Wednesday, November 1, 2017

Hidden Violence

Along the road, in the city, various signboards catch the eye. Around schools, it is not rare to see the phrase drug-like rice cakes, drug-like kimchi, drug-like pork. Of course, it is an effort to give the greatest value and to attract to what is being sold. 

Drugs are dangerous substances they destroy bodies and souls. Using the word drug repeatedly connected with food we eat daily desensitizes the young and old alike to the evil of drugs. A college professor in the Catholic Peace Weekly brings the subject of hidden violence in our daily expressions to the attention of the readers.
 

A lawyer on a broadcast news-program criticized politics using the phrase repeatedly: 'putting a knife in a person's back'. What does the phrase mean? Nothing to do with killing the person but to put a person into a corner or make problems for the person. Not something good to imagine. On the SNS to increase the number of clicks strong sexual suggestive descriptions are chosen conveying much with little.
 

A great deal of violence is contained in this language. Frequency of contact with these images makes the reality of the imagined all the more tangible. Familiarity doesn't necessarily make for correct  thinking or choice. If we do not have a critical view of the information we are given we can eventually think and act according to the information received.
 

A male penis appeared in a promotional sculpture made to announce a local government event. Explicit sexual descriptions are often reported in college festival sites. Dramatic expressions increase our emotions and effectively convey meaning in a short period of time. This can lead to a violent response. The virtue of modesty and sublimation in society has long disappeared. When wants and desires pass the level of reason we are approaching violence.
 

What we express with words or pictures is a reflection of our lives. Expressions of violence flow into our culture and daily living. Physical force is not the only way violence appears. We need to remember that symbolic expressions that we use and common ways of acting are often a cause of harm to our bodies and minds. We need time to reflect on what we see and hear, to discern the hidden violence in-bedded in what we are exposed to in the mass media.