that end they attack the police with the hope of provoking a reaction. What's funny, as you see in the video, is when the police actually arrest someone for such illegal behavior, they start wailing and screaming and putting on a hysterical show instead of enduring the consequences with a bit of dignity. What's also pathetic is that the liberal media can "interview" anyone and not corroborate their stories, so you never know if someone was really hit by the police, or if they're just making stuff up. Anyway, to answer your question, the police were not trying to hurt people, but rather trying to contain 500 or so rioting lunatics who had already disrupted the Hi Seoul Festival, and were running amok in Myong-dong. The fact that you, for example, have doubts about whether or not the police were trying to hurt civilians shows that the protesters' tactics are pretty effective.
There were a few scattered reports that the police had inadvertently seized a few ordinary bystanders in Myong-dong, but I'm automatically skeptical when I hear this kind of thing. I wouldn't put it past the protesters to have some of their members pose as ordinary bystanders, in order to paint the police in a worse light if they happen to get detained. I've watched the police very carefully at these kinds of rallies, and they are generally quite tolerant of the protesters themselves, and almost always leave the ordinary bystanders alone. Unless the police suddenly have new draconian marching orders, which I doubt, I'd wager that a few college girls who were sympathetic to the protesters decided that they didn't feel like getting arrested, and so claimed to be mere passersby, or something like that. I mean, if you're in the middle of the scrum, what are you trying to prove? Seems fishy to me.
8:43 pm on May 3rd, 2009 7
Sorry, AmericaninSeoul, but I need to revise my comment above. According to the Hankyoreh, it was actually the police who caused the protesters to attack the police and throw bricks at them:
"Ahn Jin-gul, the chief policy maker of National Conference for People’s Livelihood and Democracy criticized police, saying, 'The police’s blockade led to unnecessary violence. The police’s use of excessive force to break up the demonstrations was the cause of the violence.'"
http://www.english.hani.co.kr/arti/english_edition/e_nat...
Let it not be said that these protesters do not know how to assign proper responsibility to where it is due!
8:52 pm on May 3rd, 2009 8
And more comedy gold from the Hankyoreh:
"Our sisters did not raise their candles simply because of deformation in the education system. Mothers did not bring their strollers out because of food problems. These people were not forced out into the square through the deceptions of a TV program, nor did they stay through night after night because they were gripped by madness."
http://www.english.hani.co.kr/arti/english_edition/e_edi...
The Ministry of Truth has spoken!
8:21 am on May 4th, 2009 9
Thanks for the clarification KB. I've been quite leary of the protestors for some time now. I feel some sympathy for the police.
Maybe someone can clear another question up for me…
The police that partol outside Yongsan and ride around on the buses, what is the deal with them? I ask my KATUSA's, but they look at me like I am stupid.
What I have been able to piece together is that these kids picked riot police over military service? Is this correct?
Do they live on those buses? Anyone know how long their day is?
I think what bothers me most about these protestors is that are so willing to cause harm to the police who are their own countrymen. What about that national pride? And if these kids (which is what they appear to be) are only doing their mandatory service then the protestors should be more than ashamed of themselves! I am positive that all of them have a friend or family member that has had to serve. What if some nasty protestor attacked their friend or family member for just doing a job that they have to do? It just boggles my mind.
There are so many amazing things about Korea, but there are quite few things that almost cancel it out. I would like to come back in 10 years and see how much more the country will achieve. Right now it only raises my blood pressure.
9:22 am on May 4th, 2009 10
"What if some nasty protestor attacked their friend or family member for just doing a job that they have to do?"
I agree and my take is that a lot of South Koreans have an out-of-date, archaic view of today's riot police. Due to the legacy of the authoritarian era, especially in the 1980s during the height of the democratization movement, the riot police came to symbolize "brutal state suppression of the people." That may have been true in the past but it is no longer true today. However, it suits the interests of the progressives today to perpetuate that outdated image of the riot police, especially when they are trying to portray Lee Myung-bak himself as an old-style "dictator" and a "throwback" to the authoritarian era of the 1970s and 1980s. The progressive media are also complicit in this phenomenon, since they too actively paint today's riot police "brutal state suppressors of the people." Basically, the progressives are trying to plug into and reactivate all these archetypes of the pre-democratic, developmental era, so as to delegitimize the current conservative government, which we should remember were elected by an overwhelming majority of the Korean people. The reason the progressives are doing this is because that's all they've got — after all, they were in power for ten years, and were resoundingly booted out at the end of 2007 and early 2008. It's time for them to update their identity, and create a vision that's actually relevant for the 21st century. Certainly beating up on young military conscripts for no good reason should not be a part of that equation.
12:37 pm on May 4th, 2009 11
This is an accurate analysis. However, I believe that most of the ‘progressives’—this term has always seemed like an oxymoron to me when used in connection with this group of people—are too blinded by their own prejudices to take seriously any possible change in their paradigms and consequently their behaviour.
1:16 am on May 6th, 2011 12
LOL, You call this is fair and balanced journalism?
Calling people “clows”, etc just because you do not agree with thier opinion shows that this site is just rubbish propaganda.
P.S. You conveniently forgot to report on the 2011 Mayday rally last weekend that attracted over 50 thousand people.
5:29 am on May 6th, 2011 13
Dave, first of all I make no claims to being a journalist. This is a blog and that is it. Secondly the leftist protesters in South Korea are clowns, what else do you call things like the mad cow protests that saw a number of policemen beaten, the destruction of private and government property, and down town Seoul being trashed over something that was manufactured as way to over turn an election? If right wing protesters did the same thing I would call them clowns to.
Thirdly just because I don’t post something on here doesn’t mean I conveniently forgot anything. I have a real job and a life which means I don’t hover on the computer all day posting every little bit of Korean news that pops up . If you think it was so important to share with people why didn’t you post it in the Open Thread?
8:38 pm on May 10th, 2011 14
GI Korea,
You are aware that the May Day celebrations are attended by a wide variety of groups including the KFTU that, until this year, supported Lee Mying Bak’s presidential campiagn.
Right wing protesters use violence all the time. Just last year a group of monks stated that they do not like Lee Myung Bak and in response the fascist Disabled Veterens Association raided the temple and belted people up. The last time I read about this incident the police did nothing to those that started the violence.
OK so a police man was beaten in a protest back in 2008 during the beef protest. I do not know the details of the particular incident you are referring to and which particular group he was from and whether those who beat the police men were acting on their own account or from instructions by their group/union.
However the violence of the police and company hired strikebreaking thugs far outweighs any violence by your so called “clowns”. Lets just take a look at the last few weeks. Last month the South Korean government company KSPO used thugs to break up a picket line of female irregular workers who are struggling for reinstatement to their jobs. The 15 irregular workers are all female and in their 50s and peacefully protesting. One woman was beaten so badly she sustain an injury to her backbone and doctors say that she needs surgery.
Sometimes there is a time where you do have to stand up for yourself. If fascist thugs are breaking up legitimate industrial action then workers must defend themselves.
5:58 am on May 11th, 2011 15
Dave, the far right winger protesters can be clowns as well sometimes but by far the leftists are worse. There is nothing that the right winger protesters have done that compares to the 2008 mad cow hysteria. Those protesters didn’t just beat up one policeman they assaulted many policemen along with destroying much private and public property, made a mess out of downtown Seoul, and publicly embarrassed the nation all in an attempt to over turn a democratic election. I have already exposed the usual suspects that were behind those protests to include politicians from the DLP that was linked to a North Korean spy scandal.
Many of these same activists were also linked to prior anti-US efforts to tear down the MacArthur Statue in Incheon that just like Seoul led to the destruction of much private and public property in Incheon and open street battles. They even had the audacity to try and tear down the statue on the 9/11 anniversary. I could go on and on about the violent activities of these clowns.