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You can be dismissive of fan-death, but please know that the people who believe in it do so more out of national identity than reason. I have met many very sma

You can be dismissive of fan-death, but please know that the people who believe in it do so more out of national identity than reason. I have met many very smart lovely people who believed in it. Think of it more as regional pride in local barbecue than an actual belief. That said South Korea is far too hot in the summer to have a fan shut off automatically.

tomjakubowski 8y ago
Could one compare it to the continued use of imperial units in the UK/US?
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- zdragnar 8y ago
  Imperial units are used because they're generally easier to relate to and use than the metric counterparts- simpler divisors, that sort of thing. It's the same reason we have 24 hours, 60 minutes, 60 seconds. Even if you don't agree with that statement, it's what people who prefer imperial units will say, not that there's some mass delusion / patriotic identity.
Hydraulix989 8y ago
Koreans believe that you can run out of air in the room because of the fan.
- abenedic 8y ago
  It is not a good practice to paint with a brush so broadly. Americans believe Russia did no election meddling.
CamperBob2 8y ago
You can be dismissive of fan-death, but please know that the people who believe in it do so more out of national identity than reason. National identity is great, I guess, but at some point, it becomes actively harmful not to call out stupidity when it presents itself so flagrantly. If it takes social pressure to get people to stop believing absurd things, then so be it.
yongjik 8y ago
Wat. Koreans don't put fan death on some kind of nationalistic pedestal of overdramatic belief systems that make you Korean. If we wanted nationalistic symbols, we already have plenty---starting with Dokdo (a.k.a. Takeshima, but don't utter that word in front of a Korean), the "East Sea" (more commonly known as "Sea of Japan"), and... but I digress. Koreans believed fan death because their mothers did, and then their mothers did, and also the 9 pm news used to say "Yet another person found dead next to a fan" every summer, because in a hot, humid country of 50 million people someone is going to be found dead in a hot day next to a running fan. How could it be a "national identity", when the very concept that some people might not consider sleeping-next-to-a-fan as deadly was beyond people's imagination. (Remember, it was time before the internet.) Now, thanks to the internet and everything, (I hope) most Koreans know that "Fan Death" is a silly urban folklore. We even scored our own Wikipedia entry. Nice.
- abenedic 8y ago
  >some kind of nationalistic pedestal of overdramatic belief systems that make you Korean As I said think of it more like regional pride in barbecue. People from memphis don't think their barbecue is their identity, but if you insult it or say that Memphis barbecue sucks they defend it about as much as I have seen people in Korea defend fan death when my friend questioned it.

tomjakubowski 8y ago

Could one compare it to the continued use of imperial units in the UK/US?

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
zdragnar 8y ago
Imperial units are used because they're generally easier to relate to and use than the metric counterparts- simpler divisors, that sort of thing. It's the same reason we have 24 hours, 60 minutes, 60 seconds. Even if you don't agree with that statement, it's what people who prefer imperial units will say, not that there's some mass delusion / patriotic identity.

Hydraulix989 8y ago

Koreans believe that you can run out of air in the room because of the fan.

abenedic 8y ago
It is not a good practice to paint with a brush so broadly. Americans believe Russia did no election meddling.

CamperBob2 8y ago

You can be dismissive of fan-death, but please know that the people who believe in it do so more out of national identity than reason. National identity is great, I guess, but at some point, it becomes actively harmful not to call out stupidity when it presents itself so flagrantly. If it takes social pressure to get people to stop believing absurd things, then so be it.

yongjik 8y ago

Wat. Koreans don't put fan death on some kind of nationalistic pedestal of overdramatic belief systems that make you Korean. If we wanted nationalistic symbols, we already have plenty---starting with Dokdo (a.k.a. Takeshima, but don't utter that word in front of a Korean), the "East Sea" (more commonly known as "Sea of Japan"), and... but I digress. Koreans believed fan death because their mothers did, and then their mothers did, and also the 9 pm news used to say "Yet another person found dead next to a fan" every summer, because in a hot, humid country of 50 million people someone is going to be found dead in a hot day next to a running fan. How could it be a "national identity", when the very concept that some people might not consider sleeping-next-to-a-fan as deadly was beyond people's imagination. (Remember, it was time before the internet.) Now, thanks to the internet and everything, (I hope) most Koreans know that "Fan Death" is a silly urban folklore. We even scored our own Wikipedia entry. Nice.

abenedic 8y ago
>some kind of nationalistic pedestal of overdramatic belief systems that make you Korean As I said think of it more like regional pride in barbecue. People from memphis don't think their barbecue is their identity, but if you insult it or say that Memphis barbecue sucks they defend it about as much as I have seen people in Korea defend fan death when my friend questioned it.