Owning (and apologizing for) Evil
by David Benzion · 04/24/2007 1:08 pmThe Elder of Ziyon, whose blog is an indispensable source for information and commentary about what is really going on “on the ground” in Israel, has a dead-on post comparing South Korean vs. Arab reactions to terror.
EoZ begins:
Many articles have been written about the Arab reactions to 9/11. Critics claim that Arabs refused to condemn the atrocity in an appropriate manner, and Arabs would point to articles and statements that did seem to condemn it.
Even so, there was still a nagging feeling in much of the West that the condemnations were not strong enough, that they weren’t heartfelt, that something was missing.
In the wake of the VA Tech massacre, looking at the South Korean community’s reaction, it is now clear what was missing: shame and responsibility.
Excerpts from news articles are provided to prove the point:
For Korean Americans especially, the tragedy is hitting close to home. Though they don’t personally know Cho or his family, local Korean Americans share a cultural and ethnic background with them.
“I’m very ashamed,” admitted Buwon Brown, a community volunteer who is Korean American.
Dong Lee, an editor at the Korea Central Daily News’ office in Seattle, said the community was “very shocked, very saddened by the news.”
The state’s only Korean American legislator, Paull Shin, said he was watching the news early Tuesday morning as he was getting dressed. He “collapsed” when he heard the gunman was a fellow Korean American. “I could not face the reality. How could this have happened? I lost my control,” Shin recounted.
Later that day, the Edmonds legislator took the floor of the Senate chambers to apologize on behalf of the Korean American community. He told his fellow senators, “This (shooting) really affects me deeply. I’m sorry.” Afterwards, his colleagues came over to console him and to emphasize that the shootings were not his fault or the Korean community’s.
—————
A wave of shame washed over the Rev. Kun Sang Cho when he learned the Virginia Tech shooter was a native of South Korea.He knew the murders occurred hundreds of miles away, possibly at the hands of a mentally ill young man. But what most pained Cho and many other Korean-Americans living in Colorado was that the shooter was Korean — one of their own.
“They feel ashamed,” said Cho, pastor at Asbury Korean United Methodist Church. “This is our culture. If one of my members got involved in a crime, all members feel the shame.”
—————
First-generation Koreans tend to have a cultural sense of shared responsibility, said Adrian Hong, a board member of the Mirae Foundation, a national organization of Korean-American college students. “If something good happens to one, it happens to all Koreans, and if something bad happens to one, it happens to all of them,” he said.
Kyeyoung Park, an associate professor of anthropology at the University of California Los Angeles and member at the university’s Center for Korean Studies, said that because Korean culture tends to be homogeneous, new immigrants rely on one another emotionally.
“In Western culture there is an emphasis on guilt; in many Eastern cultures the emphasis is on shame,” she said. “I think Korean-Americans want to do something because they feel ashamed. Some of them feel truly responsible, even though it is ridiculous to think they are responsible for the action of this person.”
Park said some first-generation immigrants identified with the comments of South Korean Ambassador Lee Tae-sik, who said not only do Korean-Americans feel ashamed but called for them to “repent.” He suggested a 32-day fast - one day for each victim of Monday’s carnage.
EoZ then offers these insightful observations:
Now we can understand more fully what was lacking after 9/11 and countless other Arab terror attacks.
A condemnation is not a heartfelt, spontaneous reaction. It is almost always a contrived, carefully written, political reaction more for damage control than for true remorse.
Koreans don’t have madrassas with daily exhortations against infidels. Koreans don’t have daily or weekly terror attacks against the West. Koreans don’t have countless newspapers and websites demonizing Americans.
And yet, they spontaneously show true, heartfelt shame - and a sense of shared responsibility - for the actions of a lone crazed man who happens to be one of them. While they have a fear of a backlash, their shame is not a calculated reaction designed to blunt political reprisals - it is a true reflection of what they are feeling.
This is what was missing after 9/11 - the kneejerk reaction of guilt, shame and responsibility from the Arab community. Instead we saw attempts to deny, or redirect, or contextualize the despicable acts - never to take ownership.
While the Koreans are taking responsibility for the actions of a single nutcase, the Arab Muslims spent all their time trying to abdicate their responsibility for the culture that brought about Al Qaeda.
All the condemnations in the world is not worth a single heartfelt apology. And even though it is absurd for the Korean community to apologize for something that is clearly not their fault, the fact that they are doing it shows true remorse.
The world Arab community in general, and the Muslim Arab American community in particular, never felt truly sorry for 9/11, or else they would have acted beyond the way that Koreans are acting today for an event that is minuscule in comparison.
I don’t doubt that there are many Muslims and Arab Americans that have felt shame and responsibility–but for whatever reason (and everyone is welcome to debate that reason), these sentiments didn’t rise to the point where American society in general got the message.
Trust me… I wanted Arabs and Muslims to get this right, and was looking for them to collectively do so.
They didn’t. And the South Korean community’s response to the Virginia Tech psy-Cho is the perfect proof.
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Saudi Arabia apologized on the radio throught the USA and Europe and to date have rounded up and killed over 1,000 Terrorists and have given critical info on the shoe bomber and the massive plot to down several airliners
So has the UAE, Kuwait, and Qatar
Now are they today?
No
but on 9/12, yes they did
EPJ– that is because the ruling elite in Saudi and UAE, and Kuwait and Qatar) just wanna do ‘bidness with the US (and were afraid we’d take over their governments officially, rather than just prop them up so long as they do our bidding.
Culturally and fundamentally, I’ve seen no evidence that these communities genuinely accept responsibility for 9/11 and feel true shame.
Don’t even get me started on continued Saudi funding of HAMAS…
Saudi has put to death hundreds of Al Qaeda and lost several dozen security personnel
Also the following Countries are still funding HAMAS
The United States (through business interests in Lebanon), Holland, Great Britain, Austria, Denmark, Germany, Italy etc
Besides David, if we want communities to be sensitive the Japanese won’t apologize to the Koreans, the North Koreans won’t apologise to the South, Vietnam won’t apologize to us, Thailand and Cambodia haven’t as well either. The Phillipines? Rescued them twice - didn’t see an apology, Germany, France, Belgium, The Netherlands, Hate us - community man on the street
Yes there are alot of communities that hate us, hate other communities, and yes we are religously seperated from the Arabs as well as culturally
I’m not expecting miracles
Well, there are 2 sides to the story, just read where American Companies are contributing to the rebuilding of Hamas led areas
I’m not expecting miracles David, South Korea had anti American Demonstrations Today so the apology thing is a MSM fabrication.
They are rioting again at Hyundai macchinery over LNG Shipping contracts
Its not real safe for Us to walk the streets of Seoul anymore
But I’m okay in Saudi, Kuwait, Egypt, the UAE, of course Qatar
Packing two kids off to Egypt, wouldn’t dream of sending them to Korea
No way
I am not real worried about getting killed by a South Korean.
God bless those Koreans who share guilt they don’t own. Bless those who use this incident to improve their own lives and the lives of their children.
And God bless the muslims who see this reaction and are ashamed. May they learn the lessons they are ready to learn.
And may God bless the ones without shame with the gift of shame; it is by shame and guilt that we learn of our mistakes and are moved to correct those things in us that need correction.
I respect the Koreans, and I appreciate their reaction. But I simply don’t understand why they should feel shame for what they had no way to prevent.
I am not sure you can comparre these two cultures way of apology or emotion and shame. They are so different. To an Arab, a display of apology is weakness. A Korean is guided by propriety and not casting shame. I’m not good at expressing what I mean here, and not a sociologist, but they are just different cultures.
#8 -
An appology is not as much for the one appologizing, but for the one receiving. The culture we should focus on is the culture of the receiver, not the giver.
Anyone else agree?
One more thing - I have wondered about the Korean reaction had an American student killed 30+ Korean students in Korea and then turned the gun on themselves.
One thing I left out - evil has no shame.
David,
Excellent posting. You are very astute in your observations. To take it a step further, there were Muslims celebrating in NYC that very same evening of 9/11 at their shops. Giuliani had to close all the Muslim owned shops for THEIR protection.
#9 American Women,
That is a typical apologetic argument for Arabs. What it comes down to is partly religion, partly culture (which is sometimes one and the same). South Koreans are a predominantly Christian country whereas most Arabs are Muslim. There is no teaching of forgiveness in Islam whereas Christianity it is seen as a virtue.
David
50,000 plus fallen would disagree with you and the next war?
Korea Russia Japan conflict, 400,000 dead
Korea WWII Conflict 100,000 Dead
Korea 1950 thru 1954 800,000 to 2 million dead
Yes its a wonderful and peaceful place
Nuclear Technological and military assistance to Iran?
Yes you have a lot to fear about Korea split as it is
Make that 50,000 plus 32
Benzion my man, I think you might be making a diffficult comparison between two vastly diffferent cultures. I’m not intimately familar with either, but I think there may a deeply ingrained culture-of-shame among our Asian brothers and sisters that isn’t shared as widely with out Arab borthers and sisters. The Koreans who have spoke out about this are feeling sorrow about the results of the act and the way this reflects on them. The Muslims who expressed sorrow didn’t internalize it so much. Bad bed side manner, for sure, but I’m not sure what is gained by trying to gauge a group’s level of sympathy and empathy after such a tragedy once they’ve already acknowledged it shouldn’t have happend, they’re sorry it did and it doesn’t reflect their views.
My point is simply that Muslims and Arabs (broadly, as a group) should start acting more like Koreans (as a group) have done. It is both the mature (and politically astute) thing to do.
Muslims and Arabs are human beings, and I’m perfectly convinced they are capable of doing so… provided the rest of us are willing to insist that they do.
Soft bigotry of low expectations and all that…
It is always hard to figure out where/when something is missing until someone else provides the missing piece/point.
I never thought they South Koreans “owed” us an apology, but it is good that they take their “community” so serious. I think that is the point.
David Benzion - Forget what some of these posters are saying! You are EXACTLY RIGHT! How many Koreans jumped up and down and shouted out to allah (death be upon him) when they heard the news? None!
The arab culture is whacked! I’ve been over there 3 times this year. I know what I’m talking about!
Some, even many, of the people are perfectly nice and kind people. However, many are hateful and angry. Ramadama-dingdong is the most dangerous time of the year to go there. Everyone is hungry, thirsty, angry, po’d, and ready to fight over anything. Murders always spike during the “holy” month of ramadama-dingdong!
It’s whacked out over there!
Indeed, it is certainly nice for someone to go the extra mile and express that they feel a tragedy commited by someeone from their group brings shame upon their house — but I disagree that it makes the expression of sorrow, sympathy and empathy from someone who doesn’t go that far something less.
What ever happened to rugged individualism? As a grown-up, this child-of-a-well-of-family-in-a-ritzy-high-school-who-was-a-geeek-and-an-outcast felt terrible about the Columbine killings and felt sympathy, empathy and sorrow for all the victims and survivors but nothing inside me stirred me to issue a press release expressying how Kelbold and Harris had brough shame to geeky outcasts everywhere. And yet, I still view it as a tragedy and am sorry it happened and really wish it didn’t happen and wish that schools, governments and familes around the world would do more to reach out and help those who so desperatrely need it. But I’m still content to be the square peg in the round hole. Am I less of a person?
On a related note — it is good to read the following every once in a while: How to say you’re sorry: A refresher course
http://archive.salon.com/people/feature/2001/08/23/sorry_if/print.html
Yo, Frank, good to hear from you. Why don’t you weigh in on this one?
David,
I’ not trying to be argumentative but actually, I would like Muslims to start acting like Muslims which is a religon of peace and never ever act like the Koreans which are a rabid anti american, union strife torn group.
I don’t think people really understand Korea today.
If they acted Like Koreans we would e sending hundreds of thousands of troops to prop up their governments
Muhwahahahahaha
Oh oh (snciker) sorry excuse me. You were (hehe) serious. (giggle) Never mind.
phblbtttt Bwahahahaha Religion of Peace.
Man you need to read the various charters of Hamas and the PLO and see there Koran citations for what they do and then come back and tell me religion of peace.
Read the Qur’an. It’s not a peaceful religion and never will be. Throughout the Qur’an, the rule for a non muslim is. 1. convert. 2. pay a tax. 3 be killed.
Religion of peace! What a load. I think someones smoking the same stuff as GW.