The city of Gyeongsan in North Gyeongsang Province has stirred controversy over a promotional video created to encourage participation in the presidential election. The video contains scenes of workplace abuse and violence against employees. Gyeongsan City took the video private within a day and issued an apology.
On the 26th, a 49-second video titled 'Presidential election voting encouragement video' was uploaded to Gyeongsan City's official YouTube channel.
The video depicts a superior crumpling paper and throwing it at a female employee, hitting her with a stack of approval documents, poking her forehead with a finger, and a female employee biting the superior's finger.
In the scene where the finger is bitten, the line "Don't bite, ask about the candidate's policies" is heard, followed by a scene where a male employee grabs the female employee's hair, and the female employee counters, saying, "Don't choose, choose my rights."
The video also shows a scene where this female employee insults a male employee via computer messenger, while another superior watches from behind, and later, the female employee discovers her desk is missing upon returning from an outing, with the message "Don't take a picture, capture tomorrow's hope."
Viewers who watched the video expressed negative comments and complaints, saying, "It's an implausible and random setup," "It's inappropriate for violence against women to be consumed as humor," and "I don't understand what this has to do with the election."
As the controversy grew, Gyeongsan City made the video private on the 27th and posted an official apology on the 28th.
A Gyeongsan City official stated, "All scenes in the video are fictional, and there was no intention to promote violence or hatred. An inappropriate direction occurred during the process of the person in charge arbitrarily modifying the concept," adding, "We sincerely reflect on the discomfort that may have been caused to viewers and will be careful to prevent similar incidents from recurring."