Tactics Tactics Tactics

This is not good

Wednesday, 11 a.m. While Korea is in the throes of World Cup and election day fever, some 40 people in their 20s dressed in black T-shirts gather in front of the Kyobo building in Gwangwhamun, Seoul. A few foreigners mixed in add a dash of blond hair to the bunch. A speech in English: “How many people have to die before you show interest? The starving children in North Korea don’t care about politics. Please, show some interest in the state of human rights in North Korea.” After chanting slogans, the young people lie down on the pavement like dead bodies. Only then does the performance designed to draw attention to the plight of North Koreans attract any interest from protest-weary passersby.

The people lying on the concrete in the heart of Seoul are members of the international group LiNK:Liberty in North Korea. Its head, the second-generation Korean American Adrian Hong (25), voices his frustration about how little South Koreans seem to care about human rights abuses in the North. Koreans always talk of being of the same blood and of unification, so their silence is puzzling, he says. Based in Washington DC, the group was founded at Yale University by mostly second-generation Korean Americans in March 2004. Now it has 73 chapters and about 8,000 active members.

LiNK stages events all over the world to denounce Pyongyang’s human rights record. Last year it also started investigating the conditions of North Korean refugees in China. Members arrived in Korea on May 15 and have since been carrying out the demonstrations all over Seoul. On Wednesday, they lay down on the tarmac, stood up again, lay down, stood up again, repeating the process without end; but while the suffering of North Koreans is a concern for Koreans born abroad and to foreigners without any relation to Korea, the streets of Seoul were indifferent.

I really want LiNK to be successful in Korea, but as soon as I see them do a “die-in” I become worried. What is a die-in? According to Wikipedia,

Die-ins are a form of protest where participants simulate being dead (with varying degree of realism). Possible motivations include:

* prevention of violent conflict, war
* raising awareness of an existing conflict
* expressing disapproval of technology which is perceived as deadly

In the simplest form of a die-in, protesters simply lay down on the ground and pretend being dead, sometimes covering themselves with signs or banners. Much of the effectiveness depends on the posture of the protesters, for when not properly executed, the protest might look more like a “sleep-in”. For added realism, simulated wounds are sometimes painted on the bodies, or (usually “bloody”) bandages are used.

Die-ins were a popular form of protest around the world against the 2003 invasion of Iraq.

Cindy Sheehan was arrested for a die-in in Washington, DC.

From this definition, two things about die-in’s bother me. One, it is difficult to execute. Do you look like you are dead or just snoozing on the ground? From the pictures, I can’t really tell. But for a die-in to be an effective tactic, it has to executed flawlessly.

Second, guess where die-in originated? The anti-war movement. While that movement attracted alot of attention, it achieved, in my opinion, the opposite effect. I think South Koreans, like Americans, are more interested in content than style. So what was the content. Well, read the signs.

“How many people have to die before you show interest?” If you ask me that, I’d take action immediately, but I’m already doing that. It’s a rhetorical question, not something you’d like answered (1000? Maybe a million or so?). Nor does it attract people.

Tactics should advance both organizational goals and issue goals. LiNK can now tell prospective members that they went to South Korea to raise awareness. Cool. But did they succeed? Based on this article, not really, but success is relative. I’ll ask what metrics they use.

Personally, I prefer quality over quantity. I try to attract a type of person, rather than the masses. That may sound contrary, publishing in the World Wide Web, my main audience (all four of them) appears to be other bloggers. We all know we’re 100% quality. All kidding aside, I think it’s time to think small and beautiful instead of fat and ugly.

Note: LiNK’s other tactic (this one), probably derived from these folks. Not exactly coming from winners, but nonetheless I’ll be sending in my entry as soon I find something clever to write.