@samuelszuchan: In August 2019 a young man doing his national service at a Seoul elementary school heard six-year-olds in a corridor calling each other two-hundred bug, three-hundred bug, five-hundred bug. One turned to another and said, "You're a two-hundred bug, you can't play with us, get lost." He asked what it meant. A child explained: "If your dad earns in the two hundreds you call him a two-hundred bug. Three hundreds, three-hundred bug. Above five hundred it's a gold spoon." Those numbers are monthly salary in Korean won. Two hundred is about $1,700 a month. Five hundred, about $4,300, is where you stop being a bug. The suffix means vermin. Korean internet forums coined it around 2013, and by 2019 first graders had attached it to their fathers' paychecks. Three months later a teacher at a new-town school (where branded apartment towers and public rental blocks sit side by side) told Money Today, "The students were saying two-hundred bug and three-hundred bug, and now jeonse beggar and monthly-rent beggar have appeared too." A kindergarten teacher in the same report said the children asked her on her first day, "Which neighborhood do you live in?" A parent in Bundang said her child came home and told her, "Everyone in my class except me has been abroad." In Gwangjin-gu, a parent of a fourth grader said children were asking each other, "Why haven't you been abroad?" and teasing anyone who hadn't. By 2020 that had produced a new term: perfect-attendance beggar. A child who never misses school, because the family can't afford trips abroad. Korean schools grant a formal absence for family travel, so the kids who stayed behind were visible. The Human Rights Commission surveyed young Koreans in 2019. 57% said they had heard or used slurs like these, and over half of those who had used them said they did it because it was funny or because everyone else was. These kids learned to rank each other from somewhere. That same school had given them a homework assignment called "My Dad's Car." Each child had to bring in a photo of their father's car and describe it to the class.

𐒍𐒗𐒕𐒈𐒖𐒐 :

its miserable to live there

Mr.StealYoFitch 🫎. :

Korea and Japan genuinely sounds like hell😭.

mrml :

the mindset of these children are a reflection of their parents mindset. how is a 5 year supposed to learn to judge ppl by their wealth.

BrickRat :

Why is the cultural basis for this? Like why are even toddlers & small children being taught to engage in behavior like this?

Eddie :3 🇵🇭🏳️‍🌈 :

It's quite interesting how both Koreas became dystopian versions of their respective political systems

AK :

South Korea is underhated

Big_Bro🇷🇼🇺🇬 :

Let's be honest here, a perverse society like this will inevitably go extinct And rather than raise a child in this kind of environment, one might as well not have any at all It's just so toxic

𐔌՞. .՞𐦯 :

?????? something about this country always something bizzare i cannot comprehend

kimche17 :

how the hell do 1st Graders even know there parents salaries why are they even flexing there parents salaries sounds like middle to highschool drama 😔

Enoch 🤨 :

they probably say bug because the word bug in korea sounds like the word for earn

clay.politics :

Genuine capitalist hellscape

Nothing :

Korean culture is the worst culture, you get bullied, you get looked down just because your parents arent ceos. I cant believe i had a friend that wanted to live in korea it just shows how much he doesnt know about korea

Yaw :

And I thought all those webtoons were pure fiction…

Heckel 🇵🇸🇨🇳 :

Bullying in South Korea is institutionalized 🤣

mistel ban :

classism final boss

expatpilled :

how do they even know lol

j :

bruh imagine getting perfect attendance and then getting bullied for it 🥀🥀

Goof4_overseer :

Swear every country in east Asia is competing to see who has the worst bullying💔

Ex0dius.02 :

It really is a hellhole

marcelmorgun :

kids with different economies don’t belong in the same class. i was the poorest kid in my class and it made it impossible to connect with them. it’s just how it is. if you force kids to get along you are awful

Declanberry :

This is like the complete opposite of what zizek talks about with capitalist ethics. Kinda wild.

Mark :