The Gangnam Station Post-it Note protest in Seoul, South Korea was organized in response to the murder of a 23-year-old woman inside a public toilet by a 34-year-old man in Seoul, on May 17, 2016, also known as Seocho-dong public toilet murder case.
The protest was held just at the exit of Gangnam metro station where the wall was filled with post-it sticky notes and many chrysanthemum flowers. Seong-min Kim justified the reason behind his killing was that he felt disregarded by women his whole life, and the courts ruled in his favor. Protestors demanded justice and claimed that the killing was based on gender-based discrimination. However, the police gave a statement that there was a mental stability in the man and highlighted that the motives behind the murder was not prejudice against a certain gender but an experience from the mental disorder. The motive was further reinforced by an article from The Korea Herald. The man was reported to have been admitted to hospital for treatment on his mental illness.
Gangnam Station murder case
The “Gangnam Station Murder Case” (also called the Seocho-dong public toilet murder case) occurred in Seoul on May 17 in 2016. A 34-year-old man, Seong-min Kim, hid in a gender-neutral restroom for more than an hour inside a karaoke bar near Gangnam station, an expensive area in the city, and stabbed a woman entering a toilet four times with a kitchen knife at around 1 am. The surveillance cameras showed that before the incident, there were men going in and coming out of the restroom unharmed. Finally when a woman went in, she was attacked by the murderer. He was later arrested by the police.
Judicial proceedings
On May 22, the police announced the results of the investigation as a motiveless crime by one with a mental illness, not a hate crime. On June 1, comprehensive measures against violent and motiveless crimes were announced. On July 10, the prosecution too announced that the case was not a hate crime. On Oct. 14th, the Seoul Central District Court sentenced Kim to 30 years in prison, and the judicial procedures were concluded.
Conflict
Immediately after his arrest, Kim stated during police examination, “I have often been ignored by women and committed crime because I could not take it anymore.” The police remarked that this was a motiveless crime by one who had a mental illness, schizophrenia, who had not been taking his medicine since he ran away from home in March. Since the announcement, the conflict between those who agree that the crime is without motivation and those who think it a gender-based hate crime had intensified.
Responses
Media representations
The difference in the viewpoints on the case also appeared in the media . In analysis of the articles of political conservative journals Chosun and Dong-A and the progressive journals Kyunghyang and Hankyoreh, this murder case was reconstructed differently at each side. <Chosun> and <Dong-a> reported it as a murder case of mental illness in the unsafe public space of the toilet. In contrast, Kyunghyang and Hankyoreh reported the story as a female hate crime, a result of daily violence against women. Causes and solutions of this occasion were explained differently on each side.
With regard to the incident's cause, conservatives pointed out carelessness about the management of mental illnesses and about gender-neutral toilets. And the solution was also seen in the management of mental illnesses and the improvement of public toilets. The focus was on social conflict and confusion caused by different perceptions or ignored the characteristics of gender violence implicated in the case to define it as motiveless crime.
The progressive side attributed the murder to the sexist culture perpetuated in Korean society.
Violent crimes are not very common in the country however statistics from government data had indeed shown an increase in the number of reported sexual violence cases has increased that year. The 2015 U.S. State Department report showed that South Korea had scored high on the category of its safety - calculated based on the number of crimes the occurred and ranked extremely low on the category of upholding gender equality. Statistics have shown that physical abuse is pervasive in the country, and, according to a study in 2014, the percentage of the number of women that has been physically abused by their partner went up to 50 percent.