The "Room N" incident that shook South Korea has not yet been finally concluded, and at the end of June, the police decided to make public the information of the main culprit, "Dr. Zhao", setting off new waves.
The "Room N incident", which was exposed more than two years ago, has had a huge impact on Korean society. In May 2020, the Room N Prevention Act was introduced, which increased the sentencing for the crime of digital sexual exploitation.
At that time, the first to expose the scandal was the undercover reporting team "Tracking Spark" formed by two female college students, and the life of one of the team members, Park Ji-hyun, was changed.
Under the influence of another member of the team, Park Ji-hyun became a feminist. She cut off her long hair, gave sexual violence speeches to women, exposed digital sex crimes, and joined politics.
On the eve of South Korea's 2022 election, Park joined Lee's campaign, which showed a determination to combat digital crimes when he ran for president. Park Ji-hyun, who entered politics with a distinct style, held the position of chairman of the "Special Committee for the Eradication of Digital Sexual Crimes", and people projected a lot of expectations for the story of this inspirational girl. But what is surprising is that not long after she took office, she encountered a slippery slope of word of mouth.
On the one hand, critics deny the young Park Ji-hyun's ability to work, and on the other hand, her Democratic Party has frequent sex scandals, for which she has to publicly apologize.
South Korea's presidential candidate Lee Jae-myung conceded defeat and congratulated Yoon Seok-wook on his victory
A month ago, on June 2, local time in South Korea, the Common Democratic Party lost the election, and Park Ji-hyun retired with the Democrats. Originally, presidential candidate Lee Jae-myung wanted to turn around with The Hand of Park Ji-hyun, and Park Ji-hyun wanted to use the power of the Democratic Party to carry out reforms – both of which ultimately failed.
Born in 1996, Park Ji-hyun is 26 years old and has spent four short-lived months in South Korean politics.
It would be nice to be a boy
"It would be nice to be a boy," Ms. Park thought to her father when she was born.
Park Ji-hyun is the second child in the family. In the 1990s, when she was born, the idea of son preference in South Korea was still relatively common. According to media reports, south Korea's sex ratio at birth in 1990 was as high as 116.5. Influenced by traditional concepts, many families hope that there will be a son in the family who will be "passed on from generation to generation".
Park Ji-hyun's father is a company employee and his mother is a school teacher. The first child in the family was a daughter, and Park Ji-hyun's father also wanted to have a son. Because only the son can wrestle with him and bathe with him.
In order not to disappoint her father, Park Ji-hyun chose to be a "son" - when she went to kindergarten, she beat other children to nosebleeds; When she was in elementary school, she fought with friends with a shovel; While eating with her parents, she shoved the whole piece of pork belly into her mouth. Looking at Park Ji-hyun's informal, even her parents felt, "She should be a boy."
Stills from "Princess Han"
When I was in elementary school, Park Ji-hyun learned Aikido for about 5 years. The boys' fists posed no threat to her at all. When it comes to force, they want to call her a "gangster boss." There was a boy who had to single her out every time they met, and Park Ji-hyun had never lost.
It wasn't until junior high school that Park Ji-hyun suffered a loss in strength for the first time.
Or this boy. After entering junior high school, his height began to grow tall. One day, he once again "invited" Park Ji-hyun. When Park Ji-hyun approached, he found that the situation was a little different--the other party was obviously much taller than himself.
Thinking of the authority of his "gangster boss", Park Ji-hyun still hardened his scalp. But this time, she lost, and was kicked hard by the other side, tears swirling in her eyes.
Park Ji-hyun endured the pain and thought for the first time about the physical differences between boys and girls.
However, Park Ji-hyun does not always "play" boys. In front of her former boyfriend, she often had a different face: Sven, elegant, like a flower in a greenhouse—in other words, she was "playing" a lady.
Park Ji-hyun
At the age of 15, Park Ji-hyun was in the second grade of junior high school. That year, she began a 5-year relationship.
The boy's name is Hoon, and he is one year older than Park Ji-hyun. Park Ji-hyun was embarrassed to open his mouth in front of Hoon, and he had to chew and swallow slowly every time he ate. A "tomboy" who can eat a hamburger in five bites in front of his father, when he comes to his boyfriend, he leaves more than half of the hamburger every time.
For a lady, going to the bathroom is also indecent. When she went to the toilet, she always had to leave the table under the pretext of "washing her hands" or "answering the phone". Worried that the other party thought she was defecating, Park Ji-hyun always rushed out after dealing with it.
Because of his association with Hoon, Park Ji-hyun can't talk to the boys in the class much because "all the men except him are sex wolves." However, Xun can mingle with girls without scruples.
On the first anniversary of the relationship, Park Ji-hyun began to wear makeup 3 hours in advance, putting on his sister's dress and high heels for the appointment. But instead of appreciating it, Xun got angry and let her go home and change back into jeans.
He asked Park Ji-hyun how many men he had met during his time on the road in dresses. He said he wanted to gouge out all their eyeballs.
Park Ji-hyun is angry and depressed, but is persuaded by the other party's "I love you will be like this" statement.
On April 6, 2022 local time, Park Ji-hyun, co-chairman of the Emergency Countermeasures Committee of the Democratic Party of South Korea, stood in the corridor of the National Assembly
Looking back on it many years later, Park Ji-hyun feels that Hoon just likes gentle and submissive girls, and what he said is exactly a kind of violence masked by love.
These experiences later enlightened Park Ji-hyun's gender consciousness.
The fire was lit
After the age of 5, Park Ji-hyun never cut his hair short again. Like most girls, she thinks girls' hair should be over the shoulders — "How can a woman have short hair?" That's what she's thought since she was a kid.
Park Ji-hyun's later changes have a lot to do with her sister "Dan".
During the PyeongChang Winter Olympics in February 2018, Park Ji-hyun and "Dan" were volunteers living in the same dormitory. At the time, "Dan" often shared his views on gender issues on social media.
That year, South Korean social media set off a "escape from tights" craze.
Some young South Korean women ruined cosmetics to participate in the "Escape From Tights" movement
At that time, South Korea's beauty industry was in its prime, with annual sales of up to $13 billion (about 89.7 billion yuan); The facelift rate also ranks first in the world.
Under the influence of this women's liberation movement, "Dan" cut his hair short and kept telling Park Ji-hyun how convenient it was to shorten his hair and how comfortable his face was.
Park Ji-hyun was a little annoyed at first, until she read the book Escape from the Bodysuit: The Imaginary Arrival, and the words in it hit her:
Now I know that the basic setting that men need to have when they go to work, that is, "human-like", is different from us all the time. Women have to spend a certain amount of time and expense every day before they have a "human look", and they can achieve it through hard work, while men are different, they originally have a "human look".
She finally realized that she had been insisting on long hair only to maintain the so-called "woman's appearance", "I was worried that I would look like a man and not like a woman if I cut my hair short." ”
As a sort of rebellion against this discipline – Early the next morning, Park Ji-hyun went to the barbershop and cut his hair into "ultra-short hair."
Park Ji-hyun was interviewed in Congress on January 27. On the same day, she was elected Chairman of the Special Committee on the Eradication of Digital Sexual Offences
Park Ji-hyun, who had cut his short hair, not only did not adapt, but felt that he was "a little cool". When she entered the classroom, the boys in the same class threw surprised glances at her, but she didn't care at all.
Park Ji-hyun wanted to be a journalist, so he studied media at university. After the Olympics, she and "Dan" interned at the same newspaper. Over the course of two months, they wrote many cases related to sex crimes and noticed the problem of illegal filming. During this period, their exchanges became more and more frequent, and the two gradually became like-minded good friends.
In the spring of 2019, Park Ji-hyun and "Dan" chose the same news writing class. The professor suggested that they write a report about illegal filming together and participate in the in-depth documentary exploration reporting competition. If they win this game, they can get up to 10 million won in prize money. This is the opportunity for the N room incident to sensationalize the whole country.
At the time, they named the team "Tracking Sparks." It means — "Because we ignited a fire of public concern about the crime of digital sexual exploitation." I hope that this thing will ignite the fire like a spark, so the team name is 'Spark'. ”
Later, the Room N incident received widespread attention, and Park Ji-hyun also appeared on social media at home and abroad as "fire".
"Fire" and "Dan" of "Tracking The Spark"
What few people know is that park ji-hyun actually participated in another game in the summer of 2019. The interviewer asked her: What are the social issues that are most concerned?
She spoke about telegram sexual exploitation and illegal filming, and what kind of problem awareness the government, prosecutors and the media should develop. After talking for a long time, she suddenly found that the interviewers did not agree with her — they did not feel that it was a social problem, but preferred to treat it as a "small incident".
She wondered: "Why is it only me, why only women feel that the problem is serious?" ”
Footage from the documentary "Cyber Purgatory, Exposing Room N"
Political turmoil
After the "Tracking The Spark" campaign, Park Ji-hyun decided to start politics and further eradicate digital sex crimes.
During this year's South Korean election, gender issues remain at the center of public opinion. Man on Solidarity, South Korea's most active anti-feminist group, shouted the slogan until the day all feminists were eliminated.
In order to cater to men, Yoon promised to abolish the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family Affairs and prosecute women who falsely accused rape and other sexual crimes.
On March 10, 2022 local time, Yoon Seok-yue was elected as the new president of South Korea
Park Ji-hyun was not very interested in the election, but given the diametrically opposed positions of Yoon Seok-wook and Lee Jae-myung, "taking sides" does not seem so difficult.
In 2020, Park Ji-hyun met Lee Jae-myung at a promotional event. The latter had already decided to run for president and said he would crack down on digital crime and address sexism in the workplace — in line with Park's goals.
At the invitation of feminist activist Andy Jeon In-sook, a Democratic lawmaker, Park joined Lee's campaign in early 2022 as chairman of the special committee on electronic sex crimes and began appearing in public as a real person.
Since then, Park Ji-hyun has walked from behind the scenes to the front of the stage and into the Korean political arena.
Park Ji-hyun volunteered for reconstruction work in the area affected by the mountain fire in Yuximian, Gangneung City, Gangwon Province
In South Korea, men hold 81 percent of seats in parliament and 95 percent of executive positions in public companies. In contrast, it is rare for a 26-year-old woman to become a leader of the Great Party. In South Korea's presidential election, the Common Democratic Party suffered a slight defeat of nearly 0.8 percent, and Song Yongji, who was the party leader, resigned. She was appointed, along with another colleague, Yoon Hao-chung, as the new co-leader of the Common Democratic Party. Unfortunately, Park Ji-hyun's career was not satisfactory.
No matter how big the impact of the N room incident, Park Ji-hyun is still a simple person with zero political experience, which is difficult to convince everyone. Some partisans believe That Park, 26, is still too young.
Park Ji-hyun proposed to protect victims of sexual crimes and address the rights of persons with disabilities, social inequalities and pension reform. But critics note that she spent too much time dwelling on allegations of sexual harassment and bad behavior within the party, with insufficient attention to local elections. Local elections are the only chance for the Democratic Party to "counterattack" that loses the presidential election.
A march of South Korean women against candid photography
Moreover, Ms. Park's proposal to "retire older generations of party members" has drawn criticism from the Democratic leadership and senior politicians, who accuse her of talking openly about party reform without consultation. A chosun Ilbo report even called her a "party wrecker." Faced with pressure from within the party, the young Park Ji-hyun had to apologize.
On the other hand, Park Ji-hyun, who claims to protect victims of sexual assault, encountered many gender scandals in the party as soon as he came to power.
A democratic party member is accused of sexually suggesting to another colleague in an online meeting. Not long after, the Democratic Party announced the expulsion of lawmaker Park Wan-joo on charges of "serious sexual crimes" against a female aid.
Park Ji-hyun read out the official apology on television: "We did our best, but it happened anyway. ”
On May 12, Park Ji-hyun and Yoon Hao-chung publicly apologized for their lawmaker, Park Wan-joo, for sexual harassment
In a televised address to the National Assembly in late May, Park Ji-hyun said: "No matter how difficult and lonely, I will continue to move forward with common sense and confidence in the people." I will move forward as a burning flame for deeper democracy and broader equality. She tried to bring more change to Korean society, but failed to do so.
In early June 2022, South Korea's largest opposition party, the Common Democratic Party, lost miserably in the 8th local parliamentarian and local government leadership elections (prefectural elections). The ruling National Force won 12 of the country's 17 regional chief elections, overwhelmingly defeating the Common Democratic Party.
Subsequently, the leadership of the Common Democratic Party, the largest opposition party in South Korea, decided to resign en masse and apologize to its supporters.
Park Ji-hyun's fire, from brilliant to the end, only burned briefly in South Korean politics for four months.
But Park Ji-hyun didn't give up, she was still making a sound. Recently, she wrote on social media: "I will do everything I can to keep these precious promises from becoming waste paper until the day the sex crimes disappear." ”
(The pictures in the text are partly from Visual China, partly from the Internet)
Author | Liu Yang
Edit | Monet
Typography | Moon month