By Jason Lim
Aylan Kurdi was a three-year old Kurdish-Syrian boy who washed up on the shore of a beach in Turkey in September 2015, drowned when the boat carrying refugees sank off the coast.
The visceral image of an innocent child victimized so cruelly by circumstances beyond his control led to an outpouring of grief around the globe. Expressions of public grief were likewise plentiful in Korea, with everyone conveying heartfelt sympathies.
Until Aylan arrived in Korea, that is. When a little over 500 Yemeni refugees arrived on Jeju Island recently, intending to apply for asylum, Korea spasmed as if it were facing another Toyotomi invasion. A Cheong Wa Dae (Blue House) petition against granting asylum for the Yemeni refugees garnered more than 700,000 signatures in less than a month. On June 30, more than 1,000 people demonstrated in Seoul against the Yemeni refugees. They held up signs that read, "Fake Refugees" and "Korean Citizens First," among others.
The arguments against refugees are not unique to Korea. They are familiar refrains with echoes from other countries. A common argument goes that Muslim refugees will not assimilate into the larger mainstream society and will be radicalized into terrorists. It takes too much money to house, educate and feed the refugees; money that should be spent on Korean citizens first and foremost. We shouldn't grant them asylum because they are economic opportunists. They are fake refugees who left their homeland because they wanted to avoid getting conscripted in their war-torn countries.
Much of this can be attributed to Korea's well-documented xenophobia. Korea wasn't called the "Hermit Kingdom" in the early 20th century for nothing. Korea definitely has a deeply ingrained sense of "pure-blood" heritage that it treasures and informs its ethno-nationalistic identity. Even the so-called "white privilege" isn't a defense against xenophobia.
There have been countless cases of biases against native English-speaking white teachers over the years, especially if the white man happens to be with a Korean woman. I always found it amazing at the number of self-appointed guardians of Korean women's virtue who would suddenly show up to defend their honor against unthinkable defilement, usually emboldened by alcohol or numbers. God forbid if you are a Chinese-Korean or Southeast Asian laborer.
But everyday xenophobia doesn't seem to explain the full extent of Korea's resistance against the refugees. The great sense of risk perception in the rhetoric against the refugees seems to indicate that something more is at work here.
Perhaps it's what Angi English calls "affect bias" in her Medium article titled, "The Affective Influence of Risk Perception and the Collapse of Compassion." She explains: "The affect bias is an emotional response that allows for quick decision making without the benefit of extensive research and critical thinking … As our brains have evolved over time, the limbic system still processes emotions and perceptions very quickly and it is still our default mechanism to take in threat information."
These threat decisions are largely made along social identity lines according to the "Us vs. Them" paradigm. We don't feel a personal connection when a group of people with a different social identity is suffering; therefore, we don't act. However, when we see an individual suffering, we socially connect to him or her on a personal level that breaks through the social identity barrier and can be motivated to act selflessly. The latter is what happened in Korea when Aylan died; the former is what's happening today with Yemeni refugees.
But even this doesn't feel enough. Let's extend this hypothesis a bit further. What is it about Koreans that makes them feel this "affect bias" in such an outsized manner? It's not the economics. Care and feeding of 500 refugees won't bankrupt one of the richest countries in the world with GDP approaching $30,000 per capita, so the economic argument doesn't really hold logical water. Also, what are 500 additional people in a country with 50 million citizens?
Is there a collective, subconscious emotional trauma that Koreans share? The suffering that Koreans experienced during the first half of the 20th century cannot be overstated. The dying spasms of the late Joseon Kingdom, the brutal occupation by Imperial Japan that sought to eradicate Koreans as a people, and the millions who were killed by a fratricidal war must have left an indelible mark on the Korean psyche. And, if science is correct, on Korea's DNA.
Scientists are finding out that past traumas of dead ancestors might actually be passed down through genetic material to their offspring and affect how they react to certain environmental stimuli. Moreover, environmental factors can shape racial and ethnic identities that are also passed down to children through genetic material. In other words, we can inherit our ancestors' PTSD because it is etched into their genes somehow. Can such trauma suffered as a people a generation ago ― at the hands of the "other" ― manifest itself today as an exaggerated risk perception against anyone who is not "Korean?"
Jason Lim (jasonlim@msn.com) is a Washington, D.C.-based expert on innovation, leadership and organizational culture.
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The visceral image of an innocent child victimized so cruelly by circumstances beyond his control led to an outpouring of grief around the globe. Expressions of public grief were likewise plentiful in Korea, with everyone conveying heartfelt sympathies.
Until Aylan arrived in Korea, that is. When a little over 500 Yemeni refugees arrived on Jeju Island recently, intending to apply for asylum, Korea spasmed as if it were facing another Toyotomi invasion. A Cheong Wa Dae (Blue House) petition against granting asylum for the Yemeni refugees garnered more than 700,000 signatures in less than a month. On June 30, more than 1,000 people demonstrated in Seoul against the Yemeni refugees. They held up signs that read, "Fake Refugees" and "Korean Citizens First," among others.
The arguments against refugees are not unique to Korea. They are familiar refrains with echoes from other countries. A common argument goes that Muslim refugees will not assimilate into the larger mainstream society and will be radicalized into terrorists. It takes too much money to house, educate and feed the refugees; money that should be spent on Korean citizens first and foremost. We shouldn't grant them asylum because they are economic opportunists. They are fake refugees who left their homeland because they wanted to avoid getting conscripted in their war-torn countries.
Much of this can be attributed to Korea's well-documented xenophobia. Korea wasn't called the "Hermit Kingdom" in the early 20th century for nothing. Korea definitely has a deeply ingrained sense of "pure-blood" heritage that it treasures and informs its ethno-nationalistic identity. Even the so-called "white privilege" isn't a defense against xenophobia.
There have been countless cases of biases against native English-speaking white teachers over the years, especially if the white man happens to be with a Korean woman. I always found it amazing at the number of self-appointed guardians of Korean women's virtue who would suddenly show up to defend their honor against unthinkable defilement, usually emboldened by alcohol or numbers. God forbid if you are a Chinese-Korean or Southeast Asian laborer.
But everyday xenophobia doesn't seem to explain the full extent of Korea's resistance against the refugees. The great sense of risk perception in the rhetoric against the refugees seems to indicate that something more is at work here.
Perhaps it's what Angi English calls "affect bias" in her Medium article titled, "The Affective Influence of Risk Perception and the Collapse of Compassion." She explains: "The affect bias is an emotional response that allows for quick decision making without the benefit of extensive research and critical thinking … As our brains have evolved over time, the limbic system still processes emotions and perceptions very quickly and it is still our default mechanism to take in threat information."
These threat decisions are largely made along social identity lines according to the "Us vs. Them" paradigm. We don't feel a personal connection when a group of people with a different social identity is suffering; therefore, we don't act. However, when we see an individual suffering, we socially connect to him or her on a personal level that breaks through the social identity barrier and can be motivated to act selflessly. The latter is what happened in Korea when Aylan died; the former is what's happening today with Yemeni refugees.
But even this doesn't feel enough. Let's extend this hypothesis a bit further. What is it about Koreans that makes them feel this "affect bias" in such an outsized manner? It's not the economics. Care and feeding of 500 refugees won't bankrupt one of the richest countries in the world with GDP approaching $30,000 per capita, so the economic argument doesn't really hold logical water. Also, what are 500 additional people in a country with 50 million citizens?
Is there a collective, subconscious emotional trauma that Koreans share? The suffering that Koreans experienced during the first half of the 20th century cannot be overstated. The dying spasms of the late Joseon Kingdom, the brutal occupation by Imperial Japan that sought to eradicate Koreans as a people, and the millions who were killed by a fratricidal war must have left an indelible mark on the Korean psyche. And, if science is correct, on Korea's DNA.
Scientists are finding out that past traumas of dead ancestors might actually be passed down through genetic material to their offspring and affect how they react to certain environmental stimuli. Moreover, environmental factors can shape racial and ethnic identities that are also passed down to children through genetic material. In other words, we can inherit our ancestors' PTSD because it is etched into their genes somehow. Can such trauma suffered as a people a generation ago ― at the hands of the "other" ― manifest itself today as an exaggerated risk perception against anyone who is not "Korean?"
Jason Lim (jasonlim@msn.com) is a Washington, D.C.-based expert on innovation, leadership and organizational culture.
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