Preface II: The limit

Evolution of Conservative Movement in Korea according to liberals.

Before moving to the talking about the actual articles themselves, I wanted to spend little more time talking about the media outlets. The above picture is how the liberals in Korea see the conservatives and their establishments: as long unbroken tradition of being traitors and corrupt Neanderthals.

Since the independence from Japan after the Second World War, the conservatives in Korea, whether they wanted or not, were have been seen to have originated from the Japanese collaborators. Even after the chaos of Korean War and three decades of Military Dictatorships of Park Chung-Hee, and Chun Doo-Hwan (and their aggressive propaganda to discredit the liberals) the conservative movement in Korea has a legitimacy problem that cannot be overcome. They are viewed to have been collaborates to the Japanese, to the Americans, the Military Dictatorship and the Chebol that brought the humiliating IMF bailout in 1997s Asian Financial Crisis.

The Newspapers themselves are also deeply intertwined with the conservatives in the messy history of Korea. I hope to elaborate more on this later, but briefly speaking, despite the messy conditions they worked with (Chosunillbo and Donghaillbo was closed down repeatedly by the Japanese), it cannot be denied that they worked within the hated colonial system of Japanese overlords. Moreover, their behavior during the three decades of dictatorship after the Korean war, where they viewed themselves largely as partners of the oppressive regime cannot be forgiven by the liberal activists of younger generation whose persecutions and sacrifices were belittled or ignored for 30 years and even now are insinuated as pro-North Korean by the media establishment.

This is the background in which I begin my journey.