A Meeting to Discuss "Kim Ji-Young: Born 1982" 「82年生まれ、キム・ジョン」について話しました!

Japanese follows English. 英語の後に日本語が続きます。

I attended a meeting to discuss "Kim Ji-young: Born 1982," a million selling book by Cho Nam-joo published in 2016, and a film based on the novel, released in 2019.

The main character Kim is a Korean woman in her 30s who juggles work and family and faces gender discrimination. The story ends happily in the film but not in the book, which is more realistic, with Kim still struggling with many gender and family problems.

I haven't read the book or watched the movie, but joined the meeting because I was interested in gender discrimination and learned several things from the meeting.

First, many Japanese are unconscious of gender discrimination, like one of the attendees of the meeting and myself when I was younger. Japanese schools, including those I went to, used and still use roll books listing male students first and then female students in the Japanese alphabetical order. This is gender discrimination, but most Japanese are unaware of it. 

Secondly, I no longer have to feel guilty about not being fully honest with female coworkers who come to me for advice on their relationship with boyfriends doing no household chores. I would tell them to break up with such axx xxxxs but I cannot because they're not my friends but colleagues... But the guest speaker of the meeting, a female lawyer, said that as long as their boyfriends do not abuse them, I can just let it go. It's their life. They may marry and learn a lesson themselves.

Thirdly, I became fully aware that I had been discriminated at my first employer. A male manager had told me when we'd first met, "You are a flake of snow, so you will melt and disappear soon, and after a lot of snowflakes go away, finally snow will pile up..." Women were still segregated, but this is not something that a supervisor would say to a new hire on the day they first meet. This story appalled all the other attendees. 

It was a Zoom meeting of less than 20 people, but it made me feel connected to them and reduced loneliness. Covid-19 has separated me from some people I don't share values with, while creating opportunities to be connected to others I have something in common with. 

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「82年生まれ、キム・ジョン」を考える会に参加しました。「82年生まれ、キム・ジョン」というのは2016年に韓国で出版されたベストセラーです。キム・ジョンという30代の韓国人女性がぶつかる女性差別を描いた話で、2019年には映画化もされました。

私は本も読んでいないし、映画も観てないのですが、ジェンダー問題に興味があり参加しました。そして発見がありました!

先ず、私も小さい頃は性差別に無意識だったようです。学校の名簿って「男の子」→「女の子」だったような気がしますが当時は何も感じていませんでした。今でもそういう名簿を使っている学校があるようです。信じられません!

次に、家事をしない彼氏について相談してくる若い女性同僚に罪悪感を感じるのもやめました。「別れてまえ!」と言いたいのに言えなくて(同僚だから)良心の呵責を感じていたのですが、参加していた女性弁護士が言ってくださったんです。「暴力とか暴言がないなら一度結婚していただいて失敗していただきましょう!」おっしゃる通り!

最後に、働き始めてすぐの上司に言われた言葉が客観的にもひどいということが分かりました。「君はひとひらの雪だ。すぐに消えるだろう。そして君のような女性が何人も消えてなくなったその後に道ができるだろう」初対面の新入社員に言う言葉じゃないでしょ(怒)。

コロナ以降、価値観の違う人とは会わず、つながりたい人とつながるようになりました。楽しかったです!

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