By Michelle Woo
Photos courtesy of The Korea Times
In the days following the Virginia Tech massacre, Korean community members across the nation gathered at prayer services and vigils to mourn the victims.
When South Korean officials learned that the person responsible for the deadliest shooting rampage in U.S. history was one of their own, they did something that seemed unheard of to many Americans.
They apologized.
Korean ambassadors and many first-generation Korean Americans expressed guilt and responsibility for the actions of Seung-Hui Cho, who killed 32 people at Virginia Tech on April 16.
At a candlelight vigil, South Korean ambassador Lee Tae Shik urged the Korean American community to “repent,” suggesting a 32-day fast, one day for each victim.
Many shared his sentiments. The day after the tragedy, TV news reporter Janet Choi walked the streets of Los Angeles’ Koreatown, home to thousands of Korean immigrants.
“Talking to people in the community, the No. 1 word that comes up is ‘shame,’” Choi says. “It’s amazing how much responsibility a community can feel.”
More than a month after the massacre, such a response remains puzzling to outsiders, including 1.5 and second-generation Korean Americans, who learned of their community’s “shame” primarily through TV and Internet news reports.
“When Koreans automatically feel ashamed and responsible, that’s completely ridiculous,” says David Yi, a student at USC. “With the shootings at Columbine, should all Caucasians feel ashamed? No, of course not.”
The disagreement on whether Koreans, both in Korea and the U.S., should have apologized for the Virginia Tech tragedy represents a division between generations, an internal clash of subcultures. But for some Korean Americans, this tension serves as an opportunity for exploration and understanding, as they ask the big question: Why?
Why did Koreans apologize? And, because they did, what consequences are in store for Korean Americans?
At the surface, as heavily reported by the mainstream media, Koreans felt a fear of backlash, as early headlines highlighted the fact that Cho was a “Korean national.” Perhaps the apology, therefore, was a pre-emptive move to defend themselves. It’s a predictable fear, considering America’s history with racial profiling, seen during World War II with Japanese American internment, and, more recently, after 9/11 with Arab Americans. And many Korean immigrants still feel the reverberations of the 1992 Los Angeles riots, when they were cast as oppressors.
The morning after the Virginia Tech shooting, when it was revealed that the killer was Korean, South Korea’s Foreign Ministry said its government hoped the tragedy would not “stir up racial prejudice or confrontation.”
That day, 21-year-old Myungyu Jung of San Diego received a call from his parents.
“They told me to be extra careful at school,” says Jung, whose mom and dad are both immigrants. “I unwillingly took off the Korean flag badge that had been proudly placed on my backpack.”
But is fear enough to provoke apologies? Experts on Korean American history say the apologies were more than just a defense mechanism. In order to fully understand the guilt and shame, one must look to Korea, where expressions of sorrow are instinctive and the line between individual and collective responsibility is blurred.
Koreans and many first-generation Korean Americans carry what veteran journalist K.W. Lee calls “Confucian baggage,” an East Asian mentality that places the emphasis on the collective. He says it’s part of the ancient Korean concept of han, a shared sense of injustice, self-pity and grief caused by years of political oppression.
“[Koreans] share the common fate of everlasting victimhood,” Lee says. “They cannot blame outsiders for their misery. They are bent on exterminating themselves.”
In Korea and in Korean America, han is still present. “Just as a parent apologizes on behalf of [his or her] child, our community should come together and apologize for this child’s mistakes,” explains Hong Jae Lee, 57, of Glendale, Calif., who immigrated to the U.S. in 1979. “Something of this magnitude requires a big gesture. It took so long for us to be accepted again after the Saigu incident — we don’t want to lose all that again.”
But Kyeyoung Park, an associate professor of Asian American studies at UCLA, says that some of the the apologies may have been misunderstood. Park, who has explored the Korean immigrant experience extensively, says she became uncomfortable when she heard of the apologies, knowing how they might be interpreted.
“The meaning of ‘sorry’ [in Korea] is different,” Park says. “They really felt sorry morally and wanted to do something about it because it was such a horrific incident. [Apologizing] was how they showed their emotional reaction. They didn’t mean it legally. Over here, ‘sorry’ means you committed something wrong. This wasn’t conveyed properly to the American public.”
To non-Koreans, these expressions of shame and regret remain curious, and some wonder what effects they might have on the way the Korean American community is perceived. Some believe the apologies could simply be seen as an overreaction. Others believe they could send the wrong message that Koreans somehow share Cho’s guilt.
“It takes the focus away from the individual and puts the focus on the larger community,” says Elliot Lee, program director of the Korean American Coalition (KAC) Washington, D.C. chapter. “It insinuates a sort of responsibility.”
As a response to the tragedy, KAC, along with several other Korean American nonprofit organizations, created a Virginia Tech memorial fund for the victims and their families. Lee says this is something these organizations would have done whether or not the shooter was Korean.
Adrian Hong, executive director of Liberty in North Korea, a Washington D.C.-based human rights organization, says the apologies might reveal something about what Koreans value.
“On one hand, people might think, ‘Wow, Koreans are honorable. They take the blame for something they’re not even responsible for,’” Hong says. “But it also came across as being kind of selfish. Like, ‘Yeah, this sucks, but we’re looking out for ourselves.’ … Why don’t these people cry for things that don’t publicly shame us? Why don’t they cry for domestic abuse, drug abuse or other issues plaguing our country?”
Park says that by turning the spotlight on themselves through their apologies, Koreans set themselves up to be seen as “foreigners.” She says that what Koreans in America should be doing is joining national discussions on gun control, school safety and mental health — issues that must be addressed in order to help prevent this type of tragedy in the future.
Today, as the Virginia Tech tragedy has faded from the media screen, a major backlash against the Korean American community has yet to be realized. Perhaps this was partly due to the quick, proactive apologies by the Korean community. Or maybe it’s simply a testament of how far America has come.
