A sadistic country?

Chinese communist leader Mao Zedong and legendary Mongolian conqueror Genghis Khan are known to have been responsible for the deaths of about 40 million people each. The world population when Mao ruled China was 2.5 billion and that in the 13th century when Khan created his empire was a mere 400 million. This means the Mongolian warrior slaughtered a bigger percentage of people than the Chinese leader. Harvard University professor Steven Pinker said violence is decreasing across the world due to modernism and enlightenment. Liberal democracy is ethically superior to utopian ideologies such as Marxism and Nazism because of respect for human rights.

A Korean Army private who killed himself Sunday allegedly complained about violence in the barracks. He is known to have told his friends that he was hit “both because he answered and didn’t answer.” This shows certain parts of Korean society have yet to be blessed by modernism and enlightenment. According to data on the parliamentary inspection of the Defense Ministry compiled last month, the number of military officials punished for abusing their subordinates increased from 64 in 2009 to 71 last year. The brutal acts included forcing subordinates to eat garbage and smell military boots. The inspection of the Marines conducted by the National Human Rights Commission of Korea found that a Marine set air freshener alight and sprinkled it over the bottom of his subordinate.

Inevitable acts can be committed in the military to tighten discipline. No parent, however, will tolerate what happened at a public daycare center in Seoul. A surveillance camera installed in the facility caught several teachers stamping children lying on the floor and grabbing two children by their hair to bump their heads. The young female teachers who mindlessly treated young children might make people think Korean society has many with a sadistic streak.

In his recent book “The Better Angels of Our Nature,” Pinker wrote that another wave of violence can erupt according to social and cultural change, technology and ideology. The Weimar Republic was an advanced country in Europe at the time, but its subculture that idealized the military and patriotism instead of modernism gave rise to the emergence of the monstrous Adolf Hitler. If harsh treatment is the act of treating others badly and cruelly, sadistic treatment is the act from which the perpetrator feels pleasure. From daycare centers to military barracks in Korea, if harsh and sadistic acts are committed, those who are powerless and virtuous cannot lead happy lives.

Editorial Writer Kim Soon-deok (yuri@donga.com)