A radical feminist group in Korea has been found engaging in hate-inspired practices online.

WOMAD, a portmanteau between “woman” and “nomad”, is an online community in South Korea known for its support for radical feminism and misandry (deep-rooted contempt or prejudice towards the male sex).

ADVERTISEMENT

Members of WOMAD take to the website’s forums where they release their cruelty and prejudices with hateful messages and images. According to The Korea Times last July 15, a WOMAD member in the past was found sharing an image of a strangled, dying cat, saying that it deserved the cruel treatment because it was a male.

Another member, too, was reported to have bragged she aborted her baby because it was a “boy.”

Homophobia also pervades the website’s forums. In a post dated last February, a user wrote in a post that women are “low” in human rights because of “gay” people.

“The beginning of the women’s movement should begin with the gay slaughter movement,” wrote the user (frame bee honeycomb) in her post, titled “Gay rights movement = anti-women movement”.

But apart from attacking men, members of WOMAD also target the Catholic

Church, with one member remarking she’d light up a church in Busan.

Whether her words were truth or threat did not matter, as she caused local police to investigate. Meanwhile, in another occasion, a WOMAD member shared an image of a burnt piece of sacramental bread, with profanities written on it.

Their hate campaign for the Catholic Church seemed to have worked, as they caught the attention of The Catholic Bishops’ Conference of Korea at the beginning of July.

“Desecrating the sacramental bread is unacceptable,” Sister Clara Kwon said in the report. “We were in shock at the news. What WOMAD member did is a sin. Before celebrating the Eucharist, it is a loaf of bread made from wheat. But after the Christian rite, it represents the body of Jesus Christ, so it’s sacred and should be treated as such.”

Meanwhile, one criminology professor at Soon Chun Hyang University, Oh Yoon-sung, has since branded the WOMAD activists as “pathetic attention-seekers.”

ADVERTISEMENT

“They are only attention-seekers,” Oh was quoted as saying. “I believe WOMAD activists are irritating the faithful as this could help them gain attention from the public.”

As per Oh, radical feminists enjoy how society and media react to their “provocative” tactics. Cody Cepeda/NVG

RELATED STORIES:

Criticize Mocha Uson all you want but don’t slut-shame her

Why misogyny is alive and kicking in the 21st century

Read Next

EDITORS' PICK

MOST READ