Talk:Anarchism in Korea

Additions?

Ha Ki-Rak, Kim Jwa-jin, and Sin Chaeho were all Korean anarchists, so could be worked into this article. Murderbike (talk) 03:46, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

That's a good idea, Murderbike. I will consider working them into the article. --Grrrlriot (talk) 04:06, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Done I added the 3 Korean anarchists listed above into the article.--Fang 23 (talk) 01:11, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

Worthy of note are articles on recent decisions on the part of South Korea to recognize it's anarchist history through the lens of anti-colonialism and pseudo-nationalism. Recent decisions to declare Kim Jwa-jin, Shin Chae-ho (1880-1936), Yu Rim (1894-1961), Park Ryol (1902-1972), Yu Cha-myong (1891-1985), and Yo Un-hyung (1886-1947) "national", "patriotic" heroes, and positive portrayals of anarchists in film (Anakiseuteu) are worthy of note. For more information, try this relatively recent article: Korean Anarchists Pursuing Third Way--Cast (talk) 05:15, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Oh yeah, and Anarchists (film). Murderbike (talk) 05:17, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

And of course I forgot, much to my unyielding regret, the relatively unknown anarchist uprising in Manchuria, the second major anarchist revolution in the autonomous Shinmin region. Don't leave it out. It's practically a smear on us all for not knowing more about it.--Cast (talk) 05:20, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

I will add more to this article in the near future. These are some good ideas that the both of you are suggesting. --Grrrlriot (talk) 16:49, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

There is also tons of info to glean from this Google Book search. Murderbike (talk) 18:18, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

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Korean anarchism and misleading nonsense about 'anarchist revoltions by Koreans in Sinmin' etc --

Much of the so called 'anarchist histories of the Korean people' is blatantly false and misleading -- there was no 'anarchist revolution' whatsoever in Manchuria, Sinmin or parts of Korea -- ever -- at any time. It is fantasy inspired by vague half truths and bad research.

Korean so called 'anarchists' active in Manchuria/Sinmin such as Shin Chaeho and Kim Jwa Jin, were racially motivated extreme nationalists, who believed in concepts of 'racial purity', 'pure race', 'pure blood lines',and Darwinian struggle for survival which would lead to racial supremacy of 'the superior races', and so on :it is true that they -- briefly -- showed an interest in anarchism, but only because they thought it served their purposes at the time.

But that is really where the comparisons end.

The Korean 'anarchists' ( more accurate to call them racial nationalists) did, indeed, meet and mobilise in Manchuria ( Sinmin )but it is plain false to describe it as some kind of 'anarchist victory/utopia' -- the Koreans did indeed mobilise there, because it was an area that many Koreans lived in when Korea itself was occupied by Japan, and it gave them freedom of movement when Korea was being harassed by external forces ( traders and other subversive influences from the West and East, desperate to turn Korea into a submissive nation ) . And Koreans were also there for extreme nationalist reasons : many Korean nationalists considered Manchuria ( Sinmin ) to be Korean, and they dreamt of reclaiming it, because thousands of years ago, it was indeed, Korean ruled land ( read up on history of Kogu-ryo and Manchu).

So much absolute crap has been written about the so called Korean 'anarchists', mainly by poorly informed Westerners, who want to fantasise about 'Korean Anarchist revolutions and free autonomous Anarchist areas' and other such nonsense -- it is just not true, and it is misleading history. People should get informed by reading the KOREAN historians, and the KOREAN academics, who understand the period very well, and understand the complex cross overs between conservative nationalism, Confucian traditions, and the influences from nineteenth century western traditions of Darwinism, Fascism,biology and genealogy and -- to a very small degree -- anarchism. Read Shin gi wook, Choi Jang Jip and Professor Em. These KOREAN writers will tell you far far more than Western amateurs who want to imagine Korea was some kind of righteous or bohemian anarchist utopia for a period in the 1900s.

The truth is, the history of Anarchism in Korea is really tiny -- it is true, that anarchism was a passing influence on Shin Chaeho, and one or two others -- but only because anarchism coincided with already existing Korean ideas about peasant purity, peasant unity, cooperation, peasant economies based on sharing,and the Korean peasants/nationalists rejection of the individual destructive greed inherent amoral subversive capitalism and so on.

But that is where it ends -- as soon as Koreans decided that extreme blood and soil based nationalism suited their ends better, anarchism was sidelined as a very brief influence. In reality, Koreans are, historically, a people motivated and shaped, for the most part, by conservative forces and racial interests -- anarchism and internationalist ideals that rejected nationalism and rejected exclusive racial allegiances could never have taken hold in Korea.

Copyright issues

I rewrote a good chunk of the paragraph as it was lifted from [1] with only minor changes. It needs some attention from someone more knowledgeable but obviously should not be simply reverted. CIreland (talk) 15:59, 2 February 2008 (UTC)