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Opinion

Columnists

Mon, July 6, 2020 | 11:14

What have you done for me lately?

Janet Jackson’s 1986 pop hit, “What Have You Done for Me Lately?” is about a lover who used to do great things in the relationship, but hasn’t done anything in a long while to keep the relationship afloat. Way too often, when Republicans and conservatives talk about race relations and social justice in America, they parrot the same tired refrain: “We’re the party of Lincoln. Our party freed the slaves.” That was over a century and a half ago. Whenever I hear this refrain, all I can hum is “What Have You Done for Me Lately?” The answer is: not much, or worse, harm. Republicans, and more broad...

2017-09-06 17:05

Why Trump was right

Please, before the deluge of emails, hear me out. Venal, cruel, racist, sexist, corpulent (and like a lot of unattractive men, has much to say about other people’s appearances, when they themselves could use a gym membership and makeover), a malignant narcissist, dangerously ignorant about domestic and foreign affairs, Trump is frightening. And though I stand by my earlier assertion we’ve had worse American presidents, Trump’s psychological instability is worrying because he has complete control of America’s nuclear arsenal.

2017-08-28 17:21

Dear black people

American Otto Warmbier’s arrest, detention and subsequent death isn’t news anymore. It was widely covered. Less discussed is the reaction said incident garnered from some fellow African-Americans, and colored people more broadly. Blogs, essays, and Facebook commentary too often reflected a cruelty I found shocking and morally reprehensible. “He got what he deserved.” “He was a frat boy; served him right.” “White, male privilege made him think he could break North Korean law and get away with it.” “I can’t muster any sympathy for him with all these police killings of black people in America.”

2017-07-31 18:13

President Moon is a politician. Let us start there. Politicians hold an interesting place in a democracy’s psyche. They inhabit the space similar to celebrities. We build them up to tear them down. We hold them to standards impossible to maintain. Like police officers, we act as if politicians are enlisted from some other-where, some distant constellation where human faults and frailties are not present. There are honorable politicians; there are honorable police officers and famous people, and the majority of them are more good than not.

2017-07-03 17:31

If I may, I would ask Koreans to be proud

When asked to speak at “The Korea Times” Forum, I was taken aback by the topic. I told my editor as much: it sounds Western-centric, and maybe even racist. For one, it works on the illogic of generalities and presumptions. Koreans are: fill in the blank. As an expat myself, I dislike being stereotyped. A bit of that’s being perpetrated in entertaining this question.

2017-06-27 17:23

Koreans are constantly evolving breed

How North Korea came to be

Now that Korea’s presidential election is over, Korea’s relationship with the North will be analyzed anew. In evaluating the North, some perspective on how it came to be, and its deep animosity towards the West, and the United States in particular, should be explored. Most Americans, indeed, most Westerners, know precious little about the aptly titled “Forgotten War.” What little they do know are the broadest of strokes: over 3 million dead; a bifurcation of North and South Korea; decades of hostility; and an uneasy armistice between the two Koreas.

2017-06-05 17:43

We are all Trump

As the Park Administration has come to an inglorious end, and the Trump Administration becomes more mired in scandal and controversy, I’ve noticed an odd, ahistorical, holier-than-thou aura about both of these politicians and their faults espoused by the masses analyzing them.

2017-05-01 16:14

On Okyere's lamentations

“White folks be a miracle of affliction.” From “The Color Purple,” by Alice Walker. Sam Okyere, a Ghanaian celebrity in South Korea, recently recounted some of his racist experiences whilst being in the country on the TV program “As You Say.” He was called names, dubbed “Black Brother,” reviled and verbally accosted by passengers on public transportation, amongst other examples. Perhaps the saddest part was when Okyere said he wished when Koreans said “we,” they meant all of humanity, not just other Koreans. For as long as I can remember, there’s been a discussion, online and off, on the sta...

2017-04-04 17:19

My country is better than yours (II)

The human heart is full of evil. Let us start with this sad, irreducible truth. The world over, how we drove whole cultures to extinction; how we sent children first to the gas chambers in Poland; how we bombed millions of civilians in the Vietnam War. As with many nations, my native country was built off of empire. It meant the genocide of millions, through war and plague and the nuts and bolts of imperialism; plowing the good earth; tilling the soil with the sweat and tears and blood of the oppressed. Many Koreans, like some people from other countries, look at America with envy and awe: o...

2017-03-06 16:59

It's your fault (II)

“Toute nation a le gouvernement qu'elle merite.” (Nations deserve the governments they get). - Joseph de Maistre, French counterrevolutionary. On the dreaded Book of Faces, otherwise known as Facebook, good friends and family members have posted more articles, essays, missives, and cries of discontent about Trump’s nascent presidency than they have about anything else in recent memory. Notifications from posts fill up my tablet and smartphone without ceasing. Koreans experienced the same thing on social media platforms about President Park’s alleged misconduct and subsequent impeachment.

2017-02-06 16:37

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