By Kang Joon-mann, professor emeritus of media and communication studies at Jeonbuk National University

There are no media channels devoted to badmouthing different races. There are also no media channels dedicated to denigrating people of various genders. Well, those sorts of channels do exist, but there are no mainstream media channels that draw their audiences by talking about such issues out in the open.

However, there are some media channels that focus openly on belittling opposing political parties and people with different political opinions. In fact, it’s more accurate to say that there are many, not just some. They also happen to be very influential. We don’t think that this is strange. In fact, it’s something we take for granted. Partisan hostility is one of the few beliefs that our society not only allows, but actively encourages.

This is an issue that comes up in American journalist Ezra Klein’s book “Why We’re Polarized” (2020). Political scientist Shanto Iyengar stated that “Political identity is fair game for hatred. Racial identity is not. Gender identity is not. You cannot express negative sentiments about social groups in this day and age. But political identities are not protected by these constraints.”

When it comes to this, Korea is surprisingly similar to the United States. Media channels devoted to finding faults with different political parties have, thanks to the digital revolution, become a lucrative industry.

Intellectuals also rely on such channels to maintain their reputation while catering to the demands of the channel’s fandom by stoking their hatred of the political other.

Partisanship, which is being used as a pretext for hatred, causes division between the state and the community. However, politics has been reborn as a “divisive industry” as the number of people who benefit from such divisions has increased significantly to form a powerful privileged class.

Theoretically, there is nothing wrong with this. Conflict is, after all, the “great engine of democracy,” as per the words of Schattschneider. The problem is what the conflict actually is. What are we to do if the conflict takes the form of a conflict of “good” versus “evil” and “us” versus “them” — a sort of “high conflict” that becomes the paramount conflict in our society?

Journalist Amanda Ripley, who has written extensively on the issue, addresses this in her book “High Conflict: Why We Get Trapped and How We Get Out” (2021).

“Any modern movement that cultivates us-versus-them thinking tends to destroy itself from the inside, with or without violence. High conflict is intolerant of difference. A culture that sorts the world into good and evil is by definition small and confining. It prevents people from working together in large numbers to grapple with hard problems.”

This is also the reality that our society faces. In many international surveys on various “conflicts,” South Korea has been dubbed a “conflict republic,” as it always ranks among the worst, if not the worst itself, on the charts when it comes to antagonisms.

In a Gallup Korea survey carried out in 2022, 89% of People Power Party (PPP) supporters stated that they “disliked or hated” supporters of the other party, while 92% of the Democratic Party responded the same. Only 70% of PPP supporters stated that they “liked” the opposing party while 73% of Democratic Party supporters stated the same.

This offers the background and explanation as to why Korea’s political parties devote their best efforts to propaganda and incitement criticizing their political opponents rather than working in the interests of the party and the people.

What is even more tragic is that such conflicts are occurring within political parties as well. The recent conflict over the PPP party leadership race shows that it isn’t an issue of “who can do better,” but a far-gone competition of elimination aimed at stopping certain people from claiming the position of power.

President Yoon Suk-yeol is said to have used the term “the height of disrespect” towards another politician, but no matter who the phrase was aimed at, why has he not thought that such harsh meddling in party politics is also “the height of disrespect” toward Korean citizens?

Why is he so insecure? Seeing how pathetically Yoon and the PPP is self-destructing less than a year into his administration could be seen as karma — the karma of a history where partisanship has been used as a pretext for hatred.

The idea that working and cooperating with people with even the slightest different beliefs is impossible has spread to ordinary voters. What is there to say when one poll reveals that 40% of respondents stated that they would not want to share a meal with someone of opposing political beliefs?

In a society such as this, is it possible to successfully engage in politics and call ourselves a democracy? We need to face reality: What we’re doing right now isn’t politics and it isn’t democratic. What we’re doing is competing to direct vitriol and hatred toward the other.

Maybe it’s time to redesign the nature of democracy to match changing technology. Even if that is the case, it goes without saying that the president needs to experience an epiphany to go through a great change.

Please direct questions or comments to [english@hani.co.kr]