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Show founder and leader Kim Ou-joon, opposition lawmaker Chung Bong-ju, investigative journalist Choo Chin-woo and Kim Yong-min compete to outdo one another in an obscene siege on the country’s political status quo, all in the name of free speech. They deride Lee as the head of a culture of suppression and self-censorship – which the government has responded to by charging them all with sedition. The powers that be have already succeeded in incarcerating one of them.
Kim Ou-joon, 44, claims millions of listeners are entertained by the men “raising all kinds of allegations against His Highness”.
“We offer data to support [our accusations], but what really matters is our attitude. We believe that His Highness’ conservative regime has intimidated people. So we tell our audience: ‘Let’s not be intimidated! Let’s say whatever we want, even if we’re thrown into jail tomorrow,’” he has told the media.
Na-ggom-su feeds on six decades of government intolerance, spurred by high tensions across the Korean Peninsula. The rift across the 38th parallel has given regional stakeholders – Japan, China and the United States – leverage over the South: first by propping up dictators, then pressuring heads of state to maintain a unified front.
A long-term US military presence has eroded the country’s sovereign will, contributing to a sense of general disenfranchisement. South Korea’s repeated kowtowing to its allies on trade and foreign policy issues has been condemned as slights against its people. Yet the North Korea issue locks Seoul in a perennial bind.
Lee has followed suit with past leaders, maintaining unity by stifling internal dissent. But his popularity has fallen dramatically in recent months on the back of skyrocketing energy prices, a decaying financial system – buckling under years of high-level graft – and, this month, the arrest of his elder brother on corruption charges. Public opinion has turned against the once-popular self-made millionaire, making the president a highly visible target for the venting of spleens.
“President Lee once claimed that his government was ‘morally perfect’,” says Kim, in a later interview with Post Magazine. “Now Choi Si-joong [considered the mentor to the president] and Lee Sang-deuk [the president’s brother] are under arrest. Also, Kim Hee-jung, the former personal secretary nicknamed ‘President Lee’s Doorknob’, is under arrest. Therefore the president’s claim … has collapsed.
“Na-ggom-su is focusing on the issue.”
The comics give voice to the discontent while injecting all the melodrama and hyperbole of a South Korean soap opera into the solemn world of South Korean politics.
“Let the major broadcasters air porn films after midnight and on weekends to encourage sh**ging. Let’s sell aphrodisiacs under the name of contraceptives,” cried Kim, the son of a Christian minister, in one episode of the show, delivering his lampoons in the form of sermons to the tune of hymns he sang as a child: “Korean Christian churches act as a kind of criminal syndicate and should be wiped out,” he said.
On stage, the activist-comedians shoot from the hip at public figures and organised religion, then retreat in a thin smokescreen of political disclaimers and semi-retractions.
“They turn the dirty game of politics into an enjoyable festival,” said one Twitter user, who participated in a 6,000-strong flash-mob event in April, organised by Na-ggom-su to support Kim’s run for office.
In January, the show, which goes out weekly (legal obstacles permitting), began racking up global downloads of 10 million per episode. Such popularity has taken the celebrity dissidents’ show on the road. In late May, they performed for packed Korean audiences in Britain, at London’s King’s College and at Oxford University.
In online BBC video footage of a live Seoul show, three of the four entertainers peddle rumours involving high-ranking party officials before chastising one another for making even more trouble for themselves.
Amid the cacophony of laughter, however, one of the four panel chairs remains empty.
The government initially reacted to the group as it does to all other outspoken dissidents, levelling charges of political slander at Chung, 52, the group’s most talkative member. The Lee administration underestimated the show’s popularity and swiftly faced public uproar.
In the months following the December imprisonment of Chung, Na-ggom-su called on female fans to upload revealing photographs of themselves that would “keep him company” to a website petitioning for the former lawmaker’s release. one particularly salacious fan attracted widespread media attention – and the displeasure of women’s-rights groups – by donning a swimsuit and scrawling across her cleavage: “I want Chung out so bad my breasts are exploding.”
Yonsei University journalism professor Kang Sang-hyun puts the podcast’s success down to growing disenchantment with the government-aligned mass media while several bloggers have suggested that most of Na-ggom-su’s fans want to be entertained more than informed.
The battle lines remain confused: supporters cheering on the dissidents and laughing at their lewd jokes are often the same people who vote to keep Lee and his ilk in office.
Kim’s political failings may well have boosted the morale of the group’s enemies. The special edition of the show comes as the three commentators still at liberty prepare to report to the prosecutor’s office for questioning on fresh sedition allegations. The future of The Bunker remains unclear, even to the embattled trio of superstars who may yet follow Chung into prison.
Podcasts are still being released and Kim continues to beat the drum: “I will fight this war against the old and the corrupt and win it.”
Whether or not all of Na-ggom-su’s members are jailed, this could be just the beginning of an underground war for free speech in South Korea. A host of podcasts have sprouted up to emulate the country’s most long-lived and blatant anti-government movement. Meanwhile, the state continues to grapple for an effective response to the unfamiliar guerrilla tactics of these entertainers.
After a hard-fought year, Kim and his accomplices must decide whether they will continue feeding their reputation as South Korea’s most infamous political pundits. It’s a reputation that grants them a level of celebrity immunity – but only up to a point.
글 출처: 유사 언론인 김용민 블러그 | 