Blasphemy in the Temple: Thoughts on Ramstad, Kirk, and the Finance Ministry
I’m going to add just one small bit to the fracas between the Korean Finance Ministry and two reporters with whose work I’m familiar — Don Kirk and Evan Ramstad. As to the questions themselves, sometimes, the function of a good reporter is to challenge official groupthink and corruption, especially in a place where groupthink is as prevalent as it is in Korea. I do not think that a country that aspires to be a hub of international business can nonetheless exempt itself, for cultural reasons, from ethical standards that have gained international acceptance. One of these is that governments ought not to ply interest groups or investors with prostitutes (which seems to be a reasonably good guess as to where the questions might be headed). If a reporter has a basis to believe that this has occurred, it seems fair to ask about it. The questions Kirk and Ramstad were at least as appropriate as the question that brought us this infamous episode of presidential mendacity. As for the context in which the questions were asked or the other issues between Ramstad and the Foreign Ministry, I have no particular knowledge and therefore nothing useful to add.
I will confess, however, that I am biased toward Kirk and Ramstad, am a fan of their work, and wish them both well. Long before this episode, I’d noted their role in a trend toward much-improved reporting about Korea lately. Some full disclosure would be appropriate: I consider Kirk a personal friend, and he arranged for his publisher to send me a free review copy of his excellent book about Kim Dae Jung. I don’t think this was enough to buy me off, but I put that out there for your consideration. Kirk’s book, like his original exposure of the 2000 summit scandal, are prime examples of questions that some Koreans no doubt considered pushy and inappropriate at the time, not just in spite of the fact that they contradicted Korean groupthink about DJ and North Korea, but because they contradicted it. Those who lived in Korea in those years know the extent to which those issues had become intertwined with Korea’s national pride and nationalism. For a time, it was blasphemy to challenge it.
Ramstad has featured my work, and Curtis’s, in the Journal. In addition to our lengthy conversation during which which he interviewed for that article, we’ve had a number of e-mail exchanges. These, in addition to my observation of his work, have been sufficient for me to get a sense of his subject matter knowledge, which is first-rate. His reporting has added a much-needed correction to past reporting of North Korea by reporting on conditions inside North Korea itself. Both Kirk and Ramstad are correspondents of the first caliber. To the extent that their questions drew attention to elephants that went unmentioned in a room filled with reporters, so much the better.
Good links. Good times. Not really related to NK, but that’s cool. Do have to say that the questions asked did not seem very tactful (though they were amusing and not irrelevant). Maybe I’m just not used to international reporters’ interrogation style.
Saw Sonagi is a commentator there as well. Gotta say if you don’t think China has a more visible sex industry than Korea I’m not sure where you were living here. It’s pretty hard to get a normal massage here without the offer or special services and there are dozens and dozens of massage places within about a 30 minute walk from any major place I can think of in my city. As someone said, if the services aren’t for you, they may be less visible.
While I’m glad that the questions have been asked now that they’ve been asked, I wonder how prudent it was to use profanity — badly enough that he had to apologize twice (?) — to the people working for the foreign ministry, and I wonder if the questions themselves should have been directed at a different ministry, like the 여성부, which has a lot to say on these issues. I defer to Won Joon Choe’s take on the matter.
By the way, Joshua, did you see this story? Do you have anything that points to the difficulties of North Koreans in Russia trying to get to ROK, US, or Japanese consulates?
Suggest posting this comment, also on Marmot:
First, everybody should be grateful for this interlude. The speech was so boring I had to keep from nodding off, and the Q&A was worse. Then Evan asked his question, and the minister gave quite a coherent and comprehensible reply. At which point, having shaken myself awake, I asked simply whether the biz people who spend most of the dough on the room salons were able to write off the expenses. The minister calmly explained there was a limit to how much they could write off. Fair enough. I did not rpt NOT “insist,†as the Korea Times reported, “the government should bar companies from deducting such expenses from their taxable income.†To be truthful, I don’t think the government SHOULD bar all such expenses. Hell, a lot of business gets done that way. I was just wondering what was the rule. The question was asked more out of idle curiosity than anything else. (I didn’t write a story on the subject and don’t plan to.)
Trust this response will greatly enlighten the multitudes before they turn to something a lot more interesting.
Don
Joshua, it is almost as if Kirk and Ramstad have treated you to an intellectual room salon. 😉
With all due respect to Mr. Stanton and the (metaphorical) client(s) he is defending, I cannot agree with the implication that this is a proto-typical case of the South Korean government/media bleating about any legitimate foreign criticism. Indeed, I see what Ramstad did as more muck-throwing than muckraking. But let me start with the “who” aspect:
1. I do not see a compelling reason to rope Mr. Kirk and Ramstad together and then present a defense of both. It almost seems like an attempt to exonerate by association of sorts, given that Mr. Kirk’s name rightfully commands a lot of respect among long-time Korea watchers.
Nonetheless, Mr. Kirk did not first broach the indelicate topic, nor did he respond with a profanity-laced temper tantrum when privately reprimanded. Nor is he, to my knowledge, a recidivist when it comes to boorish behavior toward officials of his host country. Finally, and understandably, the controversy has revolved around the (in)appropriateness of Ramstad’s questions and his subsequent (and now it turns out preceding), rude behavior.
So let’s leave Mr. Kirk out of this.
2. While the room salon culture is indeed pervasive in South Korea, I maintain that Ramstad’s question was out of place en toto, even abstracting the issue of sensitivity to local cultural norms (the knowledge in which Ramstad seems woefully deficient).
To begin with, and as others have pointed out, the Finance Minister was not exactly the right person to ask what is primarily a sociological question.
Second, as a matter of commonsense, I fail to see how the prevalence of the room salon culture can be the primary cause of South Korean women’s reluctance to enter the workforce. Aside from my methodological allergy toward mono-causal explanations: Is it not more commonsensical to assume that that primary cause could be something much more mundane? Start with the tremendous wage gap based on the gender. People work, among other things, to make money, do they not? Or if you want a more abstract or airy explanation: What about the all-encompassing pressures of a relentless, Confucian socialization process that indoctrinates women into believing their place is nowhere else but home, sweet home? Most young Korean women I know quit working when they got married simply because that’s how things have been done since time immemorial, and that’s how their expectations were shaped from their earliest days. Yet, Ramstad picks, pardon the pun, the most sexy mono-causal explanation designed to do nothing but offend (and perhaps sell papers: “Titty bar corporate culture discourages Korean women from leaving the kitchen”!).
Third, that Ramstad’s primary intent was to rile up the good Minister seems almost demonstrated by his gratuitous ad hominem question that directly targeted the Ministry’s own practices in regard to room salon.
Again, I ask: Why was all this necessary?
3. Finally, Mr. Stanton side-steps Ramstad’s most egregious transgressions by professing ignorance: i.e., Ramstad’s history of profanity hurling episodes toward the Ministry officials. But the profession of ignorance in this context is a weak defense, because Ramstad himself explicitly admitted it happened. So I am afraid that we must take a stand regarding whether it is proper for a foreign correspondent to swear at public officials when he does not get his way–regardless of the provocation.
Now it appears from Ramstad rather nonchalant “apologia” of sorts at Mr. Koehler’s Blog that he considers the said behavior rather everyday when it comes to interaction between reporters and public officials. In fact, he appears miffed that the Ministry belated publicized his past spats with it. He’s a “big boy,” and it almost seems like he’s implying that the insulted person should have f-bombed him back and then called it even.
I do not think Ramstad actually believes all this (would he have acted the same way if he were a correspondent in Washington or London?).
Instead, the pattern seems to indicate we have a journalistic variant of the “Ugly American” syndrome–rather characteristic of how some (I deleted the original adjective “many”) American correspondents in East Asia behave: With insufferable hubris and utter obliviousness to the local context.
And if Ramstad does actually think what he did represents the proverbial par for the course for his job, I wonder whether he possesses the requisite contextual cultural discernment for the job. There is a fundamental difference between asking tough, probing questions at opportune moments and being an ass always.
I wrote a long, over-hasty response–some of which repeats what I said at Mr. Koehler’s Blog. The response rather strongly departs from my usual mild tone and can even be characterized as polemical. But I do think my points are fair, though I may be more impassioned or less rational regarding this topic, because the mis-deeds of hubristic, insensitive Western scribes in South Korea have been a long-running pet peeve of mine.
At any rate, it seems to have been caught up by the moderation filter (probably because of a particular noun I used in the last sentence).
Kushibo,
Do you mean seoulmilk’s comment #196? If so, I also obviously agree on the need to pay attention to the “time, place, and manner” when speaking.
I am re-reading Cicero’s De Officiis, and this passage stands out:
“Orderliness must, then, be imposed upon our actions in such a way that all the parts of our life, as of a speech that has constancy, are fitted to one another and in agreement. For it is dishonourable and a great failing to introduce into a serious matter something worthy of a dinner party, or some frivolous conversation. Pericles and the poet Sophocles were colleagues as praetor and had met about some shared duty. By chance, a beautiful boy went past and Sophocles said, ‘Pericles, what a lovely boy!’ His answer was a good one: ‘It is seemly for a praetor, Sophocles, to abstain not only from touching, but even from looking.’ But if Sophocles had said the same thing at an athletes’ trial, it would not have been just to criticize him; so great is the significance of place and time. Similarly, if someone who was about to conduct a lawsuit were to practise to himself while on a journey or a walk, or were to reflect deeply on some other matter, he would not be criticized. If, however, he were to do the same at a dinner party, his lack of awareness of the occasion would make him appear uncivilized.”
As for the issue of room salons, my views on it–as is the case of many things involving the patria–are complex, and I do not think it would be politic or seemly to elaborate them in their entirety for now.
Yeah, comment #169:
I also like seoulmilk’s gravatar.