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GUEST WORDS--This weekend's Pride Parade in Seoul drew a record number of revelers chanting "LGBT is love!" as they marched through the rain under rainbow color umbrellas from Seoul Plaza to the Bank of Korea.
Hosted this year under the slogan, “There is no later - now is the time for change,” the celebration is part of a Korea Queer Culture Festival that has grown from about 50 people in 2000 to last year's roughly 50,000. This year, organizers estimated the crowd at 85,000; disapproving police said attendance was about 9,000.
While homosexuality is not a crime in South Korea, LGBT people remain largely scorned and isolated. This year's event included, along with the usual booths, the presence of many foreign ambassadors and diplomats, who hoisted a banner reading “Diplomats for Equality.”
Still, celebrants were confronted by hundreds of anti-LGBTQ protesters, many of them conservative Christians who prayed and sang to "cure" the marchers of their "illness."
Homosexuality "can corrupt the minds of our children,” said pastor Hong Ho-soo, secretary general of the Homosexuality Countermeasure Council for Korean Churches. He accused gay people of spreading disease and a "decadent sex culture against the teachings of the Bible,” urged them not to exhibit their sexual orientation in front of others, and to “return to Jesus Christ."
Except oops: In response, right under a massive banner screaming, "Homosexuality Is Sin! Return to Jesus!" not one but two Jesuses turned up in full Biblical regalia to troll them with the reminder that, actually, Jesus loves everyone, including queers.
One Jesus doppelganger was Robert Evans, 27, an American photographer from Atlanta who has lived in Seoul for four years and held aloft an "I'm Cool With It" sign. Straight but with many gay friends, he cites Korea's "long road towards equality" and his aim to be "part of the small steps it's taking in the right direction.”
At his first Pride event two years ago, he was moved to tears by the "tangible and intense" hate he felt from protesters who assumed he was gay: "As a straight western male, I had never felt anything like it.” As Jesus this year, he wanted his message "to be simple, positive (and) to present an alternative interpretation" of Christ’s teachings.
Another Jesus also argued that “opposing homosexuality is not the Bible’s teaching.”
"Homosexuality is not sin. It is love," said Chung Sang-hyuk, a 26-year-old Protestant Korean. "It is not subject to approval or opposition.” His message: “What Jesus has taught us is to love everyone."
Both he and Evans were swamped by gleeful attendees offering hugs, cheers, selfies and blessings. Chung smilingly accepted them all, following the tenet of the sign he held high: "Keep Queer and Carry on."
(Abby Zimet writes ‘Further’ for Common Dreams … where this perspective was first posted. This is a guest column. Ken Draper will return next CityWatch) Photo above: Rachel Stine.
-cw
