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One of the scariest things about the pandemic is how many people I see willingly filling in the blanks of “we don’t know yet” with a best case scenario, even as tidbits of data trickle in contradicting that.

Then they cry, in unison, “The Spice Must Flow! The Spice Must Flow!” I can envision the people saying, “Schools need to open so I can work!” weeping, a decade or two from now, when their kids keel over from heart attacks or strokes due to lingering effects of undetected MIS-C or COVID-19, and then declaiming, “How could we have known?”

@osamasonite Yeah, I’m not sure what’s going on but multiple people have said packages can be sent without issue and haven’t had issues all the way along (except for that they arrive slowly).

Also, y’all, come on, this song. Damn, man, this song. It’s about a dude who is all dressed up and out for dinner… but can’t pay. Sassy server tells him, “Go home and fry yourself a mung bean pancake if you’re broke, jerk!” Somehow I *love* this song.

youtube.com/watch?time_con…

@dcozy Huh, here I’m told (elsewhere) it’s the opposite, letter mails aren’t going but packages are. *shrug*

@ColetteBalmain @ellie0tran @BBCLBicker It’s a very complex problem. But on some level, when governments wake up and decide to give enough of a damn to combat it, known responses can help despite the complexity. This is what enrages me about it the whole national discussion being subverted for a power grab for so long. @ColetteBalmain @ellie0tran @BBCLBicker Obviously there are crisis centers and call lines and so on. But the public consciousness hasn’t moved anywhere near as much as it could have. I have heartbreaking stories I could tell you… ? But heartbreak eventually transmutes to anger at those who did (almost) nothing.

@ColetteBalmain @ellie0tran @BBCLBicker That data only goes to 2016, but more recent sources are all over the place. I am not disimissing dismiss the troubling rise among young women, of course. I suppose if we label revenge porn as cyberbullying, that’s part of it. @ColetteBalmain @ellie0tran @BBCLBicker I would tend to consider it a special case of online abuse, but I’d hesitate to lump the two together, as it might facilitate the some downplaying of the seriousness of the former.(Especially in a discourse where some all but claim that being cursed at can drive one to suicide.)

@ColetteBalmain @ellie0tran @BBCLBicker In fact, here’s some data that suggests the internet may have reduced suicide rates among younger Koreans: the rate among teens and those in their 20s halved in the decades since the internet became a household fixture in the late 90s:

https://t.co/012jyEgnsU @ColetteBalmain @ellie0tran @BBCLBicker Meanwhile, it almost-doubled, doubled, or even more than tripled in various age demographics from middle-aged to elderly. (The post-Asian Financial Crisis economics likely play a big role in that, but so does a general decline in elder care.)

@ColetteBalmain @ellie0tran @BBCLBicker Yes, but… the discussion is always about cyberbullying celebrities, which IS a red herring when we’re talking about nationwide suicide rates. The rhetoric is, “We need to stop people using curse words online to protect poor celebrities.” This ignores the suicide epidemic. @ColetteBalmain @ellie0tran @BBCLBicker Also, it’s worth noting that the biggest rise in suicides here isn’t among the heaviest and most involved internet users, at all. It’s among middle-aged and older people, and normally caused by isolation, depression, loneliness, and despair.

@yenooi @sy876 No worries!

Retweeting so (@sy876) Soyeon can see your comment… twitter.com/yenooi/status/…

@ellie0tran @ColetteBalmain @BBCLBicker Yes, obviously there are many reasons for this that predate the pandemic. The taboo re: talking about mental health problems has been one of those fundamental issue in society, albeit far from the only one. There are *many* reasons for it. @ellie0tran @ColetteBalmain @BBCLBicker But again, my contention is that cyberbullying is a red herring designed to garner political power over dissent and criticism online. (Consistent across the pol. spectrum, btw.) Past initiatives based on this failed to change online abuse, but did chill pol. speech (somewhat).

@GeekinKorea Also, this reassures me that I made the right choice just telling my students attendance would be based on Zoom session records, cross-referenced with my notes about whether they participated. None of that depends on the stability of a server run by our sysadmins, because… no. @GeekinKorea That said, I do let them get partial attendance credit for classes they missed without sufficient reason for an excusal, and that’s tracked on campus servers. But it’s provisional: if the servers fail, not much I can do. (But I don’t expect them to get deleted.)

@ryanestrada Ah, okay.

@GeekinKorea Good grief. Did the server fail or something?

@GeekinKorea “But my other professors…”

(At least that’s the response I’ve gotten when I asked.)

@dcozy Allowed or required? It looks like it’s required over here, by the wording on the embassy site. (And what this guy was told, maybe.)

@ColetteBalmain @BBCLBicker Agree re: mental health issues, so much.

@ColetteBalmain @BBCLBicker Yeah, it’s also that the media itself touts the whole, “We Need a Real Name System” narrative because people pretty much fixate on the Poor Celebrity instead of noting that celebrity suicide is out of hand because suicide in general is. It’s a bait-and-switch.

@ColetteBalmain @BBCLBicker Absolutely!

I mean, just the other day I heard a story about someone being transferred around each time his icky behavior with kids came to light. Impunity, just move him away. It’s not so unusual approach.

That’s not anywhere near the realm of “normal” for social behavior in South Korea. Buddies do more crotchgrabs and stuff here, I’ve seen that. Not total strangers. Now, the 3(?) cases I’ve experienced in 18 years here is not a lot, but… it’s enough that I can envision a handsy, 개저씨 diplomat just being transferred around when it becomes a problem, instead of acknowledging it and firing him. That’s exactly how things often get handled.

And no, none of the incidents (plural) were “misunderstanding” or “miscommunication.” That would suggest any ambiguity in the situation. I was present. Dude was curious. Dude groped. I slapped dude’s hand away and told them to f*ck off. People will come and say, “In Korean culture…” but, I’m sorry, no. It’s not normal in Korea to grab a complete stranger’s genitals within 5 minutes of meeting them, or to offer to scrub someone’s junk in a swimming pool change room, or grab your taxi’s passenger’s crotch.

Yeah, this does feel like the headline’s intentionally designed to mislead people away from the fact that the sexual offender was a Korean diplomat, not a New Zealander. https://t.co/3j9BFFzngZ Also, the article takes care to highlight the gender of the person who was groped.

As a foreign male in Korea, I’ll just note that I’m far from the only guy I know who has been groped by a random older Korean man. Most weren’t drunk, either. (Though that’s the go-to excuse.)

@ColetteBalmain @BBCLBicker I’ve been ranting since at least 2006 that celebrities kill themselves often here because people in general kill themselves often here, and gov’t control of comments on Naver won’t fix that. (Also, that gov’t and newspapers pretending it will is morally bankrupt and evil.) @ColetteBalmain @BBCLBicker But every time a celebrity kills themselves, it’s another round of, “WE NEED A REAL NAME SYSTEM BECAUSE MEAN COMMENTS LEAD TO SUICIDE.” I mean, they can mess people up, but… mean internet comments aren’t the cause of the epidemic here, obviously.

@ryanestrada Right, but the guy who said “no” is an employee of Korean Post, not the US government, right? I’m trying to figure out if this is related to some US-side policy, or something here. Or just some idiot in one place making up rules. (I’ve had the latter in other institutions, so…)

@ColetteBalmain @BBCLBicker Oh, definitely! I was only linking for the numbers.

There’s also the fact that until recently, every high-profile suicide was used by the government to justify more internet surveillance instead of as a prompt to try change all these things. (I’ve seen that for 1.5 decades.) @ColetteBalmain @BBCLBicker Also, widespread sexual harassment and abuse in workplaces and institutions, done with impunity can’t be helping, along with so many other things.

@ElliottBlackwe3 I’d want the not-actually-Le Guin desk, but honestly it’d end up looking like Gaiman’s within three days. And I do envy Pratchett’s multiple monitors.

@ColetteBalmain @BBCLBicker Actually, going by this KBS report (2019), 38 people/day was the approximate number *last* year. Since some increases have been reported, I suspect the numbers are even worse now. 🙁

world.kbs.co.kr/service/news_v…

dw.com/en/south-korea…

@ArchivistsAlley Did you send it EMS? I’m still trying to figure out WTF is going on but someone claimed EMS is okay, normal post isn’t.

(Not my country, but I am concerned nonetheless.)

@ryanestrada Could this be a case of a local person making up a rule? @ArchivistsAlley replied to my own tweet asking with information that contradicts your local postal worker’s comment:

twitter.com/ArchivistsAlle…

RT @BBCLBicker: Every day, on average, 38 people commit suicide in South Korea according to new national statistics. The highest increase i…

@yenooi Well… my son likes it. But it is well-made, even if, alas, it has increased the proportion of fart jokes in his total joke output astronomically. ?

@tweetsbymoi Citizens! Voting is now easy! Disclose your vote contents to vote by email, facilitating improved assignment to the appropriate Citizens’ Reeducation Center when you repatriate! Voting yourself into a better ideology has never been easier!

@ryanestrada Yeah, seems to be discussed here?

kr.usembassy.gov/u-s-citizen-se…

@ryanestrada Is this ballot specific, or is it all mail right now? (Were they clear about this?)

Um, why is Korea Post saying they cannot send mail (including election ballots) to the United States? How? Why? Is this new? I want to know more about this. twitter.com/ryanestrada/st…

If anyone needs US Stamps, let me know. I have tons from back in the days before magazines took electronic submissions. twitter.com/ryanestrada/st…

RT @TylerWSack: There are non-Indigenous people in NS, petitioning for the revival of Residential Schooling in response to our exercising o…

@AcculturatedEgo @TylerWSack And an MBA in Finance. Of course. (I mean, not you can’t find shitbags in other majors, but…) @AcculturatedEgo @TylerWSack And in a show of tremendous courage, he took his post down, or hid it or whatever. (And reversed his profile ID?)

Always get this song stuck in my head when I have what I’m having for lunch today… (It’s not a bad song, so that’s okay.)

빈대떡 신사 한복남 youtu.be/RUa8bv5atw8 via @YouTube

They’re actually pretty well-done books, though, despite their being totally fart-centric (in a way kids love…).

Tons of minor characters in the art, like Where’s Waldo but every minor character has their own narrative and there’s lots of “hunt out the details” stuff. Even if you can’t read Korean, the page images in this blog post give you an idea what I mean:

m.blog.naver.com/gpfls4143/2213…

Since I mention it in a reply, some will miss my summary of things my son is crazy about now. Octonauts, Captain Underpants, Dog-Man… and 엉덩이 탐정 (おしりたんてい). The latter is basically Sherlock Holmes except his head is a butt, and he defeats enemies with farts. https://t.co/l13O2Wd4D6 Seriously, the climactic confrontation at the end of every investigation is resolved by him letting a really awful fart rip. His enemies drop like a sack of bricks. Sometimes his dog Brownie also ends up suffering from his “fart punch.” (Friendly fire, alas.)

@yenooi Yup! I was referring to the fact that I haven’t done much writing because we’re keeping our son home from daycare due to the pandemic. It’s Octonauts and Dog Man and Captain Underpants all the time now! 🙂 https://t.co/N3WRaA7Hqd @yenooi Oh, and also 엉덩이탐정. (Butt Detective? The original Japanese is apparently おしりたんてい.) Really big hit chez nous.

@GeekinKorea 🙁

@GeekinKorea Yep, I could have written that myself, so I can relate!

@GeekinKorea Yeah, this is something I’ve been trying to do (without much success) for a while. I am hearing this from a lot of other people too: that Social Dilemma documentary on Netflix kind of clarified things for a fair number of folks, I think).

@JustinHowe @GeekinKorea @tweetsbymoi @TheZoneCast It was!

@mythopoetica I think mainly for messing with keyboard tunings people use plugins + MIDI in a DAW like Ableton Live.

@BenBurgis Toward my Jehovah was pretty great too! 🙂

RT @jbf1755: Wow.