The Gendered Politics of the Korean Protestant Right: Hegemonic Masculinity

198 Pages·2016·2.85 MB·English

by  Nami Kim (auth.)

ASIAN CHRISTIANITY
IN THE DIASPORA
THE
GENDERED
POLITICS
OF THE
KOREAN
PROTESTANT
RIGHT
Hegemonic Masculinity
NAMI KIM
Asian Christianity in the Diaspora
Series Editors
Grace   Ji-Sun Kim
Earlham School of Religion
Richmond , Indiana , USA
Joseph   Cheah
University of Saint Joseph
West Hartford ,   Connecticut, USA
Aim of the Series
Asian American theology is still at its nascent stage. It began in the 1980’s
with just a handful of scholars who were recent immigrants to the United
States. Now with the rise in Asian American population and the rise of
Asian American theologians, this new community is an ever-i mportant
voice within theological discourse and Asian American cultural studies.
This new series seeks to bring to the forefront some of the important,
provocative new voices within Asian American Theology. The series aims
to provide Asian American theological responses to the complex process
of migration and resettlement process of Asian immigrants and refugees.
We will address theoretical works on the meaning of diaspora, exile, and
social memory, and the foundational works concerning the ways in which
displaced communities remember and narrate their experiences. Such an
interdisciplinary approach entails intersectional analysis between Asian
American contextual theology and one other factor; be it sexuality, gen-
der, race/ethnicity, and/or cultural studies. This series also addresses
Christianity from Asian perspectives. We welcome manuscripts that exam-
ine the identity and internal coherence of the Christian faith in its encoun-
ters with different Asian cultures, with Asian people, the majority of whom
are poor, and with non-Christian religions that predominate the landscape
of the Asian continent. Palgrave is embarking on a transformation of dis-
course within Asian and Asian American theological scholarship as this will
be the fi rst of its kind. As we live in a global world in which Christianity
has re-centered itself in the Global South and among the racialized minor-
ities in the United States, it behooves us to listen to the rich, diverse and
engaging voices of Asian and Asian American theologians.
More information about this series at
http://www.springer.com/series/14781
Nami   Kim
The Gendered Politics
of the Korean
Protestant Right
Hegemonic Masculinity
Nami   Kim
Spelman College
Atlanta, Georgia , USA
Asian Christianity in the Diaspora
ISBN 978-3-319-39977-5 ISBN 978-3-319-39978-2 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-39978-2
Library of Congress Control Number: 2016948428
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C
ONTENTS
1 The Resurgence of the Protestant Right in the 
Post-Hypermasculine Developmentalism Era 1
2 “When Father Is Restored, Family Can Be Reestablished”:
Father School 41
3 “Homosexuality Is a Threat to Our Family and 
the Nation”: Anti-LGBT Movement 81
4 “Saving Korean Women from (Im)migrant
Muslim Men”: Islamophobia 115
Epilogue 151
Bibliography 155
Index 179
v
A
CKNOWLEDGMENTS
Chapters 3 and 4 in their formative stages I presented at the Third Era
Christianity Institute in Korea in 2013 and 2015, respectively. I am
deeply grateful to Reverend Jin Ho Kim for inviting me to present my
work despite a threat to cancel my talk on the Protestant Right’s anti-
LGBT movement. Sang-tae Ahn and Yong-taek Jeong, researchers at the
Institute, also provided me support, critical questions, and feedback that
I appreciate. I am also thankful to the attentive audience who came to my
presentations and asked thought-provoking questions. I am indebted to
LGBT human rights activists and allies who, despite bigotry, discrimina-
tion, and injustice toward them, continue to struggle to bring a better
world.
I want to thank the Asian Theological Summer Institute 2014 for pro-
viding me an opportunity to present my work. I also want to acknowledge
the panelists, respondents, and audience at the session organized by the
Korean Religions Group at the American Academy of Religion in 2014,
in which I received feedback and questions that signifi cantly affected the
outcome of this book. My thanks also go to PANAAWTM mentors and
sisters who have encouraged me to continue the work I do.
I want to acknowledge my colleagues who serve on the LGBTQ
Curriculum Committee at Spelman College—Angelino Viceisza, Beverly
Guy-Sheftall, Cynthia Spence, Erica Williams, Holly Smith, Kimberly
Jackson, M.  Bahati Kuumba, Marisela Mancia, Mona Phillips, Opal
Moore, and Rosetta Ross. Their commitment to bring positive changes
to the College community through the curricular changes in relation to
vii
viii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
gender and sexual justice has inspired and sustained me as I was writing
this book.
I thank the editor and publisher for permission to revise and republish
Chap. 2 that was written in Korean and fi rst published in The Independent
Critic Journal, W ord and Bow , Vol. 7 (February/March 2015).
My heartfelt thanks are to the series editors, Grace Ji-sun Kim and
Joseph Cheah, whose support has been invaluable. I am thankful to a great
team of experts at Palgrave Macmillan. I want to thank Phil Getz, editor
at Palgrave Macmillan. I am also grateful to Alexis Nelson at Palgrave
Macmillan who has enthusiastically and patiently assisted me throughout
the production process.
I am grateful to my partner, David Daesoo Kim, for his love, steadfast
support, encouragement, and humor that have sustained me in all that I
do. If my mother fi nds out about this book, she will try to learn English
to read it. I do not want her to do that, but my deepest gratitude is to her.
I : F S ,
NTRODUCTION ATHER CHOOL
A - LGBT M , I
NTI OVEMENT AND SLAMOPHOBIA
INTRODUCTION
On November 30, 2014, the Seoul metropolitan government dropped
its plan to enact a human rights charter that was originally scheduled to
be declared on World Human Rights Day, December 10, 2014. Faced
by the Protestant Right’s vehement opposition to adopting a municipal
charter that is inclusive of LGBT 1 (lesbians, gays, bisexuals, and transgen-
der persons) rights, the Seoul government decided not to promulgate the
human rights charter that could have banned discrimination against sexual
minorities and other forms of discrimination. The human rights charter
was drafted by 150 Seoul citizens in addition to 30 advisors. The LGBT
human rights activists and allies staged six-day sit-in protests at Seoul City
Hall demanding that the charter be declared and that Won-soon Park,
Seoul Mayor and former human rights lawyer, apologize for indefi nitely
postponing the proclamation of the charter. Park was criticized for apol-
ogizing only to the Protestant Right pastors for “creating more social
confl icts.”2
Whether one wants to admit it or not, the Protestant Right, a subset
of Korean Protestant Christianity that combines conservative evangeli-
cal/fundamentalist theology with social and political conservatism, 3 is a
unifi ed social and political force that cannot be underestimated largely
for its organized political and social actions with enormous resources.
Although the Protestant Right has been the subject of grave concerns
and even ridicule among concerned Christians and non-Christians alike
because of its insidious rhetorics, divisive stance, and aggressive actions
ix
x INTRODUCTION: FATHER SCHOOL, ANTI- LGBT MOVEMENT...
on varied social and political issues, it is, nonetheless, diffi cult to dismiss
or ignore its presence and infl uence. This diffi culty has mostly to do with
its collective power, networks, and resources that can be mobilized for
the purpose of achieving its desired outcomes regarding important soci-
etal matters. Its often harmful actions and discourses need to be critically
examined rather than dismissed primarily because of their actual material
effects on people whose lives have already been marginalized, discrimi-
nated, and neglected in society. Those who have become the Protestant
Right’s “targets,” whether directly or not, will have to bear the brunt of its
destructive theo-political rhetorics and actions. Included among them are
sexual minorities, gender-non-conforming people, and racial and religious
minorities such as (im)migrant Muslims and their families. Moreover, like
other contemporary religious fundamentalist movements, the Protestant
Right poses serious challenges to the efforts to achieve gender and sex-
ual justice in Korean society, as well as in Korean diasporic communities
where conservative immigrant Korean churches have maintained transna-
tional connections with the Protestant Right organizations and churches
in South Korea.
As researchers who have studied the Religious Right in the USA argue,
what is broadly called the Religious Right, often used interchangeably
with the Christian Right, 4 does not simply refer to Christians who “hap-
pen to be conservative in their politics.” Rather, as “a coherent movement
with identifi able leaders, objectives and infl uence,” the US Religious Right
is comprised of religious and political leaders and groups and “mobilizes
adherents to action on issues that relate to their fundamental values.” 5
Similarly, the Protestant Right in this study also refers to a constellation
of conservative Protestant churches, pastors, political leaders and groups,
and Christian organizations that have formed a movement in advancing its
conservative theo-political and social agendas.
Needless to say there are Christians who self-identify as evangelical
Christians and do not necessarily agree with the Protestant Right’s agenda.
There is also a growing number of Protestant Christians and churches,
mostly small-sized, who disagree with and even oppose the Protestant
Right’s aggressive agenda. Certainly, not all individual congregants of the
churches that are part of the Protestant Right network agree on every
activity of the Protestant Right, either. Korean scholar Dae-young Ryu also
distinguishes politically liberal evangelicals from what he calls the “evan-
gelical Right.”6 The focus of this book is not individual Christians who
may have actively participated in the Protestant Right activities or who