Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Scorpion]

Apparently Seoul has had a gay pride parade for several years now. First I've heard of it. It's good to see gay people standing up to the bigotry of religious freaks. Of course they turned up to protest, but hopefully they will be ignored. Attitudes towards gay people in Korea are ridiculous. Apparently one can be fired from their job if an employer finds out about one's sexual orientation. Gay people here have a lot of work to do before attitudes change.

But one thing they don't want to do is to follow the trend set by Western gay parades. Too many parades in the West aim to shock and provoke, what with the near nudity, vulgarity and overt expressions of sexuality. That will backfire here big time.

Anyway, did anyone see the parade? What were your impressions?

http://blogs.wsj.com/korearealtime/2014/05/29/seoul-gay-pride-parade-to-defy-official-disapproval/

[maximmm]

On one hand, I'm not a big fan of various religions. On the other hand, I'm not a big fan of gay pride parades. I have no issues with gay people, but gay pride parade is an oddity that I never really understood/liked. If the idea is to promote gay rights, I haven't seen any posters . Have you?
The name itself is odd - what are you proud of? I'm heterosexual but I don't feel particular pride about that fact. I'm also white, but I don't feel proud of that either. Should we perhaps hold heterosexual/black/white/asian pride parades?


Ah, it would appear that I am strictly in the opposition camp - as this wiki entry pretty much describes my opinion on this matter.

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There is opposition to pride events both within LGBT and mainstream populations. Critics, such as gay shame, charge the parades with an undue emphasis on sex and fetish-related interests which they see as counter-productive to LGBT interests, and exposing the "gay community" to ridicule. LGBT activists[who?] counter that traditional media have played a role in emphasizing the most outlandish and therefore non-representative aspects of the community. This in turn has prompted participants to engage in more flamboyant costumes to gain media coverage. Parody newspaper The Onion satirized this perceived result of gay pride marches in a fake news piece in 2001.[87]

Within the academic community, there has been criticism that the parades actually set to strengthen homosexual- heterosexual divides and increase essentialist views.

[optik404]

I went, was alright but got a little crazy when the protestors tried to block the parade. The saddest thing was that some of the religious groups were using the Sewol accident to push their cause. Saw some young kids holding signs as well about wanting to grow up in a clean society. With their parents standing behind them LOL. Lot of cops but they didn't do much except block protestors, they didn't use any force at all. I can understand why, nobody wants to be on camera manhandling old people. Good seeing the US embassy booth along with some other countries showing support.

Overall not bad though. Apparently it was the 20th parade. Where the hell have the parades been held previous years, cause I never heard a damn thing about them.

[Fox]

[cj1976]

I used to live in Brighton, England where there was a huge Pride parade every year. I found it bemusing that the event was allegedly about breaking down misconceptions and prejudices about gay people, while said gay people dressed in full SM gear or as slutty nurses. It was hard to take any socio-political message seriously under those circumstances. I saw one bald musclehead butt naked with just a pink ribbon tied around his wang.
I imagine it is quite tame here compared to that.

[le-paul]

[Fox]

What was so shocking about that particular sentence? It wasn't the one to which I was expecting a response.

[Lucas]

I was talking to K buddy the other week.

He was telling me about one of his uni friends, out in Seoul drank too much,fell asleep in one of the parks.

It turned out that this park was a meeting place for gays.

He was woken when some guy put his hands down his pants and started tossing him off.

[Scorpion]

This is an interesting article. The religious freaks aren't just opposed to the parade, they are actively campaigning against basic rights for gays. There is a human rights bill being debated in parliament at the moment. It is legislation banning discrimination against a number of identifiable groups, including gays and lesbians. The reference to gays however has been removed due to pressure from conservatice Christians. In other words, people can still be fired and otherwise discriminated against for being gay. Thanks to pressure from those nice church people.

http://www.fridae.asia/gay-news/2007/11/23/1947.exclusion-from-non-discrimination-bill-mobilises-koreas-lgbt-community

[le-paul]

[Fox]

I don't think there's anything particularly closed-minded about suggesting that people who are genuinely happy and content with who they are as people have better things to do with their time than march around trying to convince the world that they are proud of being a particular race, religion, sexual orientation, or so forth. I'm an atheist, for example, but I don't take part in atheist groups or atheist pride demonstrations. Others do, and when they do, I'm left with a similar assessment of the participants. I'm happy enough to side with the homosexual community when they face unconstitutional behavior (I believe there are still posts of mine on this forum attacking Don't Ask, Don't Tell for example), so I hope this can avoid turning into a "Fox hates gays" thing.

[Steelrails]

Gotta second those who are fine with gay rights but find the over-the-top gay parade a strange thing, ultimately self-defeating, especially when you seek to embody every stereotype held about your cause. I mean, when black people marched for Civil Rights they didn't go around during minstrel routines and soft shoe while wolfing down fried chicken and watermelon.

If you can't place a certain seriousness and dignity around your cause, it makes me wonder how seriously you take it and how truly you are oppressed. People who are seriously oppressed and marching for their rights tend to do so in deadly earnestness. Selma, AL or a Salt March this is not.

[le-paul]

[duhweecher]

[Fox]