Chemyon, or Face
In South Korea, people are usually careful not to publicly criticize others. Harsh words, when needed, should be either delivered in private, or cloaked in a veil of respectfulness. It is common for investment analysts in the financial district of Yeouido to point out companies’ weaknesses between the lines of their reports while still labeling them a “buy.” Advertisers call attention only to the merits of their own products rather than the negatives of rivals. The realm of politics—for instance, the National Assembly, in which insults, and occasionally punches, are traded—is virtually the only exception to this rule.
The reason for this discretion toward and respectfulness of others’ public image is the importance of preserving face, or chemyon, in Korean society. Chemyon is considered something of an old-fashioned word, and one that encourages stereotypes. Part of the classic image Westerners have of East Asian society is the notion of people doing anything to avoid a loss of face. In Korea though, a person’s, family’s, or company’s public image is of utmost importance, and there is still plenty of truth in the stereotype. Very often, such a public image is the product of a great deal of work and refinement.
The Nature of Chemyon
Chemyon is essentially a product of Confucianism. Under Confucianism, conforming to society’s expectations, especially as related to duty, was extremely important. The perception of others that one did not meet expectations was grounds for deep shame—a loss of face. In a paper on the influence of chemyon on Korean consumer culture, Yoosun Hann of the University of Illinois wrote that it was important “not to stand out, but to fit in” with society. Confucianism values harmony, and this meant all members of society must play their proper role and fulfill the duties that came with that role. For example, a married woman was supposed to be a devoted wife and mother. During the later Joseon era, it would have been a source of shame to a respectable man were his wife to be constantly seen around town, spending time with friends, contrary to the expectations of her role.
According to Dr. Hann, “for Koreans, high social status implies a high moral level.” Because of this, members of the yangban class were more influenced by chemyon than were members of the general peasantry. For a yangban family, it was important that the sons be educated, the daughters chaste, the father a pillar of his community, and the mother a devoted servant of the household. Society demanded less of a family of poor tenant farmers.
Chemyon was something to be defended. Preserving face used to mean not falling below expected standards. However, the wave of competition unleashed in South Korea since the economic take-off in the 1960s has brought about a crucial change. Now, according to Hwang Sang-min, a professor of psychology at Yonsei University, Koreans feel impelled to achieve an image of perfection rather than mere respectability and to be seen as doing not just well but better than others. A kind of “face inflation” has taken place. According to Professor Hwang, face in Korea today is “not simply [about] what one is but rather what one wants to be.” It relates to an idealized version of one’s true self. People construct about themselves the public image of a perfect person and then somehow they must live up to it. A word that has great currency in Korea today is jalnancheok, or “pretending to do well.” It applies to anyone considered guilty of exaggerating his or her social value.
The perfect person is no longer just a good mother, a devoted student, or a father who provides a stable income for his family. As with other countries that have experienced high economic growth, such as China from the 1980s on and Russia in the 2000s, the materialistic side of Korean society has become exaggerated. People establish face in South Korea not just by having a good education or being an excellent parent; they also achieve it through wealth displayed conspicuously by means of the purchase of visible status symbols, such as expensive cars or designer clothes.
Face still applies most to those of high social status. The yangban no longer exist, but there are families whose elevated social rank is based on relative wealth and educational credentials. For such people the pressure to preserve their image in society is great. The average person in a rural South Korean town may merely dream of graduating from Seoul National University and consider a Gucci handbag a ridiculous waste of money, but for the denizen of a nouveau riche area of Seoul such as Gangnam or Seocho, these things may seem like necessities.
Creating the Image
South Koreans of high social status, or those who aspire to it, may seek to enhance their image in a number of ways. Department stores in the major cities of South Korea dedicate a large percentage of floor space to myeongpum, luxury products, and huge amounts of money are spent on designer bags and clothes. One example is the Galleria Department Store in the new-money Cheongdam-dong neighborhood in the Gangnam area of Seoul, where the most immaculately dressed, beautiful, and yet curiously unhappy-looking women in Korea can be seen.
According to McKinsey Consulting in their 2010 Luxury Goods Survey, “Korea is different.” Despite the global economic downturn, South Korea saw a 16.7 percent increase in luxury goods sales between 2008 and 2009, driven by what they label as “the pressure to conform,” i.e. to preserve face in front of peers (“keeping up with neighbors”), as well as Korea’s overall “luxury-friendly culture.” As of 2010, only booming China had higher growth in luxury spending than South Korea. Koreans spend 5 percent of their income on luxury goods, on average—the absolute highest rate in the world.
Similarly, when one is offered a drink at an important meeting, one will probably be served a very old whiskey, perhaps Ballantine’s, the most popular imported luxury whisky brand in Korea. Whether or not this is objectively the best whiskey, it is an expensive one, and that is what counts in this circumstance. Bringing out the thirty-year-old Ballantine’s or Johnnie Walker Blue Label signals that you respect the other person—you would not want to insult him by offering a glass of Jack Daniel’s—and underscores that you have the wherewithal to afford it.
Housing, too, has such power to convey social status or value. The district of Seocho in Seoul, south of the Han River, looks little different from other parts of the city. However, the quality of schools in Seocho is high, and this has led education-obsessed parents to seek out apartments there, resulting inevitably in inflated apartment prices. Today, many people without school-age children want to live there too, simply because a Seocho address confers status on them. According to the Yahoo! Korea property website, an apartment that would cost 1.33 billion won (around US$1.3 million) in the immediately adjacent district of Dongjak would cost 2.45 billion won in Seocho, other things being equal. The excess amount spent on an apartment in Seocho by a childless person could be called an investment in face.
The most important way in which face is gained or lost is in education. A degree from Seoul National University has brand value in the same way that owning a $3,000 handbag or a big Seocho apartment does. In addition, though, it also reflects a person’s intellectual capacity and academic achievement, and because of the legacy of the Confucian exam culture, this is especially prized. The prime means of social advancement for centuries, academic success meant entry into the prestige class. Advancing to a prestigious university is valued for that reason as well as for what it means in potential earning power. Education plays a large part in a family’s face, and not only an individual’s. If a child has been to excellent schools and has received endless hours of after-school tuition from private tutors, as is very often the case, but ends up only being accepted by a mid-ranked university, his or her family will feel gravely disappointed. The child will feel an acute sense of shame. Where the family can afford it, youngsters in this situation are often shipped off to mid-ranked universities in the United States, since an American education is generally prized, and does allow for some degree of status rebuilding.
This aspirational kind of face is no doubt a recipe for personal disappointment and unhappiness. However, the power it has over attitudes to education has probably done a world of good for South Korea’s GDP. “I don’t mind what you do as long as you are happy,” is not a philosophy that many Korean parents adhere to. Instead, they spur their children relentlessly to achieve top grades, admissions to the world’s best universities, and jobs with the highest salaries. Far less than one percent of the world’s people are South Korean, but in 2007, a full 10.7 percent of foreign students at American universities came from South Korea. In the same year, Harvard had 37 South Korean undergraduate students, a figure exceeded only by students from Canada and Britain, two countries culturally and linguistically far closer to the United States.
The Face of Tragedy
What happens when you cannot make it, though? What if your standard of education is a letdown to your family, your apparently perfect marriage breaks down, or your business goes bankrupt? Unfortunately, the combination of the event itself and the sense of shame it brings from the loss of face creates an unbearable amount of pressure for some—and may result in tragedy.
Every year there are suicides of third-year high school students at the time of suneung, the university entrance exam. For the students, their entire lives—and social value—will seemingly be determined by that single day, and, unable to tolerate the pressure, some choose to end it all. They are not the only suicides, though. South Korea has the second-highest suicide rate among all nations of the world, at 31 per 100,000 people per year. By comparison, Japan, also well known for its suicide problem, has a figure of 24. Korea’s high suicide rate is due at least in part to the perceived necessity to vault the impossibly high bar of success and honor, according to Professor Hwang Sang-min. “Koreans always want to show their best image to other people,” he notes, but when that proves impossible, it can lead to a final “desertion” of the self and a desire to simply give up on life.
Celebrity suicide is also common in South Korea. The year 2009 was an especially tragic one, with no less than nine famous people taking their own lives. It is natural to imagine actors and singers having enviable existences, but in Korea celebrity brings a special burden. When they lose face, the whole country sees it, which can make the pressure of celebrity unbearable. Internet bulletin boards embolden “anti-fans,” who benefit from anonymity, to break the taboo of public criticism and spread malicious stories about their unfortunate targets. According to a masters-degree paper written by actress Park Jin-hee in 2010, 40 percent of 260 actors she surveyed had contemplated suicide at some point in their lives.
Unfortunately, suicide can have a cleansing effect on a person’s image. When former president Roh Moo-hyun took his life in 2009 in response to the corruption investigation targeting him and his family, the family image (which had been under attack) was restored. Despite having very low opinion poll ratings upon leaving the presidency in 2008, by 2011 Roh emerged in a public opinion survey as the second most popular South Korean president of all time, behind Park Chung-hee. His suicide also rendered continuing the investigation against his family a political impossibility. Roh saved them by sacrificing himself, in an act that was both his apology and his redemption. His death was immensely tragic. He was an extremely accomplished man, who rose from rural poverty to become a self-taught human rights lawyer and later president of the country. No doubt there was much more he could have done in this world.
The Public-Private Gap
Because of face inflation, the gap between public image and private reality is unusually high in South Korea, and people defend the gap with vigor. It can be no coincidence that in South Korea libel laws are the strictest in the democratic world. Myeongye hweson—defamation—may occur, according to Korean law, even if the original allegation was true. Defamation can also be tried as a criminal offense. This has serious negative implications for free speech in Korea. In December 2011, Jeong Bong-ju, a former Democratic Party politician and regular guest on Nakkomsu, the world’s most popular podcast, was sentenced to a year in prison for accusing President Lee Myung-bak of complicity in a notorious fraud scheme. In another democratic country, the greatest punishment Jeong would have faced would have been the payment of damages. Yet in South Korea, “many criminal defamation suits are filed for statements that are true and are in the public interest, and are used to penalize individuals who express criticisms of the government,” the special rapporteur on the freedom of opinion and expression at the United Nations, Frank La Rue, told the New York Times in December 2011.
The Internet poses unique new problems for the preservation of public face, for it blurs the boundaries between public and private. An online critic is able to remain private while making public criticism. Theoretically, any individual may destroy the honor of a well-known person without ever having to face the consequences that would come from being identified. “Anti-fans” are a prime example. The popular rap artist Tablo came under repeated attack in the late 2000s by Internet users, who alleged that he had not graduated from Stanford University, as he had publicly stated. He even received death threats. The choice of educational record as avenue of attack is of course very Korean. Tablo’s career suffered, and even after he was vindicated, many continue to believe him a liar. "Since my attackers were all anonymous, there was no way for me to know who was after me," Tablo is quoted as saying.
South Korea’s response to this sort of vulnerability has been to enact a “real name” law, by which Internet users must enter their national ID numbers when registering for forums. This requirement leaves users open to being exposed and possibly sued. For celebrities terrified of having their honor attacked, it is a godsend. However, like the defamation law, the real name law can also be used for political purposes, restricting free speech and criticism of those in power. In 2008, an Internet forum poster going by the name of Minerva began making a series of gloomy predictions about the Korean economy on an online forum. After being proven correct a few times in succession, he attracted a following that ran to millions of other Internet users. The fearful government unmasked him as the unemployed thirty-year old Park Dae-sung and prosecuted him on charges of “spreading false information.” He was later acquitted, but the fact that he was tried means that free speech is not at all guaranteed in South Korea.
When the Lee Myung-bak administration finally announced in 2012 that the real name law would be scrapped, it was seen by government critics and free speech campaigners as an overdue step in the right direction. However, it is hard not to sympathize with celebrity victims of anonymous attacks, because the price they pay in Korea is so much higher than in other societies. The comparison between American celebrity heiress Paris Hilton and Korean pop star Baek Ji-young is instructive in this regard. Both were featured in private sex tapes that were leaked into the public domain (in 2003 and 2000 respectively). While Paris Hilton’s career actually benefited from the public airing, Ms. Baek’s was ruined. She had the misfortune to be filmed without her knowledge doing something that every other adult does, and in her country that was enough to destroy her image and keep her out of the mainstream media for almost six years. She finally made a comeback in 2006, but to this day her public reputation still suffers from the effects of a scandal that should not have been considered scandalous.