INTRODUCTION TO LAW AND POLICY

March 2, 2015
The freedom of speech is one of the most treasured rights possessed by all people in
democratic nations. The First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution includes the
freedoms of speech, press, and assembly, and freedom of religion. The U.S. Supreme
Court has held that the freedom of speech includes the right to say things which may
anger others, including so-called hate speech.
The Court also has held that the freedom of speech includes not just verbal
statements, but written statements, and some physical acts. These physical acts
intended to make a point are referred to as symbolic speech. These include signs,
picketing, and the burning of the flag.
Freedom of speech is not absolute, however. The U.S. Supreme Court has held that
the government can regulate obscenity and speech that is likely to provoke a violent
response, referred to as fighting words. Commercial speech, speech contained in
advertising, song lyrics, books and magazines may be regulated to a greater degree
than political speech.
Government actions infringing freedom of speech can be classified in two tracks:
1) Content regulations
2) Content neutral time, place, or manner regulations

TRACK ONE: CONTENT REGULATIONS

A track one analysis is appropriate whenever a governmental action is not content
neutral, where a statute prohibits the dissemination of specific information.
Where the challenged government action is not content neutral, the government must
prove that the speech being regulated falls within the four categories of unprotected
expressions.
1) Communications likely to incite violence
2) Obscenity
3) Defamation
4) Commercial speech
INCITE VIOLENCE
Speech can be regulated if it creates a clear and present danger of imminent lawless
action. The speech has to be a call to action where the danger of violence is serious
such as forceful overthrow of government or widespread rioting.
FIGHTING WORDS
Speech can be regulated if it constitute fighting words, personally abusive words
likely to incite immediate physical retaliation by an average person. Words that are

merely annoying are not sufficient. Fighting words that insult on the basis of race,
religion, or gender cannot be regulated.
HOSTILE AUDIENCE THE HECKLERS VETO
Even though a speaker does not use fighting words, if that speakers communicates
creates an imminent danger of uncontrolled violence, the police may order the speaker
to desist or face arrest. If not carefully limited, the hostile audience doctrine can
permit the police to suppress any public communication of unpopular views.
OBSCENITY
Obscene speech is not protected.
Obscene speech describes sexual conduct that
1) appeals to the prurient interest
2) is patently offensive
3) and lacks literary, artistic, political, or scientific value.
Prurient means having a tendency to excite lustful thoughts.
SEIZURES OF BOOKS AND FILMS
Seizure of books or films may be made with a warrant based on probable cause. If the
item is available for sale to the public, a police officer may purchase a book or film to
use as evidence without warrant.
PRIVATE POSSESSION
Private possession of obscene material in the home cannot be punished except for
possession of child pornography.
ZONING
A land-use or zoning regulation may limit the location of adult entertainment places if
the regulation is designed to reduce secondary effects such as rise in crime rates, drop
in property values, etc. However, regulations may not ban such adult entertainment
places altogether.
1) A total ban on non-obscene activities such as nude dancing in a commercial
area is not permitted.
2) Land use ordinances may regulate the location of adult theaters.

COMMERCIAL SPEECH
Expression whose main purpose is to sell is commercial speech. It is regulated due to
its economic consequences from deception and confusion. Commercial speech is

protected if it is truthful. However, commercial speech that proposes unlawful

activity or that is misleading or fraudulent may be regulated.
Example: Binggrae banana milk => banana flavored milk
However, truthful and lawful commercial speech may be regulated if a substantial
government interest is directly advanced. Regarding prohibition of advertisement for
casino gambling to local residents, it advanced the governments interest in protecting
the local residents from the adverse effects of casino gambling.
FREEDOM OF THE PRESS
TRUTHFUL INFORMATION.
Generally the press has a right to publish truthful information regarding a matter of
public concern, and this right can be restricted only to further a more important
government interest such as national security.
BROADCASTING REGULATIONS
Radio and television broadcasting may be more closely regulated than the press. The
paramount right is the right of viewers and listeners to receive information of public
concern rather than the right of broadcasters to broadcast what they please.
DEFAMATION
Defamation involves injury to reputation. Thus a message is defamatory if it lowers
plaintiff in the esteem of the community or discourages third persons from associating
with her.
A defamatory message concerning plaintiff is not actionable unless a third person
receives and understands it. Thus in a defamatory statement about plaintiff made only
to plaintiff, there is no publication and therefore no defamation.
This message has to be 1) published or communicated to a third person, and the
plaintiff must have 2) suffered damages.
Slander and libel are generally not protected and may be made subject to criminal or
civil liability.
SLANDER
A defamatory message not in permanent form as speech is slander. Plaintiff must
introduce proof of money damages to get recovery for slander.
SLANDER PER SE

A form of slander that damages need not be proven, because its meaning is apparent
on the face of the statement. Broadly there are four categories to slander per se; 1)
accusing someone of a crime, 2) imputing serious sexual misconduct (e.g. chastity of
a woman); 3) comment adversely impacting ones profession or business, or 4) that
someone has a disease, for example a sexually transmitted disease or mental illness.
CASE OF REP. KANG
Rep. Kang Yong-seok, 41 years old, had already been expelled from ruling Grand
National Party following comments he made in July 2011 to university students that
suggested female TV announcers should be willing to provide sexual favors to further
their careers.
You should give everything to become an anchorwoman, he said.
A group representing TV announcers sued him for defamation and in May Rep. Kang
was given a suspended six-month jail term.
During the dinner, Kang told one of the students who hopes to become a TV
presenter, Do you know that you have to give everything to become an announcer?
You want to become an announcer despite this?
Kang was indicted on charges of making sexually abusive remarks during a dinner
with dozens of female students from Yonsei University in Seoul, portraying female
TV presenters as prostitutes.
Recently this decision was reversed by the Supreme Court for lack of any specific
plaintiff suffering damages.
LIBEL
A defamatory message in permanent form is libel. Writing, picture, sculpture, film,
and even a hanging in effigy can be libelous. To recover for damages for libel,
proof of money damages are not necessary.
PUBLISHED
A defamatory message must be communicated to a third person to be actionable. If it
is uttered to the plaintiff alone, it is not actionable.

DAMAGES
Plaintiff must have suffered damages to bring an action for defamation. It can be
monetary damages and/or general damages like injury to reputation, loss of friends,
humiliation, etc.
DEFENSE
If the defamatory statement is true, then it is a complete defense to a defamatory

action, even if defendant acted out of ill will and even if he was not aware that the
defamatory message was true.
ABSOLUTE PRIVILEGE
A Legislator may not be held liable for any defamatory message uttered wile on the
floor of the legislature or during hearings or committee proceedings, etc. This is so
regardless of the nature or content of the defamatory message or its lack of
relationship to any matter before the legislature.
Assemblyman Lee, Seok-ki refused to salute the flag and sing the national anthem on
the opening day of the National Assembly session.
a)
Analyze according to symbolic speech and content-based/content-neutral
regulations.
b)
Discuss his legislators privilege.
FIRST AMENDMENT CONCERNS
If the defamatory statement is about a public official or public figure, or involves a
matter of public concern, the plaintiff must additionally establish that 1) the
statement made by the defendant was false and that 2) the fault was on the part of
defendant.
Malice must be proven in defamation cases brought by public officials and public
figures. New York Times vs. Sullivan
1)
2)

Defendant had knowledge that the statement was false, OR

Had reckless disregard as to whether it was false.

On the otherhand, Private persons need not prove Malice.

Gertz vs. Welch
Where a private person is the plaintiff, only negligence regarding the falsity must be
proven even if the statement involves a matter of public concern. It the statement did
not involve a matter of public concern, constitutional restrictions do not apply.

NATIONAL SECURITY AND PRIOR RESTRAINT

FREEDOM OF SPEECH
A democratic society guarantees freedom of expression which includes freedom of
speech and press. However this right has been interpreted as less than absolute when
there are some competing societal interests to regulate expression. There must be
some balancing of interested promoted by such freedom against the competing
societal interest.

PRIOR RESTRAINT
One of the fundamental rights guaranteed freedom of expression is the freedom from
prior restraint. Derived from English Common Law, the rule against prior restraint
prohibits government from banning expression of ideas prior to their publication. The
rule against prior restraint is based on the principle that Freedom of the Press is
essential to a free society.
However, the rule against prior restraint is not absolute. The rule would not, for
example, prevent government in time of war from prohibiting publication of "the
sailing dates of transports or the number and location of troops." Threats to national
security interests are almost certain to prevail over freedom of the press, although it
has proved difficult to invoke the "national security" justification.
Prior restraint prevents speech before it occurs, rather than punish it afterwards. The
government must show that some special societal harm will otherwise result.
An injunction, administrative order, or other governmental action, issued or taken in
advance of a communication, which purports to forbid that communication to be
made, is a prior restraint.
A prior restraint on speech can only be justified where the competing interest is
extremely important and where the harm threatened by the proposed communication
cannot be adequately remedied by post-publication measures. A prior restraint is
presumed to be unconstitutional and the agency or official involved must convince the
court that such extreme measures are necessary.
UNPROTECTED SPEECH
Courts have recognized that prior restraints may be imposed where the activity
restrained presents a clear and present danger or a serious and imminent threat to the
administration of justice. The "clear and present danger" test subsequently evolved
in Brandenburg v. Ohio. In that case, the Supreme Court held that the advocacy of
force or criminal activity may not be penalized unless such advocacy is directed to
inciting or producing imminent lawless action and is likely to incite or produce such
action.
NATIONAL SECURITY
The national security may justify a prior restraint, as where someone intends to
publish the date, time and location of troop ship sailings during wartime. Prior
restraints were valid in prohibiting publishing of troop movement in times of war and
prepublication review of CIA agents writings.
WARTIME CENSORSHIP
During World War I, and to a greater extent during World War II, war
correspondents accompanied military forces, and their reports were subject to advance
censorship to preserve military secrets. The extent of such censorship was not
generally challenged, and no major court case arose from this issue. Such issues arose
again during the 2003 Invasion of Iraq, when many embedded reporters accompanied

soldiers as they made their way into the country. These reports were subject to
censorship in that they were not allowed to reveal a unit's exact location.
SONYS INTERVIEW AND FREE SPEECH
"The Interview," the Sony Pictures film about a fictional plot to assassinate North
Korean leader Kim Jong Un, opened in more than 300 movie theaters across the
United States on Christmas Day, drawing many sell-out audiences and statements by
patrons that they were championing freedom of expression.
The Interview, a highly controversial film landed Sony Pictures Entertainment in
hot water with the North Korean government.
Its easy to see why the North Koreans would be offended. If another nation made a
film about killing President Obama, many Americans would be justifiably livid.
This story illustrates the vast gulf of differences between a nation that (mostly)
embraces free speech, and one that does everything in its power to restrict it.
North Korea blamed Obama for trying to distribute the film, as if arts and culture fell
under the primary responsibilities of the leader of the free world.
Obama always goes reckless in words and deeds like a monkey in a tropical forest,
a CNN quote from the North Korean National Defense Commission states.
We cannot have a society in which some dictators some place can start imposing
censorship here in the United States, because if somebody is able to intimidate us out
of releasing a satirical movie, imagine what they start doing once they see a
documentary that they dont like or news reports that they dont like, Obama said in
the same CNN report.
Sony Pictures backtracked from its original decision to cancel the release of the $44
million film after major U.S. theater chains pulled out because of threats of violence
by Guardians of Peace, a computer hacking group that claimed responsibility for a
destructive cyberattack on Sony in November 2014.
The United States blamed the attacks on North Korea.

Sony decided to release the film after U.S. President Barack Obama, as well as such
Hollywood luminaries as George Clooney and Republicans and Democrats in
Washington, raised concerns that Hollywood was setting a precedent of selfcensorship.

Free speech is being not only challenged, but attacked with gunfire. From North
Korean computer hacks to last weekends Copenhagen caf shooting, the world is
being shown that fundamental rights are only our own as long as we are fearless in
their pursuit.

First, the American produced film, The Interview, was met with threats of merciless
action by North Korea against both Columbia Pictures and any theaters that dared to
show the film. The movie follows the (mis)adventures of an American gossip shows
host and producer (played by James Franco and Seth Rogen, respectively) as they use
an interview with notoriously unforgiving North Korean leader Kim Jong-un as
means to carry out his assassination.
However one feels about the movie or its subject matter, the important outcome of the
whole issue is North Koreas response. Starting with the now infamous Sony
computer hacks, North Korea proceeded to demand The Interview not be released,
ironically referred to it as the movie of terrorism and threatened to attack any
theater that did follow through with its release.
The theme of attacks on free speech consists of unreasonable, extremist responses to
comedic depictions of a group or figure.
The next major attack was in France at the headquarters for Charlie Hebdo, a satirical
magazine. After publishing controversial illustrations of Muhammad and other
Islamic leaders, men later identified as members of the Yemen branch of Al-Qaeda
killed 12 people. They claimed their motive was revenge for the honor of
Muhammad. The phrase Je suis Charlie (I am Charlie) became famous for those
standing in solidarity with Charlie Hebdos right to free expression.
The murders of Charlie Hebdo staff and the police who were assigned to protect
them come shortly after the commotion over The Interview subsided here in the
United States. In that case, prominent theater chains declined to screen a satirical (and
very silly) movie about reporters (James Franco and Seth Rogen) who were asked by
the CIA to try to kill North Korean leader Kim Jong Un (Randall Park) after hackers
made vague but grandiose threats against showings of the film.
Both The Interview and Charlie Hebdos publishing on Islam are provocations,
rather than immortal works of art. The responses in both France and the United States
to threats against Charlie Hebdo and The Interview illustrate the conflicts in both
societies over what resources it makes sense to commit to freedom of speech.
After Charlie Hebdos editors decided to run more cartoons in the wake of the
firebombing, a hacking and a series of death threats, the French government had
appealed to the editors not to go ahead with publication, and shut down embassies,
cultural centres and schools in 20 countries out of fear of reprisals when they went
ahead anyway. Riot police were also deployed to the Charlie Hebdo offices to protect
it from direct attacks.
French officials may have disapproved of Charlie Hebdos exercise of the
publications free speech rights, but the government defended the magazine anyway.
With The Interview, President Obama faced a somewhat more complicated
situation: a private company (Sony) had produced a provocation, but its commercial
partners (the movie theaters that were afraid to screen the movie) were making it
difficult for Sony to get that provocation in front of audiences. Im sympathetic that
Sony as a private company was worried about liabilities, and this and that and the
other. I wish they had spoken to me first. I would have told them, do not get into a

pattern in which youre intimidated by these kinds of criminal attacks, Obama said in
his year-end press conference.
In the United States, The Interview has inadvertently become an advertisement for a
new model of movie development, netting $31 million in online sales and rental fees.
Its as much a lesson about commerce as about courage. But in France, at least twelve
people are dead.
In the attacks on Charlie Hebdo and the hack of Sony Pictures, we see the costs of
making provocative art and protecting the people who make and distribute it. But we
shouldnt let these consequences blind us to the very high price we would pay for
backing away from such a defense.
Most recently on February 14, a cafe in Copenhagen, Denmark was hosting an event
called, Art, Blasphemy and Freedom of Expression when a gunman entered, killing
one civilian and three police officers. The shooter is assumed to be targeting a speaker
at the event, Lars Vilks, an artist whose drawings of the prophet Muhammad depicted
as a dog has caused protests and uproar in his home of Sweden. A long time target of
Islamic aggression, Vilks continues to portray Muhammad in his cartoons.
The message is clear and powerful: Dictators and rogue states are free to control what
is seen by people who labor under their rule, but the rest of us have no interest in
living like that, where others control the movies in theaters or the selections on
newsstands. We may or may not all be Charlie Hebdo, but we certainly want to be
free to read the paper if we wish.
SHIN EUN MI AND NORTH KOREA SYMPATHIZERS
Shin Eun-mi, the Korean American woman who was accused of holding a pro-North
Korea lecture in South Korea, was deported from the country and returned to Los
Angeles on January 10, 2015.
Shins arrival at Tom Bradley International Terminal inside LAX was met with a
crowd of supporters and naysayers.
Shin, 54, is a California resident. Korea Immigration Services deemed her lecture
series held last year in which she allegedly made North Korea-sympathetic
comments in violation of Seouls National Security Law.
She will be unable to enter South Korea for five years.
Ms. Shin, whose American passport gives her name as Amy Chung but who has used
her Korean name here, emigrated to the United States after graduating from college in
Seoul. In a series of articles online about her North Korea trips, she described the
people there as warmhearted and called for Korean reunification.

She has appeared in a documentary on the North that was sponsored by the South
Korean government, and in 2013, a book she wrote on her North Korea trips was

included on a Culture Ministry recommended-reading list. But the ministry withdrew

its recommendation after the current controversy erupted.

The denunciations of Ms. Shin began after she gave a series of joint lectures with a
leftist activist, Hwang Sun, last year. Ms. Hwang, who is notorious among
conservatives for having given birth to her daughter in Pyongyang while on a visit in
2005, was once convicted and imprisoned on charges of aiding the North. Prosecutors
recently accused her of violating the National Security Law and asked a court to issue
a warrant for her arrest.

During the joint lectures, Ms. Shin, a trained singer, sang a North Korean song that
officials here said praised the North Korean leader Kim Jong-il, who died in 2011.
She was also quoted by the South Korean news media as saying that North Koreans
appeared to be happy under the rule of the current leader, Kim Jong-un.

Ms. Shin also said that she liked North Korean beer, and that North Korean defectors
living in the South had told her that they wanted to go home. Such comments
infuriated conservative critics, including defectors from the North, who accused her of
creating a distorted and nave picture of the country and ignoring its dire human rights
conditions.

Last December, a high school student threw a homemade explosive device toward a
podium where Ms. Shin was speaking. She was unhurt, and the student was arrested.

Under South Korean law, pro-North Korean sentiment is punishable by up to seven

years in prison. Critics including U.S. State Department spokeswoman Jen
Psaki, according to the Huffington Post say the law limits freedom of expression
and restricts access to the Internet.
The move to deport Ms. Shin has drawn criticism from Washington, where the State
Department on Friday reiterated long-held misgivings about South Koreas National
Security Law, which bans praise or support for the North and which officials here
invoked to expel Ms. Shin.
Were concerned that the National Security Law, as interpreted and implied in some
cases, limits freedom of expression and restricts access to the Internet, a State
Department spokeswoman, Jen Psaki, said when asked about Ms. Shins case.

Prosecutors in Seoul has said that Ms. Shin had made supportive comments
about North Korea during a series of talks in South Korea late last year, describing
three trips she made to the country between 2011 and 2013. They accused her of
violating the National Security Law but apparently did not consider her offense
serious enough for a formal indictment, instead asking the Justice Ministry to deport
her.

Ms. Shin denied violating the security law, saying that her lectures were not aimed at
praising the North Korean government but at promoting reconciliation between the
Koreas. She said she was a victim of a witch hunt by conservative South Korean news
media outlets, bloggers and activists campaigning against what they call jongbuk, or
followers of North Korea.

Six decades after the Korean War ended in a truce, the Korean Peninsula remains
technically at war, and how much one is allowed to say about North Korea remains a
delicate issue. Under the National Security Law, South Korea blocks access to North
Korean websites and jails people for circulating pro-North propaganda on the Internet.

For years, international human rights groups have recommended that South Korea
repeal or amend the law, saying that it hinders freedom of expression and political
association. But mainstream conservative parties have blocked any attempt to change
it, saying that it protects the South against real threats from the North.

Critics said the laws loosely worded definition of illegal activities benefiting the
enemy leaves it open to abuse. Such fears increased after President Park Geun-hye
daughter of the former military dictator Park Chung-hee, who used the law to
arrest many political dissidents took office two years ago. Last month, her
government won a Constitutional Court ruling that disbanded a small leftist
party accused of following North Korean ideology.
By almost any measure, South Korea is a thriving liberal democracy. It has held free
and fair elections since 1987. Raucous, if peaceable, protests routinely fill its streets.
But one measure is far from liberal: its National Security Law punishes, with up to
seven years in prison, anyone who praises the gangster regime to the north. The law
was adopted in 1948 to safeguard the new country from communist infiltration from
North Korea. Under Park Geun-hye, the countrys conservative president who took
office in 2013, 119 were arrested on suspicion of breaking the law in her first year.
The continued use of such draconian powers has prompted calls from the UN to
abolish them.

South Korea is still technically at war with the North, six decades after an armistice
was signed. Many conservatives say that, given the unpredictability of the regime of
Kim Jong Un, the laws continued use is justified. In a new-year address this week,
Ms Park described it as an essential law that ensures minimum security in the case of
a unique weakness.
Fresh instances continue to justify it, say its supporters. Last year Lee Seok-ki, a
member of the United Progressive Party (UPP), a minor hard-left grouping, was
sentenced to 12 years in prison on charges of plotting a pro-North rebellion to
overthrow the government. In December the constitutional court disbanded the UPP,
stripping its five other MPs of their seats in the National Assembly. The order was the
first of its kind since 1958, when the South was in effect a dictatorship.
Ms Park greeted the judgment as a historic decision that strongly protects liberal
democracy. Few true progressives have any sympathy for Mr Lees nastier views; he
helped rig his own partys elections and tried to purloin confidential military
documents. Yet it is hard to see how he poses a real threat to national security either.
And the UPP was one of the few political groups actively promoting peaceful
reunificationsupposedly a national tenet.
The triumph of vigilance over free speech has tended to damage the cause of the
Souths real progressives. They are often vilified as jongbuk, or pro-North
sympathisers, for opposing the conservative order.
Prosecutors have decided to deport a Korean American woman accused of making
pro-North Korea remarks at a series of talk shows she hosted in South Korea.
Shin Eun-mi, 54, allegedly made comments sympathetic to Pyongyang alongside her
South Korean co-host Hwang Sun at on-stage talk shows they hosted from
November to December last year. Local conservative groups filed a complaint with
police in November, accusing them violating of Seouls National Security Law.
Though Ms Shin claims no political motive, she was joined on her tour by Hwang
Sun, a former leftist politician who gained notoriety for giving birth by Caesarean
section in Pyongyang, the Norths capital, on the anniversary of the founding of its
Workers Party. Ms Hwang was arrested for praising the North Korean regime.
South Korean authorities have arrested a reunification activist for making favourable
comments about North Korea, in the latest case critics say infringes on the countrys
freedom of speech.
Hwang Sun, a former member of a leftist party who came to public attention in 2005
for having a baby in Pyongyang, was taken into custody for violating the National
Security Law that prohibits attempting to praise, encourage or propagandise North
Korea.
Her arrest follows the deportation of her Korean-American talk show co-host Shin
Eun-mi. Ms Shin was deported to the US for making positive comments about life in
the North in speeches around the country, some together with Ms Hwang, as well as
in online posts. Both of them deny the charges.

Ms Shin and Ms Hwang have been castigated by the Souths conservatives for being
North Korean sympathisers and their activities have even been greeted with violence.
In December, a high-school student who is a member of a rightwing group detonated
a homemade explosive device at a talk show where they were speaking, injuring
several people. The student is awaiting trial.
The arrests of Ms Shin and Ms Hwang, which follow the recent dissolution of a small
leftwing party accused of pro-North activities, have worsened the national divide
between conservatives and liberals in a country still preoccupied with ideological
differences and concerns over North Korea.
They have also intensified debate over the national security law, with liberal critics
saying that the outdated law should be abolished and accusing South Korean
president Park Geun-hye of using it to crack down on political dissenters, following in
the footsteps of her dictator father Park Chung-hee, who ruled the country in the
1960s and 1970s.
Some parts of the security law clearly infringe on the freedom of thought and
expression, said Lee Jae-hwa, a member of Lawyers for a Democratic Society. It is
time for social debate over whether we still need the law. It is often used for political
purposes although those people like Ms Hwang and Ms Shin did nothing to harm
national security.
But President Park says the security law is needed because of continuing threats from
North Korea. We need the very minimum of law to ensure security in this country as
we remain in a stand-off with the North, and the law is enforced according to that,
she said.
However, in a rare note of criticism of its ally, Washington recently rebuked Seoul
over the law. Jen Psaki, US state department spokesman, said it limited freedom of
expression and restricted access to the internet.
Hwang had been investigated under the charges of allegedly working as a pro-North
activist for the group, Practical Implementation of the South-North Joint
Declaration, praising the North Korean regime, and promoting editorials published
by North Koreas Party-run publication, Rodong Sinmun, through her Sovereignty
Broadcasting Channel online.
Prosecutors say Hwang wrote pro-North statements in her blogs and emails, such as
referencing Premier Kim Il Sungs achievements. She is also being charged for
possession of the book, Laughter Through Hardship, which was published in North
Korea.
The 40-year-old allegedly made endorsements of former and incumbent North
Korean leaders on a South Korean Internet broadcasting station. She was also found
to be active in a group South Korea has dubbed anti-state, according to police.
On February 10th, the Seoul Central District Prosecutor's Office indicted Hwang
Sun for violating National Security Law.

According to the prosecution, Hwang is being charged for allegedly praising and
idolizing the North Korean regime at her event, Hwang Sun - Shin Eun Mi Talk
Concert, that took place at the Jogyesa Temple last November.

NORTH KOREA SYMPATHISERS AND NATIONAL SECURITY LAW

Most of the time, South Koreans are assumed to be either hostile or indifferent to
North Korea.
The two countries are, after all, officially still at war. And recent aggressive acts - the
shelling of Yeonpyeong Island and the sinking of the Cheonan come to mind - haven't
exactly painted a picture of friendship.
So it wasn't surprising that many South Koreans appeared unfazed by the passing of
Kim Jong Il in December 2011. Instead of mourning the eccentric leader, most were
preoccupied with what might happen next, now that their nuclear-armed neighbor was
suddenly leaderless.
What's more surprising, however, is that amid the uncertainty there were actually
some South Koreans who were genuinely sad to see the Dear Leader go.
Kim Dae Hee, 45, who has longish hair - rare for a middle-aged South Korean man and a steely gaze, attempted to hold a mourning ceremony in central Seoul with a
group of activists on the day Kim Jong Il's death was announced. Kim was arrested
that day, and is currently on probation.
Kim is a part of a small group of South Koreans who openly praise the North, many
of whom hold the goal of reuniting the Korean peninsula. They do so despite the fact
that expressing pro-North views is illegal in South Korea under the country's National
Security Law, and despite the fact that in recent years the number of those arrested
under the law has risen.
Some pro-North Korea activists in the South are motivated by the ideology of the
North, while others dream of one Korea. And then there are those for whom the issue
is freedom of expression itself. For them, it's less about North Korea and more about
the fact that they should be able to speak their minds, no matter what they have to say.
Dreaming of a united Korea
Kim says his warm feelings toward North Korea stem from his dream that Korea
would once again stand united.
The Korean peninsula was occupied by the Japanese from 1910 until the end of World
War II, when Soviet troops occupied north of the 38th parallel and US troops took
over south of it.
"The main problem is that our country was divided by an outside force. We need
American forces to withdraw from this country to gain true autonomy. That is the
most important thing, not freedom or democracy. Those are secondary," said Kim,
who speaks effusively and uses many old-fashioned Korean honorifics.

On his lapel, he wears a pin of the Korean peninsula shaded entirely in blue, a color
associated with integrity.
Kim draws inspiration from the philosophy of North Korea's founding father, Kim Il
Sung, who preached the notion of self-reliance and said that Koreans were the masters
of their country's development. Much of the North's propaganda is based on the idea
that the country must resist the corrupting influence of the outside world and boldly
forge an independent path.
To activists like Kim, this is paramount. "North Korea has its own final say. It doesn't
have to follow the direction of outsiders. I don't believe freedom exists in this
colonized nation," he said, referring to South Korea.
Getting behind North Korea's ideology
For Hwang Seung Ho, who manages a pro-North activist group, Victims of the
Korean National Security Law (VKNSL), it's all about ideology.
"I admire and cherish the ideology of North Korea. That is the most important thing in
this globalized world," said Hwang, who once trained to be a Catholic priest but didn't
complete his studies.
"I find the Christian ideals of universal love and compassion in North Korea," he said,
explaining that he finds North Korea to be the world's only true democracy. In other
countries, he says, when leaders are elected they only have part of the population's
support.
In North Korea "all of the population supports one leadership, one goal," Hwang said.
Police raided Hwang's home and all his materials on North Korea were confiscated.
He was fired from his previous job as a tutor for his political activities. Hwang
appeared stoic, and seemed to accept the raid as the price to be paid for his beliefs.
"Thats what happens," he said.
Many raids on people suspected of pro-North activities are carried out in connection
with the National Security Law, which was put in place in 1948 to stifle procommunist activities.
Although South Korea was technically a democracy once the US moved in after
World War II, political turmoil and periods of military rule kept it from being a full
democracy until the 1980s. Military dictators used the National Security law to hinder
pro-democracy activists until 1987, when the law fell out of use during the
administration of the more liberal Roh Tae Woo.
But in the last few years, convictions have surged under the conservative leadership of
President Lee Myung Bak, which many critics see as a return to heavy-handed rule.
Hwang also blames the media for perpetuating unfair bias against North Korea.
"They do everything they can to paint North Korea in a negative light. We have to get
rid of the many negative images of North Korea in the media and convey the truth of

North Korea to our people in South Korea and muster our power to build one big,
powerful country," he said.
By and large, pro-North activists consider themselves victims of draconian National
Security Law, which they say is abused by the government and used to stifle free
speech.
But some supporters think it's a necessary piece of legislation to control the
expression of pro-North Korean views and to root out traitors in South Korea.
What the critics have to say
"We need this National Security Law to protect our country from North Korean
spies," said Jeong Ji Un, spokesperson for National Cyber Security Observers, a civic
group that monitors pro-North Korean activity on the South Korean internet.
Jeong expressed concern over possible collusion between the North's regime and
South Koreans. "Many people say they are just activists but really they are working
for the North," she said.
Indeed, the reality in North Korea is far from the idyllic picture many pro-North
Korean activists in the South have in their minds, according to Brian Myers, a North
Korea specialist at Dongseo University in Busan, South Korea.
"[The North's ideology] is a sort of catchall for everything the North Korean regime
does," Myers said by phone during a recent interview.
"In reality it's a red herring that distracts from the real ideology, which is something
much more scary - a paranoid, race-based nationalism," he said.