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Korean society witnessed an unusual phenomenon when MBC��s "PD Diary"
attacked cloning pioneer Hwang Woo-suk: the nation's leading left-wing
media outlets and progressively inclined people were not only united in
their defense of the program��s reporting, they even sided with its
Hwang Woo-suk bashing. Before MBC apologized, the Hankyoreh said a considerable portion
of the report was true, and labeled criticism of the reporting a "witch
hunt." They were scornful of people who accused the program of treason
by criticizing Hwang and his team. President Roh Moo-hyun was along the
same lines in an article posted on the Choeng Wa Dae website, where he
welcomed the Hankyoreh reporting and said he felt uncomfortable at
seeing the PD Diary so widely attacked. An OhMyNews reporter, after criticizing Prof. Hwang as "having
repeatedly lied to conceal the facts," asked back, "Are we really
democratized after having for so long been influenced by arguments that
justify dictatorship in the name of development?" One article went as
far as defining the public sentiment toward ��PD Diary�� as a combination
of "fanatical nationalism" and a "results-are-everything ideology." A
senior official in the Democratic Labor Party said nothing was wrong
with the ��PD Diary�� reporting, which was timely, and likened women who
offered to donate ova for stem cell research to "chickens on a poultry
farm." Then there were the usual suspects among the civic groups.
Those attending a forum sponsored, among others, by the Citizen's
Coalition for Democratic Media on Thursday persisted in defending the
MBC show. They detected "a queer call to keep mum about the truth in
the name of the national interest," and said the very spirit of
journalism had come under attack. ��The ��PD Diary�� reporting was fully
justified in raising ethical issues; better now than never" Most ordinary citizens were puzzled. What is in it for MBC,
they wondered. Is it so disagreeable for us to be proud of Prof. Hwang
when he has emerged as our first world-class scientist in a long time?
Of course, they felt, Hwang should be censured if it turns out that he
fabricated results intentionally. But if there were errors in
procedure, couldn��t the producers have the kindness to point them out
quietly so they can be corrected? The suspicions of ordinary people, then, focus on the real
motives of the Hwang-bashers and the defenders of ��PD Diary,�� and on
whether the two are not pulling on the same string. Globally, leftist
movements tend to be concerned about the environment, abortion, the
death penalty, the gap between rich and poor, union causes, student
causes -- and bioethics. The unique features of the Korean left wing,
in addition, are opposition to Seoul National University, the capital��s
wealthier districts, privilege, conglomerates and America. South
Korea's leftist movement also likes to stress that we are ��one nation,��
with all the pro-North Korean sentiment that implies. Ordinary common sense may not tell us how these are related to
the Hwang Woo-suk affair. But a clue is provided by OhMyNews, when it
links justifying dictatorship for the sake of development with blind
belief in the national interest and the consequent abandonment of due
process: there you get a glimpse of a mindset that regards defending
Hwang Woo-suk as a product of vested interests or a remnant of
dictatorship. It is not for nothing that a reader warned OhMyNews
against "looking at the Hwang Woo-suk affair under the tenet of
classical progress theory that medical technology, monopolized capital
and the state all collude with one another." An OhMyNews reporter likened criticism of ��PD Diary�� with the
Nazis and Japanese imperialism, which made it nothing but
��totalitarianism�� in the spirit of the ��dictatorship of the past." But
such statements in themselves are intolerant and censure differing
views in an extreme way. The greatest loss of face has been the president��s. In the
image of him when MBC issued a formal apology after he had just
defended it, we can read the embarrassment of the entire progressive
wing, who failed to read ordinary citizens�� ordinary minds. The majority of ordinary citizens and Internet users who
harbor affection toward Prof. Hwang may have played a key role in the
last presidential election, rejecting ��dictatorship�� and bringing us
the current government. These ordinary people who are indignant at ��PD
Diary�� and its disparaging of Prof. Hwang are also the people who
thronged the Gwanghwamun intersection to restore their pride in Korean
football. In other words, the national interest is rooted in our will
and efforts to defend it; it is not a cliquish settlement of accounts
to get a particular result. If the ruling forces now even take to
bashing ordinary people, they are going too far.
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