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The May 18 Gwangju Uprising
- sho_hn 5y agoRelated movie recommendation: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Taxi_Driver https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Taxi_Driver It recreates some of the original newsreel footage from Gwangju that was smuggled out into the West, embedded into a Hollywood-style narrative based on historical characters. With Song Kang-ho, recently familiar from "Parasite". There's a lot of Korean cinema that processes Gwangju in one form or another, but this is one of the more accessible entries, especially to an international audience.
- Klasiaster 5y agoAnother one is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/May_18_(film) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/May_18_(film) which tries to be a more of a chronology focusing on the citizens and the armed self-protection unit.
- Tsiklon 5y agoMy girlfriend at the time brought me to see that film, Gwangju was her home city. She was very pleased to show me after how accurate the recreation of some of the scenes were and the locations of the film.
- yongjik 5y agoI think it was a decent movie, except for that one... Hollywood action scene toward the end, which felt out of place and more like a "fan service." Not depicting the same event, but if you liked A Taxi Driver, I'd also recommend 1987 - When the Day Comes which depicts people fighting against the same dictator. (Fun fact: in 1987, the role of one major character was kept secret and he's never called by his name until the end of the movie, because otherwise everybody would've recognized who he was.)
- sho_hn 5y agoAgreed, I think the "car chase" is the part everyone feels was a bit superfluous and much like it had to tick the formulaic boxes toward the end to make box office. But if you make those concessions to form it's a picture with some great moments and definitely a story worth telling. Maybe especially for me as a German citizen, and then watching the original Tagesschau clip (the news hour the footage surfaced in) after getting home from theaters, it really resonated a lot. 1987 - I liked it, but I'd say it was more on the nose and lacks Song Kang-ho's acting chops :). Still, around the time I watched it I often worked from a café across from gates of Yonsei Univ., which figure prominently in this real-world tale so it still had an impact on me. The other movie I really liked that's loosely connected to the era and the student uprisings was "Sunny". The comedy-drama tone of that one is a super close match to some German films processing the end of the East German regime and I felt really connected to that film.
- graup 5y agoDo you have a link to the original Tagesschau clip featuring the Gwangju footage? I could only find one from a day or two before, featuring only footage from Seoul.
- MattGaiser 5y agoOne of the things that surprised me in high school history was just how recent many democracies are. Within the lifetime of my parents, Portugal, Greece, Spain were dictatorships. Apparently South Korea is one of these as well.
- baybal2 5y agoAnd its a good reminder just how fledging this moment can be. Two days ago I posted an article on just how rapid was the downfall of democracies in the last decade: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27320565 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27320565 There are less functioning democracies today than in 1991. The truth of life is simple. There is no deep, philosophical argument to it. Who wins, rules, be it a democracy, or totalitarianism. If you lose to totalitarians, you die. If totalitarians lose to you, they die. Do not discount military action as sometimes the only option on the table to defend, and solidify a democracy.
- bserge 5y agoAnd if that military has other plans, well, learn to live under the new regime. I always think how fortunate western Europe was to have the US force them into democracy and freedom for the individual. Many don't agree with that, but if left to either the Nazis or the Soviets, we'd all be living under some sort of authoritarian regimes to this day.
- op03 5y agoOr Democracies could just try attack ala Soliemani.
- joe_the_user 5y agoIf you lose to totalitarians, you die. If totalitarians lose to you, they die. That's kind of a bizarre and exaggerated way to put things. Nominally, what separates dictatorship and democracy is that a democratic regime doesn't wantonly murder it's enemies. Some dictatorial regimes engage in brutal attacks on their enemies but even there, for most people life goes on. Also, there are a variety of regimes mid-way between democracy and totalitarianism - the current regimes of India and Turkey for example. Which is to say the loss and the gaining of democratic rights is often (though not always) a gradual thing.
- eynsham 5y agoI think that we forget 18 May partly because it succeeded. There is no enormous symbol of the failure and suppression of 18 May in the same way that there is of 4 June. I suppose that another massacre that sticks in my mind is the Kent State Massacre, which also passes unremarked. The lesson I draw from this is people may forget even when the state does not encourage them to do so: it’s much easier to discuss the Kent State Massacre in the US than 4 June on the Mainland, and yet it’s not really very obvious which in the respective area is better known.
- jinwoo68 5y agoMay 18 succeeded? It was a beginning of a long dictatorship in Korea. Maybe we can say it was a success because Korean people achieved democracy as a result of a long battle against the dictatorship that shared with May 18 in spirit. But it was a big loss at that time causing huge sorrow in people’s hearts.
- eynsham 5y agoI suppose that you are right that it is an infelicitous turn of phrase: I mean what you mean, i.e., that the long battle eventually was won. In China, the vindication of 4 June looks more distant a prospect than ever.
- yongjik 5y agoAmerica largely forgot about 5/18 because they never got the chance to know it: on the very same day, Mount St. Helens erupted, killing 57. I can only imagine the media frenzy after that. Of course, in South Korea, it was never forgotten. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1980_eruption_of_Mount_St._Helens https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1980_eruption_of_Mount_St._Hel...
- xbar 5y agoI liked this story. The failure to account for the amount of mindshare Mount St. Helens' eruption consumed is regrettable. This date, May 18, 1980, is clearly burned in my memory as the day of the eruption. As a youth, I cut out the the headlines and photos from 2 newspapers and saved them for decades.
- pirate787 5y agoThis item is on the front page on the US holiday of Memorial Day, when we remember those who died so others could be free. That count, of course, includes 36,516 Americans who died fighting in the Korean Conflict.
- trasz 5y agoBut not about ~million victims of that war?
- atomicity 5y agoYeah, what exactly makes the 36k US lives lost more important to focus on during Memorial Day? The best arguments I can think of: 1. This memorial must be acknowledged or practiced by the Hackernews community, because it's _mostly_ US-based and English speaking. So by association by language, we are expected to talk about a United States federal holiday? 2. All human lives are equal, but there is a day and place for everything. On May 31, the world should practice the Unided States federal holiday. On May 18, well... May 18th is just a Korean holiday. Not everybody needs to be aware of it. 3. US citizens and other English speakers should observe US holidays because that's just the way the world works. Just like how you do more for the funeral of your family, you should discuss US federal holidays more than Korean holidays. Holiday practice is a like zero-sum game, as there isn't that much time to just think about holidays and there are too many holidays. Using the same logic, some people's lives are worth more to you because they affect your life more. Sometimes with this approach, we mess up and overvalue one race more than another...but that's just a side effect of "the way things work". I can't see the logic. Saying that we should focus on Memorial Day sounds like a talking point that riles up emotions to me.
- refurb 5y agoAre you asking why Memorial Day, an American holiday that recognizes the sacrifice of its military, doesn’t recognize the victims of the Korean War? Do you want to rethink the question?
- Klasiaster 5y agoThe Jeju Uprising is mentioned just shortly, it's even more neglected in the public memory – it's a massacre that happened before the Korean war: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeju_uprising https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeju_uprising
- cbHXBY1D 5y agoOr the Bodo League massacre - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bodo_League_massacre https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bodo_League_massacre Which then reminds me of how neglected the Indonesian mass killings of Communists, trade unionists, and minority groups in 1965-66 is in the west - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indonesian_mass_killings_of_1965%E2%80%9366 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indonesian_mass_killings_of_19...
- emmelaich 5y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Year_of_Living_Dangerously_(film) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Year_of_Living_Dangerously... is a very good movie about that time.
- coupdejarnac 5y agoI appreciate the post, but I don't think it's constructive to argue that the Gwangju Uprising was bloodier than June 4. That's only true if you go by official numbers put out by the CCP.
- nsajko 5y agoYour post is less constructive: your only argument is an appeal to the lack of trustworthiness of the Chinese government. Even so, it would have been better if you stated what are your opinions on the number of casualties regarding both events. To give a starting point to the discussion; the English Wikipedia gives about the same summary for the independent estimates of casualties related to both events: from hundreds to thousands. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gwangju_Uprising https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gwangju_Uprising https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1989_Tiananmen_Square_protests https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1989_Tiananmen_Square_protests
- coupdejarnac 5y agoAppeal to the lack of trustworthiness of the CCP: this is the level of discourse?
- nsajko 5y agoNo idea what you're saying now.
- xbar 5y agoOP is saying CCP is known untrustworthy.
- scaramanga 5y agoWe also have strong reason to believe that south korean figures are a gross underestimate (if you read the linked wikipedia article). Victims have a hard time coming forward if there is a strong possibility of being victimised again (korea has a long history of blacklisting victims families for generations, it's not just a north korean thing).
- JohnJamesRambo 5y agoI'm embarrassed to say I had never even heard of this. What an interesting and inspiring read, thank you for sharing.
- jchook 5y agoPossible that we in the US do not learn much about the atrocities of South Korean autocracies because they were largely supported and propped up for decades by the US government. After nearly 40 years of Japanese rule, Korea formed a unified independent, democratically elected government with representation from right, center, and left political leaders on September 6, 1945. The very next day US forces showed up to dissolve the government and keep power in the hands of the Japanese. The subsequent election in South Korea was boycotted by nearly every political group. In the late 1940s, Kim Gu had unification talks with Kim il-Sung but the CIA had him assassinated in 1949. From there it’s a long chain of military dictatorships, coups, and suppression of democratic uprisings, with US influence and support.
- GartzenDeHaes 5y ago|and keep power in the hands of the Japanese I think you mean Japanese collaborators, who were hated by the population, but who also were the only people with any experience in technical and administrative areas.
- jchook 5y agoYes
- ngcc_hk 5y agoPolitics are dirty especially you fought with a dirty opponent like china supported North Korea. I think the great is so much then we might lost sight why the horrible dictatorship of South Korea and Taiwan in those days. One wonder whether they will fall into communist hand, even today. Korea not sure. Quite sure the nationalist party might even today.
- nsajko 5y ago> In the late 1940s, Kim Gu had unification talks with Kim il-Sung but the CIA had him assassinated in 1949. Taking a look at Wikipedia, the assassin seems to have been an US Army Counter Intelligence Corps (CIC, of "ratlines" fame) asset. Are there indications of him also being employed by OSS or some of its descendants (among which CIA is included), or did you just mistake one part of the US government for another? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kim_Gu#Death_and_legacy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kim_Gu#Death_and_legacy
- wrp 5y agoI was able to discuss Gwangju soon afterwards with Americans who were in Korea at the time. Reports of what happened varied considerably between witnesses. A conservative establishment guy who was in Seoul claimed Chun Doo Hwan intentionally sent troops there with murderous intent. A liberal Peace Corps guy who was down around Gwangju said the locals initiated the violence by raiding the local armory. The article is good in that it gives more attention to regional animosities than is usually done, but its tone is far too flippant for the subject matter and I think it may be a bit too credulous regarding the local accounts.
- yongjik 5y agoThere might have been confusion during the time, but now we have hour-by-hour accounts of what Gwangju's citizens were going through. Paratroopers were beating citizens to death starting on 5/18. Protests escalated. On 5/20, all reporters of the regional Jeonnam Maeil Newspaper resigned in protest, leaving this note that later became famous: We saw, with our two eyes, people being dragged like dogs and slaughtered. But we could not write a single line on the paper. So we put down our pens in shame. On 5/21, there were thousands of protesters in front of the Jeonnam Provincial Office. On 1 pm, paratroopers started firing indiscriminately into protesters. Citizens began raiding armories that afternoon.
- 1cvmask 5y agoThe Paris massacre of demonstrators against white colonialism in Algeria was also avoided in western (and American) reporting: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paris_massacre_of_1961 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paris_massacre_of_1961
- whall6 5y agoThe movie Taxi Driver (not the Scorsese one) is a really good film about this
- some1_from_ygn 5y agoThis read exactly like Yangon, except for the ending. There is no ending for Myanmar yet.