United Nations Rules that South Korea Discriminates Against Foreign English Teachers

The earlier Korean Herald article linked to here (from 2013) points out that there has been some confusion over the past few years about whether the official requirement for HIV testing had been rescinded and for whom:

A Justice Ministry spokesman confirmed on Monday that one-time testing for immigration purposes was still in place, after earlier claiming the ministry had no such requirement.

An official with Korea Immigration Service, a division of the Justice Ministry, however, also said there had been no change in policy.

“We have not changed any of our policies on HIV testing,” Lee You-jin, a member of the residence and visa division of KIS, said via email on Nov. 19.

In follow-up correspondence after publication, however, she claimed that all Korean public servants were required to take the same test, as part of a general health checkup. Accordingly, she said that such a policy could not be regarded as discrimination.

One of several hospitals that list HIV testing for foreigners separately from the general public servant health check on their websites, however, said there was no such requirement for Korean government employees.

…

In 2010, the government lifted its general entry ban on most HIV-positive foreign nationals, followed later that year by the scrapping of mandatory testing of unskilled laborers and those on so-called “entertainment visas.” The E-6 entertainment visa has long been associated with prostitution.

Mandatory testing for native English teachers, however, was maintained.

This is great, but what about the real racial discrimination issue when it comes to hiring foreign English teachers–blacks, browns and even non-Korean Asians have a hard time getting hired by Korean schools.

I know a gay English teacher. He LIKED the mandatory HIV test.

He said it gave him peace of mind if he was shotgunning some other teacher’s steaming man-goo or taking a hot splooge bareback colon wash.

Actually, I might be paraphrasing. I don’t recall him going much beyond the peace of mind part… but we all get the idea.

Nice post GIKorea. You are right on point with the comparison between the US GIs and foreign English teachers. That’s actually a major part of a paper that Matt and I put together explaining part of the “why” of the tests, which were never about HIV or drugs or public health or teaching English, but just a way for the ROK to assert its sovereignty and its (imagined) national identity (as uniquely drug-free, AIDS-free, extra-moral, not like those foreigners, etc.).

Leaving aside the obvious concerns over human rights abuses for a moment, it is worth remarking on how the successful implementation of E-2 visa requirements has provided clear confirmation of the government’s jurisdiction to prescribe and enforce HIV restrictions for foreigners on its territory. As such, for nationalists they likely represent a significant victory for the ROK’s exercise of sovereign authority over foreigners in Korea. In the late 1980s, at a time when it was asserted that US soldiers were “bringing AIDS and drug abuse” to Korea, the popular movement to impose mandatory HIV tests on USFK in order to “expel AIDS” and “low quality American culture” failed because “U.S soldiers under the mandate of the Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA) [were] out of the reach” of legislative efforts.

The popular movement that sprung up on the Internet in 2005, which would coalesce into the Citizens’ Group, similarly called for the expulsion of “low-quality foreign teachers [and] vulgar foreign culture” and would eventually connect foreign teachers to AIDS and drugs. Foreign teachers, however, are unlike foreign soldiers in that they are without any SOFA-like extraterritorial protections. Thus, in choosing to focus its efforts on foreign teachers, the Citizens’ Group’s movement was able to accomplish what earlier groups had failed to achieve: mandatory HIV tests and deportations targeted at a group of non-Korean men (the majority of whom were American) residing in Korea who were seen as acting with impunity and treating Korean women with contempt. There is little doubt the members of the group view such an accomplishment as significant progress in the “restoration of sovereignty and national pride.”

At the height of the Hongdae photo scandal, members of the Anti-English Spectrum cafe suggested forming an offline “Yankee counter strike force” that would target not only the “foreigners who threw the promiscuous party” but would also urge members to “[i]mmediately punish U.S. soldiers discovered in the Sinchon area who act disrespectfully toward Koreans.”

These calls to “take direct action” and strike at the “Yankee bastards” were severe enough to attract the attention of the U.S. Embassy, which took note of “a strong reaction in the form of web postings threatening attacks in the vicinity of Hongik University and the Sinchon area against Americans and other foreigners who speak English” and issued a warning of “potential threats” in those areas. Such warnings by the U.S. Embassy had in the past referred to protests against U.S. military forces, but this warning was unique in that it extended not only to U.S. soldiers and Americans but also to “other foreigners who speak English.” Through the efforts of the Citizens’ Group this generalized animus toward such English speaking foreigners would become focused on so-called “native speaker” English teachers (woneomin) and would eventually result in specific sanctions against E-2 visa holders in the form of mandatory in-country HIV and drug tests.” [pages 223-225]

There is more, specifically on how blood nationalism and the ideas of collective responsibility figure into this, for those interested in reading please see (p. 225) “HIV/AIDS Tests as a Proxy for Racial Discrimination? A Preliminary Investigation of South Korea’s Policy of Mandatory In-Country HIV/AIDS Tests for its Foreign English Teachers”. http://s-space.snu.ac.kr/bitstream/10371/85184/1/03_BK%20Wagner_OK.pdf

@7 BKW…”You are right on point with the comparison between the US GIs and foreign English teachers.”

I don’t see the GI Korea “comparison”? Wherever(?) it was, the “comparison” was difficult to spot and was certainly overcome by GI Korea’s following statement…”It all began in 2005 when English Spectrum-gate occurred.”

It DID NOT all begin in 2005! If he had thought there was a “comparison” then he wouldn’t have made that statement.

@setnaffa…”Yie sounds like a real nice guy. Someone who really cares about children.”

“Yei” or ie Eun-woong, volunteer manager of the Seoul-based Anti-English Spectrum… not only “stalked or followed” English teachers but went through their garbage they placed on the street…in search of condoms etc…because using condoms is BAD ~ sign of bad “morals and values” since who else could these BAD English teachers be using those condoms with but Korean females(property of Korean males)? “ie Eun-woong” reminds me a bit about this Korean I once played tennis with(gave a whoopazz lesson) at an apartment complex in S. Korea and afterward I took a shower in its locker room…guess who couldn’t resist opening the shower door to check out my package?