Korean Lawmakers Propose Scrapping Anti-Sodomy Law

[aki-san.livejournal.com]

by Harald Olsen on Tuesday, March 25

After ten members of the National Assembly presented a bill that would eliminate criminal penalties for sex between homosexuals in the military, the protest online was harsh and unanimous. Critics claimed that the South Korea military, which has been the scene of infamous physical abuse in recent years, will now become even more dangerous as gay senior officers are able to take advantage of new recruits.

Some netizens accused the lawmakers of using the issue to score political points. Notably, the ten sponsors of the law included representatives from all of the major opposition parties but no members of the ruling Saenuri Party.

Article from Newsis:

Proposal to Remove Military Code that “Punishes Homosexual Sexual Activity”

On March 21st, it was confirmed that lawmakers in the National Assembly had proposed eliminating the military law code specifying criminal penalties for homosexual acts.


Masked protesters criticize the law punishing gays in the military.


Jin Seon-mi, a National Assembly Member and member of the Democratic Party, along with ten other members opposition parties, proposed removing clause 6 of article 96 of the military law code that states, “any soldier, military employee, reservist, or conscript on alternative duty who commits sodomy or otherwise molests a fellow soldier shall be punished with up to two years’ incarceration.”

Jin and her fellow lawmakers explained, “under the current military law code, there is no punishment for engaging in typical [heterosexual] sexual acts, so long as they are not forced or in a public space. However, clause 6 of article 9 punishes homosexual sexual activity even if it is consensual and private…in cases where soldiers have disrupted military sexual discipline, applying criminal punishment of two years’ incarceration only if the participants are homosexuals seems to violate constitutional principles of fairness.”

The lawmakers went on to state that, “Even in Korea, our respect for individualism and sexual openness has led to many changes in our citizen’s preference for how the law should treat sexual activity. Our society is slowly progressing beyond the belief that homosexual sexual activity is abnormal or severely violates our sexual morals…we have recognized that discrimination based on someone’s sexual preference in hiring or elsewhere violates principles of equality, leading us to recommend that the law be changed to reflect changes in our society.


Koreans protest against the anti-sodomy law in the middle of Seoul

The sponsors of the law include Kim Kwang-jin, Bae Jae-yeong, Eun Su-mi, Jang Ha-na, and Jin Seon-mi from the Democratic Party, along with Kim Jae-yeon and Lee Sang-kyu of the Unified Progressive and Kim Jae-nam, Park Weon-seok, and Jeong Jin-woo from the Justice Party.

On the day before the presentation of the bill, Assembly Member Kim Kwang-jin stated on his Twitter, “due to preparations for the bill eliminating the criminal penalties in clause 6 of article 92 of the military law code, our office today was deluged with phone calls in protest, so many that we couldn’t get anything done except answer the phones…in a better world, those sponsoring this bill would receive more calls of support than calls of protest.”

Comments from Daum:

불편한진실: So now do you all understand why the Democratic Party is so unpopular? When our military is already filled with stories of physical abuse, you want new recruits to become fresh meat for all of those gay bastards?

엘란: I’m not so sure about this… Why are they only trying to do things that will make them lose votes.. Homosexual acts aren’t exactly natural, right?

xuthgxyrwyc: They push aside the laws they should be focusing on, and this is what they are spending their time sitting around talking about? So if someone is just doing that kind of weird thing in the army, are you supposed to just stand by silently? Ugh, makes me want to spit.

danbee: Hey you dumb-ass Democratic Party lawmakers, are you going to make our soldiers’ assholes burn?

Qlfhd: Hey DP, don’t you know this is the kind of thing that costs you votes… Why would there be intercourse in the military? Do you think that the barracks is looking forward to that?

시크시코: Wait, what? This seems dangerous…

개자추: I’m anti-reform!!!!

픽팍폭: I’m better off since I don’t have a son… still, this isn’t good. The military is a hierarchical organization, so if someone is a homosexual wouldn’t they be able to impose that on their junior soldiers? You are trampling the human rights of normal people in order to protect the rights of weirdos. I would like to start a petition to get these ten idiots to resign. This isn’t why I pay taxes. Remember what they have done and keep it in mind the next time you go to vote. The rights of the minority are important, but it is wrong to toss out the rights of the majority..

빅뱅힉스: In the army? This will mean the end of discipline..

발샘: No matter how I look at it, I don’t understand how homosexual groups in the military can maintain discipline or how such an organization could win a war. I don’t agree with this…

큰바위: Won’t there also be divine punishment if we make anal sex normal?

새봄: What bullshit from these bitches and bastards… Then send your damn kids to do it.. Then I won’t complain.

이정범: Hey assholes… Then send your little whelps to the military!! You filthy pro-Japanese bastards!!!

55세은퇴목표: I will have to be careful when I send my son to the military..

현명한여자: Faggots are going to like this article.

BOSS: I have no idea what these people were thinking. Use your time to figure out how to make women serve in the military as enlisted soldiers just like men.


Source: Newsis and Daum via koreaBANG

Comments

[coteo.livejournal.com]

wow, no, what the hell some of those comments genuinely make me want to cry.

[stoppedclock321.livejournal.com]

reading those comments leaves me cold all over, inside and out.

[the-erotomanic.livejournal.com]

oh wow! the people that left those comments need to think more. they're talking about sexual harassment/assault and not consensual homosexual acts.

[marsinblue.livejournal.com]

can't even finish reading those comments. despicable.

[jlie-ly.livejournal.com]

oh hell no @ these comments, the worst i've ever seen. yikessss

[aki-san.livejournal.com]

The netizen comments are part of the article on koreaBANG, and I think they're perfectly relevant as a barometer of the social climate that legislation like this will have to go through.

[shineebambi.livejournal.com]

I think the problem with the comments is those articles always look for the worst most offensive comments. Is it the ops fault, not really but it very well could have been left out.

[aki-san.livejournal.com]

Netizen comments are brought up by the author in the very first paragraph of the article (the first sentence, actually). It didn't seem appropriate to edit them out since they seem as much a part of the overall story as the mention of the flood of protest calls the assembly members' offices were receiving.

[uledy.livejournal.com]

yeah, i often post from koreabang and face the same dilemma. generally, i feel weird editing other people's articles, cause i feel like it violates some type of internet decorum, so, i usually just put the comments under a spoiler cut or something. maybe try that next time if it's such an issue???

[inori88.livejournal.com]

let me make sure I understand....
there is a penalty for homosexual sex in the army? Why?
I mean I do understand that people would have penalties for rape and molestation, do they need to basicaly point out only homosexual sex?
Is all homosexual sex in the army threated the same way?

"punishes homosexual sexual activity even if it is consensual and private"

Ok so yeah it is...
why do straight people feel that they have anything to say about homosexual sex (or love) life?

I wonder what is the penalty for rape in the army.

"When our military is already filled with stories of physical abuse, you want new recruits to become fresh meat for all of those gay bastards?"
Instead of having penalties for gay sex that includes consensual, why don't they enforce penalties for molestation regardless of the sexual orientation?

the coments.. oh god

"You are trampling the human rights of normal people in order to protect the rights of weirdos."
Shouldnt we ALL have the same human rights? What human rights are being trampling when removing a penalty that punsh a group of people for having consensual sex?

[shineebambi.livejournal.com]

I've pretty much given up that any military is gonna handle sexuality and assaults/rapes appropriately. They don't even pretend to try 3/4 of the time

[yakuniku-8.livejournal.com]

i think sodomy is still punished in a lot of countries. I heard that the Malaysian opposition leader was in a trial for that when the plane crash happened.

[theemii.livejournal.com]

netizens comments..

[shineebambi.livejournal.com]

I'm just gonna take solice in the fact that most of those comments are left by the scum and cave trolls of this world, but ya not supposed that people are being shitty about shit like this

[gray-fairy.livejournal.com]

Those comment legit made me feel sick on my stomach. Absolutely disgusting.

[yakuniku-8.livejournal.com]

What? there's a difference between sodomy and forced sodomy. if a senior soldier takes benefit from a young one, it's a rape and it should be punished. but sodomy in itself, between two people who want it, is not a crime.

[iznanassi.livejournal.com]

Rape in the military is an issue not connected to homosexuality.. idg how people suddenly equate homosexuality with sexual assault if they're not going to make that same connection with heterosexuality.

[asnindie.livejournal.com]

The fuck am i reading.

[suxaholic.livejournal.com]

Koreans ignorance never fails to surprise

[ababobaby.livejournal.com]

uhhh

[teukiesu.livejournal.com]

rme @ this comment

[tempestdance.livejournal.com]

I'm neutral on the topic of bringing netizen comments, but I do hate that the only translated comments are from nate, naver, and daum, when pretty much majority of the korean netizens dissociate themselves with them. i wish they would go to the large community sites like bestiz, todayhumor, and some of the actual daum cafes, instead of bringing what's equivalent of Yahoo! article comments and calling them the barometer of Korean sentiments. It is not.

edit: this actually ticks me off, since the article itself is an evidence that korea is slowly changing, trying to rid of homophobia and stupid laws that were set in the old days and the only thing that gets the focus is some stupid ass comments posted by assholes who sit in their room posting shitty comments about anything and everything including women and people from Jeollado and gays and any minority population you can think of, and all other Koreans including me have to be lumped with those ignorant assholes.

[yakuniku-8.livejournal.com]

yeah we can't generalize to all the population and we can see that they all say the same thing. i think OP quoted them because they illustrate the begining of the article but i'm sure they were positive comments as well. and anyway, people who comment this kind of article are extremist most of the time. the majority usually stay quiet.

[tempestdance.livejournal.com]

I'm just tired of seeing omona responding to articles about social issues like this with those ignorant Koreans tsk tsk tsk when really it's not any better elsewhere in the world. I've also been called defensive and been told that they understand that I'm trying to make Korea look not like "some inherently backward country" but *continue shaming korea and its supposed ignorance that supposedly only exists in korea.* and the issue at the time didn't even have to do with the korean netizens, so wow.

like I'm probably one of the those who are most aware of social issues going on in korea and I fully admit that we still have a long way to go with issues like this, but even when there's a sign of change there's more focus on the negatives. i don't like it.

[uledy.livejournal.com]

I will say that I often find your comments regarding omona's relationship with netizen comments defensive and condescending. Essentially you accuse the community as a whole of being so ignorant and narrow-minded that they cannot differentiate between selected netizen comments and Korean society as a whole and that's just not in the case. For example, there is literally ONE comment in this post that's like "ignorant Koreans", a comment that actually got pushback. Furthermore, I would say that most of these articles have more comments emphasizing that the fact that these selected comments don't speak for Korean society as a whole (as if any group of 5 or so comments could). I think the vast majority of people realize that these comments don't speak for Korean society as a whole, that many of these people are trolls, and that these comments are often selected for the purposes of inciting drama and it's irritating for you to assume that people are too stupid to realize this.

[4minutesluts.livejournal.com]

*golf clap*

[tempestdance.livejournal.com]

Mmmm well I realize I was guilty of generalizing the whole community when that was exactly what my point of the comments were, don't generalize the netizen opinions. That was hypocritical of me, I admit, and I apologize.

I'm just really tired of seeing the netizen comment translation on Omona though, exactly for the reasons I've mentioned above, and while in this particular article people are acknowledging the comments in the article might be trolls stirring up drama, it wasn't really the case earlier here and we've had several posts on Omona with no other content but the netizen comments for the Omona members to berate and be disgusted at (of which they should be, they were gross, but that was the only point of the posts, to be disgusted at the netizen comments), which possibly can't help the situation. Like in this article the purpose of having the comments might be clear but it's not really the case with most other articles.

You accuse me of assuming the community ignorant and narrow-minded, but that's actually what I accused of a lot of comments on Omona whenever articles like this popped up. Like, why do we even bother with the select netizen comments if we're all aware that they don't speak of Korean society as a whole?
I guess what bothers me is when the omona members often lump these trolls and call them collectively as the "korean netizens" which include the trolls and the whole lot of people who aren't trolling, and it makes me feel like i need to do something to convince people that we're not like this at all. Yes, I am being defensive but frankly, I don't want to be associated and be viewed on the same level of these assholes, as someone who identifies as both Korean and American netizen. So I apologize if I went overboard and became defensive assuming there was gonna be an incoming slew of comments berating Korea and their netizens as a whole.

I don't know, I'm not on Omona solely to carry out some holy mission to defend my mother country and some bullshit. I like here and honestly it's probably one of the more logical and sensible communities I'm part of. With that said I just wanted to add the other side of view many Omona users don't see because of the language and culture barrier and it often involves being defensive I guess. As for condescending, well, I don't know. I guess that's something for me to work on.

[uledy.livejournal.com]

I actually understand where you're coming from on multiple levels. I actually pushed back against the influx of netizen-centric articles, especially those that contain no actual substantive material save for those comments. Personally, I just don't see their purpose.

However, I think as this community becomes more respectful, socially and culturally aware, we have fewer trolls and fewer offensive comments. And as this is the internet, we both know that contention heightens activity and the number of comments. So, I feel like some people need to have something to criticize or there's very little them to say, you know? I also feel like these netizen-centric posts act as a prompt for discussion in the same way an OP's note may. If you know if a more neutral netizen comment source or one that retrieves comments from places other than Nate and the like, please share, cause although we find these comments useless, the community (or at least active members) seem to enjoy them so perhaps we can try to push a more realistic and less skewed representation.

With that said I just wanted to add the other side of view many Omona users don't see because of the language and culture barrier.

I have noticed it and I think people genuinely appreciate it, I guess it's just the manner in which you convey that information. What might be cool, if you had the time, would be after one of these articles or a hot button topic to submit an original op-ed like "The Normal Korean Netizen Says..." and pull comments from different sources and add in some cultural insights. I think that would be cool.

[shineebambi.livejournal.com]

Exactly, neitzen comments could be used to give a window into the social climate in korea. However it always seems that these articles find the worst comments on these sites for more shock value then actual commentary

[tempestdance.livejournal.com]

I don't know about KoreaBANG but allkpop, netizenbuzz, and gasaengi.com have been found to have some anti-korean tendencies and it frustrates me to no end that they pick the most shocking comments to translate, ignoring the thousands of normal ones. also, manipulating portal comments isn't very hard, and a lot of these people who write terrible comments often find a way to send their comments to the top for some, idk, internet karma point pride or something. attention-seekers are what they are. like, no one pays attention to those comments.

[shineebambi.livejournal.com]

Exactly it's like going to fox news to see what a majority of Americans belive and it's just frustrating to me

[teukiesu.livejournal.com]

JFC those comments, but it's clear that there's and increasing number of people who support abolishing the law, which is good.

[eijem-sawada.livejournal.com]

I'm not shocked with those comments...not shocked.

[1111-am.livejournal.com]

this was actually a good article to read and it's nice hearing about korea working towards change. the netizen comments are sickening and unfortunately seemingly overpowering it :/

[chikage-chan.livejournal.com]

"We have recognized that discrimination based on someone’s sexual preference in hiring or elsewhere violates principles of equality, leading us to recommend that the law be changed to reflect changes in our society."

I guess i'll just focus on this part of the article and hope everyone can start thinking like this soon.

[torontok.livejournal.com]

Good luck getting this passed tbh.

[phililen3.livejournal.com]

The comments are ....WOW.... Damn...