Korean Job Discussion Forums

[wylies99]

Biracial children shunned by classmates

http://www.koreaherald.co.kr/NEWKHSITE/data/html_dir/2009/01/24/200901240033.asp
Six out of every 10 "native" Korean students do not consider biracial children born in Korea to be full-fledged Koreans, according to a recent survey released yesterday.

In the survey that questioned 1,725 elementary and middle school students in Seoul and Gyeonggi Province, only 40 percent of them perceived children born out of international marriages as Koreans.

Almost half of the students said they have difficulties in maintaining friendships with students from multicultural backgrounds.

Of them, 24.2 percent cited the difference in skin color as the reason for their problem with getting close to biracial children. It was followed by a fear of becoming a outcast among their fellow students with 16.8 percent and a feeling of embarrassment with 15.5 percent.

"Children of multicultural families who are born out of international marriages are likely to face difficulties due to fears of family break-up that result from prejudice and miscommunication within their family members," said Ko Seong-hye, an official of a youth foundation which conducted the survey at the request of the Ministry for Health, Welfare and Family Affairs.

"When they start going to school, they become the victims in many cases, being ignored and pestered by their classmates, which often makes it hard for them to continue to go to school," Ko said.

Most of the surveyed students also said they are able to accept the multicultural students as their classmates and felt comfortable having meals with them, but believe it was wrong to get married to a student with various cultural backgrounds, it said.

State education authorities pledged to spend 70 billion won ($50 million) by 2012 to support those students.

After-school classes will be expanded to help young children who have fallen behind in their studies and money will be allocated to educating pre-school children who do not go to kindergarten, officials said.

Together with short-term foreign residents, the number of expatriates living in Korea reached more than 1.17 million as of Sept. 30, figures from the Korea Immigration Service said.

That figure is projected to jump to 2.9 million by 2020, taking up more than 5 percent of the total population.

Of 144,385 people who have settled down in Korea due to international marriages, 76.5 percent of them live in metropolitan areas, while 23.5 percent reside in the farming regions, the ministry said.

By Cho Ji-hyun


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2009.01.24

[wayfarer]

Hey, I had just read that article and was about to post it myself. Zounds.

It's official: Korean racism a statistically documented fact. And to think it's a survey pool of children... that says everything.

What a bright future Korea has in the global age.

[marlow]

[roknroll]

[GoldMember]

Don't blame the kids. Kids are stupid, think of what you were like when you were a kid.
All their doing is responding to the uri nara, uri saram garbage taught as required by the education ministry.
The real culprits are the parents as they allow such garbage to be taught to their kids.

[Blockhead confidence]

It would be better if Koreans worried less about their 민족 (pure blood) and accepted outsiders.

But is this report surprising? And I don't mean just for Koreans, but for people in civilisations generally.

It's hard to imagine now, but if Western societies were almost purely white, say, and had only recently had foreigners of a different appearance start showing up on the streets and their children in schools, surely our reaction would be fairly similar.

[PeteJB]

As a kid growing up in the UK, we would often refer to non-whites as 'not English' back in the early 90's, despite that I myself had a foreign background - just a white one. Naturally my parents had some influence on this but even going into the early 90's, that was relatively the norm. That being said - My best friend throughout early school was an Indian boy, so I myself had no problem mixing with ethnic groups. Ofcourse, nothing about 'pure blood' or even the concept was ever mentioned, but it seems to be a similar kind of discrimination, don't you think? Korea seems to be a tough cookie to crack when it comes to merging it with the international community - And to be honest, advanced western nations are only slightly further ahead. Korea is just lagging behind... The question is, for how long will it lag behind?

[moosehead]

it's so ironic - one of the first things I noticed upon moving here was how diverse in appearance everyone is. It was easy to see how many different societies had influenced the population.

when I first went to SE Asia and spent time in Vietnam, I was struck by how similar in appearance my former hakwon director's husband was to the Vietnamese and how it explained why her daughter always somehow looked different than other K children.

the entire K population is as heterogenous as it can be - almost - certainly there are exceptions but overall, they are not nearly as "pure" as they try and profess to be.

[Yesterday]

So Stupid - but what do you expect of Koreans?

Even Koreans look different

- yellow skin, black hair, black eyes, almond-shaped eyes

- brown skin, very dark brown hair, very dark brown eyes, rounder eyes

- white skin, lighter-dark brown hair, dark brown eyes, almond-shaped eyes

Koreans look different because they mixed generations ago with the Chinese, Japanese, Mongolian, Indian, etc etc people

After the 1980's its just patriosm/nationalism at its worst!!

Hating other races - (even though they themselves are mixed)

I knew a 7/8 year old boy whose father was Korean (adoptee) and mother was African-American..

He went to a Public elementary school in Seoul and didn't last one year..

Every day he was bullied, teased, beaten - he was too afraid to go to the bathroom during break-time - because he would be beaten up in the bathroom by "Korean" 7/8 year olds...

Many a day - other classmates (Korean 7/8 year olds would beat him u and tell him to go back to Africa)...

luckily - his mother pulled him out and took him back to the USA

[roknroll]

[T-J]

I suspect wylies motivation for posting this was not to say what a great job Korea is doing.

It is true Korea has a long way to go. The fact that this article is even written shows me that Korea has the self awareness that a problem exists.

The fact that a survey is even taken shows concrete steps are being taken to address a problem that they admit exists. Furthermore the $50 million pledged to work on this in a positive manner is not chump change.

So what was your point exactly Willies?

[Typhoon]

This is the biggest reason I am getting my family the hell out of this hate filled country. There are many other reasons to get out of here, but the biggest one is that my daughter will never have a chance to live a happy a life because of the bigots that live here.

In Chicken Soup for the Teachers Soul there is a great story. In a grade 1 classroom a new student is brought in. The new student can't walk and is in a wheel chair. The student was going to try out the class for half a day and see if she felt comfortable enought to attend the class. Afterwards the teacher talked to the class about the new student. She asked what they found out about her and thought about her. Not one students brought up her disability and how she was different. They talked about how nice she was, things they learned about her personality and what things she liked.

Now imagine this senario in Korea. Would never happen in a million years. There are just too many people that are prejudiced against anything that doesn't fit into their norms. What a sad thing that kids are turned into bigots and racists at such a young age. I am not sure if the majority of Korean understand why this is a bad thing and just how bad this is.

[Typhoon]

[12bme]

...

[exit86]

I strongly concur with all above opinions,
but would also like to add that Korea is still
prejudiced against itself. particularly in terms of
regionalism. This aspect of K. society has not
gone away friends, though we hear a bit less about it
than we had ten years ago. The regional stereotypes still exist
(Examples [NOT MY IDEAS AT ALL BUT KOREAN STEREOTYPES]
Pusan folks are stupid, dishonest loudmouths; Cheollanamdo people
are always looking for fights; Cheollapukdo folks are just as bad;
native Seoul people think they are better than everyone else;
etc.)
We live in a place where people have been and still are discriminated
against because of their hometown.
Upon meeting new Koreans, I always have made it a point to ask their
hometown. Here is what happens:
--those not from Seoul will still say "Seoul"
--I'll then ask where their father is from, then I get the real story
--folks from the southern provinces--particularly Cheollanamdo--
are visibly ashamed when they admit their hometown;
folks from small towns also appear visibly ashamed (head turned downwards, embarrassed grin, sometimes even a change in facial color!)


We non-Korean citizens are not alone in the discrimination we experience. Our difference is just far more discernable.

Ever wonder why 5 million "Koreans" don't live in Korea anymore?