Signals and Shadows: Confronting the Invisible Network

This second piece, though shorter, is an attempt to speak candidly about a rather heavy matter. I believe that when a problem continuously recurs, its agenda must be explicitly laid bare before our eyes so that we can collectively recognize the issue.

Unlike many other nations, the field of RF (Radio Frequency) transmission in South Korea is virtually sealed off from the general public due to draconian power output limits. Meaningful transmission is permitted only to those who have secured business authorization and are deeply entrenched within networks of mutual interest. While this may seem like a trivial piece of legal trivia, it is easily overlooked—yet this single line of law fundamentally shapes domestic society and culture, and even enables political demagoguery. What is stranger still is that the country operates under social rules that leave vast vulnerabilities for external actors to infiltrate, even as the system collapses from within. Internal erosion is a constant fixture.

I am not a shameless person; thus, I could never bring myself to replicate the behaviors I have witnessed. However, when it comes to reclaiming what was stolen from me—things snatched away by those seeking to keep me in check for no justifiable reason—I will absolutely block them and take back what is mine.

Even if something was observed under the guise of national security, it is only proper to refrain from exploiting it if it falls under copyright protection or economic assets. Is that not the very social contract enshrined within the constitution of a liberal democracy? In truth, it is not as though I haven't read the constitutional laws regarding liberal democracy, which makes addressing the violation of the right to privacy feel awkward and bewildering. It is profoundly perplexing.

Celebrities, in fact, occasionally serve as shields for others. Yet, I have frequently witnessed the very intent behind trying to persuade through such pretexts being misused and abused. If anything, 'that specific fissure' acted as a detonator. Certain elements have served as the inception of social conflict and, worse, as tools to strip away the subject's identity. My wish is for the spotlight to be cast not on the victims, but on those who were entangled in these web of interests. While I cannot generalize, the phenomena I discovered were truths already deeply entrenched in the past.

A true friend is one who understands the proper distance required for a healthy relationship.

When viewed through the lens of data, South Korea's history appears to have traversed a highly idiosyncratic path to achieve rapid growth following the Japanese colonial period—an evolution that invites clear inference from a humanistic perspective. Conventional wisdom dictates that South Korea achieved its breakneck economic growth solely through manufacturing, but that is only half the truth. Uniquely, this country built itself upon data mining and energy. However, the shadow cast by this growth is immensely vast. It breaks my heart that my own lineage is entangled within this history like a foundational stone. At times, it seems foolish individuals were mixed into the fold; yet, even within the same clan—specifically tied by a last name that dictates one's ancestral lineage in South Korean society—it is only rational to discard a rotting main beam. It imposes far too much of a burden on the newly born generations.

To build the economy, certain social mechanisms triggered activities within specific echelons. Consequently, a clan-oriented society—far more rigid than any other—bought up genealogies to the point where it became the average norm. As I previously noted, clan ties, school ties, and regional ties operate in a highly peculiar manner within South Korean society.

I remained oblivious to this during my youth, but following certain incidents I endured, I uncovered these dynamics while analyzing my own family tree.

Since those incidents, I resolved to embrace religion and become a believer, seeking to catch even a faint murmur of the lessons left by a Messiah acting on behalf of the Absolute. I plan to publish a subsequent piece regarding this specific experience.

Though invisible to the naked eye, computers and radio waves completely dominate human culture and commerce itself. Even branding is established far more simply than one might think. There is a precise reason why things are produced in an instant, fast-food manner rather than focusing on creating authentic culture and art. Though I did not major in this field, the reason I acquired such intuition is entirely the result of self-analyzing the incidents I personally experienced.

Just as George Orwell taught that language dominates society and civilization through the speech of its people, one might lack the leisure to care during youth—consumed as they are by personal struggles and self-exploration. Yet, it is only by fostering an analytical capacity toward others, culture, and language that one can easily discern another's lies.

Although I plan to leave South Korea and relocate, those 'super-parachute' figures who leapfrog procedures by misusing data never fail to draw my disdain. I possessed a talent for weaving words, yet with no venue to prove it, I began to publish my writings here.

Peculiarly, there are an abundance of people who closely resemble one another in South Korea. Even more bizarre is that these similar faces die, only to be born again. Fascinatingly, even in eras before the development of mass media, these uncanny resemblances existed.
It is only natural to loathe someone who looks exactly like oneself. The emergence of multiple reflectors should not mean morphing into that person; rather, it ought to be an opportunity to be reborn with a brand-new identity of one's own. If foreign forces begin to exert containment, it is only normal for those with greater authority to lead first, while granting the targets of protection the opportunity to grow. Anything beyond that—such parallelisms of identity and life—is simply an overreach.

The reason I leave something behind as I depart is my hope that the younger generation, who are reborn in ten-year cycles, will possess at least the critical faculty to avoid being deceived by adults who enjoy blurring the camera angles to feed them predictable lies. People tend to chase whatever is immediately in front of them, venting their fury, only to forget what occurred right behind them. For matters requiring a fundamental solution, shouldn't the entire community move with a collective sense of the common good, rather than leaving it to a single individual?

I hope no one becomes like that foolish person who, making others the scapegoats for their own lack of speechmaking skills, scatters strange composite advertisements to innocent people; who digs through someone else’s family tree and mobile phone 'to check vision and data and anecdotes'; who, with the vast authority they hold, injects images about physiognomy, which is the practice of judging a person's character or fate from their facial features; and who leads an army to strike down people who are already contaminated, yet desperately tries to hold onto power by becoming the very evil they claimed to fight. I genuinely do not know why they keep holding on when they do not even have the ability to structure and refine institutions.

Furthermore, perhaps because I have recently seen so many people doing the exact same thing—yet acting incredibly shameless, making bold assertions, and focusing entirely on their image branding—I have even come to worry about what kind of society this truly is. What is even more ridiculous is that conflicts break out even among these similar people just to secure a monopoly.

Though I have never lived longer than the grandmothers and grandfathers who have crossed the century mark, I received such a profound shock that when I express my thoughts on South Korea, it rarely feels like a peninsula; instead, it frequently feels like an archipelago operated entirely by radio waves. Due to the immense stress, I often worry about the onset of hair loss.

Whoever the subject may be, what they chose to do with their vast authority before they lost power... whoever that was, I do not think I will ever forget it for the rest of my life.

For that, too, constitutes a part of the totality of who that person is.

Recently, I heard news of a favorable ruling, and I sincerely hope that justice is carried out swiftly and properly until the final verdict.