The Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism has filed a complaint against a group of netizens, who allegedly uploaded an edited video clip of skating queen Kim Yu-na and Minister Yu In-chon together.
Jongno Police Station in Seoul said Wednesday that it was investigating the netizens for uploading the clip after receiving complaints from the ministry. The clip was edited to look as if the minister tried to embrace Yu-na and the skater avoided him, the ministry said, complaining that it was an act of sexual harassment.
The video clip in question is an edited version of a KBS news segment when the minister greeted the athletes from the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics on their return home at Incheon International Airport on March 2.
It shows Yu giving the gold medal-winning figure skater a bouquet and celebrating with her at a faster speed than in the original clip.
The ministry said the video clip was edited with ill intentions, distorting the minister's behavior, which is libelous against the minister.
"The minister only tried to congratulate Kim, but it was edited to look like Yu was trying to hug or even molest her. This kind of false representation causes people to misunderstand the minister's good-hearted gesture," a ministry official said.
You'll find clips of the KBS footage on YouTube:
Just last week we read the results of a BBC survey that said 70% of Koreans don't consider the internet a safe place to express opinions. Last week, too, Reporters Without Borders named South Korea one of the "enemies of the internet" because
draconian laws are creating too many specific restrictions on Web users by challenging their anonymity and promoting selfcensorship.
Matter of fact YouTube users from within South Korea aren't even able to upload videos to YouTube because the company chose not to comply with Korea's real-name verification law. The way around that is to simply switch your location from Korea to Worldwide.
My favorite Yu In-chon moment was when some bad English made it look like he was encouraging people to stop buying DVDs and simply copy them.
11 comments:
It did look like he was trying to hug her or something and she backed off not sure what was going on. But she looks like she just got off a plane after 12 hours and was like any of us who get off plane in Inchon after 12 hours from the West coast. "Errr. WTF? Where am I again?"
Although I'd hope she flew biz class and could get a good nights sleep on the lie flat beds.
Puffin Man, that's exactly the same impression I got.
But judging from what I've heard others say (but not this video specifically), I also think a lot of young, pretty women do get tired of touchy-feely ajŏshis, and Kim Yuna might just have been in guarding-my-personal-space mode, whether the Culture Minister had ill-intentions or not.
WV: criali, knock-off Chinese Cialis.
if this is a mashup of two different videos, the author did a masterful job.
Cowardice. Pure Cowardice.
"Welcome to Fantasy Island!"
I'm laughing hard at that "No! Illegal Downloading!" sign. I don't know why. I've been in Korea long enough that it shouldn't be funny, but it is.
It's illegal to copy DVD's in Korea? It must one of those places where selling them is legal but copying them isn't... like how selling drugs is illegal but taking them isn't...
Are Koreans "huggers" in the first place? Should he even be trying to hug or touch her in any way? Shouldn't that guy be bowing to her? Hasn't she justified his job in life?
It's a good point about the touchy feely ajoshi. I remember once I was in Myeong Dong with my Korean American friend (she was actually an adoptee) and she was standing over some kind of trinket table and this ajoshi made a BEE LINE for her and grabbed her ass as if it was nothing at all, like he was kicking the tires of this year's model car. And walked away satisfied with the product.
Lancity I think the video Brian posted is just the original raw footage. Someone probably did some kind of loop of the hug denied moment. No doubt all concerned dolled up with neon kitty whiskers, kitty ears, devil horns, and farting sound effects as is the custom.
Wow... someone had fun with a video editor. ^_^
Eh, if I were her, I'd be backing off too. I always get a little suspicious if an ahjussi wants a hug. Sucks for him, but all he should do is shrug it off. Netizens will be netizens.
I read earlier that they were contemplating charges of libel for whoever did it. Totally bogus. That should only apply to professional media... not blogs or Youtube.
Emma brings up a good point... you would think that something said on youtube would be covered under free speech. But it does fit the definition of libel... so long as the plaintiff can show malicious intent (parody, for example, is not libel).
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