Three South Korean companies and Seoul police this month have had to pull ads and other content after men’s rights groups claimed that “small penis” symbols were used, insulting men.
The offending images?
Hands with the thumbs and the index fingers pinching toward each other illustrating the reaching out for an object, but the gesture is also often used to indicate something small in size and, in South Korea, it is associated with a strident, albeit now defunct, feminist group that used the image in its logo.
Photo: Reuters
Exacerbating the problem, one ad and a menu involved were also advertising sausages.
South Korea’s largest convenience store chain, GS25, saw a handful of members from the men’s group Man on Solidarity protest outside its headquarters after it ran the ad.
The group’s YouTube channel, which posts videos of its protests, has gained more than 200,000 subscribers in just two months.
GS25 withdrew its ad and fried chicken chain Genesis BBQ pulled its menu, issuing apologies and saying that they had no intention to demean men.
Kakao Bank Corp has apologized for a hand drawn similarly in one of its ads, while Seoul Metropolitan Police also removed a hand from a road traffic ad saying it wanted to avoid any misunderstanding.
The controversy is the latest flare-up in long-running tension over gender rights in South Korea that has pitted men’s and women’s groups against each other, and which has also resulted in police looking into whether female comedian Park Na-rae broke any laws with a ribald joke made in March.
The joke on a YouTube video involving a Stretch Armstrong action figure whose arms were brought near his genital area resulted in a storm of complaints that a similar joke by a male comedian would never have been acceptable.
Park, 35, and her agency, JDB Entertainment, issued statements apologizing and her YouTube channel was shut down.
Police are obligated to look into the matter after a complaint was filed on a Web site set up to address the public’s grievances, although it remains unclear if charges are to be filed.
Park and her agency did not respond to requests for comment about the potential police action.
South Korean Ministry of Gender Equality and Family Women’s Policy Division Director Kim Garo said that while the problems of misogyny and misandry are not new in South Korea, the targeting of companies and individuals is.
She said it is difficult for the government to interfere when protests took the form of consumer action, but that it would continue with outreach programs that invite young men and women to discuss issues such as gender equality and jobs.
When South Korean President Moon Jae-in came to power in 2017, he pledged to be a president for gender equality, vowing to do more to fix disadvantages for women in the nation.
South Korea has one of the largest wage gaps of any Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development member and low political representation for women, who hold just 19 percent of parliamentary seats.
Since Moon, women have seen some improvement in wages and are also eligible for bigger government subsidies than men when starting a new business.
However, political scientists say that many young men now feel their own needs and rights are not being sufficiently acknowledged, adding to widespread discontent over the lack of job opportunities for young people.
“Anti-feminist sentiment is strong among men in their 20s and early 30s, as well as the generation that is becoming adults,” Hankook Research Co senior fellow Jeong Han-wool said.
Research for a 2019 book he coauthored found that 58.6 percent of men in their 20s said they strongly opposed feminism.
That complicates the outlook for the ruling Democratic Party as it seeks re-election next year when Moon’s five-year term ends.
The party has also lost support among women after multiple sexual abuse scandals involving politicians, contributing to crushing defeats in recent mayoral elections for Seoul and Busan.
Park Jun-young, a 27-year-old engineering graduate school student, says he is among those who think men are now at a disadvantage.
“Feminism in South Korea started with gender equality, allowing women the same access and to break the glass ceiling, but it’s turned into something where the nowadays young men — who are not better off than women the same age — have become a target of criticism,” he said.
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