Occidentalism

They say give up, 97% of the worlds mass calls it the “Sea Of Japan” — but we say, “IT’S A START!”

I really do think VANK is doing more harm than good. I doubt many people are affected in a ‘positive’ way by getting spam from VANK. They were able to get a map changed on about.com, however the administrators of the site say the changed it not because they had a good argument, but because they were sick of getting 20 or so spams a day. [1]

VANK stands for – ‘Voluntary Agency Network of Korea’, a civilian international exchange association in Korea. We work for the promotion of Korea’s image all over the world by Internet. VANK was established in 1999 by volunteers, and now has over 12,000 members. Using email or internet we serve as cyber travel guides to overseas Koreans and foreigners so that they can understand Korean culture and language better, and at the same time we hope we build international friendships. VANK is a great chance for those who are interested in Korean language, arts, cultural education, history, geography, social studies, sciences to learn about our country, and we also welcome with open arms anyone just wanting to make Korean friends!

Yes, the image of Korea is so much better now that the world knows people who are incapable of providing useful information therefor resort to harassment feel they are the best representatives of a nation of some 49 million. [2] I do wish the normal people of South Korea would step up and tell everyone they think these guys are fools just like the rest of us do and then present a logical argument to prove the rest of the world wrong once and for all, because as for now, we are forced to assume the self-declared representative of all Koreans -slash- author of “The Hate Japan Wave” is actually an accurate representation. Or perhaps he is???

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[1] http://geography.about.com/library/weekly/aa022402a.htm
[2] http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/ks.html#People