in short, divorce is a very important social issue in korea. getting divorced is a kind of mark of shame, especially for the children of the divorced couple. now, like many americans, my parents are divorced. i let my boss know my parents were divorced when i was five, and it wasn't a big deal in america. brian (my boss) then said that it is the parents' duty to stay together at least until the child(ren) is(are) ten before getting divorced, that way the children are mentally ready for the divorce even if it's not fun. i made passing mention to the question of why ten years old is the proper number rather than nine or ten, but my main problem was my boss's (problem unwitting) supposition that i was by necessity maladjusted because i was under ten when my parents divorced. soon enough, it came down to my boss saying 'well it's important we respect each other's cultures'.
while this is true in some cases and respects, it is not a universal. i mean to say that respect is earned, not given as a prerequisite. no one has to respect anyone's else culture just because it is someone else's culture. cultures are like opinions. they can be had by anybody, but that doesn't mean there aren't wrong opinions or wrong cultures.
i don't think my culture is perfect by any means. but having spent a little bit over 2 years in this country, i realize i prefer my own country's culture to this one. in fact, i would go so far as to say that my culture is better than this one. i say this because there are many things in this culture that require an individual to do some duty, which is not required in my own. an individual should stay with his/her wife/husband, because it's their duty to their families. a worker should go to dinner or drinks with his boss, because it's his duty as an employee. a person should prostrate themselves before their parents and grandparents because it's their duty to their elders.
my culture, more often that not, says 'fuck duty'. if a thing is not to be enjoyed when it's done, then it's not done. people's feeling are hurt, of course, but mainly people aren't allowing feelings to be developed where they could be hurt by the free choice of individuals. this society, ensconced for thousands of years in a rigidly stratified confucian farfreleuches dictating 'a place for every man, and every man in his place', still holds on, strongly in many cases, to the the belief in and even reverence for forms. 'this is how things should be, so this is how we'll act'.
if these people had any balls, they'd be westerners by now.
