[KS] An open letter to Epstein and other list members

[Young Rae Oum]

REPLY sends your message to the whole list
__________________________________________

[Moderator's note:  this message came in on Friday 13 October, and I am
forwarding it to the list after careful consideration and after
re-confirmation of intent from the author.  My apologies for the delay,
but it might be worthwhile for list members to keep in mind that running
the list and moderating it is entirely voluntary, unpaid, and
increasingly without gratitude.  I and my trusted colleagues on the list
management team do have lives separate from running the list, and delays
in carrying out voluntary work are inevitable.  On a closing note, I
must say that I do not accept the characterization of this list as
expressed in the first paragraph below.]

As some readers of this list must have realized by now, many troubling
posts laden with crude racist comments plagued this list for years.  I
am compelled to speak on the latest message posted by one of the
owners/moderators of the list.  I am referring directly to Stephen
Epstein's message regarding "homosexuality in South Korea & Lou
Harrison" that included a note by his colleague  with a short commentary
attached to it.  (For those who deleted the post without reading it or
those who do not remember it any more, I have enclosed the original post
at the end of this message.)

I was mortified by the observation, "boys seem very available," in the
forwarded message, by a "Jack Body." (In Epstein's commentary, "boys"
were subtly transformed to "men.")

What is he saying by "Korean boys... available"?  Is he nonchalantly
confessing that he had been preying upon minors in Korea?  I would not
accept any argument that those sexual "encounters" happened with
consent, because minors are legally unable to give consent, and thus
those qualify as statutory rape in any case.  According to Korean laws,
the age of majority is 19-- for example, the age that can be allowed in
adult movie theaters and so on.

Secondly, what does he mean by "available"?  The choice of word reminds
me strongly of the popular racist stereotype of (all) "Asian women" as
sexually "available."  There is no way to tell from this message if
those encounters were a form of prostitution, but it still does not
matter.  This type of encounter is bound to be exploitative, because of
the difference in economic and social power.  These white (or at least
mostly white) men were older and more socially established (musicians,
graduate students, or professors) and wealthier than the "boys"-- at
least wealthy enough to travel to Korea and seduce the "boys."

I am also surprised that no post on this sub-thread about white men's
homosexual experience in Korea (which originally started as an honest
and useful question on homosexuality in Korea) ever mentioned the race
factor: These Korean "boys" might have been attracted to the non-Korean
(I suspect mostly white) pedophiles because they were "exotic."  (Of
course, this attraction could be mutual and those pedophiles might as
well have so-called "Asian fetish" as well.  I am only pointing to the
particular context of the encounters, and to one obvious reason why so
many Korean boys may have appeared to be so willing.)

Considering the recent calls for quality control, how could a list
moderator put such a message that is downright atrocious?  Had the post
mentioned how "available" young Korean girls are to foreign travelers,
and how some travel guidebook offers such information as they are very
open to sexual "exploration," would he have presented it to the list as
"further data points" of (hetero)sexuality in Korea, as though no moral
and ethical question were involved?  Were his own sons and daughters
exposed to such sexual exploitation, would he consider this valuable
"academic discussion"?


Sincerely,

Young Rae Oum
Women's Studies
Clark University


*** Original Message ***
Date: Wed, 11 Oct 2000 14:09:23 +1300
To: korean-studies at iic.edu
From: Stephen Epstein <Stephen.Epstein at vuw.ac.nz>
Subject: Re: homosexuality in South Korea & Lou Harrison
Sender: owner-korean-studies at iic.edu
Precedence: bulk
Reply-To: korean-studies at iic.edu

Further data points: I fwd with permission the following from a
colleague
who is a composer in our own music department, and who, like Lou
Harrison,
is both openly gay and has spent time in Korea.  He once mentioned to me
(as indicated below) that he found Korean men the *least* personally
homophobic and most willing to experiment of any place he had ever
traveled--if a proposition was made discreetly.  While I certainly have
no
reason to doubt him, his statement, which highlighted the gap between
actual private behavior and professed public ideology, was enough to
make
me gape with disbelief.

Date: Wed, 11 Oct 2000 10:10:14 +1300
To: Stephen Epstein <Stephen.Epstein at vuw.ac.nz>
From: Jack Body <jack.body at vuw.ac.nz>
Subject: Re: Fwd: homosexuality in South Korea & Lou Harrison
Mime-Version: 1.0

Hi Stephen,
All very interesting.
Lou Harrison is a dear friend but we never really talked about his
experiences in Asia.
As far as Korea is concerned there are lots of paradoxes from my
experience.
1. The gay-club scene is paranoid and exploitative, subject to raids etc
-at least this was the impression I was left with.
2. On the other hand, boys seem very available, boys in general that is,
met anywhere in the street, not necessary "gay", but just open to new
encounters. My impression is that homophobia as such might be directed
against the life-style (as in most Asian countries, EVERY young man MUST
marry) and (possibly) overt public display, whereas, with discrete
behavior, anything is possible.
I did read once in a Spartacus Guide that Korean boys are the most
available in the world, and my experience suggests there is some truth
in
it!
Jack Body,
School of Music,
Victoria University of Wellington,

>Lou Harrison who is (and has been almost right from the get go) and
>openly gay
>american composer who visisted Korea twice in the early 1960s. I have
>often
>heard that he liked to tour the gay underground every where he went and
>would
>give others "the tour" in the SF bay area when they visisted. It would
>be
>interesting to know what kind of gay world he discovered in Seoul then
>and if he
>met with any problems because of his orientation.