For anyone watching international news lately it has been difficult to eschew the recent events unfolding here in Korea regarding American beef. Before I get into details, allow me to digress with what I think is an apt analogy.
I often play “telephone game” with my kids here in Korea. Chances are you know it. There are a line of people, the first person thinks of a sentence and whispers it to the next person and that person whispers the message into the next person’s ear and so on and so forth. The last person shouts out what they heard, which, idealistically, is the same as the original sentence. Of course, if you’ve ever played this game in North America, it's done a little differently. If the first person starts by saying something like, “I see two watermelons,” this becomes “I see your daughter’s melons,” which somehow, by the end of it, becomes something completely different like, “Your mother is a whore.” It’s inevitable that the phrase or sentence is changed as it passes from ear to ear. It’s undeniably the best part of the game, or at least that's the case in North America. In Korea my students play this game rigorously and properly. They are inexorable when passing along the message and become irrate with the student that they smoke out and determine is the word-slurring culprit. With the recent beef predicatment I feel as if everyone in Korea is playing a big game of telephone and the message is, “psst... America has bad beef. Pass it on.”
Now, allow me to briefly explain the situation. First off, beef prices in Korea are mountainous, about three times higher than they are in North America. This is partly because Korea shut it’s doors on American beef in 2003 when a case of BSE (mad cow disease) was reported in America. About three months ago the ban was removed and the newly elected Korean government was pleased (or so they thought) to bridge a gap with its third largest trading partner and biggest ally.
But Koreans can be stubborn and unforgiving. Once they got wind that American beef was going to be allowed back into their country, they became manic. They were afraid that America was going to be shipping over all their beef that was older than 30 months. This 30-month cut-off is of particular concern because BSE has a long incubation period of around 4-years. The general concensus among the Koreans I’ve talked to is that America is simply going to ship over all their geriatric cows and offload their infected beef to Korea. While being here I have been asked many times, if I would eat American beef. I have confessed that I would, and do, to which they respond, in complete seriousness, “aren’t you afraid you’ll die?” I rarely ask them to consider how Americans, consumers of 28.1 billion pounds of beef every year, aren’t all dead except for Drew Barrymore, Bob Barker and the 13 other vegetarians in America.
After they tell me I am stupid for taking such a risk, I mention that I am Canadian so it's not so bad. I then ask them if they would ever eat delicious and world famous Canadian beef. They always admit they would. But, truth be told, Canada has had 10 reported cases of BSE compared to America’s three. Statistically, Canadian beef is far more dangerous.
After two months of unrelenting protests, it has become clearer that this issue isn’t really about bad beef, but more so with Korean’s discontent with America and the newly elected President. President Lee Myung-bak was elected in February and is being held accountable (in just four months in office no less) for the beef “crisis,” a rise in gas prices and a slump in an already bearish economy. Last week, in accordance with the rabbles and their complaints, President Lee completely reshuffled his cabinet and rectified the beef situation by ensuring that no beef over 30 months would be imported for the time being. What happened two days after this news? There were massive riots again, where protesters took to the streets with iron bars, stones and obstreperosity.
Now, I am all for a vocal and engaged democracy, and it is impressive that 1,000,000 people can take to the street to let their voices be heard on an issue, but I just wish that these people wouldn’t be so ignorant. In there defence, there is so much fearmongering and propaganda going on that it is difficult for anyone not to believe that all American meat is mad cow diseased! (as roughly half of Koreans believe). I just wish they would think for themselves before getting into a tizzy.
“Psst... America’s beef is fine. Pass it on.”
