Picture of the Day
As I've said to friends dozens of times, "Nobody riots like the South Koreans." Personally, I view that political passion as a great thing although the violence isn't.
At the WTO meeting, "Witnesses said hundreds of protesters from South Korean farmers' groups, who say free trade is ruining them, broke through police lines to reach the building, although they were prevented from getting inside."
UPDATE: The Disillusioned Kid in comments pointed to this post which describes an on the spot account of the S. Korean protesters being separated out from the rest of the protesters.
posted by mikevotes at
7:05 AM
4 Comments:
The Chinese authorities seem to agree with your assesment. They've put an awful lot of effort into their own racialised take on the "good" protester/"bad" protester dichotomy which views the Koreans as violent troublemakers. They've also made physical efforts to separate them from fellow protesters during anti-WTO actions.
By
Disillusioned kid, at 7:49 AM
That is a great find. Put it up as an update.
And, I recognize that my comment is somewhat racial, but riots in South Korea seem to have a very unique passion to them. I see any way that the root of this is racial, that's completely illogical, but I would argue that there is something in the political history of South Korea, or some current socio political element that plays into it.
But please understand that I view this level of political passion as a good and somewhat enviable thing.
And it could just be biased observation. Once an idea like that creeps into your mind, you tend to selectively collect evidence to support it.
If I'm wrong in this, please feel free to blast me. As I've often said, good argument will change my mind.
By
mikevotes, at 8:16 AM
I wasn't accusing you of being racist. I was simply pointing to the parallels and differences between the presentation of protesters against the WTO and the G8 in July. I don't know how it got presented over the pond, but here in blighty the media almost across the political spectrum were fawning over the Make Poverty History peeps (the "good" protesters) while expatiating about the "violent" anarchists (the "bad" protesters). The hope, of course, being that the "good" protesters could be co-opted (as they were to a large extent), while excluding and weakening the "bad" protesters. That seems to have been the strategy utilised by the authorities in HK with the help typically compliant media. Racialised was probably a bad choice of words on my part. I hope I've clarified my point, though.
I'm glad you liked the link and I appreciate the link to my blog. I'll put my hands up and confess that the author is a friend, so it isn't something I stumbled across. His blog's a good place for info on the protests, although what with Typepad going tits-up and the WTO to protest it isn't being updated all that regularly at the moment.
In related news, Lenin of the Tomb is reporting that one of the protesters has died in hospital. No further news as yet.
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Disillusioned kid, at 12:54 PM
I didn't take your statement as an accusation. My comment was just kind of a blanket defense because I recognize that the "all _____'s are _____" kind of statement is never completely true.
It was kind of a pre response if my statements bothered anybody before opening up the floor for people to take shots at me.
The part that was meant for you was the "thanks for the link bit."
And this summit has gotten no coverage here. As it's more or less a failure from the US go'vt point of view, there's nobody from the administration talking about it, and thus, it's not in the news.
Plus, as you may have noticed, we have a few other things going on at the moment.
Mike
By
mikevotes, at 1:41 PM
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