DP under fire for derogatory remarks about older voters

Politics

Published: 01 Aug. 2023, 19:01

DP under fire for derogatory remarks about older voters

Kim Eun-kyung, the head of the Democratic Party's special innovation committee, makes a speech in meeting with young people in Seoul on Sunday. Her comment that was made at the roundtable had been accused as belittling older people. [YONHAP]

The Democratic Party (DP) is mired in controversy over statements critics say denigrate older, largely conservative voters.

DP Rep. Yangyi Won-young on Tuesday backed an earlier assertion by Kim Eun-kyung, head of the party’s special innovation committee, that younger people should have more votes in determining the future than older people with fewer years left.

“Our future is decided by what kind of politician is elected,” Rep. Yangyi wrote on her Facebook. “But many of the people who vote today are people who won't be alive in that future.”

She said that younger people who live longer should be able to determine their future.

“Our children can’t do anything against the Yoon Suk Yeol government, which decides on major policies that could affect lives in 2050,” she said. “I don’t know if I will live that long, but I will try to prevent a dystopian Korea for the future of our children.”

The controversy began when Kim, attending a roundtable meeting with 25 or so young people at a coffee shop in Seoul on Sunday, mentioned a conversation she had with her sons.

Kim said her younger son, who at the time was in middle school, asked why older people were determining their future.

She said her son was being rational in his belief that the number of votes should be proportionate to remaining lifespan.

“He was asking why people whose future was shorter should get an equal vote,” Kim said.

“I told him that while his idea was rational, it was also impossible in a democratic country.”

Her comment immediately received backlash from the conservative People Power Party (PPP), which continued on Tuesday.

PPP leader Kim Gi-hyeon wrote on Facebook on Tuesday that not only should Kim make a public apology and resign, but the party’s innovation committee should be dismantled, too.

“It’s truly pathetic how Kim Eun-kyung, who herself should be the target of innovation and subject to punishment and expulsion, has the right to penalize others [within the DP],” the PPP leader said.

PPP Rep. Lee Chul-gyu accused Kim of completely denying the principle of democracy and condemned her for disrespecting older people.

Kim was appointed to head the DP’s innovation committee in late June as the party faced dwindling support due to party leader Lee Jae-myung’s numerous scandals and legal battles, a bribery scandal tied to the party’s convention in 2021 and suspicious cryptocurrency investments by a DP representative and close aide to Lee.

However, she has instead courted controversy over a string of recent comments, including ones that seemingly downplayed the bribery scandal surrounding the 2021 convention.

She even suggested prosecutors may have fabricated the bribery case before retracting her statement in the face of intense public criticism.

“The case is serious,” Kim admitted a few days later.

In a radio show last month, she also compared first-time DP lawmakers to students’ whose scholastic abilities have fallen due to Covid-19.

She also faced criticism from supporters of Lee Nak-yon, the former DP’s leader and a known rival of Lee Jae-myung, after she said acts that internally divide the party must stop.

The PPP said the DP's attacks on older people are nothing new.

In 2004, former DP presidential candidate and liberal lawmaker Rep. Chung Dong-young was criticized after telling people who were over the age of 60 to stay at home and not vote.

That same year, fellow liberal lawmaker Rhyu Si-min said people become "stupid" in their 50s and that people in their 60s shouldn’t hold important positions.

Cho Kuk, the former Justice Minister during the Moon Jae-in government, wrote on Twitter in 2011 that a person who books a trip so that his or her parents can’t vote is a good son or daughter.

“This is not the first time that the DP has made comments that disparage older people,” said PPP Rep. Lee Chul-gyu.

“Belittling and denigrating older people is in the DP’s DNA,” PPP leader Kim Gi-hyeon said on Facebook.

BY LEE HO-JEONG [lee.hojeong@joongang.co.kr]