Korean Think-Tank Traces Every Single Thing Wrong With Korea to Japan

In a startling release yesterday, a Korean think-tank announced the completion of a years-long research project well-covered in the Korean media.

Ho Jung-ha, head of the project, beamed with satisfaction at the press conference yesterday, as she explained the final completion of her life's work.

"It's taken forty years, and with things constantly changing, it's been hard to stay abreast of all the new developments, but we believe we have conclusively traced every single problem in modern Korea to either Japan's imperial colonial period, their war atrocities, or their economic aggression against Korea in the post-war period.  We have also developed a paradigm by which all new Korean social problems, as they develop, can be integrated into what we like to call blame plinko."

Ms. Ho pulled away a curtain to reveal a giant board, and the crowd gasped in awe.

"Once we laid the groundwork, the whole process became almost a game," Ho says, "Like the game Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon, except the Six Degrees of Jappo-Demonizing instead."

The Blame Japan Project would have been impossible without extensive help from Korea's Teacher's Unions, who have already been inculcating appropriate levels of Japan-hate in Korean children for years, as well as the print and television media, and a whole host of commenters, academics and other kinds of experts.  However, Ho Jung-ha took a break from exulting in her accomplishment to thank, "The little people."

"It wasn't just the academics, scholars, and Korean historians I did this for," she said, "it was also the little people: the small, unheralded private individuals, parents, uncles, grandparents, teaching kids to blame Japan even at a young age; all the amateur historians writing letters to the editor, even without the rigorous academic backing I am about to provide for them -- all those people, blaming Japan in their own small ways, helped me, inspired me, to finish this project. . . for them."

Housemother Song Hye-jung spoke out in support of Ms. Ho's valiant effort to validate Korea's place in history.  "We need great patriots like Ms. Ho to make Korea great: without her, Korea's unique culture of fostering distrust and dislike between ourselves and our nearest neighbors, and greatest potential allies, would be lost.  Feeling alienated from our neighbors is an important part of our heritage, and without people like Ms. Song, who would teach our youngsters to carry on Korean traditional land-claim disputes, historical revisionist squabbles, or shirking of responsibility for Korea's problems?  Jesus!  Without Ms. Song, we might need to look in the mirror instead!"

During the question and answer period, Ms. Song demonstrated the uses of her Blame Plinko game: given questions from the press about who is responsible for various Korean problems, from Alcoholism and Asbestos in Subway Stations, to Zoning Confusion in the mailing address system, as well as familiar touchstones like American beef contamination, wonjo kyojae, netizen insanity, road safety, corporate corruption, and university exam competition, she traced, step by step, chains of cause and effect that led, invariably, back to Japan.  As she demonstrated the facility of the blame-plinko board, the crowd slowly grew more and more jubilant, and by the end of the press conference, as she shouted, "Blame goes to...JAPAN!" with increasing relish, the entire crowd would burst into cheers and shouts of, "Fu¢k Japan!  Down with Japan!  Go Korea!" and clapping soccer cheers.

Update:

Thanks for pointing this out, Brian.