One year after the murder of a woman near Gangnam Station

Wednesday marked one year after a 23-year-old woman was murdered past midnight at a unisex public toilet near Gangnam Subway Station in southern Seoul. During the past year, people were divided on what the murder meant. Some said it was a crime committed by a person with schizophrenia, while others said it was a misogyny hate crime. Investigations and trials concluded it as a crime committed by a person suffering from schizophrenia, but women groups strongly argued that it was misogyny.

The misogyny view resulted from the murderer saying that he committed the crime because women ignored and disliked him. As a result, women feared that it could have been them who were at the murder site, with a flurry of remembrance post-it messages covering Gangnam Subway Station. Despite the investigation results, misogyny claims have continued even after a year has passed.

Women are regarded vulnerable human beings, and there is a social mood of refraining from resisting the ideas that defend vulnerable people. Whatever the reason was for the murder, it gives a chance to reflect on misogyny. Even if the murder was due to schizophrenia, a wrongly structured awareness of women could be the reason. However, there was also a social mood to oppose the claim that it was schizophrenia, criticizing the results of investigation and trials.

Simply holding a signboard reading "We oppose misogyny" on the streets cannot prevent murders like that near Gangnam Station. Recently, another murder happened by a schizophrenia patient. A 17-year-old girl suffering from schizophrenia killed an eight-year-old child out of no reason. Dealing with schizophrenia patients is a difficult task to tackle since the public has to be protected from them and at the same time schizophrenia patients' human rights have to be considered. Blurring the focus cannot help when the overall society needs to pay attention to come up with appropriate measures.