They decided to fight back because they were being bullied in the workplace

This was the response of a bank employee's supervisor when the Korea Herald newspaper revealed on 25 August that he was forced by his boss to cook, wash dishes, do laundry and clean at his workplace every day.

Gapjil 119, a Korean civil society organ organization with workplace bullying, revealed that the employee worked for a community credit union in Namwon, North Jeolla Province, South Korea. For almost two years, the employee had to clean the fridge and wash the towels in the bathroom, and she had to make a meal at 11 am e11 am morning and report back to her supervisor on how it had been cooked.

The clerk felt that these tasks were beyond the scope of her duties, and after complaining to her superior, she was told, "You must understand, because this is a country bank."

This kind of hierarchical suppression and dictation that is taken for granted in the workplace is commonplace in Korea. Distressed Koreans have even coined a word for it, "gapjil". This is a term reserved for workplace bullying, an act of power in which superiors take the high ground and humiliate, suppress and force their subordinates.

"Employers think, 'I pay you, so I'm your master. They believe they have bought the person with money." A volunteer at an anti-workplace bullying hotline who answers calls from victims sums it up.

"I want you to die."

"You're a cripple - a cripple without arms, legs, face, ears, and mouth. You're a madman. Didn't your parents ever teach you that? I hate you and I want you to die.

The words, not from a cranky boss or an arrogant employer, came from the mouth of a 10-year-old girl. The person she was verbally abused by was the dedicated driver who was responsible for transporting her.

When the audio came to light in late November 2018, it instantly ignited public opinion in South Korea. The little girl in the recording is the granddaughter of the president of a highly influential South Korean newspaper.

After being verbally abused in this way, the driver reported her comments to the girl's parents. The girl's mother took the child to the driver and demanded an apology from the girl. But immediately after the girl left, her mother changed her face - she asked the driver to delete the recording and fired the driver the next day.

"I expected her (the girl's mother) to comfort me with apologies and warm words when she called me privately, but that was not the case." The man, who is over 100 years old, couldn't help but shed tears during an interview with South Korea's MBC TV.

After the recording was revealed, the immense public pressure forced the girl's father to publicly apologise and take the blame. However, the day before the girl's father apologized, his agent said, "My agent can be criticized for the wrong attitude [his daughter showed towards the driver], but it is inappropriate for the driver to record what the girl said and leak it to the media."

To most Koreans, the arrogance in the girl's family's bones cannot be covered up by a paper apology, and the resignation aimed at quelling the outrage is just a shot across the bow of such bullying.

This is something that angry Koreans know all too well.

A bag of nuts brings the plane back

Kim Chang-hee, a researcher at the Cairns Institute in Australia and director of the Korea Human Resources Development Association, has heard of several eye-opening ways of workplace bullying because of his profession: "Some of them force their subordinates to kill chickens, force them to dye their hair various colors and prevent them from going to the bathroom after drinking. One university professor was even ordered to eat spit by his boss."

Kim Chang-hee also remembers a president of a Korean technology company he met who was exposed for brutally slapping a former employee. "This president was not surrounded by any colleagues or subordinates in a normal relationship. Instead, he liked to make people his 'toys'."

This feeling of being unjustifiably humiliated, bullied, and even forced to kneel in public by a brutal superior is something that former Korean Air flight attendant Park Chang-jin understands better than anyone else. As a person involved in the "Nutgate" incident that ignited public opinion in Korea, he described his feelings at the time as "his dignity as a human being was being trampled on."

On December 5, 2014, Cho Hyeon-e, the eldest daughter of Korean Air President Cho Yang-ho, flew on Korean Air flight KE086 from New York, the USA to Incheon, South Korea. As the plane taxied down the runway ready to take off, Cho Hyeon-E, who was sitting in first class, suddenly burst into a rage. It turned out that the flight attendant had served her a meal without the required bag of nuts on a plate.

Feeling neglected, she became furious and the stewardess did nothing to explain. Park Chang-jin, who is the flight attendant, tried to plead with the furious Cho Hyeon-e to calm down after learning of the situation, but Cho Hyeon-e ignored her. She ordered the stewardess and Park Chang-jin to kneel and apologize to her in public, told the captain to take the plane back to the gate, and threw the stewardess and Park Chang-jin off the plane.

As he walked back to the terminal, he felt "as if I was walking to my coffin".

According to Yonhap News Agency, Korean Air forced the crew to make false statements after the incident. In a subsequent public apology, the company claimed that the flight attendant had "made a big mistake" by failing to unlock the tablet password and lying about it, which led to Cho Hyeon-e's anger. She said it was "natural" for Cho to blame the flight crew for poor service and that the plane had turned back as a "result of discussion" with the pilot.

However, the Seoul-based NGO "Participatory Link" said at a press conference in front of the Western Seoul District Prosecutor's Office that according to insiders and the Korean Air union, the contents of the apology statement were completely untrue.

The incident has created a nationwide outrage in Korea. As a result of the public outcry, Cho Hyeon-ho, the father of Cho Hyeon-oh, the chairman of Korean logistics company Hanjin Group and chairman of Korean Air, was forced to make a public apology, Cho Hyeon-oh resigned from her position, and the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, and Transport opened a case against Cho Hyeon-oh for allegedly violating aviation safety laws and forcing flight attendants to give false testimony.

However, during the nearly three-year trial, Cho's sentence was reduced again and again - in February 2015, she was sentenced to one year in prison in the first trial; in May of the same year, she was sentenced to ten months in prison, suspended for two years in the second trial, and released on the spot; and in December 2017, her final verdict was handed down, with the court ruling upholding the second trial verdict. Shortly afterward she was back in charge of part of Korean Air and even accompanied her father, Cho Yang-ho, in carrying the flame of the 2018 Pyeongchang Winter Olympics 2018.

Ironically, it was during this year that a surveillance video was made public. In the video, Cho Hyeon E's mother, Lee Myung Hee, is seen swearing at, punching, and kicking an employee at a construction site. Another employee was also verbally abused by Lee for coming to her aid.

After the recording of Lee's verbal abuse was released, Lee, who is now in her seventies, was arrested by the law. In response, Lee argued that she had "accidentally lost control" due to pressure from her husband, mother-in-law, and others.

The court said that the victim, as a driver or housekeeper, had no choice but to put up with Lee's unfair behavior. The fact that Lee had "admitted her responsibility" and reached an agreement with the victim was taken into account in the sentencing.

The scandal has sparked outrage across Korea. Nearly 1,000 Korean Air employees held a candlelight rally at the same time as the recording of Lee's insults was released to press for Cho Yang-ho's resignation. "It's time for a change. If we can't get Cho Yang-ho to step down, it will be our son's and daughters' turn to continue to be bullied by the children of the chaebol in the future." said one Korean Air employee, who asked not to be named.

In 2019, after decades of bullying clouds hovering over the Korean workplace, South Korea began implementing the Workplace Bullying Prohibition Act, which stipulates that employers or employees who use their authority and seniority to cause mental or physical suffering to other employees beyond the scope of their work or to worsen the work environment, will face up to three years imprisonment. The employee will face up to three years in prison or a fine of 30 million KRW.

In July 2020, Lee Myung-hee was sentenced to two years in prison, suspended for three years, and 80 hours of community service for multiple charges including "habitual brutality".

Back to the "Nutgate" incident. Park Chang-jin, who was involved in the incident, developed a psychological disorder after the incident and often felt anxious and depressed. He took 18 months of sick leave and took anti-depressants. Upon his return to work, Park was demoted to the level he was at when he first joined the airline. As he was unable to pass the Korean and English tests, he was assigned to economy class and was often sent to do menial tasks such as cleaning toilets. As a result, after being awarded 100 million won, he resigned from the airline and joined politics.

"This incident gave me a whole new perception of society and the true nature of people. I realized that this abuse could never be eradicated without making some changes." Park Chang-jin, 51, is now at the forefront of the "anti-workplace bullying" movement in South Korea.

"You just have to put up with it"

South Korea has one of the longest working hours per capita in the more developed world. Overtime is commonplace and being plied with alcohol at the table is part of "workplace etiquette". In June this year, in an online survey of 1,000 respondents in South Korea, nearly 30 percent of workers said they had experienced some form of workplace bullying in the past year, up from 23.5 percent in a similar survey in March.

Sexual harassment is one of the most common forms of workplace bullying experienced by female employees and includes verbal, physical, and visual sexual harassment, ranging from mild to severe. "I hate the senior male managers who always comment on the dress of female employees in the office as if there is nothing else to do but that." Hong Chae Young, 30, said this encounter was one of the reasons why she quit her job.

Between January 2021 and March this year, the Gapjil 119 organization received 205 reports from victims and analysis revealed that more than 80 percent of those who experienced sexual harassment in the workplace suffered retaliation. Some were ostracised from the company and insulted by their bosses in front of their colleagues; others were transferred or forced to leave the company for reporting workplace harassment and bullying.

So much so that most chose not to take action. The main reason for this is the fear that reporting abuse will damage their future job prospects. The statistics explain their 'weakness'. According to Gapjil 119, of the 32 complaints and allegations reported by victims to the Korean Ministry of Labour, only three were taken to prosecution.

Ms. Shin, who answers an anti-workplace bullying hotline, receives between 80 and 100 calls a day from victims, most of whom experience reactions similar to a traumatic stress disorder, including involuntary panic, insomnia, and inexplicable phobias.

In a survey of 1,500 Koreans conducted by a consulting firm in late 2020, more than 83% of respondents said that workplace bullying was a serious social problem, and in response to the question of how to deal with it, 70% responded in the same way, "I can only put up with it."