rob the knob
07-15-2015, 06:21 AM
i never heard of this so i took the advice and looked it up.
Originally posted by E46..sTyLez
Not gonna tell a long winded story, even though I have lots...but one time I was dating this crazy Korean girl.
She was nuts, so angry.
We had an argument over the phone one time which ended in me basically saying I wasn't interested anymore. She told me to F off, F that, calling the cops etc. I just lol'd and put my phone on silent in my sock drawer.
I fell asleep for a few hours and woke up to...112 missed calls!! One hundred and twelve.
People who know me on here know exactly who I'm talking about haha.
K-Rage...it's a real thing. Look it up.
K-Rage
The Historical Roots of Korean Anger Post published by Sam Louie MA, LMHC on May 13, 2015 in Minority Report
The Atlantic
Source: The Atlantic
My Korean psychotherapist colleague John Kim would often describe his passionate temper as a byproduct of his heritage. "K-Rage" (short for Korean Rage) is how he self-identified his emotional state. So much so, he's built a successful practice using the moniker "The Angry Therapist" and ending his emails with the pseudonym, Angry.
(http://www.theangrytherapist.com (link is external))
As a therapist in private practice myself, I've also noticed anger to be an issue among Korean clients. Was this a coincidence, a recent pattern, or just a bad stereotype?
Having researched the topic and even visited South Korea on a journalism fellowship, Korean journalists confided that the nation has an inferiority complex. Koreans consider their small country the "shrimp of the East" due not only to its size but lack of military might having been bullied by neighboring China and Japan since time immemorial.
Koreans are intimately aware of their country's precarious place in history. As recently as 1894, China and Japan fought to gain control over Korea with Japan eventually occupying and annexing the country by 1910. "During this occupation, Japan attempted to ban Hangul, the Korean language, from schools and publications and forced Koreans to abandon their Korean names. Korean history texts were destroyed or altered, and much of Korea remained in povery under Japanese rule. During World War II, almost 3 million Koreans were forced into labor, with thousands of Korean women forced to become 'comfort women' for Japanese soldiers." (McDermott)
Furthermore, the Korean War (1950-53) occurred less than a decade after the end of World War II which left an already impoverished and exploited nation to deal with the ramifications of having its country serve as a proxy war between the United States and the Soviet Union. In addition to the heightened tension of having its country split into Communist North and Democratic South Korea, 2 million Korean civilians were killed or wounded from the Korean War.
Yet despite repeated outside attempts to obliterate the country of Korea and its people, Koreans persevered and prevailed while their culture stayed intact. "This pattern of repeated trauma by occupation and wars on Korean soil continues to remain a strong part of the Korean identity...many come to the United States with a great sense of Korean national pride and recognize the fragility of their cultural identity."
However, this repeated trauma is not without emotional repercussions. In order to survive colonization, civil war, and repeated imperial threats to their national sovereignty, Koreans have developed a culture of resiliency, resourcefulness, and persistence which is seen through personality traits of being emotionally passionate, expressive, and confrontational. (Harvey & Chung)
In therapy circles, this is known as the "intergenerational transmission of emotions" as emotions are passed through the generations due to a heightened response due to trauma, fear, and anger. In Korea, there is even a specific culture-bound diagnosis known as Hwa-byung that translates as anger syndrome complete with identifiable physical symptoms such as insomnia, fatigue, panic, fear of impending death, indigestion, loss of appetite, difficulty breathing, palpitations, generalized aches and pains, and a feeling of fullness in the abdominal region." (Sadock, Ruiz, Kaplan)
Si-Hyung Lee, M.D., Ph.D., a psychiatrist in the department of neuropsychiatry at Kangbuk Samsung Hospital in Seoul says these symptoms worsen as Koreans try hard to suppress their anger. "This makes hwa-byung a very chronic [cyclic] process, with episodic eruptions of anger." In addition to hwa-byung is the associated feelings of collective grief, guilt, and the desire for vengeance known as haan. Scholars have described it as an "all-encompassing sense of bitterness, a mixture of angst, endurance and a yearning for revenge that tests a person's soul, a condition marked by deep sorrow and a sense of incompleteness that can have fatal consequences." (Los Angeles Times)
Luke I.C. Kim, M.D., Ph.D., clinical professor of psychiatry at the University of California, Davis, elaborates on haan by explaining, "the Chinese character originally [symbolized] revenge, getting even, and so had a more action-oriented, vengeful meaning. But in Korea the vengeful motive or desire, while there, is secondary. The primary meaning of haan is the suppressed, unexpressed anger felt inside...frequent war and political and social upheavals have been the norm...they have brought about destruction, suffering, personal loss and unbearable pain for many Koreans, who experienced deep feelings of haan and felt trapped and victimized." (SF Gate)
In modern times, the pent-up anger has erupted in an unprecedented rise in domestic violence, suicide, and even homicides. Journalist Si Soo Park of the Korea Times describes how the anger is leaking out in society. "Korea is becoming an 'angry society', where killing people in a fit of rage is no longer a rare crime and other crimes of passion are increasingly becoming commonplace." (Korea Times)
Contributing to the personal and historical factors include western globalization and the obsessive and competitive nature to succeed which have penetrated a country once known as a "hermit kingdom" for its isolation until the end of the Joseon Dynasty (1392- October 1897).
Dr. Woo Jong-min, a psychiatrist at Paik Hospital in Seoul says, "They [Koreans] don't know how to wisely quell and vent anger. They have learned how to compete at their schools and workplaces, but never learned how to relax and vent their frustrations." (Korea Times)
John Kim, used with permission
Source: John Kim, used with permission
Which brings us back to my Korean fellow therapist John Kim who has found an outlet for his inner "K-Rage" by offering a unique, brash, and rebellious form of therapy which defies conventional techniques of impartiality and limiting self-disclosure. Kim's website includes graphic slogans which reflect his own experiences of haan and hwa-byung such as, "Fuck your identity" and a book titled, "Your Fucking Feelings" (website shows him blazing down a highway on a vintage motorcycle without a helmet and with arms outstrectched). I'd say it's the perfect picture that encapsulates how this Korean man has made peace with his anger.
Related Resources:
http://articles.latimes.com/2011/jan/05/world/la-fg-south-korea-han-2011... (link is external)
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2010/02/117_60780.html (link is external)
http://blog.sfgate.com/wchung/2012/04/10/korean-rage-stereotype-or-real-... (link is external)
http://www.psychiatrictimes.com/cultural-psychiatry/examining-anger-cult... (link is external)
http://www.theangrytherapist.com (link is external)
http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2013/07/teletherapy-tumblrd/27... (link is external)
McDermott, J. & Andrade, N. (2011). People and Cultures of Hawai'i: The Evolution of Culture and Ethnicity. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press.
B.J. Sadock, V.A. Sadock, P. Ruiz, and H.I. Kaplan, Kaplan and Sadock's Comprehensive Textbook of Psychiatry, 9th ed., Philadelphia: Wolters Kluwer/Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, 2009.
Y.K. Harvey and S. Chung, "The Koreans," in J.F. McDermott, W. Tseng, and T.W. Maretzki, eds., Peoples and Cultures of Hawai'i: A Psycho-cultural Profile, Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 1980: 135-154.
Originally posted by E46..sTyLez
Not gonna tell a long winded story, even though I have lots...but one time I was dating this crazy Korean girl.
She was nuts, so angry.
We had an argument over the phone one time which ended in me basically saying I wasn't interested anymore. She told me to F off, F that, calling the cops etc. I just lol'd and put my phone on silent in my sock drawer.
I fell asleep for a few hours and woke up to...112 missed calls!! One hundred and twelve.
People who know me on here know exactly who I'm talking about haha.
K-Rage...it's a real thing. Look it up.
K-Rage
The Historical Roots of Korean Anger Post published by Sam Louie MA, LMHC on May 13, 2015 in Minority Report
The Atlantic
Source: The Atlantic
My Korean psychotherapist colleague John Kim would often describe his passionate temper as a byproduct of his heritage. "K-Rage" (short for Korean Rage) is how he self-identified his emotional state. So much so, he's built a successful practice using the moniker "The Angry Therapist" and ending his emails with the pseudonym, Angry.
(http://www.theangrytherapist.com (link is external))
As a therapist in private practice myself, I've also noticed anger to be an issue among Korean clients. Was this a coincidence, a recent pattern, or just a bad stereotype?
Having researched the topic and even visited South Korea on a journalism fellowship, Korean journalists confided that the nation has an inferiority complex. Koreans consider their small country the "shrimp of the East" due not only to its size but lack of military might having been bullied by neighboring China and Japan since time immemorial.
Koreans are intimately aware of their country's precarious place in history. As recently as 1894, China and Japan fought to gain control over Korea with Japan eventually occupying and annexing the country by 1910. "During this occupation, Japan attempted to ban Hangul, the Korean language, from schools and publications and forced Koreans to abandon their Korean names. Korean history texts were destroyed or altered, and much of Korea remained in povery under Japanese rule. During World War II, almost 3 million Koreans were forced into labor, with thousands of Korean women forced to become 'comfort women' for Japanese soldiers." (McDermott)
Furthermore, the Korean War (1950-53) occurred less than a decade after the end of World War II which left an already impoverished and exploited nation to deal with the ramifications of having its country serve as a proxy war between the United States and the Soviet Union. In addition to the heightened tension of having its country split into Communist North and Democratic South Korea, 2 million Korean civilians were killed or wounded from the Korean War.
Yet despite repeated outside attempts to obliterate the country of Korea and its people, Koreans persevered and prevailed while their culture stayed intact. "This pattern of repeated trauma by occupation and wars on Korean soil continues to remain a strong part of the Korean identity...many come to the United States with a great sense of Korean national pride and recognize the fragility of their cultural identity."
However, this repeated trauma is not without emotional repercussions. In order to survive colonization, civil war, and repeated imperial threats to their national sovereignty, Koreans have developed a culture of resiliency, resourcefulness, and persistence which is seen through personality traits of being emotionally passionate, expressive, and confrontational. (Harvey & Chung)
In therapy circles, this is known as the "intergenerational transmission of emotions" as emotions are passed through the generations due to a heightened response due to trauma, fear, and anger. In Korea, there is even a specific culture-bound diagnosis known as Hwa-byung that translates as anger syndrome complete with identifiable physical symptoms such as insomnia, fatigue, panic, fear of impending death, indigestion, loss of appetite, difficulty breathing, palpitations, generalized aches and pains, and a feeling of fullness in the abdominal region." (Sadock, Ruiz, Kaplan)
Si-Hyung Lee, M.D., Ph.D., a psychiatrist in the department of neuropsychiatry at Kangbuk Samsung Hospital in Seoul says these symptoms worsen as Koreans try hard to suppress their anger. "This makes hwa-byung a very chronic [cyclic] process, with episodic eruptions of anger." In addition to hwa-byung is the associated feelings of collective grief, guilt, and the desire for vengeance known as haan. Scholars have described it as an "all-encompassing sense of bitterness, a mixture of angst, endurance and a yearning for revenge that tests a person's soul, a condition marked by deep sorrow and a sense of incompleteness that can have fatal consequences." (Los Angeles Times)
Luke I.C. Kim, M.D., Ph.D., clinical professor of psychiatry at the University of California, Davis, elaborates on haan by explaining, "the Chinese character originally [symbolized] revenge, getting even, and so had a more action-oriented, vengeful meaning. But in Korea the vengeful motive or desire, while there, is secondary. The primary meaning of haan is the suppressed, unexpressed anger felt inside...frequent war and political and social upheavals have been the norm...they have brought about destruction, suffering, personal loss and unbearable pain for many Koreans, who experienced deep feelings of haan and felt trapped and victimized." (SF Gate)
In modern times, the pent-up anger has erupted in an unprecedented rise in domestic violence, suicide, and even homicides. Journalist Si Soo Park of the Korea Times describes how the anger is leaking out in society. "Korea is becoming an 'angry society', where killing people in a fit of rage is no longer a rare crime and other crimes of passion are increasingly becoming commonplace." (Korea Times)
Contributing to the personal and historical factors include western globalization and the obsessive and competitive nature to succeed which have penetrated a country once known as a "hermit kingdom" for its isolation until the end of the Joseon Dynasty (1392- October 1897).
Dr. Woo Jong-min, a psychiatrist at Paik Hospital in Seoul says, "They [Koreans] don't know how to wisely quell and vent anger. They have learned how to compete at their schools and workplaces, but never learned how to relax and vent their frustrations." (Korea Times)
John Kim, used with permission
Source: John Kim, used with permission
Which brings us back to my Korean fellow therapist John Kim who has found an outlet for his inner "K-Rage" by offering a unique, brash, and rebellious form of therapy which defies conventional techniques of impartiality and limiting self-disclosure. Kim's website includes graphic slogans which reflect his own experiences of haan and hwa-byung such as, "Fuck your identity" and a book titled, "Your Fucking Feelings" (website shows him blazing down a highway on a vintage motorcycle without a helmet and with arms outstrectched). I'd say it's the perfect picture that encapsulates how this Korean man has made peace with his anger.
Related Resources:
http://articles.latimes.com/2011/jan/05/world/la-fg-south-korea-han-2011... (link is external)
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2010/02/117_60780.html (link is external)
http://blog.sfgate.com/wchung/2012/04/10/korean-rage-stereotype-or-real-... (link is external)
http://www.psychiatrictimes.com/cultural-psychiatry/examining-anger-cult... (link is external)
http://www.theangrytherapist.com (link is external)
http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2013/07/teletherapy-tumblrd/27... (link is external)
McDermott, J. & Andrade, N. (2011). People and Cultures of Hawai'i: The Evolution of Culture and Ethnicity. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press.
B.J. Sadock, V.A. Sadock, P. Ruiz, and H.I. Kaplan, Kaplan and Sadock's Comprehensive Textbook of Psychiatry, 9th ed., Philadelphia: Wolters Kluwer/Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, 2009.
Y.K. Harvey and S. Chung, "The Koreans," in J.F. McDermott, W. Tseng, and T.W. Maretzki, eds., Peoples and Cultures of Hawai'i: A Psycho-cultural Profile, Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 1980: 135-154.