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Anti-Japanese sentiment in Korea has its roots in historic, cultural, and nationalistic sentiments.

The first recorded anti-Japanese attitudes in Korea were effects of the Japanese pirate raids and the later 1592−98 Japanese invasions of Korea. Sentiments in contemporary society are largely attributed to the Japanese rule in Korea from 1910 to 1945. A survey in 2005 found that 89% of those South Koreans polled said that they "cannot trust Japan." More recently, according to a BBC World Service Poll conducted in 2013, 67% of South Koreans view Japan's influence negatively, and 21% express a positive view. This puts South Korea behind the People's Republic of China (mainland China) as the country with the second most negative feelings of Japan in the world.

Historical origins

Japanese invasions of Korea

This section needs expansion. You can help by adding to it. (January 2011)

During this time, the invading Japanese dismembered more than 20,000 noses and ears from Koreans and brought them back to Japan to create nose tombs as war trophies. In addition after the war, Korean artisans including potters were kidnapped by Hideyoshi's order to cultivate Japan's arts and culture. The abducted Korean potters played important roles to be a major factor in establishing new types of pottery such as Satsuma, Arita, and Hagi ware. This would soon cause tension between the two countries; leaving the Koreans feeling that a part of their culture was stolen by Japan during this time.

Effect of Japanese rule in Korea

Korea was ruled by the Japanese Empire from 1910 to 1945. Japan's involvement began with the 1876 Treaty of Ganghwa during the Joseon Dynasty of Korea and increased over the following decades with the Gapsin Coup (1882), the First Sino-Japanese War (1894–95), the assassination of Empress Myeongseong at the hands of Japanese agents in 1895, the establishment of the Korean Empire (1897), the Russo-Japanese War (1904–05), the Taft–Katsura Agreement (1905), culminating with the 1905 Eulsa Treaty, removing Korean autonomous diplomatic rights, and the 1910 Annexation Treaty (both of which were eventually declared null and void by the Treaty on Basic Relations between Japan and the Republic of Korea in 1965).

Japan's cultural assimilation policies

The Japanese annexation of Korea has been mentioned as the case in point of "cultural genocide" by Yuji Ishida, an expert on genocide studies at the University of Tokyo. The Japanese government put into practice the suppression of Korean culture and language in an "attempt to root out all elements of Korean culture from society."

"Focus was heavily and intentionally placed upon the psychological and cultural element in Japan's colonial policy, and the unification strategies adopted in the fields of culture and education were designed to eradicate the individual ethnicity of the Korean race."

"One of the most striking features of Japan's occupation of Korea is the absence of an awareness of Korea as a 'colony', and the absence of an awareness of Koreans as a 'separate ethnicity'. As a result, it is difficult to prove whether or not the leaders of Japan aimed for the eradication of the Korean race."

After the annexation of Korea, Japan enforced a cultural assimilation policy. The Korean language was removed from required school subjects in Korea in 1936. Japan imposed the family name system along with civil law (Sōshi-kaimei) and attendance at Shinto shrines. Koreans were formally forbidden to write or speak the Korean language in schools, businesses, or public places. However, many Korean language movies were screened in the Korean peninsula. In addition, Koreans were angry over Japanese alteration and destruction of various Korean monuments including Gyeongbok Palace (경복궁, Gyeongbokgung) and the revision of documents that portrayed the Japanese in a negative light.

Independence movement

On March 1, 1919, anti-Japanese rule protests were held all across the country to demand independence. About 2 million Koreans actively participated in what is now known as the March 1st Movement. A Declaration of Independence, patterned after the American version, was read by teachers and civic leaders in tens of thousands of villages throughout Korea: "Today marks the declaration of Korean independence. There will be peaceful demonstrations all over Korea. If our meetings are orderly and peaceful, we shall receive the help of President Wilson and the great powers at Versailles, and Korea will be a free nation." Japan repressed the independence movement through military power. In one well attested incident, villagers were herded into the local church which was then set on fire. The official Japanese count of casualties include 553 killed, 1,409 injured, and 12,522 arrested, but the Korean estimates are much higher: over 7,500 killed, about 15,000 injured, and 45,000 arrested.

Comfort women

Many Korean women were kidnapped and coerced by the Japanese authorities into military sex slavery, euphemistically called "comfort women" (위안부, wianbu). Some Japanese historians, such as Yoshiaki Yoshimi, using the diaries and testimonies of military officials as well as official documents from Japan and archives of the Tokyo tribunal, have argued that the Imperial Japanese military was either directly or indirectly involved in coercing, deceiving, luring, and sometimes kidnapping young women throughout Japan's Asian colonies and occupied territories. In the case of recruiting Japanese comfort women (일본군위안소 종업부 등 모집에 관한건) (1938.3.4), the Ministry of Army records that the method of recruiting military "Japanese Military Sexual Slavery" in Japan was "similar to kidnapping" and was often misunderstood by the police as kidnappers.

Park Yu-ha, a Korean professor of Japanese language and literature at Seoul's Sejong University wrote a book titled Comfort Women of the Empire, in which she disputed the numbers of Korean comfort women. She interviewed many survivors and sifted through Japanese military records, and says there's some evidence some of the women were given labor contracts as prostitutes. Her book challenged the view that all of them were rape victims, and says there were Korean middle men, or collaborators, who helped traffic Korean women, leading to the book's censorship in Korea, and to Park being labeled a Japanese apologist and a traitor. She would later tell NPR "Nowadays, people think Japan came and raped and never gave compensation, but that's not totally accurate. I've been a victim of this anti-Japanese sentiment". South Korea's mainstream academic circle, which is critical of her, argues that she provides intellectual justification for Japanese historical revisionism and that her argument should be equated to Holocaust denial.

After declaring in 2015 that the comfort women issue had been resolved "finally and irreversibly", in 2019, the South Korean government dissolved the foundation (the Reconciliation and Healing Foundation) set up for the purpose of providing support for former comfort women to which Japan had contributed 1 billion yen, without consent from the Japanese government. A task force created by Moon Jae-in "criticized the previous administration for not doing more outreach to the surviving comfort women, and making too many concessions to the Japanese side."

Contemporary issues

Including non-Korean race Japanese-born naturalized South Korean liberal scholar Yuji Hosaka and centre-left media Hankyoreh, argue that South Korea's anti-Japanese sentiment has nothing to do with xenophobia. They argue that anti-Japanese and anti-Chinese sentiment in South Korea is mainly anti-imperialism stemming from conflicts related to history, politics and culture, and that race is not the main factor. Many Koreans believe that resistance-nationalism is necessary to counter strong powers such as China and Japan.

Effects of sentiments

Society

A 2000 CNN ASIANOW article described popularity of Japanese culture among younger South Koreans as "unsettling" for older South Koreans who remember the occupation by the Japanese.

While some South Koreans expressed hope that former Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama would handle Japanese-South Korean relations in a more agreeable fashion than previous conservative administrations, a small group of protesters in Seoul held an anti-Japanese rally on October 8, 2009, prior to his arrival. The protests called for Japanese apologies for World War II incidents and included destruction of a Japanese flag.

When Akihito stepped down as emperor in 2019, Sana, a member of a South Korean popular girl group called TWICE, posted on Instagram, "Since I was born in Heisei era, I'm somewhat sad that Heisei is coming to an end, but did a great job in the Heisei!!!" (Template:Lang-ja), which was cyberbullied by South Korean netizens. According to her critics, "She comes from a war criminal state, and lacks courtesy to South Koreans". Sana has Japanese nationality and is ethnically Japanese. However, even Hankyoreh, which is critical of Japan, suggested that this could be excessive nationalism and xenophobia against foreign women.

National relations

Yasuhiro Nakasone discontinued visits to Yasukuni Shrine due to the People's Republic of China's requests in 1986. However, former Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi resumed visits to Yasukuni Shrine on August 13, 2001. He visited the shrine six times as Prime Minister, stating that he was "paying homage to the servicemen who died for defense of Japan." These visits drew strong condemnation and protests from Japan's neighbors, mainly China. As a result, China and South Korea refused to meet with Koizumi, and there were no mutual visits between Chinese and Japanese leaders after October 2001 and between South Korean and Japanese leaders after June 2005. Former President of South Korea Roh Moo-hyun suspended all summit talks between South Korea and Japan.

Education

A large number of anti-Japanese images made by school children from Gyeyang Middle School, many of which depicting acts of violence against Japan, were displayed in Gyulhyeon station as part of a school art project. A number of the drawings depict the Japanese flag being burned, bombed, and stepped on, in others the Japanese islands are getting bombed and destroyed by a volcano from Korea. One depicts the Japanese anime/manga character Sailor Moon holding up the South Korean flag with a quote bubble saying roughly "Dokdo is Korean land".

Politics

Political anti-Japanese sentiment has been used against the conservative camp, given the familial ties between the conservative and the former Japanese collaborator elites. The Interpreter wrote that in South Korea, "anti-Japanism" was like 'political correctness' which South Korean officials "dare not bend". South Korean liberals and progressives have also taken a more hawkish stance against Japan, especially clashing with Japan's conservatives. Western experts say that the conflict between the two countries intensifies the most when a conservative (mainly LDP) regime is established in Japan and a liberal (mainly DPK) regime is established in South Korea.

The United States's ambassador to South Korea, Harry B. Harris Jr., who is of Japanese descent, has been criticized in the South Korean media for having a moustache, which his detractors say resembles those of the several leaders of the Empire of Japan. A CNN article written by Joshua Berlinger suggested that given Harris's ancestry, the criticism of his mustache may be due to xenophobia. South Korean liberal media point out that Harry B. Harris Jr. had similar words and actions to the right-wing of Japan. On November 30, 2019, Harris verbally abused, saying, "There are many Jongbuk leftists around the president of Moon" (문 대통령 종북좌파에 둘러싸여 있다는데). On January 16, 2020, he was criticized by the Democratic Party of Korea for "interference in internal affairs" (내정 간섭) for saying that U.S. consultation was needed on tourism to North Korea. South Korean liberal media believe the attack on his beard is not racist because he attacked the South Korea's "national sovereignty" (주권) using rhetoric like "Japanese colonial governor" (일본 총독).

When Shinzo Abe was assassinated in 2022, many South Koreans reacted with glee, mainly due to Abe's negationist stance over Japan's rule over Korea.

Chinilpa

In South Korea, collaborators to the Japanese occupation government, called Chinilpa (친일파), are generally recognized as national traitors. The South Korean National Assembly passed the special law to redeem pro-Japanese collaborators' property on December 8, 2005, and the law was enacted on December 29, 2005. In 2006, the National Assembly of South Korea formed a Committee for the Inspection of Property of Japan Collaborators. The aim was to reclaim property inappropriately gained by cooperation with the Japanese government during colonialization. The project was expected to satisfy Koreans' demands that property acquired by collaborators under the Japanese colonial authorities be returned.

2019 boycott of Japanese products in South Korea

In August 2019, Seoul, the capital of South Korea, had planned to install more than 1,000 anti-Japan banners across the city in a move to support the country's ongoing boycott against Japanese products. At that time, the Democratic Party of Korea, which was negative about 'Japanese imperialism', was the ruling party in Seoul city. The banners featured the word “NO”, in Korean, with the red circle of the Japanese flag representing the “O”. The banners also contained the phrases “I won’t go ” (가지 않습니다) and “I won’t buy ” (사지 않습니다). However, after 50 banners were installed, the city had to reverse course and apologize amid conservative criticism that the campaign would further strain the relationship between South Korea and Japan.

Feminist movements

Feminist movement in South Korea also often has anti-Japanese sentiment. This was naturally formed by war crimes committed by the Japanese Empire during the past World War II, such as Korean Women's Volunteer Labour Corps, Comfort Women, etc. South Korea's far-right (anti-feminist) conservative-biased media accuse feminist schoolteachers of anti-Japanese education.

However, South Korean feminists actively interact with Japanese feminists. Japanese society antagonizes its feminist movement by calling it "anti-Japanese" because South Korean and Japanese feminist movements is related to the issue of war crimes against Korean women committed by Japan in the past.

See also

• Anti-Japanese sentiment in China
• Anti-Korean sentiment in Japan
• Boycotts of Japanese products
• Japan–Korea disputes
  • Japan–South Korea trade dispute

Notes

1. Template:Lang-ko; Hanja: 反日感 情, Banil gamjeong

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• Anti-Japanese sentiment in Korea
• Comfort women
• Japan–Korea relations
• Japanese imperialism and colonialism
• Japanese war crimes