Wednesday, September 23, 2009

It's raining syringes!

This video I found while doing some research. It's from October 17, 2007, the day after it was found out that Christopher Paul Neil had taught in Korea. When I first saw it, I just shook my head in disgust. Then I found this:


Here Anti-English Spectrum takes credit for the original news clip first aired on October 16. The same clip in truncated form is shown below and is taken from this news report, in which it followed a story about Neil with the segue, "Incidents surrounding native speaking instructors are never-ending..."



One of the arrested teachers shown is the one featured in this article after he was arrested and deported for teaching on a tourist visa - not for molestation, which the article just linked to makes clear he didn't commit, but which the video above links him to, because it's so much handier to mention another seongchuhaeng case - whether it happened or not - back to back with Neil's. Note that his 'AIDS threat' was dropped in favour of the molestation allegation, likely for the same reason.

Of course, that's something that's always bothered me. Why is it, when Korean men pay minors - even eleven-year-olds - for sex, it's called wonjo gyoje (which I've discussed here and here, and which is a euphemism meaning 'compensated dating'), but when Neil did the same thing in Thailand, it was called seongchuhaeng, or molestation? The answer is likely that the media here simply translated foreign media reports, which don't tend to make a distinction between molestation and underage prostitution like the Korean media do. Still, for those who contributed to the above clip, it was a very fortuitous translation applied to someone belonging to a group whose jobs mainly involved working with minors, and whose morality had been the subject of many news report for the previous two years.

15 comments:

Anonymous said...

When I see those cascading syringes, followed the pissing one that just about spits its deadly venom right in your face, I think to myself: isn't there someway to clean up those junkie English teachers?

Come on, strung out on smack is no way to go through life guys.

SUPER EAGLE said...

that's so... insidious...

Unknown said...

This is hilarious for 2 reasons. Firstly, the people going to the clinic to be tested are the responsible people. Secondly, we're teaching children, not having sex with them. Why would AIDS be a threat to your children. Did I miss share a needle day?

Helen said...

원조교제 literally
means 'compensated dating' but it's generally used as a meaning of 'underage prostitution' in Korea.
It's a bit different with 'rape'.
성추행 literally means rape or sexually molestation. but we usually use the word as a meaning of 'sexually molestation rather than 'rape'.
We use the word '성폭행'or'강간' for the english word 'rape'.
I knew Neil raped(or sexually abused) the children from the media. right?
I think the two cases are a bit different.
Both are disgusting evil things though.

Anonymous said...

Neil paid children to have sex with him.

It is sexual molestation because they are children and children can't engage in "prostitution" because they lack the ability to understand what they are consenting to. Such is the theory. Do you think children should be able to engage in prostitution in Korea? Or should we call it sexual molestation even if they receive money for it?

matt said...

I'm saying the Korean media makes that distinction. What Neil did was 'wonjo gyoje' - or it would be if he was paying girls for sex. There was a case a year or so ago when men were caught paying teenage boys for sex - I don't know how it was referred to in Korean, and seeing as that's what Neil did, perhaps there is a different word for it (still, I imagine it's either 원조교제 or 성매매).

Helen said...

Actually it's not suitable using the word '원조교제' in both cases whether it was paid or not.
'원조' means 'compensated' and '교제' means 'association with someone'. So it's adjusted to '청소년 성매매' which means 'teenagers prostitution' and '청소년'usually means middle&high school students (in their age14-19) even though the encyclopedia limits from 9 to 24.
So I think the word '원조교제' is suitable for the cases such as in the movie 'Pretty Woman'.
As for Neil's case, I think it's close to 'children's sexual molestation'
(아동 성추행or 아동 성폭력)rather than 'underage prostitution'(원조교제 or 미성년자 성매매). It's short for calling his act just '성매매' even though he paid children for sex.

matt said...

Well, here, we see a man paying an 11 year-old girl to have sex in his car, and it's called 원조교제 and 성매매. In these cases involving paying teenage boys for sex - including exchanging sex acts for a pack of cigarettes - it's called 성매매. And here we see a man paying a 14 year-old girl for sex over two years, having group sex with her, and videoing it - and this is described at first as 원조교제. A girl described here was forced to have sex with 800 men over six months - that's also described as 성매매. None of these are described as 아동 성추행, so I don't see why - in the Korean media - Neil's crimes should be. As I said, I think 'molestation' was chosen because that's how the foreign media referred to it. But yes, looking at these cases, it seems, had Neil been Korean and committed his crimes in Korea, they would have been described as 성매매, and not 원조교제 - I don't think the term 성추행 would have been used.

Helen said...

Well, they also use the word '성추행' for the similar cases with what you linked. Try searching Naver the word '청소년 성추행' '아동 성추행'.
Anyway all that kind of cases(성매매,성추행,성폭력,원조교제..whatever) can be covered with the word '성범죄'(sexual criminals).

머리 복잡하다 =.=;

Anonymous said...

matt said: "had Neil been Korean and committed his crimes in Korea, they would have been described as 성매매, and not 원조교제 - I don't think the term 성추행 would have been used."

Matt makes a good point. It's not that Neil crimes shouldn't have been called sexual molestation (they should have), it's that if a Korean commits the same crimes in Korea then the same terms should be used.

If the media uses "soft language" like compensated dating when a Korean does an act, but sexual molestation or rape then it gives Koreans the impression that the foreigner did something that it more blameworthy.

matt said...

Well, in this case from 2006, a 40 year old man was found on a 성매매 site to have met teenage boys and when they arrested him found 2000 photos and 100 videos of 100 boys (including 10 elementary school students) that he had molested (성추행 - they use the term 강제추행 as well, which suggests force was used).

A씨는 "최근 4년동안 초등생 10여명을 포함해 수도권 일대 남학생 150여명을 성매수 및 성추행했다"고 자백했다고 경찰은 밝혔다.

In total 150 students were involved and "성매수 및 성추행했다" are used to describe his actions - 'buying sex and molestation.'

This is somewhat similar to Neil's case, so Helen is right - it seems there are no set rules for the language used to refer to these crimes.

matt said...

I should add that the one constant I see is that 원조교제 is only used to refer to buying sex from underage females. For boys it seems 성매매 or 성매수 are used. This is funny:

경찰 관계자는... "A씨가 성인과는 동성애를 하지 않아 청소년들을 대상으로 한 성도착증환자로 보인다"고 말했다.

Just because he has sex with underage boys doesn't mean he's gay - it means he's a pedophile. Why is it both cases I've seen involving paying underage boys for sex (the other is linked in comment 6), some official tells us the suspect isn't gay?

Helen said...

Maybe it's because the word '원조교제‘ is originated from Japanese culture that selling and buying teenage girls' used uniforms and underwear.

And I think Korean people usually have prejudice that male sexual offenders having sex with males (including underage boys) are gays. I read that male victims also get to have distorted thought that they were raped by gays.
I also read that sexual molestation between homosexual people comes from
authority relations(position, age, power..), not from sexual taste or sexual desire.
I wonder if there are any cases about female victims of female sexual molestation..

matt said...

원조교제 is the Korean pronunciation for the hanja in the Japanese words 'Enjo kōsai'. In 1997 the Korean media started reporting about how Enjo kōsai was happening in Japan, explained how it worked (전화방s) and within a few months it was happening in Korea - because the media gave instructions on how to set it up!

I find that those police comments funny because, you know, if you're paying teenage boys to have sex with you, you're probably gay. As to why there's such a response as 'Just because you have sex with men, you're not gay', it may be because the person saying it had... 'bad experiences' during military service.

Helen said...

Or it's because the person saying it had prejudice of gays..or had fixed idea of sex just like most koreans including me.
Many Koreans have no much ideas of various sexual culture such as gay or bisexual.I think it's still considered as a taboo even though it may happen a lot in Korea.