Friday, April 20, 2012

Netizens angered by Miryang police's hiring choice

I noticed that there were suddenly hundreds of people reading a four-year-old post titled "Justice for the Miryang victims?" and found that someone at this omonatheydidn't post had linked to it. First off, the former post tells the story of the 2004 Miryang gang rape case, in which three girls were repeatedly raped by high school boys from Miryang (who used video of the initial rape to blackmail them into returning) and who were then humiliated by the police and threatened by the perpetrators' families. Needless to say, if you're trying to cultivate a good mood on this lovely spring day, I wouldn't read that post. (Actually, it might just be best to stop reading now.)

Rather than the omonatheydidn't post, I'll point you at the post they cribbed from at Korea Bang. I've never seen the site before, but definitely approve of the extensive translation which allows you to scroll over and see the original Korean. As is noted there, in the wake of the Suwon rape-murder case which was horribly botched by police (see the Korea Bang post here for the netizen reaction to it), netizens have been enraged by the Miryang police hiring a female friend of the rapists from the 2004 case and have passed around a screen shot of a Cyworld message she wrote at the time to one of them congratulating them on getting away with it and saying, "Those bitches were so ugly anyway." The woman apologized for what she said was a mistake made in her youth, but then netizens dug up a personal statement she made when applying for the job, which says in part:
I think about crime from the viewpoint of criminals too, and in case of sexual assault I am able to consider both – victim’s as well as criminal’s position and whether the victim did not walk around in a manner encouraging to be assaulted.
Well, considering a police officer there said to the victims in 2004 -
"Weren’t you girls waving your asses around and [kept] going there because you liked it? My hometown is Miryang, and you’ve destroyed the reputation of the town."
- perhaps it shouldn't be surprising that they hired her; she would appear to fit right in.

Korea Bang also has a post translating some of the netizen reaction to Jasmine Lee being elected (and there's more discussion at the Wall Street Journal blog). If your good mood wasn't already ruined, I mean...

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