President Lee Jae-myung expressed agreement with calls to strengthen Chinese character education, while making a self-deprecating joke about a derogatory nickname used against him.
At an education ministry briefing held at the Sejong Convention Center on Monday, Kim Eon-jong, president of the Institute for the Translation of Korean Classics, proposed strengthening Chinese character education, noting that "students don't even know the Chinese characters used in the president's name—'jae' (在, meaning 'to exist') and 'myung' (明, meaning 'bright')."
President Lee responded, "That's why some people write it as 'joe-myung,' isn't it?"
"Joe-myung" is a derogatory term used by online critics and opposition supporters, playing on the president's legal troubles by substituting "joe" (罪, meaning "crime") for "jae." When the president made the remark himself, attendees burst into laughter.
"I don't think this is something I can mandate," President Lee said regarding Chinese character education. "Cho Gab-je keeps advocating for using Chinese characters alongside Korean, but right now students struggle just to learn Korean. If we force them to study Chinese characters while they're still scribbling letters, there would be an uproar."
He added, "Personally, I think learning just the Thousand Character Classic would help people easily understand the deeper meaning of most words and develop critical thinking skills. But introducing this as a formal system would require overcoming enormous obstacles."
President Lee also emphasized the importance of language refinement education to the education ministry. "What I dislike hearing most are expressions like 'jeohui nara' [a self-deprecating term for 'our country'] and 'dae-in-bae,'" he said. "As you can tell from words like 'so-in-bae' [petty person] and 'sijeong-jabbae' [street ruffian], the character 'bae' (輩) refers to street thugs or lowlifes. Why would you attach that character to 'dae-in' [great person]?"
"These words are used routinely, yet no one points out the problem," he continued. "I see many such mistakes on broadcasts, and even journalists use these expressions. This is a matter of basic refinement. We should issue a collective notice to eliminate such usage."
