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Japanese still tend to like Koreans, but the feeling is not mutual

The Chosun Ilbo reports a poll has found that despite some recent tensions between Japan and Korea, those in Japan who feel unfriendly towards Koreans are still a minority:

Most South Koreans feel unfriendly toward Japan with 62 percent, far outnumbering those who do, a poll finds. But 50 percent of Japanese feel friendly toward Koreans, as against 41 percent who do not.

The figures are down from a poll conducted in the wake of the 2002 World Cup in the two countries, the proportion of Koreans who felt friendly toward Japan was 42 percent, and that of Japanese who felt friendly toward Koreans was 77 percent. That can probably be traced to recurring disagreements over Korea’s Dokdo islets, which Japan is trying to claim.

“Japanese who were less interested in Korea in the past were adversely affected in the past one or two years as the media touched on the issue much more often,” said Prof. Lee Won-duk at Kookmin University. “Nonetheless, about half of the Japanese, influenced by the Korean Wave or Hallyu, feel friendly toward Korea.”

The survey also found that younger people in both countries held friendlier feelings, so there might be some hope for the future….

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33 comments - What do you think? Posted by James - January 3, 2009 at 6:45 am

Categories: Anti-Japan, Politics Tags:

Kenny

Its not very surprising that the younger people have friendlier feelings. The problem is that the older people in Korea despise the Japanese. I’ve met plenty of younger Koreans that harbor no hate towards the Japanese. And with the “Korean Wave” in Japan many more young people are embracing the Korea culture.
momonga

I have a Mp (minipi) at tha Japanese Cyworld, and every day on their message board I see at least 10 new messages like ” I’m Korean student, I like Japan and I want to make Japanese friends”. Many Koreans (young) make MPs there to communicate with young Japanese, and make about 20-30 Japanese friends at least.They discuss different issues of Japanese culture, ask questions about the language, and the unfriendly feelings between the older generations concerning Dokdo or other issues are a tabooed topic.
Another thing I can say is that there are many people from other nations(Chinese, Taiwanese, Americans), but most give up due to the very low trafic(=poor interest and not very friendly feelings) on their MP’s. The only popular foreigner is an Ukrainian girl, who posts rather “bold” photos of herself.I have Korean friends who come to my MP, but otherwise, especially Japanese are rather cold and unfriendly.

Feh

Ukrainian girl, eh? This is relevant to my interests.

ponta

especially Japanese are rather cold and unfriendly.

That’s exactly the way many of (anti-Japan tilted) Korean people say about Japanese.

http://www.victorymanual.com Alex

Unfortunately, on the internet – It’s typically true. Japanese are very uptight about “internet privacy” (from my standpoint), and there is evidence in conducted questionnaires that Japanese are hesitant to write about personal things on the internet or comment on other people’s blogs. For example, if a stranger wants to befriend someone on Mixi, it’s not unheard of that the person gets flagged for “harassment”.

ponta

I think it’s reasonable to be hesitant to write about your privacy on the Internet, but it does not mean people don’t write about personal things;there are a lot of blogs devoted to it. It is just that people are not interested in anonymous’ private matter.And it might be true how people express friendship differ from culture to culture.
But we are taking about how Japanese and Korean people feel towards each other.
The article says “Japanese Feel Friendlier toward Koreans than Vice Versa”
And momonga observes

Many Koreans (young) make MPs there to communicate with young Japanese, and make about 20-30 Japanese friends at least.

And yet the same person claims,

especially Japanese are rather cold and unfriendly.

I find it difficult to understand the comment that Japanese are cold and unfriendly after observing the fact 20-30 Japanese made friends with a Korean person.

momonga

Japanese are cond and unfriendly to ME.
Ponta, you need a LOT of work on your reading comprehension!

weirdo

I think his reading comprehension is fine, you never specified, making it sound like a blanket statement.
ponta

So in your opinion, Japanese are friendly to a Korean person on your Mp at the Japanese Cyworld but they are “rather cold and unfriendly ” to YOU. I wonder why.

I think rather than blaming my English ability, you need to check your complex attitudes toward Japan and Japanese.

Joey

I’ve always found it interesting that this site constantly posts information regarding anti-Japan, anti-China or anti-Korea news stories. These news stories are not hugely important nor truly reflective of the relationship between these East Asian countries.

What do you hope to accomplish with news stories like this? It very much seems like you’re just stirring the pot.

Give it a break already.

SG

It’s a current, relevant problem/set of issues worthy of discussion. I don’t see a problem with it if the posts are written evenhandedly.

And the site posts enough items about positive, and thus unassuming, links in the region that I don’t feel like they’re being inflammatory.

What’s wrong with stirring the pot? It keeps the soup from getting burned. Just as long as you don’t throw the pot at anyone else’s head…
Buster

Short answer: content + traffic.

ミグ

Japanese people are indeed cold and unfriendly – on the internet. I have quite a long and shameful history with them. I’ve never been to Japan nor met any Japanese in person, so I would leave it at that.
Matt

I can’t believe that Japan and Korea are fighting over two rocks in the ocean. Do they hold any spiritual significance to either country or is it just territorial? I mean, they look pretty worthless.
Dr.Yu

For God’s sake, Korea was colonized by Japan years ago. How do you expect koreans to feel sympathy for japanese people with such a historiycal backgroud between the two countries? Please don’t misunderstand me I’m not bashing Japan here, just trying to show that there is a logical reason why Koreans tend to dislike japan.

SG

Most of us understand this, but I would question how “logical”, as you put it, blind and irrational hate is *anywhere*.

Dr.Yu

I didn’t say hating is logical, I said that the reason why koreans dislike japanese is logical. Are you familiar with the conpcept “cause and effect”?

ponta

Those Koreans who lived under the colonial times say,

Interview after interview began with sentences such as,”Nothing much happened to me. The Japanese people were not bad. We got along. It was the police that bothered us. I just stayed out of their way. .”（page 5 “Under the Black Umbrella”)

And many Koreans were committed to Japan during the colonial times.
In fact, more than 300000 young men volountarily applied for the Japanese army in the year when the population of Korea, men and women, the children and the old together, was about 2500000.

It might be because of post-colonial Korean nationalistic education that young people learn to express the hatred toward Japan.

Bruce Cumings　says:

For Korean historians, the colonial period is both too painful and too saturated with resistance mythologies that cannot find verification in any archive. North Korea has concocted whole tapestries of events that exist only in the hagiography of Kim Il Sung..In the South one particular decade—that between 1935 and 1945—is an empty cupboard:millions of people used and abused by the Japanese cannot get records on what they know to have happened to them ,and thousands of Korean who worked with the Japanese have simply erased that history as if it had never happened. Even lists of officials in local genealogical repositories (country histories, for example) go blank on this period.page 139/Korea’s Place in the Sun by Bruce Cumings

A Korean man who lived through the colonial period says.

“I’ve overcome my hard feelings towards Japan. It’s often the younger people who are more hostile. They’ve been fed only the worst stories about the colonial period but they don’t know the reality the way we do.”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/3490835.stm

An expat observes:

Korean students are learning to Hate
http://english.ohmynews.com/articleview/article_view.asp?no=294782&rel_no=1

LB

Could have been worse, Korea could have become a Russian colony instead of a Japanese one (indeed they very nearly did become a Russian colony). If that had happened, they would have still been a colony well past 1945.

Korea in the late 19th and early 20th century was going to be made someone’s colony, there was no way around that. Too many prominent Koreans were pushing for more Russian influence or more Japanese influence for there to have been any other result. In the end, those who wanted to join Japan got their wish. Perhaps this is proof of “be careful what you wish for, you just might get it”.

Dr.Yu

“Most of us understand this, but I would question how “logical”, as you put it, blind and irrational hate is *anywhere*.”

I didn’t say hating is logical (but it could be depending on the case). I said the reason why koreans tend to dislike Japan is logical. Are you familiar with the concept “cause and effect”? You see? it is not blind neither irrational, it was provocated.

R.

Is illogical to harbour hatred when there are bigger problems going on. Also there is a saying “Don’t dwell in the past”.

The Overthinker

If hatred is illogical, then why be surprised when people hate things that are not as logical to hate as other things? You might as well ask why some people prefer Mcdonalds to Michelin restaurants.
http://www.victorymanual.com Alex

R.: Anger breeds illogic, not the other way around.

Dr.Yu

“Don’t dwell in the past”.
Very conveninet for Japan.

ponta

“Don’t dwell in the past”.
Very conveninet for Japan.

Very inconvenient for Korea?

oro_the_dog

so… better not ‘dwell’ for convenience’s sake? =)

Those who do not learn from history…

http://www.victorymanual.com Alex

Dr. Yu – Please read Gi-Wook Shin’s Ethnic Nationalism in Korea. It covers a lot of academic discussion behind Japanese colonization and the contemporary Korean national identity.

Dr.Yu

“Very inconvenient for Korea?”

My japanese friend, don’t put words in my mouth. “Cause and effect” that’s what I’m trying to show here. I will give you an example:

1. Japan wanted war with USA,
2. Japan Destroyed Pear Harbor,
3. Japan and USA in war.
4. USA wins the war,
5. USA demands Japan’s unconditional surrender,
6. Japans surrenders unconditionally,
7. USA grants Japan new constitution (USA can change Japanese constitution),
8. Japan owes USA war debts (USA can freely stipulate the terms of the debt by himself even today)
9. So …… Japan obeys so eagerly USA.

You see, cause and effect, action and reaction. So simple.
Back to the point, I’m not saying Japanese people must die nor I’m demanding any compensation from Japan, all I’m saying is that there is a historical reason why koreans tend to dislike Japan. That’s it.

klimmer

Say one was minding their own business one rainy day, standing at a bus stop. A car loses control and hits that person, resulting in paralysis. How do you explain that?

Please do not hijack Newtonian physics to justify your views.

Japanese invaders killed my paternal grandparents. I don’t hate the Japanese because it happened a long time ago, caused by a very different set of people in a very different time. Hence your linear argument is faulty and illogical. Moreover, we cannot blame the son for what the father did.

Hence, Koreans and Chinese do not have a justifiable reason for hating Japanese because the Japanese is not doing anything to prevent them from achieving their destinies? Even today, there are hardly anyone alive who lived through the war.

anonymousKim

Actually, I have my theory about the actual Korean “hatred” for Japan.
There’s of course the occupation period, but I won’t focus on this because it is well-known. Do you know that Koreans tend to accuse Japan of forging (at least making it look better) their History manuals ? (Of course, there must be some, as many historians all over the world, not only koreans, say that)

Well, the Japanese could just say the same thing about Korea. I’m South Korean (sorry for all the mistakes in my comment) who used to live abroad until 3 months ago(not in an English speaking country as you may see). I must say that I’m astonished by my country’s current state : it is a disguised dictatorship(worsening under President Lee after a period of democratisation) ! Everything that is considered to be a threat to the korean image (or to the president’s image -_-) is… DELETED(fired if a person). It’s the same for History classes and books.

In History textbooks or on the net, it’s hard to find something that could say that Ancient Korea was a damn hard place to live in (for instance)… I’d take for example a photo of a korean woman(a commoner, or “less”)from the late Chosun period (early 20th century), who is working “bare-breasted” (if you see what I mean…) and a photo showing chosun peasants, who are really, really, DIRTY. Go and try to find them in Korea. None, all censored… Koreans would only find photos of clean and smartly (and decently) dressed people (I was lucky to find them in a book published by an Italian diplomat who was in Korea in 1903): the diplomat wrote that most women(commoners) in korean wore that shocking outfit(and he’s not alone).
No many koreans would think that our “glorious people” was in that kind of outfit… Anything considered as a nuisance to our “past glory” is deleted. The bottom line is that we are(skillfully) conditioned into thinking that all was fine until the “evil japanese people” invaded… Of course, it was a BAD thing, but before saying that the Japanese are recreating their “criminal” past in order to make it more glorious,and that it is unworthy from a democratic country, we should think about our own censorship system. I’m alarmed by the fact that the UN still considers South Korea as a perfectly democratic country. No wonder that some Japanese think of Korea as a dirty underling of China (January 24th, there will be a new japanese animation : Hetalia Axis Powers… Well the korean protagonist is the worst guy possible damn it… stupid, perverted, doggy… Looks like the scenarist think of us as garbage… I wonder why…-_-#)

Oh gosh… Just hope the situation will improve, because after living in a perfectly democratic country, coming back to a country where an internet news submitter is taken into custody because he is criticising the actual government… A real pain… I won’t refuse a UN paratrooper intervention ^^.

(sorry got off-topic) Oh, and yes… I love japanese people, like I love South Africans, Pakistanis or Austrians.

The Overthinker

“that shocking outfit”

Personally I think it should be brought back. I had heard of this as well, and think it should be encouraged, at least until a certain age.

Mike

It’s so sad to see 2 Asians get in a brawl that is so pointless..But the reality is nothing has changed in Korea-Japan ties..Japan for obvious reasons downplays their crimes committed on Koreans and Koreans never cease to demand apology & compensation from Japan..In such a difficulty between them the best thing to hope for is let time heal the wounds..Until the wounds heal, there will be some kind of rift between them regarding Dokdo island ownership issue and interpretation of history..Maybe some kind of good things could happen between them in the future..

toro

Right on Mike

Man I sure strongly hope so, I totally want good to happen between them! This is really up to us to make that possible..let’s make it happen cause this cannot be done by just one person alone. Want Asia to be united, strong, and prosperous–at least one Hatoyama idea that is cool I want to see happen!

We must without fail　ｌearn from the past to step into the future–very simple! History is just as important as the future. Please do not throw the future down the drain and ruin it. Ignorance would certainly be on thing that would bring us down. Got to make sure the wounds really do not become scars, and I know in our power we can do this if we really seriously want to.
I’m ready how about you? Korea and Japan are brothers in my book, I know we can be cool I wish them well!

The future will be a very cool place, and sure hope we can make it shining bright for Japan, Korea, and the world. It’s so very obvious the future is Asia!

Japanese still tend to like Koreans, but the feeling is not mutual

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