“Too many ‘aware’ celebrities with no awareness” Kim Gi-hyeon attacks Kim Yuna of the band, Jaurim

Kim Yuna of the band, Jaurim, and People Power Party leader Kim Gi-hyeon (right). Kyunghyang Shinmun Archives

On September 12, People Power Party (PPP) leader Kim Gi-hyeon attended the inaugural meeting of Cultural Action for Freedom, a conservative organization of people in culture and arts, and said, “Recently, a band member said she thought of hell after the discharge of treated contaminated water from Fukushima, and people call her an ‘aware celebrity’ for it, but aren’t there too many ‘aware celebrities’ lacking awareness?” His words targeted a post by Kim Yuna, a member of the band, Jaurim, who wrote on social media shortly after the discharge of contaminated water from Fukushima, Japan, “On a day like this, I think about hell.”

Recently, Yoo In-chon, the special adviser to the president on culture and sports, has emerged as a strong candidate for the next minister of culture, sports and tourism, triggering concerns that the nation could witness the reappearance of the blacklist of people in culture and arts, used to oppress artists and cultural figures with progressive ideas.

Cultural Action for Freedom is a group of conservative people in the culture and arts circle formed based on a shared view that “The ideas and standards of a particular group are obstructing the development of society and state.” The group claimed to “engage in sound criticism and supervision to right the improperness, contradiction, and regression of the Korean cultural system,” and to “foster actors of cultural activities based on the values of liberal democracy and to actively seek solidarity with other societies that share such values,” presenting a purpose based on liberal democratic values, stressed by the Yoon Suk-yeol government.

Kim Gi-hyeon also said, “We can no longer let a small number of privileged people who monopolize interests in the cultural circle in a dark and closed underground economy join forces with certain political and social powers and use the culture and arts circle as the vanguard to incite the public.”

The PPP leader continued and said, “When we imported U.S. beef, one actor said, ‘I would rather put cyanide in my mouth than eat U.S. beef,’ and was called an ‘aware celebrity.’ I don’t know what she was aware of, but we once witnessed such an outrageous thing.” The actor who made the comment, Kim Gyu-ri, was included in the blacklist of artists and cultural figures in the Lee Myung-bak government for that remark.

Kim Gi-hyeon asked, “Why does Noh Sa-yeon and her sister have to be rejected as outcasts just because they paid their respects at the funeral of President Yoon Suk-yeol’s father? Why does the novelist, Kim Hoon have to endure the verbal abuse, ‘He’s senile,’ just for writing something critical of Cho Kuk?” and argued, “We need to create a culture where such disadvantages, bullying and stigmatizing are no longer possible.”

Woo Sang-il, former director of the Arts Bureau of the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism and the secretary general of Cultural Action for Freedom, was the man who reported the existence of the blacklist of artists and cultural figures to the culture minister at the time, Cho Yoon-sun in 2017. In 2014, when ruling and opposition party lawmakers argued over the alleged intervention in state affairs by Chung Yoon-hoi in a meeting of the parliamentary Education, Culture, Sports and Tourism Committee, Woo stirred controversy for passing a note to the vice minister of culture at the time with the words, “We need to turn this into a battle between the ruling and opposition parties.”

In addition to Kim Gi-hyeon, several figures from the PPP attended the inaugural conference of Cultural Action for Freedom Tuesday, including former legislator Na Kyung-won and Kang Seung-gyu, senior secretary to the president for civil and social agenda.

As Yoo In-chon, who served as the culture minister when the blacklist of artists and cultural figures was drawn up in the Lee Myung-bak government, emerges as a strong candidate for the next culture minister, there are growing concerns that people in the culture and arts circle who oppose the political views of the incumbent government could be suppressed again. Shortly after he took office as minister in February 2008, Yoo said in a press interview, “It is natural for the heads of culture and arts organizations who share the political ideas of the previous government to voluntarily step down.”