Korean Show

From animal abuse to group circumcision surgery, embarrassing cases of national broadcaster KBS

KBS’s “The King of Tears, Lee Bang-won” has caused the most complaints and controversy this year.

KBS, which is operated with a subscription fee paid by the public, is in disgrace as it has programs that rank first and second on the chart of shows that received the most complaints this year. This should never be passed lightly in that it is a public broadcasting station that should take the lead in issues such as human rights and  animal abuse. Broadcaster not playing a proper role is the reason why calls to cancel the channel subscription are pouring in. 

Taejong of Joseon

According to data from the Korea Communications Standards Commission (KCC) released on Oct 12th, a total of 944 complaints were submitted from January to September regarding the KBS1 epic drama “The King of Tears, Lee Bang-won.” The scene in question was broadcast on January 1st, in which a running horse fell down mid-air, taking the actor with it. 

At that time, the production team of “The King of Tears, Lee Bang-won” put a noose on the horse’s back foot to shoot the scene and forced him to sprint and topple. Contrary to the production team’s statement that the horse was sent back with no apparent injury, the horse was confirmed to have died a week after the filming. 

Taejong of Joseon

This is an inexcusable cruelty to animals. Although it was possible to film the falling scene without using an actual horse, the production team did not respect the safety or life of the horse. As the scene in question became widely known, a national petition for abolition and boycotting the drama appeared. Animal protection groups strongly protested that it was a violation of the Animal Protection Act, releasing video footage of the scene in which a wire was tied to the horse’s ankle and forced it to collapse.

In fact, this is not the first time KBS has abused animals. In the past, the production team of the drama “Tears of the Dragon” knocked a roe deer out and threw it on the floor, and the drama “Jeong Do-jeon” also has the scene where a horse falls just like that in “The King of Tears, Lee Bang-won”. It is the low ethical consciousness of drama production teams that makes it hard for their repeated apologies to be forgiven.

Taejong of Joseon

It is such a shame that the program that received the most complaints after “The King of Tears, Lee Bang-won” was also produced by KBS. 143 complaints were sent to protest against the controversial broadcast of male students undergoing circumcision surgery on the entertainment show “Mr. House Husband 2”.

On a broadcast of “Mr. House Husband 2” in September, former professional baseball player Hong Sung-heon took his son to visit a urologist and undergo circumcision surgery together with his friends. The children were shown lying on the operating table and subtitles as well as captions that described the operation process were added in the scenes. Therefore, the viewers raised the issues of children’s human rights and men’s human rights. Some even pointed out that the production team might have forced underage children to undergo surgery and raised concerns about sexual harassment and child abuse.

The Living Men

Even the production team’s apology seems to have fueled the controversy to become more intense as they were too busy avoiding mentioning their mistakes and making excuses. As a result, there was a flood of criticism against public broadcaster KBS. Moreover, since August last year, KBS has been caught repeatedly violating the broadcasting review regulations for the most times in over a year.  Among the provisions of the broadcasting review regulations, there were 10 cases in which Article 47 about “indirect advertisement” have been repeatedly violated.

While pushing for higher subscription fees, KBS is consistent with the false statement that they will take responsibility if controversies arise. Before apologizing, shouldn’t they look back on their shameful actions?

Source: daum

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