The Sewol Ferry Disaster: Why we Must Question some Aspects of Korean Culture

jinjoo2713 (Naver User)

In the aftermath of great tragedies, one must be thorough in drawing conclusions about the causes and the way people respond in times of trouble and be careful not to explain away matters on handy scapegoats.  Asking pertinent questions is very much a part of this.

The captain of the Sewol and his crew were obviously in the wrong, their individual actions and orders cost lives and they should rightly be brought to justice.  However, the reasons behind their actions are complex.  It is convenient for everyone, including Park Geun Hye and her government, to brush away the issues highlighted by this disaster as the result of solely individual errors and incompetence.  This may be so, but they have to be more thorough than that.

There have been a variety of articles written that place a fair amount of blame on Korean culture for what happened (many from Koreans themselves), and inevitably people have become upset, calling this simplistic and racist (mostly non-Koreans).  I have two thoughts on this; 1) Yes, it is simplistic to say that culture is the sole cause for the disaster, of course it's not, but I have not heard anyone make this claim, only that it may be part of the reason for it or exacerbated it; 2) It is not racist, how can it be?  We are talking about culture, not DNA. People that constantly make this claim are using a kind of language which is not true, unhelpful, and emotive.

The truth is, individuals are significantly influenced by the culture in which they are brought up and this drastically impacts on their individual thoughts and actions.  It is too simplistic to say culture caused the disaster, but did it play a role?  I would argue that the evidence so far suggests it may very well have done, and it is not wrong to suggest it as a possibility and should not be insulting to do so.

I think there are two main aspects of Korean culture which may have helped cause or exacerbate the catastrophe (and I think they are linked):

1. Hierarchical Respect Culture
2. A disregard for rules and regulations and lack of knowledge of safety procedures

Of the two factors, number 2 might be the most important.  "But this hasn't got anything to do with culture", I hear you say.  But you'd be wrong.  Sure, one can't blame it on Confucianism (the usual turn-to) or pinpoint it to other parts of cultural history, but a lack of respect for safety protocols, rules, and regulations is a modern day cultural issue in Korea and is something all of us who live here regularly see. This is why I shake my head in disbelief that articles like this pop-up, titled "Stop Blaming Korean Culture for Last Week's Ferry Disaster", especially when they go on to write this:

"The real problem, at all levels, seems to be protocol—or rather, the absence of one. Kim Su Bin, a classmate of Lim’s at Danwon High School in Ansan, pointed out that passengers did not receive any safety instruction before or during the trip, and that life jackets were available on the fourth floor but not on the third. A communication’s officer for the Sewol has admitted to the crew’s lack of evacuation training, or the enforcement thereof. And the indecision written all over the transcripts between harbor officials and the Sewol crew reveals an apparent dearth of actionable protocol for either side in the event of such a calamity."

The author then goes on to quote a journalist in South Korea:

“The main point is not culture,” said Jaehwan Cho, a Seoul-based journalist covering the events on his Twitter, in an interview on Sunday. “The main point is government structure... We need to turn our eyes to the government situation, government atmosphere. If we can revise those things, I don’t think this kind of disaster will happen again.”

He is at least partly right, government is an issue, but the lack of a safety protocol, instructions, lack of training, etc, could very well be heavily linked to culture because this is not something unique to this situation and it is not all the government's fault.  And after all, where does government come from if not the people and the culture that created it?

When I spoke to my wife about all this, she told me that when she worked as a nurse in a hospital in Korea she was given no fire safety training, but legally she was supposed to, she was even given a form to sign to say she had.  When she said she had no such training, she was simply told to sign it by her superiors anyway.  Irresponsible of my wife? In the atmosphere of the Korean workplace, in reality she had no choice whatsoever, you simply can't question your superiors, if she had refused, her life would have been made very difficult (a subtle way respect hierarchies reduce safety).

So, if there was a fire in that hospital, you might well have had a similar situation occurring as to what happened on the Sewol; panicked people searching for members of staff to tell them where to go and what to do and the response and information would have been poor because the problem is that the patients in the hospital and the passengers on the ferry would have had about as much information on safety as the people who were supposed to be in charge.

Also, people in junior positions are regularly thrown into the deep end and given responsibility for things they perhaps should have been better trained and equipped for. In my wife's case, she became a surgery room nurse and her training consisted of sitting-in on only one or two surgeries and watching (she did many different kinds of joint surgery) and then told to learn terms and instruments at home on her own time. Basically, she had no training and learnt on the job - and was often shouted at and bullied by doctors when she made inevitable mistakes every now and then.  To make matters worse, in the quest for profits and the busy world of Korea, she was forced to rush from patient to patient, hastily sterilising instruments (and often having minor accidents as a result; cuts, burns etc), and feeling extreme pressure to finish important and possibly hazardous tasks quickly (빨리 빨리!).

I see this kind of thing everywhere in Korea, therefore I think it is fair to say that this has become part of the culture and needs changing.  Whether you agree with this or not, my hypothesis is not racist because I am saying it is cultural, not racial, and because it is not about race, it is something that can be changed; it is not written in their DNA and not set in stone.

The exact reason why I believe hierarchical respect culture was a factor is different to most other commentators on this subject.  I simply don't know what passengers from Western countries would have done had they been given the same orders to stay below deck by the captain.  I actually think saying they were being overly obedient is probably a bit simplistic, perhaps this was a factor, but I think this is something we can't really know and it is harsh and insensitive to blame the passengers, who were obviously scared victims of someone else's mistakes and a desperately unfortunate situation.

As I have mentioned already the effect of respect culture is probably more subtle on this disaster.  It is the role of the crew and the captain that needs more focus and these are the questions I would ask:

1. Why didn't any of the crew question the captain's orders, and if they did, why did it not have any effect?
2. Why was the captain away from the bridge when the accident occurred?
3. Why did it take so long to correct the original order of staying below deck?
4. Why did they go off the original course in the first place?
5. Why was the response so slow by rescue teams?

Of course we don't know the answers to any of these questions yet, but I am going to highlight some of the side effects I see day to day in Korea of rigid respect hierarchies and I will leave it to you to connect the dots:

1. People rarely question orders of superiors, even when they are obviously wrong sometimes.
2. The sense of entitlement being of higher age or rank gives people often affords them the luxury of sitting back and letting those below them do most of the difficult work.
3. When mistakes are made by elders or those of superior rank, they can be very stubborn in admitting them and will often carry on regardless or hope everything will be alright in order to save face.
4. Protocol, rules, and regulations are often ignored by people who have high status because they feel they know better and are above them.
5. Respect hierarchies are inefficient, causing a lack of initiative in individuals and can cause slow responses by waiting for orders of superiors.

Now I am not saying these factors are all definitely related and this is exactly what happened, but it is everyone's responsibility to consider all of these a possibility.  In fact they are questions you could ask people of any culture, but Korean culture accentuates things when it comes to issues of status and respect.  If you refuse to acknowledge them for fear of being a racist or upsetting those of another culture, you may be sending others to their doom in the future.  People's lives, whoever and wherever they are, are more important than the risk of offending cultural sensibilities.

Finally, if someone were to hypothesise that the 7/7 bombings in the UK had something to do with British culture, why on earth would I be offended?  I just don't understand it.  In fact, one could make a good argument that British culture played a role (over-politeness, political correctness, and tolerance of even the dangerous and intolerant for fear of giving offence) in the creation of the Muslim radicals (the UK seems to be quite good at cultivating them) who hatched the plot and carried it out.  Not only that, but even if it had nothing to do with British culture in the end, it would have been our responsibility to question it (and many did) and at least rule it out.

In fact the two examples correlate rather nicely because in the case of the 7/7 bombings it was the actions of psychotic and brainwashed individuals; in the Sewol disaster it seems it was the actions of incompetent individuals in positions of responsibility.  We can leave it at that on both disasters and hope both never happen again, but it must be discovered whether in each case such disasters were a one-off or whether there is something about each culture that might encourage future similar events.  In the case of British culture, might it encourage radical Muslims to flourish?  And is there something about Korean culture that encourages incompetence, danger and confusion, in potentially dangerous situations, to flourish?

The only way to find out and be as thorough as possible in avoiding future disasters is to ask questions, which it seems is easy and not at all insulting to do with British or American culture, but when we do it to non-Western cultures like Korea, we suddenly turn into racist simpletons.

A Culture Bias in Reporting of Korean Culture and Plane Crashes?

I might have some issues with TheKorean's writing, but that does not detract from the fact I read his blog more than most others.  His opinion on many matters seems to run opposite to mine and I enjoy hearing my opinions challenged, which most of his writing does, in an eloquent, well thought-out way.  It is easy to think that just because people disagree with each other that this necessarily involves hatred or even dislike. I do not see it this way, so I'd like to begin this post by saying that I really appreciate TheKorean's blog and the time he has taken recently and in the past to respond to me.

I do, however, still disagree with him about his theory on cultural explanations and culturalism.  I will explain why in this post.  I do believe TheKorean's ambitions in his first post were greater than the position he is taking now, but the way I understand things now - and with his arguments stripped down as generously as I can - it goes like this:

1. We should not posit a cultural explanation for something, especially if the issue is a sensitive one, before we know the facts or at least have explored other avenues first, with particular responsibility placed on the media.

2. In the West, we jump onto cultural explanations when it comes to the non-Western countries and we don't when it comes to ourselves or other Western countries.  This is an example of a bias called "Culturalism."  Here are some quotes to verify this:

"If national culture is such an important concept that must be examined to promote airline safety, why does the discussion about cultural factors never happen when a European or an American plane crashes?"

 "The honest answer to these questions must inevitably involve the concept of bias, for culturalism is a form of bias."

 "This is why Europeans and Americans get a pass from the culturalist desire. It is not that Europeans and Americans do not have a culture that impacts their behavior; they clearly do. It is that Europeans and Americans are always afforded the luxury of being treated as individuals who are not slaves to their cultures. The same luxury is rarely afforded to South Americans, Middle Easterners, Africans and Asians."

"CNN will continue running stories about Korean culture whenever a Korean plane crashes, while never raising questions about American culture when an American plane crashes. That is the discrepancy that I want you to think about."

As I said, I think his ambitions were greater than this in his original post, but I am not going to dwell on it and I am willing to concede that it may only be my mistaken interpretation of what he wrote which is the cause of me thinking this.  This is what he is saying now, so let's examine it.

The first part of his argument I have some sympathy to, but the second part is simply showing complete indifference to the multitude of situations where culture is used by Europeans and Americans to explain their own behaviour, their own problems, and their own disasters, rightly or wrongly (and the behaviour of other Western countries).  Culture isn't used specifically for explaining plane crashes, he's right, but it is used in many other situations which include (and are glaringly easy to find); obesity, gun crime, healthcare, and education in the US, soccer hooliganism, violence, binge drinking and anti-social behaviour in the UK, and the economic crisis in Southern Europe.  Whether all these cultural explanations are correct or even justified are irrelevant to the 2nd point, because it does definitively show that there is no bias and Europeans and Americans don't get a pass from the "culturalist" desire as he says. 

When TheKorean talks specifically about plane crashes, the reasons for supposing a nation's culture might cause them is absolutely vital in the positing of a cultural explanation.  The fact is that we had good reasons with Korean culture, the reasons are not so clear with Western countries (even if these reasons turned out to be wrong, I think you can see how it is someone might hold them based on Korean hierarchical respect culture).  If I was to start talking about traditional Korean food culture as playing a role in rising obesity in Korea, it would be ridiculous and difficult to comprehend.  But if I started to talk about American food culture seeping into Korea and that being a cause of rising obesity, you might begin to think I am making some sense judging by the fact Americans have the highest calorie intake on the planet on average and have high obesity rates, and American food is generally higher in calories than traditional Korean food (especially fast food, which is becoming more popular in Korea).

In a reply to me, he did however, express another factor that could be involved.  He argued that problems, say, in American culture are often localised or universalised and that we didn't do this with Korean culture and airplane crashes.  He gave the examples of people not talking about Korean pilots coming from the military and the effect that might have (localised) and people not talking about "cockpit culture" being a factors across all countries (universalised).  For example, in education the problem isn't so much American culture, but arguments are given relating to the poor within America or the immigrants from other countries (localised).  And in the 2008 financial crisis, again American culture wasn't directly blamed, but corporate greed or "the one percent" a problem we see everywhere (universalised).

I think he was wrong about this because I distinctly remember reading articles in the Western press talking about military pilots becoming airline pilots in Korea, and this possibly being a factor in past crashes, and a large amount of talk about "Cockpit culture" not being uniquely Korean.  So the accusation that we don't localise or universalise with other cultures is false, at least in the example he uses.  I provide these links to show this:

http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/regions/asia-pacific/south-korea/130709/asiana-airlines-crash-possibly-effected-cultur

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/dec/12/asiana-pilot-feared-landing-safely-ntsb-report

In the second article, the Guardian never even mentions Korean culture in the Asiana crash investigation findings. 

When it comes to point 1, however, the justification of the reasons we make for culture being an issue are important.  It could very well be that the people in Western countries are too quick to jump to cultural conclusions and they shouldn't (especially in the media), whether it is about themselves, other Western countries or non-Western countries.  This may in fact be true of people from all countries and cultures.

In my last post, I outlined the reasons why I thought we had good reasons to suspect Korean culture as playing a role in potentially catastrophic failures of communication in plane crashes.  I think it was fair enough to speculate that this was part of the reason for the Asiana crash (especially in light of the previous cases), I also think it is perfectly fine to speculate about it on a blog.  A slightly trickier question is whether it is responsible of a major world news corporation to speculate about it in the wake of the crash when it hadn't been fully investigated yet.  The truth is, I am not sure about this.  When it's put like that it doesn't sound good, for sure.

However, without the obvious signs of a mechanical failure and a history of Korean respect culture playing a role in other crashes - according to crash investigators - I do think they were justified in bringing up the subject of the reasons for previous plane crashes of Korean airliners.  After all, if a British Airways plane crashed tomorrow, the news would probably bring up previous crashes of British Airways and other British airplane disasters, especially if circumstances looked similar.  So in Korean airline companies, the history of previous crashes will hint at the same reason applying for the current crash, so I guess drawing the same conclusions is unavoidable.

It is of course quite natural for us to look for cultural explanations for bad things we see happen connected with cultures that are not our own, this is the tribal instinct at work, perhaps.  I understand why TheKorean is against this, just because it is natural doesn't make it right and it is perhaps an urge that we all should fight against.  But I think Western culture does, quite uniquely, fight against this.  While I have written myself about the frustrating levels of prejudice still present in Western culture, institutionally, in politics, and in the media they actually sometimes take positions that are too relative and too "fair" to other cultures, to the point where we even do not apply our own laws for fear of being insensitive to another culture.  We often disregard objectivity, equality, and human rights to the detriment of our own countries and the detriment of vulnerable people who are immigrants from other countries.  Examples can be seen of this in my own country lately with the brouhaha over the allowing of segregation of men and women in universities by Muslim speakers (which has now thankfully been rescinded after an official watchdog and the government voiced objection to Universities UK's decision).

The Issue of Freedom of Speech

The wonderful thing about free speech and expression, is that when you say or do something that is lazy or is motivated by pure prejudice without reason, logic and evidence, it tends to show up.  You look like a dumbass when you're exposed, you feel like an idiot, and after a period of licking one's wounds, hopefully your opinions get changed.  This is why my heckles are raised significantly when the word "racism" is used in these kinds of arguments.

TheKorean did explicitly state he did not equate culturalism with racism (also note he remarks that culturalism is something Americans do to other Americans in this quote, which seems to contradict his 2nd point):

"I am not willing to equate culturalism and racism, because the two terms do not overlap completely. For example, culturalism is evident in the manner in which the rest of America discusses the Deep South, in a way that racism is not. But as I wrote previously, culturalism and racism are related, as they are two streams from the same source--the desire to reduce an identifiable group of people to some kind of indelible essence."

However, he is creating a strong connection between the two and he made pains to make this clear in his original post:

"Like racism, culturalism puts a large group of people beyond rational understanding."

"Like racism, culturalism distracts away from asking more meaningful questions, and obscures pertinent facts."

"like racism, culturalism destroys individual agency"

The problem with doing this is that he should know that as soon as the word "racism" comes up in an argument people from the opposing side tend to back down for fear of being labeled a "racist."  It has been a tactic used by the far-left progressives for some time now.  It is corrosive to free speech and I believe encourages a festering of racism because people's actual racist views or border-line racist views are left unchallenged.  This is the whole debate on the right to offend in freedom of expression in a nutshell and I firmly sit on the side of the right to offend (without going out of our way to offend just for the sake of it).  Of course, TheKorean is perfectly entitled to write what he does, but this is my response to it.  It is an important debate to have because it has not really been settled yet.

Because of all this, then, if he had made point one without bringing-up the subject of racism or indeed culturalism or any prejudice at all, I might have been more inclined to agree with him, but his second point was the biggest problem.  I think he alienated many people who see good reasons for making cultural explanations/opinions/speculations because they simply honestly see that there could be a large dose of truth in them.  Most are not "culturalists", or even have any prejudice at all and they resent being linked to racists. 

This is a game the progressive left have been playing with conservative opinions for some time now, and whilst I actually have mostly liberal opinions, I have great sympathy for those that hold conservative opinions when they are shot down for being racists or bigots, or simply labeled as ignorant and prejudiced.  Some undoubtedly are, like some liberals are, but I know by having known many of them that most probably aren't and they would not discriminate or show any malice against individuals on the basis of race and culture. 

It is not wrong to have an opinion about a culture, it is wrong to apply this opinion to discriminate unfairly against individuals, that is the bottom line.  By speculating that Korean culture might have been a factor in a crash, how did anyone discriminate against an individual or violate their human rights?  If then some airline company chooses to use this speculation to not hire a Korean pilot, for example, then we have a case of discrimination and this is unfair.  However, is that really likely to happen?  Perhaps it does, but that would be exactly the area we would need to clamp down on.  Not the honest musings about how culture effects behaviour, but the treating of individuals as individuals.

People were totally within their rights to challenge the assumption or the evidence that Korean culture was involved in airline crashes, but until TheKorean did so, perhaps the argument simply wasn't out there.  It is pretty difficult to report on a side of an argument that doesn't exist yet.  One should give credit to TheKorean for questioning Gladwell's lack of thoroughness and people's blind acceptance of what he said and giving the other side of the argument, but to call it "culturalism" and an example of prejudice is going too far, perhaps it was simple ignorance.  There is nothing wrong with ignorance as long as it is not willful.  By putting your opinion out there, you invite others to enlighten you and critique your position, the key is having an open mind.  I would also note how well received TheKorean's article was going against Gladwell's previously accepted theory, he certainly wasn't silenced.

Speculating with an open mind is fine, with a closed mind it is wrong.  Speculating and making it seem like fact, that is another problem and which TheKorean took Gladwell to task on.  Sloppy work motivated by culturalism?  That's a step too far, as I said, I'd say simply sloppy work and perhaps he is a 'culturalist', but I think he should be given the benefit of the doubt that he is not and his work should not be marked as motivated by a form of prejudice.  In fact, TheKorean's conclusion about Gladwell and those that accepted his work hints at a fair amount of hypocrisy because he is the one saying we shouldn't jump to cultural conclusions and says it is unfair and insensitive.  Yet at the same time he is jumping to the conclusion of prejudice, which is just as - if not more than - unfair and insensitive itself.

There will always be examples of people with prejudice, or even whole TV stations or newspapers with prejudice, but to accuse it on the whole culture or the journalistic profession in the West is unfair and not true.  And as I have mentioned, I think even the bad ones do it across the board with all cultures, including their own.  Also, defense of other cultures in the Western media is quite vociferous and a popular position to take among liberals these days.

One newspaper or TV network does not speak for the whole of Western culture.  If TheKorean's point is merely to enlighten us when we see individual news reports about their inaccuracies and jumping to cultural conclusions, he must surely know that CNN, for example, have been roundly trashed for doing both by other news networks, newspapers, political commentators and comedians.  Let's face it, sometimes, especially 24-hour news networks are so desperate for something to report, that they will report nearly anything.

The issue TheKorean brings up is not about prejudice, it is about politeness, sensitivity and accuracy in media reporting and writing, and that is something I could be persuaded upon to change my views when it comes to using cultural explanations, of any culture (when it comes to sloppy work in the media generally, I am already sold).  I would still need to be convinced that being overly-sensitive to a reasonable criticism of your culture from other countries is necessary or essentially understandable (logically speaking, I think it is not).  You are not your culture and should not be offended as if a criticism against your culture was a criticism of you personally, one should listen carefully and see if they have a point about the culture you live in, then dismiss it if they are wrong and try to change things if they are right.  Perhaps this is not very realistic (perhaps as realistic as trying to stop jumping to cultural conclusions), but this is how we can truly grow and create a better society with which to live in, and importantly, live together in.

The Necessity of Lying in Korea

Picture by  Stepher Uhlmann http://su2.info/gallery/stills/lie (http://artlibre.org/licence/lal/en)

One of my favourite writers and speakers currently is the neuro-scientist and philosopher Sam Harris.  In his most recent book, "Lying", he sets-out his case that the world, and indeed our individual lives, would be much better if we dispensed with the fibs and were just honest in almost every situation.  He gives some examples of when lying might be necessary, but they mainly involve situations that could result in violence and therefore lying then becomes a means of self-defense (I will let you imagine some scenarios).

I personally agree with him, we would undoubtedly be better-off if we could all be more honest with each other.  However, I have noticed how difficult it is to meet his suggested challenge of consciously making a point not to lie (even the tiny ones) for a whole week - to see how often we might do it - while living in Korea.

In a society with Confucian values, elders are to be respected at all costs and I do think this puts extra pressure on the ability to be honest; sometimes honesty actually feels disrespectful and when the clashing values of two different cultures go at each other head-on this can cause some significant difficulties which may necessitate lying.  Even without cultural differences Koreans appear to lie to each other surprisingly regularly, especially when it comes to their family, which has shocked me a little.  Since day one, I have always disliked respect culture because of this necessity to lie.  It is not a measure of true respect that one needs to lie to people and especially family, I think it shows the opposite and the behaviour is more motivated by social pressure and fear.  In this confusion between fear and respect, South Korean culture makes the same mistake as the regime in North Korea.

The times I am regularly tempted to dish-out a few porky pies occur in two situations in Korea, at work and with my wife's family and I am going to give a few examples of dilemmas that have cropped-up from time to time.

When it comes to my in-laws, my wife tends to do the lying for me, partly because I am exquisitely uncomfortable with it and also because my Korean is not quite up to it.  One, rather massive fib we told my in-laws occurred a couple of years ago during my winter vacation from work.  There was only a small window my school allowed me to get away for a few weeks and I was thinking about a trip to Indonesia.  The only time I could get away, however, clashed with the Korean New Year holiday (Seollal).  My wife told me that her parents would never allow me go away at this time and that I should be with the family; my response was to say, "Well, I am not asking them, I will go if I want to, period."  Knowing that this would be a problem (my poor wife is often stuck in the middle in cultural problems such as this), my wife told her parents that I was going home to visit my family in England.  With the tensions that are often experienced and expected between the parents of married couples in Korea and the importance of family, they would not disapprove of this. 

To me, this seemed a bit immoral, I would have rather stood-up to them, apologised, and ultimately tried to explain how important travel and new experiences were to me and my freedom to make my own choices.  On good authority, however, I have been told many times that such a show of honesty would have been a big mistake if I valued my marriage.

These sorts of situations occur quite a lot; I have often got last minute requests to join my parents in-law for drinks with their friends - on a couple of occasions just as I was preparing to go to bed.  I simply refuse, which gives my wife headaches, but again she lies and says I am sick or I have an English class with someone or some other work to do.  I have to say, I have become more comfortable with doing this as time goes by.

Of course one of the tricky things with all this lying is the potential to slip-up at a later date because you have to remember all the lies you've told (as Sam Harris mentions in his book).  Even this aspect of lying is something I find completely different in Korea to living in England.  I find in England, people really are more interested in the truth, and especially parents, but in Korea not so much.  I believe the showing of respect holds greater importance.  This all means I rarely, if ever, get tested on the lies my wife and I have told.  In the Indonesian example, I visited there in January and February and came back with a markedly different skin tone, with tan lines where I had worn sunglasses.  Now, it could be that my in-laws were just ignorant of English weather in January and February, but they never remarked on this rather telling sign.

"He who is not sure of his memory should not undertake the trade of lying" - Montaigne

In fact, they never test me or my wife, ever.  I suspect they know, at least sometimes, when my wife lies to them to avoid conflict in such cases, but I am convinced that they don't really care.  The above quote is simply not relevant to me.  Goldfish can get away with lying in most situations in South Korea.

When it comes to my job, I have also had circumstances where being honest has become incredibly difficult.  Duty and being part of the group are very important factors in Korean culture and this holds particular relevance at work.  One of my personal bug-bears with Korean culture is the forced participation and enjoyment of workplace functions and activities.  I think it is particularly troublesome for women, but I have found it rubs me up the wrong way also.  Obligatory attendance at staff dinners and outings (and the forced drinking that results) are things that I am sure many Koreans hate about their culture, especially as they have to pay for them.  On paper they are not mandatory, but everyone knows the consequences for not joining in, which include ostracism at work, a generally harder time at work, and even bullying and the loss of a job or promotion opportunities.  The whole thing is one huge mess of dishonesty; younger, lower-ranked workers never want to participate, yet say they do and all the older, higher-ranked workers know the younger ones don't want to join them, but make them do it anyway.  They are lies the culture necessitates and that everyone accepts.

A special case of this occurred with me at around the time leading-up to my school's yearly festival, often quite a big deal in Korea.  It was the time of Gangnam Style's height of popularity and so it was decided that some of the younger teachers would do a Gangnam Style dance routine as a performance.  Most of the younger Korean teachers had been practicing for about 3 weeks before I was finally asked if I wanted to join in.  After replying that it wasn't really my cup of tea in as polite a manner as I could, several times, I was cajoled into going to a practice session.  The reality of it was they were demanding that I'd be in the centre of the performance and practice "diligently" (as they like to say) outside of my school hours to get up to speed with the rest of them.  The routine was also devilishly complicated for a slightly reserved Englishman with two left feet.  On top of it all, I had really grown a special hatred for that song because of the Korean obsession with it at the time and the amount it had been played.

Needless to say then, I refused to join in with the rest of them and no matter how many times I said this, "no" was simply not an answer they were willing to accept.  I was beginning to think I should have lied, like I had a bad knee or something, I think I would have only needed to say this once and then they would've eased-off and I would have heard nothing more about it.  Instead, though, I was hounded and told in the end that it was my obligation to do it.  With my heckles raised at this point, I tried very hard not to get angry and calmly disagreed.  I eventually had to sneak out of the school when they were not looking to get out of one more practice session, which they were going to physically drag me into doing.  I actually had to craftily tip-toe my way out of the door, can you believe it, no honesty was going to get me out of this mess.

The result of this was the cold shoulder treatment for a month or so and the implicit suggestion that they might not renew my contract for the next year.  If I had lied, my life would have been a hell of a lot easier and they would have liked me more.

On a smaller and more regular scale, one of the teachers I truly like at my school often takes me out for lunch every week.  While I appreciate this, I become a little uncomfortable because he always pays and I am saving for emigrating to Australia, so I cannot return the favour.  He is still happy to pay, but I really feel as though I am in his debt.  I also really enjoy the lunches at my school and this doesn't eat-up my entire lunchtime, like it does when I go out for lunch with him.  I wish we could just have lunch together in the school canteen.  In Korean culture, though, I just don't think being honest with him is feasible without causing a fair bit of offence.  At the time of writing, I just refused the offer of a biscuit from the admin lady in my office and her reaction was as if I had just ran over her dog or something, she looked genuinely upset.  I should have lied about wanting the biscuit and just hid it under some papers on my desk if I didn't want to eat it.

I'm not saying I never lie or that I am perfect, but I do try and live my life as honestly as I possibly can and I can remember past lies that came back to bite me when I was found out.  Having to remember all one's untruths is also a hassle I could really do without.  Along with the practical reasons for not lying, I feel a pang of guilt surging through me that makes me extremely uncomfortable when I do lie, so I still don't do it very much, even in Korea.  I do often let others do the lying for me though in Korea, and this is especially relevant with my wife and her parents.

In Western society too, being honest can hurt you, and I think Sam Harris brought-up the examples of people who exaggerate their CVs (resumes) having an advantage in employment over those who are honest and write a true CV.  However, I strongly feel that honesty is far more valued in Western countries, and if you are discovered to be lying this is deplored far more than in Korea at least, and possibly Far Eastern culture generally.  I also think people in Western countries are more interested in exposing liars and this holds especially true for parents and their children.

With this in mind then, while I agree whole-heartedly with Sam Harris about an honest world being a better one and a honest life being better for the individual, I must say that I think it depends.

I think Korean society would certainly be a better one if people lied less, just like Western society would be, but for the individual I am left scratching my head a little as to the best answer.  When it comes to our everyday lives, I think it is much easier to be honest in Western culture and that the fruits of the labour of being honest can be enjoyed fairly swiftly.  In a respect-based culture like Korea, on the other hand, I am more sceptical; honesty in this culture can cause real problems, not just in getting ahead in matters to do with work, but also in relationships generally.  For the benefits of not lying to show themselves to the individual, the whole culture would have to change, but I don't think this is the case in the West.

Freedom of Speech Threatened by Cultural Etiquette and Sensitivity

Last week, I wrote the longest post ever in reply to Ask a Korean's post on plane crashes and culturalism.  I felt compelled to do it because it touched a nerve with me.  You see, if there is one thing I cannot abide it is branding anyone who has honest concerns about aspects of another culture as a racist.  Now Ask a Korean didn't quite say this, but he did label Malcolm Gladwell's cockpit theory as "culturalism" and made pains to frequently compare this to racism.  He even went so far to say that Malcolm Gladwell was likely motivated by culturalism in a reply to me, as if he can really know what goes on inside his mind.

There was a message to the Korean's post, and this was that nobody should make generalisations or judgements about another culture, especially if they turn out to be negative, derogatory, or possibly offensive without the most thorough intellectual rigour and study.  Let's try and think about this for one second; is this lofty goal actually possible?  No, it isn't.  There is always going to be an internal dialogue going on inside people's heads; they will always be weighing up situations they find themselves in and trying to find reasons for other's behaviour.  Sometimes the way people behave will be purely down to their own personality or their own personal upbringing or DNA, but many times it will because of where they were brought-up in the world.  If we judge their behaviour to be down to their culture we can often be wrong, but we can almost equally often be right.

So, if we can't stop this inner-voice, we can at least make it difficult for people to write books and make it socially unacceptable for people to bring-up cultural explanations for sensitive topics in conversation.  We can punish them with name-calling, social ostracism, or make it impossible for them ever to get their book published or read.  Hang on a minute, this is starting to sound a bit scary; weren't we warned about all this by George Orwell in 1984?

It has become a poisonous theme in conversation in recent history that any controversial viewpoint about a group of people of any kind is quickly labeled as a racist, bigoted, or prejudiced one.  It is a conversation-ender because it puts the other person immediately on the defensive as they are desperate not to be known as a racist.

To be a racist has rightly become one of the most socially unacceptable things to be in modern times in the West, yet despite this racism is still rife in the West, we haven't put that dog down just yet.  The main reason for this is that human beings are naturally tribal.  We affiliate ourselves with a tribe and any outside of this can be treated with less consideration.  If someone's skin colour is different, it is as good a sign as any that they lie outside of our tribe.  There is, of course absolutely no reason why we should treat others differently only because they have different colour skin, but it has taken hundreds of years of argument and science to figure this out.  Now we know the truth; there is no reason to suspect the colour of someone's skin makes them behave any differently, whether it be morally, intellectually or in any other way.

People should be afraid of spouting racist nonsense, not just because of the social stigma attached to it, but because of the ridicule they receive from people who know they have no reason for it other than ignorance and prejudice.

Culture, however, is profoundly dissimilar to race.  The difference is so significant that I believe one should never make the comparison between racism and culturalism.  Our culture really can determine our individual personality, values, and behaviour.  If you doubt this, just step outside your door and travel; it need not be to the other side of the world, you can just visit your local Muslim, Hindu, Asian or African community (if you live in the West) and see if they generally go about things in a different way than you.  I bet that most of them do.

Of course, no one denies that culture can cause differences, but this is only stated when the differences are benign or simply matters of curiosity.  When these differences are judged right or wrong, good or bad, however, then we run into trouble; this, it seems, we cannot do and because who are we to judge what is right or wrong?  And do we judge right and wrong based on our own culture?  It all appears so relative, but it really need not be.  I believe there really are right and wrong answers to such questions that are objective, which sit outside of cultural relativism that can be sorted out, but only by sharing ideas and talking about them, regardless of any offence that might be caused.

There is another key difference between culture and race and it has to do with the ownership of it.  I cannot disown or deny my race; I will always be White-British.  I can, however, disown my culture or at least aspects of my culture.  Granted, this is difficult to do, but it is certainly possible.  Given that culture is about thoughts and ways of living, this therefore gives me the right to be treated as an individual and not judged as thinking how every other British person thinks.  I can accept or reject different parts of my own culture and others to varying degrees.  This means that everyone anywhere should be judged on how they act and what they say not by their culture as a whole.

Culture, however, can throw-up patterns that are difficult to ignore.  In the Western world, where we are taught that everyone is an individual and it is immoral to think otherwise, we have gone too far and are preventing ourselves from seeing meaningful commonalities in the way groups of people behave.  Generalising is not always a bad thing and, in fact, it is essential to actually finding out what is true in the world.  Scientists generalise and hypothesise about patterns all the time.  Think of a scatter-graph of data that reveals a trend; aren't there almost always anomalies that sit outside of the trend?  Does this mean that any judgement we make on the results is unjustified?

As long as we are all willing to be wrong and change our minds and not treat individuals with prejudice and discrimination based on what we think about their culture, then there is absolutely nothing wrong with making generalisations and having your own opinion about matters.

As a matter of fact, I get pretty offended by those who tell me I'm a racist for giving my opinion about an aspect of someone else's culture (and I have been called this name more than once), who the hell are they to advise me on what I can and can't say and then slander me with unjustified names?  So, just for the sake of it, let's make some generalisations about British and Korean culture, simply because I have the right to (some statements will be comparative):

Korean Culture (negative)

1. Most Koreans are too hierarchical
2. The general level of manners in Korea is not as good as back home in England
3. What the hell is going on with their use of air-conditioning?
4. I find Korean students less creative and less able to think for themselves.
5. I generally find there is less empathy in Korean people when someone or something sits outside of a recognised group, such as the family, the business, or friends.
6. Following on from the last point, standards of animal welfare and concern for animals seems less widespread.
7. Too many Korean people are too focused on their status, money, and how they look to others, sometimes above and beyond everything else.
8. Many Korean people have a nasty littering habit.
9. Xenophobic at times.
10. Often dangerous drivers.
11. Working conditions and worker's rights are poor (for Koreans and especially Korean women).

British Culture (negative)

1. Many British people have a terrible attitude to drinking and behave poorly when drunk.
2. Although general manners among the population are good, the worst of the worst are in large and growing numbers and are worse than in any other country I have visited or resided in.
3. British food is unhealthy and not especially delicious.
4. The British attitude towards food is generally poor and too many people are overweight and pass bad habits on to their children.
5. Many British are too focused on appearing "cool" and this is reinforced by the cultural trend on focusing on Britain as being a "cool" place, summed up by the ridiculous phrase "Cool Britannia".
6. Many British are too arrogant and snobby when it comes to our collective intellect.  This is shown by the stupidity and magnanimity of some British when we gleefully put down Americans as intellectually inferior.
7. Service, from all manner of businesses, in Britain is often mind-blowingly poor and regularly and flagrantly tries to fraud people.
8. Those that do have prejudice against others tend to be extremely outspoken, noisy, sometimes violent and threatening, and generally in your face about it, especially when drunk.
9. There are too many people who lack personal responsibility and are dependent on the state.

Korean Culture (Positive)

1. Food in Korea is varied, healthy, and delicious.
2. Many have prejudice against foreigners (which is understandable) but most do not express it in an especially in-your-face, violent, or threatening manner.
3. Service is usually very good.
4. Public transport is excellent.
5. Children are generally well behaved and respectful at school (compared tot he UK anyway).
6. There is less politically correct nonsense.
7. The people are more genuine than in the UK.
8. There is very little petty crime.

British Culture (Positive)

1. It is easier to be honest with people in disagreement and really understand each other.
2. You can be friends with older people.
3. In general, manners are good.
4. British tend to be kinder to animals and people they don't know.
5. Easier to be your own person and be accepted in Britain for your own personality.
6. Workers have more rights and are better treated.

These are simply my own personal opinions, of course, but I do think many of them have a great deal of truth to them.  My real point, however, is that as long as you treat everyone with equal respect and kindness and the benefit of the doubt of being their own person, what is wrong with having opinions about their certain parts of their culture or even their culture as a whole?  It really is a help to know what others think of your culture; it can help in changing the bad stuff and keeping the good stuff.

Actually, discovering truth, what is morally good and what works is the most important thing.  Making judgements about how other people live is one of the most important areas of life because it enables us to ask questions and delve further.  Sometimes our initial judgements will be wrong and other times they will be right, but we can never know until we form opinions and theories and put our minds together to discuss them.

We will never know about or discuss a subject until someone writes a book on it or speaks up about it.  Any attempt to silence them harms us all.  It is precisely the subjects that are controversial, offensive, and that differ to our own that we most need to hear.  This is the very principle of freedom of speech and why it is necessary now more than ever in such a globalised and inter-connected world where different cultures mingle like never before.

My final word has to do with lightening-up and having a sense of humour.  I have just added this paragraph due to a music video I saw this morning.  "Asian Girlz" by Day Above Ground is obviously just a silly song with plenty of satire about just about every classic Asian stereotype you can think of.  My ability to take the song too seriously was disabled in one of the first verses where the lead singer sings:

"I love your sticky rice... and fucking all night"

 As a man married to a Korean I should get upset, shouldn't I?  But only morons who already have these stereotypical views could ever take this music video seriously.  The rest of us with more than half a brain should realise that it is simply a bit of fun, designed to be a little controversial perhaps and get a reaction. And it has got one; I had never heard of the band until this morning.  This always happens when those offended try to ban things like this.  Banning free speech/expression is almost always counter-productive as a tactic anyway, as this quite clearly shows.

I guess you could say that the song and video are also not just culturalist, but racist.  He goes on to sing:

"I love your creamy yellow thighs... and your slanty eyes"

I don't see any particular harm in the aspects of the video related to race, though, most people have got upset by the cultural stereotyping present in it.  I would be open to the argument that the video was in bad taste, but I have seen more exploitation of women in almost every Hip Hop video I have seen and far worse messages in the lyrics.  I remember owning an Eminem album once where almost every song was about swearing, raping, abusing, assaulting and killing (and it was much less obvious he was being satirical).  An 18 certificate was slapped on it and that was that.  It is telling that a very mild song and video in comparison has caused such an uproar.  Want to ban all controversial, bad taste, or rude music, books and TV.  What a boring world we would live in.  I would gladly put up with the stupid stereotypes I receive sometimes when I am with my Korean wife to not live in a world like this.

If we can't have a laugh at each other and have a sense of humour about ourselves, what hope have we got of getting along?  You think banning this song is going to stop the genuine prejudice present in people?  You think not banning the song is really going to set us back fifty years in the public understanding of Asian women?  Fair enough it is not everyone's cup of tea, but if you don't like it don't watch it, it really is as simple as that.

Culturalism, Plane Crashes, and Ask a Korean's Error

Ask a Korean's blog gained even more popularity last week with an extremely widely-read post debunking Malcolm Gladwell's theory of Korean cockpit culture.  It was embraced by a world rightly keen to alleviate us all of prejudice and discrimination.  But do we really know that culture has little bearing on the mistakes and achievements we make?  Is appealing to culture simply a waste of time when there are so many better explanations?  Is seeking cultural explanations allied to racism?  Is "Culturalism" rife in the world and especially in the West?

Well, I happen to utterly disagree with Ask a Korean's ideas on culturalism, because as good an article as it was on examining the details of plane crashes, there was so much wrong with the rest of it that I had to write a lengthy response.  It seems nobody else has done it, so why not?

Malcolm Gladwell's response to Ask a Korean's article criticising his work and the Western media's "culturalism" in explaining Asiana's and other Korean air crashes, answered the post with regard to some of the actual research into the specific suspected causes of the accidents, although perhaps not wholly satisfactorily for many.  If you want to get in-depth into the air-crash investigations and to get as close as possible into what was going on in the cockpits of those aircraft before they crashed, I suggest you read his reply, Ask a Korean's reply to him, or better yet, buy his book.  I actually think Ask a Korean asked many pertinent questions about Gladwell's theory, but his post left me thinking of as many questions into his own theory of culturalism as he had of Gladwell's theory of cockpit culture.

On this blog, I have written quite extensively about how some aspects Korean culture can cause some negative connotations (and positive ones) in certain situations and have also provided some counter-examples about how Western culture and, more specifically, the culture of my own country (the UK) can do the same.  For this reason, I naturally stand rather against the whole argument he put forward in that post.

So, is it wrong to suggest that the quite strictly hierarchical status aspect of Korean culture had something to do with the crash?  I don't think so and to call this out as "culturalism" is damaging, and here's why.

Perhaps the true cause of the Asiana crash will come to pass and it has nothing to do with poor communication for cultural reasons, but as a feasible theory for the crash it seems logical to consider it a possibility.  I wrote about this in a previous post on 'The Perils of Respect Culture', where I highlighted a couple of my own experiences, those of my wife and her friends, and a piece in the Wall Street Journal, which basically summarised some of Gladwell's work.  The article in the Wall Street Journal was referring to some of the problems in business of the respect culture hierarchy in Korea.  Those of us who live and work in South Korea surely must notice the communication issues that take place in our jobs.  In my own experience, concerns over how to communicate with elders or people in senior positions is of major importance in my boys high school.  It can cause major issues in clarity and honesty when it comes to disclosing problems and is an extremely relevant factor in the efficiency of running the school.

I have always seen this aspect of Korean culture as a bit flawed.  Honest communication can be a difficult thing to come by in Korea if it means possibly causing offence to or even questioning the judgement in any way to someone of higher rank or age.  Age is the most important factor and Ask a Korean is dead right in writing the following, although he failed to mention that a higher position usually does come with age, sometimes regardless of ability and that this is an ongoing problem in Korean businesses and is the cause of a great deal of age discrimination.  The discrimination occurs because employers do not want to hire older people for lower positions down to the discomfort it might cause with younger employees of higher position. This is not always the case, but this discomfort experienced from younger employees telling elders what to do is very real and is hinted at in the following quote from the article:

If you think that a Korean person in a professional setting would show any disrespect to a person who is 14 years older just because he slightly outranks the other, you know absolutely nothing about Korean culture.

I know all this better than most because of dealing with my wife's family (she is Korean, in case this is your first time reading this blog).  Questioning my in-law's decisions is not really an option for me, at least not directly.  My wife and I have to form subtle strategies of persuasion or out and out lying to get around not agreeing with their plans for us.  This is not simply my in-law's personality, it is a cultural norm and if it is their own personality, it has been highly influenced by culture, anyway.  It is no coincidence that my in-laws and I have almost completely differing opinions and values.  I have hardly met anyone with parents in Korea where avoiding a rather direct form of communication in disagreement is not the case.  There will be exceptions, of course, but they are very exceptional.  Ask a Korean must surely accept this point, he is a Korean after all, he must be aware of the etiquette in conversing and dealing with elders in Korea.

If he and the rest of you do accept this point, how on earth the possibility of a breakdown in honest communication on cultural grounds cannot be considered to be a factor in a plane crash - which seems to be nothing to do with a mechanical fault - appears, at best, to be an over-sight and at worst a dangerous lack of consideration, particularly with the recordings of conversations in the cockpit sounding so ambiguous. The next thing to note is that this could indeed happen between people from any culture, but the important question is whether it is more likely to happen in Korean culture.  I cannot believe that anyone with experience of living and working in Korea would say that it is just as likely as anywhere else.

Another area of agreement I have with Ask a Korean is the issue of the language used:

90 percent of the conversation among the three pilots is in English.

Seems to me that cultural norms can be maintained whatever language you are speaking (you can be indirect, overly-polite, and even unclear in English as well as Korean), but then something puzzled me when he then tried to explain the language used in the Guam air-crash, which seemed to actually counter his own argument. I will use the two examples below from the article:

[W]hen the first officer says: "Don't you think it rains more? In this area, here?" we know what he means by that:Captain. You have committed us to visual approach, with no backup plan, and the weather outside is terrible. You think we will break out of the clouds in time to see the runway. But what if we don't? It's pitch-black outside and pouring rain and the glide scope is down.

 "Captain, the weather radar has helped us a lot," he says.

The weather radar has helped us a lot? A second hint from the flight deck. What the engineer means is just what the first officer meant. This isn't a night where you can rely on just your eyes to land the plane. Look at what the weather radar is telling us: there's trouble ahead.

These two examples confuse me entirely and I agree with Ask a Korean that the interpretations by Gladwell are ludicrous.  Are we to take his word for it that "we know what he means by that...." and "What the engineer means...."  How on earth does he know what they meant and how it was received?  I don't even think the full transcript of the conversation makes things any clearer.

CAPTAIN: 어... 정말로... 졸려서... (불분명) [eh... really... sleepy... (unintelligible words)]
FIRST OFFICER: 그럼요 [Of course]
FIRST OFFICER: 괌이 안 좋네요 기장님 [Captain, Guam condition is no good]
FIRST OFFICER: Two nine eighty-six
CAPTAIN: 야! 비가 많이 온다 [Uh, it rains a lot]
CAPTAIN: (unintelligible words)
CAPTAIN: 가다가 이쯤에서 한 20 마일 요청해 [Request twenty miles deviation later on]
FIRST OFFICER: 네 [yes]
CAPTAIN: ... 내려가면서 좌측으로 [... to the left as we are descending]
(UNCLEAR SPEAKER): (chuckling, unintelligible words)
FIRST OFFICER: 더 오는 것같죠? 이 안에. [Don't you think it rains more? In this area, here?]

As a non-Korean I wasn't sure that Koreans would indeed read into what was being said in this way, so I asked my wife about it (who is Korean).  She was not so sure and commented that it very much depended on the personality of the pilot.  She agreed with me, though, that the language was not especially clear; their meanings could be interpreted in different ways.  It appears as if Gladwell is generalising a point about all Koreans and how they would receive information because it suits his argument.  The curious thing, however, it that this would suit Ask a Korean's argument too, if all Koreans knew that these rather unclear statements were actually grave warnings.  Bizarrely, however, if you did make a sweeping assumption that all Koreans took this use of language as a definite and strong warning it would go against Gladwell's "cockpit culture" theory.  The fact that they could easily be interpreted differently actually suits Gladwell's argument that the language used was unclear, unsafe, and possibly overly respectful to the pilot.  Later on in his post Ask a Korean goes on to rightly criticise others for not treating people as individuals, as follows:

And here, we come to the greatest harm that culturalism causes: like racism, culturalism destroys individual agency. Under culturalism, a huge group of individuals are rendered into a homogeneous mass of automatons, eternally condemned to repeat the same mistakes. We still don't know what exactly caused the Asiana crash. But it is hardly outlandish to think that it was a simple human error. To err is human, as they say--but culturalist explanation robs Korean pilots of this basic humanity. Because of our culturalist impulse, a Korean pilot cannot even make a mistake without tarnishing all other Korean pilots.

To me, my wife hit the nail on the head with her response, "it depends on their personality."  She is damned right, of course, but she also has had experience of many communication problems based on hierarchical status culture when she worked as a nurse in Korea.  She said to me that she often could not speak honestly with elder co-workers of higher position and that this caused a significant amount of friction between them all as a working team and it could seriously be deemed as a possibility for the near death of the patient at her hospital that I mentioned in my post "The Perils of Respect Culture."  So, what should be noted is that although everyone is an individual who can make mistakes, no matter where they are from, there are aspects of some cultures that cause patterns of behaviour that make certain mistakes more likely within these individuals.  Considering both explanations is the key; one should not dismiss either.

Alarm bells started to ring in my head when the post then turned into a comparison of racism and culturalism:

Like racism, culturalism puts a large group of people beyond rational understanding.

Like racism, culturalism distracts away from asking more meaningful questions, and obscures pertinent facts.

like racism, culturalism destroys individual agency.

I think he has a point that a type of prejudice can exist that can provide over-simplified answers to certain behaviours, but I am not sure it really relates to this situation.  Although I think there will be some individuals who will use Gladwell's hypothesis for this means.  There is an easy remedy to it, however, and that is to say that culture can have a large effect on people's behaviour and personality (which it surely does) but at the end of the day we shouldn't forget that people are individuals who are capable of their own mistakes, their own evils, and their own kindnesses and good points.  Again, it seems to me that you can accept cultural explanations without putting people, "beyond rational understanding", by doing this.  To regularly compare using cultural explanations for behaviour to racism is damaging to free speech and is most of all untrue.  Race explanations for behaviour have mostly been debunked by science and if there were any decent reasons to suspect that race made people significantly different, what could one do about it, considering they can't change their genes?  Culture is learned behaviour, ideas, and thinking that is not innate; importantly it can be changed in people alive today and for future generations.  Ways of doing things and living within a culture should be subject to exactly the same scrutiny as any other ideas.

Call me a culturalist or even make the mistake of turning this into racist, if you like, but all this is perhaps a result of the interminably politically correct age in which we live in.  Culture really matters; it really can determine the ways in which we act as individuals, for the good or for the ill.  There are aspects of all cultures that are mistaken, annoying, dangerous, and also wonderful.  Criticising or even condemning one aspect of a culture is not an attack on the whole.  Coming-up with an entirely plausible theory (based on actual aircraft investigations and interviews) established on an aspect of another country's culture is not anything other than trying to discover the truth, which in the end might save lives.  Calling it "cultutralism" and drawing comparisons to racism is entirely wrong.

To be fair, he did mention this in his post:

This post is not to say that a culture is immune from criticism.

However, he went on further to say:

Rather, this is to critique the way in which we deploy the cultural criticism. If we recognize that culturalism is ridiculous in the context of two bad shots by two golfers who happen to be from the same country, why do we fail to recognize the same when it comes to two plane crashes involving two airlines that happen to operate out of the same country? If we think it is valid to wonder if Korean culture factors into this plane crash, why were we never beset with the same curiosity about the French culture in the last plane crash? If it is so obvious to us that we would not sacrifice our lives, and the lives of hundreds of others, for the sake of good manners, why do we so easily believe that other people will readily throw away their lives for the same reason?

Firstly, one should not think that Korean pilots have it in their minds that they could be knowingly endangering people's lives for the sake of manners.  If it is the case that the cultural explanation is indeed the correct one, there surely is no way they are saying to themselves, "what is more important; manners or saving people's lives?" Cultural behaviours often occur unconsciously, so there is no conscious dialogue and reasoning of the sort that is suggested here.

There are also a number of comparisons here that need to be examined further; first the golfers.  In the case of pilot miscommunication there is a reasonable cultural hypothesis as to why it could happen (hierarchical status culture), is there the same for golf? Unlikely, but actually, I could envisage a situation where there could be. The individual focus of Western culture means that it is more likely that a high regard is placed on self-reliance and Westerners are brought up to be self-confident and even sometimes arrogant compared to Easterners (there again will be many exceptions down to the fact people are individuals). Arrogance is a common complaint I here about Westerners from Korean people.  Far Easterners are not brought-up in the same way and tend to be more reliant on others (again with exceptions).  Now let's imagine a par five with a water hazard in-front of the green.  Two Canadians go for broke and try and reach in two and both fail, dumping their second shots into the water and making a bogey.  They took a chance because they were confident in their ability, maybe even thought too highly of themselves and were guilty of over-confidence. Conversely, two South Korean golfers play the same hole, but choose to lay-up short of the water on their second shots, pitch over the water and make birdies because they were less confident in their own ability, maybe even less deluded.  You can also switch this around and say that the Canadian golfers believed in themselves, took a chance and it paid off and they both made eagles, it doesn't matter.

Now, I hear you say that this is ridiculous and obviously highly speculative, but this is plausible.  Perhaps golfing statistics on certain holes on certain courses in major championships might prove this point true or not. Indeed it would be an interesting sports psychology study to see if Western golfers take on more risky shots than Asian golfers.  My point is, though, that a cultural explanation for two golfers of the same country making similar mistakes is not entirely out of the realms of possibilities and that this anecdotal evidence could lead to further study.  This is how science works; we create hypotheses often thought-up from anecdotal observations and test them to see if they are right.  Whether these speculative observations are right or wrong doesn't matter, they are needed to forward our knowledge.  An experiment that proves an hypothesis wrong is just as important as one that proves it right.  If you are reading and are thinking that it is offensive to form such an idea about golfers from different countries, perhaps you should really ask yourself why.  All I am saying is that there could be a difference in the way people from opposite sides of the world, with opposing cultural values, view a given situation and act accordingly, with plenty of room for the fact there might be no difference between them whatsoever.

The next comparison he makes is more directly related to the topic, and that is of French pilots.  Why don't we question culture when they have an accident?  Again you have to find a link between the French culture and the possibility of communication problems or other types of problems in the cockpit, which I am not so sure is as obvious as in Korean culture.  But again, for the sake of argument, let's choose the old chestnut of the French being arrogant. If recordings of cockpit conversations before the crash picked-up a cocky and arrogant captain, we would indeed have cause to question the culture as well as him/her personally.  Again, you should not discount either theory straight-away; individual error alone or individual error based on culture.  Imagine a conversation a long these lines:

First Officer: Captain, Guam condition is no good.
Captain: I have landed this plane a hundred times at this airport, this is no problem.  I can do it.
First Officer: Captain, the weather radar has helped us a lot.  Don't try and land the plane just relying on your eyes, there is trouble ahead.
Captain: Do you know who you are speaking to?  I am Jean-Baptiste Levere, I am the best pilot in all of France!

As a result, there would be plenty of people saying things like, "typical arrogant French, the reason for the crash is their culture."  We could dismiss most of it as stereotyping and prejudice, but it would be negligent not to follow-up on possible signs of over-confidence in French pilots and ways they could stop this happening, especially if there was more than one crash where arrogance was a suspected cause.  The cultural explanation must be considered a possibility.  If you don't explore this as a possible cause, you run the risk of more accidents and more deaths.  To my knowledge, however, this does not seem to be an issue in French aviation.

Again, to be fair, Ask a Korean covers this also:

Sure, I suppose culture plays a role in every part of our lives, so it may be valid to ask whether Korean culture played some role in the Asiana crash. It may also be valid to watch two Canadian golfers hit a bad shot in two different occasions in a golf tournament, and wonder aloud whether Canadian culture played a role in those occasions. However, we do have to think about the quality of that question. If entertaining that question seriously wastes time and distracts from asking the more realistic and pertinent questions, the question is not worth thinking about.

To this I would say a few things; how do you know whether the question being asked is a quality one before you hear it?  How do you know you haven't missed something without considering it carefully?  In the case of the Asiana crash, like he says, we might have to wait a whole year before we really know what happened and we are still highly unsure as to the cause.  Does the cultural explanation really waste precious time (we have a whole year)?  And do you think that the air crash investigators are so distracted by this argument that they will not explore every possible reason for the plane crashing?  Is the question really not worth thinking about?  I think that would be a dangerous assumption.

Another thing:

It is not a coincidence that a culturalist explanation runs especially rampant with anything involving Asia. When a massive tsunami, followed by the Fukushima disaster, struck Japan last year, one could not take two (metaphorical) steps in the Internet without coming across a grand explanation about how Japanese culture contributed to the nuclear meltdown, or how Japanese culture enabled the Japanese to respond to the disaster with resolve. Yet no similar analysis ever emerged about American culture or British culture when the BP oil spill--one of the most catastrophic environmental disasters--occurred in the Gulf of Mexico. The supposedly earnest questions about Korean culture and Asiana crash are cropping up now, but when the Air France plane crashed in 2009, killing 216 passengers, nobody even wondered about the connection between the French culture and Air France crash. Why? Because Americans and Europeans are always accorded with the privilege of being treated as individuals, while Asians remain a great undifferentiated mass, unknown and unknowable.

Is it just me or does this more than hint that it is mainly Westerners that attribute cultural explanations for the behaviour of groups of people, especially in Asia?  Perhaps Ask a Korean is wearing blinkers to the Eastern arguments of Western culturally caused problems.  How many times have I heard since living in Korea arguments like: "It's Western food culture that is making Koreans fatter"; "It's Western capitalism and their culture of individualism and selfish personal gain that is making Koreans unhappy"; "It is Western culture's more liberal attitude to sex that means they sleep around more, which makes them so dangerous to Korean women and spreads HIV"; "Westerners are arrogant, selfish and value their freedom too much and this is why they behave badly when drunk."  I am also pretty damn sure I did here a cultural explanation for the BP oil spill in the Western media (Google "Capitalism and the BP oil disaster").  It wasn't specifically about British culture, but about capitalism (began and promulgated by the West) generally breeding selfish money-grabbers who cut corners on safety to earn more money.

So, you can see, Asians do it to Westerners too and in most cases I agree with them.  Western capitalism is probably having an effect on happiness in Asia, Western food culture might well be making Asians fatter (makes you wonder why many Koreans and Asians generally embrace them both so much though) and the values of individualism and personal freedom may make Westerners more licentious drunks and drug takers. At least these possibilities are worth considering.  We in our respective countries need to look at these criticisms of our culture coming from overseas and decide whether they have a point, not blow it off as culturalism that is allied to racism.

I have used the example of British drinking culture many times as a like for like negative example on this blog and will do it again.  If you think the behaviour of Brits abroad on drink and drug-filled beaches in South East Asia and indeed in their own hometowns has nothing to do with culture, I would wonder what planet you're living on.  (Note: There are a great many issues in Far East and South East Asian countries when it comes to drink and drugs and their own cultures create different and often equally detrimental effects that aren't quite as obvious, which I won't go into here.)

Specifically licentious, disrespectful, irresponsible, and boorish behaviour in this way is shared by many other Western country's people, not just the British, and could be the troublesome side-effect of a cultural likeness between us that values freedom, individuality, and happiness over almost all things.  These people often make the mistake of turning freedom into licentiousness and the right to be stupid and replacing genuine contentment and happiness into a short-term high induced by drugs, alcohol, and sex (in moderation none of these three need be a bad thing).  It is not freedom or happiness how it should be, but it occurs nonetheless and it is not only the brainless, poor or uneducated that do it.  Many a bright, intelligent university student can be found in a pool of their own vomit (I was one of them once, although not that intelligent), in a drugged-up stupor, in a drunken fight, or ruining the beautiful surroundings of a once idyllic island in Thailand at a full moon party. This must be acknowledged as a cultural problem, which it is by those in Asia and the Middle-East and most of us agree with them (one of the main reasons for Westerners converting to Islam has been suggested to be the perceived shallow and licentious nature of Western culture and the push-back to it). Why can't we do the same for other countries as we do for our own?  Cultural explanations for things such as alcohol and drug tourism, anti-social behaviour, and plane crashes must be part of the discussion and we should not be so sensitive about it.

There is no doubt that Ask a Korean's article was a well-researched and interesting one and he has a case against Gladwell, but I get a bee in my bonnet about any attempt to restrict the free flow of ideas and freedom of speech.  I know this was not intended, but the use of an "ism" in such a way is always a red flag to me.  It tends to insinuate an action of unfairness and prejudice, which in turn has the effect of silencing ideas that could be deemed too controversial or a waste of time.  Malcolm Gladwell used research and some knowledge of Korean culture to bring forth a highly reasonable theory into the plane crashes of some Korean airliners and there is nothing wrong with this, even if his analysis is utterly false (although I am not entirely convinced it is).   It is perfectly reasonable, of course, to site the reasons he may be wrong, like Ask a Korean did, but calling it "culturalism" and comparing it to racism is unhelpful and damaging to future dialogue between us all.  Why should Koreans be so offended for highlighting one aspect of their culture that could cause harm in certain situations? They should welcome it, so they could address it and identify if there really is a problem and, if so, change it.  And Westerners and people from other parts of the world should be able to do exactly the same.

The irony of it all is that it could be the West's concentration on the individual, personal freedom and responsibility, and its history of issues regarding racism that has shaped a culture so unwilling to admit that a the collective consciousness called "culture" can be a factor in determining many of the reasons why people behave in the ways they do.  Indeed the amazing popularity of Ask a Korean's post is evidence that people are very open to this way of thinking.  If we all don't get over this and continue the taboo of criticising culture (which I think Ask a Korean's post promotes), the truth will be hidden from us and we will all have to endure walking on glass in our dealings with other people from around the world, where a good cultural explanation exists, yet we can't say it for fear of being labeled a "culturalist" or racist.  This has the added effect of keeping prejudices silent yet ever present in people's minds; repressed and inhibited with the chance of exploding, instead of remedied.  Surely a cure for a disease is preferable to simply enabling people to cope with the suffering of it or giving it a chance to mutate into something much worse.

Prejudice does exist about different cultures, but it is not going to go away if we don't take each claim as it comes and dismiss it or confirm it through reason and evidence.  One of the big reasons why racist attitudes are slowly decreasing and maligned is the evidence from biology.  We now know that we all descended from Africa, we know for a fact there are no differences in intelligence; that it can vary in different people of different races, and we know for a fact we all react emotionally and feel pain in much the same way. Evidence puts all this beyond reasonable doubt and leaves the racists nowhere to go to make their arguments justified.  For this reason we need to put the same theories into practice to people who hold prejudices about culture.  Labeling ideas as "culturalism" that are a sign of prejudice or are a waste of time to talk about will not achieve this goal, as those who have potentially culturalist views will simply be shut up.  Silenced, yes, but they will still hold these views and from what I can see in the world, large numbers of people are just like this. There is a better way forward to understanding each other and reducing prejudice in the world.

Sources:

http://www.koreaherald.com/view.php?ud=20120327000944
http://www.humanrightskorea.org/2012/age-discrimination-rigid-obstacle-to-employment/
http://askakorean.blogspot.kr/2013/07/culturalism-gladwell-and-airplane.html
http://askakorean.blogspot.kr/2013/07/my-thoughts-on-gladwells-response.html
http://askakorean.blogspot.kr/2013/07/malcolm-gladwells-reponse-to.html
http://smudgem.blogspot.kr/2013/01/the-perils-of-respect-culture.html
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10000872396390443624204578057550057990388.html
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB933090613281869060-search.html
http://www.guardian.co.uk/theguardian/2010/jun/19/naomi-klein-gulf-oil-spill
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-12075931