Category: Journalism

B.R. Myers on Why the Foreign Media Will Not Report on Moon Administration Scandals

| March 21, 2020

I think all of us who closely follow Korea issues have noticed how the foreign press will not report on Moon administration scandals that are very similar and arguably worse than what former President Park Geun-hye was impeached for. This is in stark contrast to the massive interest the foreign press showed during the timeframe prior to the impeachment of President Park.

B.R. Myers

Well now ROK Drop favorite Professor B.R. Myers shares his opinion on why this is:

1) Since Trump was elected, most Western correspondents feel a moral duty to root openly for whatever main political figure in the host country they consider less Trump-like, who in this case is Moon. The same “mirror imaging” dictates that they root against South Korea’s main opposition party, to which they occasionally apply the label “far right,” although it’s well to the left of our Republicans, and most of its members voted in favor of impeaching Park in 2016.

2) When deciding which local stories merit attention, correspondents (and perhaps their editors) seem to follow the lead of the New York Times’ bilingual correspondent Choe Sang-hun, whose own record of stories over the past 10 or so years parallels the agenda of the once-opposition, now staunchly government-loyal Hankyoreh newspaper he used to write for. The language barrier also forces correspondents to rely on local assistants and interns who, like most young people here, get their news from the Naver portal, which has ties to the Blue House and steers clear of stories riling up the Moon-critical half of the country.

3) Foreign journalists are as reluctant as their local colleagues to annoy Moon’s excitable netizen base, especially since the orchestrated attacks in 2019 on a South Korean journalist for Bloomberg who had referred to his reputation in some quarters as a “spokesman for Pyongyang.” (The chairman of the ruling party denounced her as “a black-haired foreigner” for her “borderline traitorous” article.)

B.R. Myers

You can read much more at the link, but Professor Myers goes on to explain how the foreign media is giving favorable reporting to the Moon administration for how they are handling the coronavirus outbreak despite weeks of problems that Koreans were highly upset about similar to what you seeing going on in the U.S. now. The foreign media is also helping the Moon administration to scapegoat the Shincheonji Church for the coronavirus outbreak problems as well.

Chosun Ilbo Accused of Publishing Fake News About Polling Data

| May 24, 2019

If the accusation is true, you would think the Chosun Ilbo would be more careful about not publishing fake news considering the political environment they are dealing with that would look for any excuse to shut them down:

On the left are three controversial articles from Chosun Ilbo. On the right is survey expert Bae Jong-chan’s text message denying contact with Chosun reporters. Courtesy of Lee Taek-soo

South Korea’s highest-circulating newspaper, Chosun Ilbo, is suspected of inventing the quotes of experts for three articles attacking a polling agency, which it claimed was “untrustworthy” because it is friendly to the ruling party. 

Chosun removed the articles published on May 16 and 17 after the experts said they had never talked with the paper’s reporters. But Realmeter, the agency, has declared no mercy for “fake interviews and unfair reporting,” pledging legal action against the newspaper and the articles’ writers. 

Realmeter CEO Lee Taek-soo said the articles had “seriously tarnished” the agency’s reputation. 

The conservative daily has been at odds with liberal President Moon Jae-in and the ruling Democratic Party of Korea (DPK) on many fronts, especially North Korea and economic policies. The conflict deepened after Moon ordered the reopening early this year of some cold cases, including a sex/corruption scandal involving Chosun’s top executives. 

The articles were published after Realmeter released the approval ratings of political parties for the third week of May. In the report, Realmeter said the ruling party was 13.1 percentage points ahead of the main opposition conservative Liberal Korea Party (LKP). A week earlier, the gap was 1.6 percentage points. 

Chosun claimed the rapid gap extension was unrealistic. In the articles, the daily quoted media and survey experts as saying Realmeter “could have adjusted its opinion collecting method in a way producing results favorable to the ruling party.”

“I’ve never talked this way,” said Bae Jong-chan, one of the quoted experts. “Above all, I’ve never talked (on the issue) with Chosun reporters.” 

Korea Times

You can read more at the link.