Rotten Mango - #247: The Cheongju 2006 Curling Iron Case - The Real Life Stories Behind K-Drama “The Glory”

Episode Date: March 26, 2023

Her only mistake was picking up the phone. That’s it. She didn’t know it was the bully’s boyfriend calling her. This “mistake” almost cost her her life. She was dragged into a karaoke bar - beaten to an inch of her life. Then later, dragged into an alleyway near an abandoned factory where she was beaten by 5 bullies. They assaulted her for hours until she was drenched in blood, and the whole thing was caught on CCTV. She barely made it out alive but her nightmare was just beginning. These photos started to circulate in her high school and the victim was taunted for the fact that she was tortured. That’s just the story of one victim. Another victim was burned all over her body with a hair straightener. Another one was lit on fire for his birthday as a “celebratory candle.” These are the real-life school violence stories that inspired the K-Drama “The Glory.” Full Source Notes: rottenmangopodcast.com To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What if comparing car insurance rates was as easy as putting on your favorite podcast? With Progressive, it is. Just visit the Progressive website to quote with all the coverage you want. You'll see Progressive's direct rate, then their tool will provide options from other companies so you can compare. All you need to do is choose the rate and coverage you like. Quote today at Progressive.com to join the over 29 million drivers who trust progressive. Progressive casualty insurance company and affiliates comparison rates not available

in all states or situations, prices vary based on how you buy. Better being better, boom. We're going to be talking about a lot of different victims today, and a lot of them wanted to remain anonymous. In some sources you can actually find either their last name, their surname, or you can find their full name, but just to make it a little bit better, we're going to call them student number one. It's just going to be easier to follow because there's a lot of stories to get through today.

Student number one made maybe only one mistake, and that mistake was picking up a phone call. I mean, it's not even really a mistake. By most people's books, people pick up their phone calls all the time That's the purpose of a phone. But to these five insecure power-tripping bullies It was the biggest mistake that she could have made in her entire life June 2017 student one gets a phone call from a girl in her class's boyfriend So some random dude in her class calls her and I'm not even sure why he called student one. Either it was random, maybe he had to ask her a question, maybe he wanted to talk to her,

or maybe the girlfriend told him to call. I really don't know if it was a setup, but he calls student one, she picks up, and that's it. There's no cheating, there's no affair, there's no flirting, nothing. Student one simply picked up an incoming call. And that is why five girls in her grade decided to beat her and inch of her life the very first time.

They forced student one out of her house, hit her with flip flops, demanding to know why she would even dare pick up this guy's phone call. Like, what's wrong with you? Are you a slut? They forced her to come to this karaoke bar. They call it Norebangs in Korea and it's a little bit different from the Western karaoke bars. You can actually rent private rooms. You have this big screen in your private room and these microphones. It's so loud. So they turn up the music in that Norebang. They start hitting her with the microphone

over and over on the head. They're punching her. They beat her until she was covered with her own blood. Thankfully, student one was alive. She did the right thing. The thing that everybody tells you to do, if you've been a victim of a violent crime or if you've been bullied, she went straight to the police. The police did not hold up their end of the social contract. They didn't do their jobs. The police did nothing. The police found out that she had gone to the police and they decided they were going to teach her a lesson. They felt like they had to put her through something torturous this time, so she wouldn't even think to ever report them ever again.

They said to her, do you think that we wouldn't notice that you went to the cops? Do you think we're dumb? You'll be dead the next time we catch you. They wanted to keep their word. Two months later, September 1st of 2017, student one was invited by one of her close friends to go grab burgers and then go to the movies. Okay, look, she really needed this.

Like, she needed this night out with a friend to de-stress, to eat some burgers, and not worry about these five bullies that were harassing her every single day in school. So she gets ready and she shows up at this restaurant early. She sits down, she's got her burger ordered and she's just sitting there waiting anxiously waiting for her friend to get there. I mean, maybe she's staring at the restaurant door, just thinking about the movie that they're going to watch. Maybe they're going to go grab food afterwards, maybe they're going to eat

ramen at a convenience store. When suddenly the door to the restaurant swings open and her bullies rush in. Five girls. They walk straight up to her and they say, get up, follow us. You don't want to make a scene, do you? I think the most devastating part about this is the bullies had gotten student one's friend and forced her to set her up. So you know how her friend was like, come meet me for burgers? The bullies were like, text your friend right now. Text student one right now. Her friend was never coming to get burgers. She was never gonna go to the movies with her.

She knew what the bullies had in store for her. There is CCTV footage of student one walking out of the restaurant with the five bullies. So what happens is, at first, she walks out and she's willingly leaving the restaurant with the five bullies. So what happens is at first she walks out and she's willingly leaving the restaurant and I'm saying willingly in the sense that it wasn't forcible, like they're not dragging her out of the restaurant. Probably she was scared to say no and a scared of making a scene, but it seems like when they instruct her to go into the alleyway next to the restaurant, she steps away and tries to leave. So one of the bullies grabs her by the hair and drags her into the alleyway.

And almost immediately after, I'm sure while they're still in view of the main road because the alleyway, it's not like it's just, there's a turn immediately. Like you've seen an alleyway from the main road, you can see straight down it. Right afterwards, a police car is seen driving past the alleyway. Wow.

The police failed her a second time. They keep driving, whether they saw her or not is unclear, but the result was nothing and nobody was stopped. And said the bullies, the five bullies, they drag her to a quiet place and they start punching her. The crazy thing is, it's secluded, but it's not isolated. Like, this is a busy part of South Korea. So a few passurbys, they see student one being punched

and nobody tries to stop them. Nobody tries to call the police. But it freaked out the police enough that they dragged her to a nearby factory instead that was closed. And they started assaulting her with anything that they could get their hands on. Out of the five bullies, it was mainly two girls doing most of the physical abuse. But there were mainly two girls doing most of the physical abuse.

But there were still three girls just standing there, yelling, threatening the victim, watching as their friends assaulted her with iron pipes, glass-soju bottles, bricks, chairs. They used a knife to cut her skin and they burned her with cigarettes and they found this vitamin 500 glass bottle. It's like these vitamin supplements in South Korea and they're in these tiny glass bottles and it's the glass is thick.

It's probably thicker than a beer glass. And they start hitting student one with it and they're screaming and laughing. How come this bottle won't break? Let's just hit her till the bottle breaks. They were laughing as they said this. They also laughed as they said. I like this smell of her blood. Let's keep going, shall we? The victim was suffering from serious injuries to her jaw.

The back of her head, she was bleeding everywhere and they complained. God, why is she bleeding so much? Her blood is dirty. At one point, student one passes out, loses consciousness, and the bully say, let's beat her up more since we're already guilty of attempted murder. Might as well. They tortured her for nearly two hours, and they did all of this, thinking that they were going to get away with it, thinking that they taught her a lesson.

They had no idea that they were recorded by the CCTV near the factory. The whole two hours of the assault was recorded, which I don't even know if they care. I don't even know if they care, because they were caught on camera forcing student one onto her knees, like the begging pose, like pleading for her life,

and taking pictures of her with the flash on. I don't know as some sort of sick evidence of their torture, like a trophy? Yeah. I mean, I guess they wanted to show it to others of like this. Look what we did to her. Look what will happen if you go to the police and tell on us. They would later share this picture. The kneeling photo. Oh my gosh. So the CCTV is in black and white, but every inch of this student one's body was covered in blood.

Like I'm talking, her hair is caked in blood. Every part of her arm and legs are covered in her own blood. They took this picture with the flash on, and one of the bullies would actually send this to a senior upper class man. And in South Korea, the social hierarchy of age is very intense. I'm sure you guys are familiar with this by now, but if you're a junior in high school, the sophomores in high school are usually bowing 90 degrees

to you when they see you in hallways. Like it's not even an upper class man under class man type of ordeal. Like it's very serious. There's even a term you call someone like onni opa hyong do na, right? And she sends the bully, sends it to an Onni. So this is someone older than her,

and someone that she actually is somewhat scared of. Maybe the bully's bully. I have no idea. But she sends this picture, and the Onni texted back, what did you do? I hit a kid. They'll say it's attempted murder. Do you think I went overboard? You did that? Did you do? I hit a kid. They'll say it's attempted murder. Do you think I went overboard? You did that? Did you do it alone? Your real psycho, LOL. Did you and your friend do it together? Answer me. She doesn't respond. So the un-need text back, answer me, you bitch. Are you really sending this to me right now asking if it's okay? I'm getting really tired of you now. You need to control yourself better. That conversation is the most chilling, weird, unnormal, natural conversation I've ever heard.

Like what is going on? That's why a lot of people had a problem with this conversation once it started getting public because that's not how you react to a picture like this. You don't just say, I'm getting sick of you. You've been acting up these days. To a picture like this. But thankfully, the only does do something about it. She kind of sleeps on it, but she ends up bringing this picture to the police.

And the five teenagers would be taken in by authorities and only two would be charged as the main perpetrators. The only reason that they were caught is because this only sent the picture into the police. When the bullies found out that the Onni had reported them, they just scurried to turn themselves into the police, not because they felt remorse, not because they wanted to serve their time for their heinous crime, but they heard that judges are easier on them

if they turn themselves in first. When they were questioned on why they did this, they said, the victim was being rude to an Onni, which means, you know, an upper-class man. Which is a straight-up lie. They did this because her boyfriend called student one, and student one being a normal human being picked up a phone call.

Yeah. There's a picture of the floor of the factory where there's just blood staining the entire place where she was kneeled. These bullies would actually only pay for their crimes by spending a few years in prison. The main bullies received two years in juvenile detention centers, another bullie received just a few months,

and all of South Korea was pretty outraged. I think the feeling of injustice practically ran through the whole nation, the judge tried to argue, minors are physically and mentally impulsive, and they don't have the same ability to perceive as adults do. The courts not gonna try these teens under the same standard as adults. The girls, the bullies? The girls, they show guilt and reflection.

We must acknowledge that there's room for change with educational rehabilitation. Okay, fine. Maybe with rehabilitation, there will be no such thing as bullying anymore. But that clearly wasn't the case. In fact, more extreme cases of bullying started to pop up all across South Korea after this viral case, some even inspired the popular Netflix drama, The Glory. These are the real life stories that inspired that drama. As always, full show notes are available at rottonminglepodcast.com, as well as resources

if you're being bullied or if you've been having darker thoughts, please take out help. I'm gonna leave a few links and hotlines in the description, but with that being said, there's also gonna be a content warning for intense bullying, school violence, and taking of one's life. And just know that if you're feeling bullied or feeling alone,

you're not alone. There are people out there that can help you that you can talk to. And another thing, this isn't necessarily in the show notes, but the glory on Netflix is a 16 episode Korean drama that's been widely talked about. I actually made like three videos on it, okay? We've covered the whole series on our other podcast channel,

Miss Mangle Butter, Baking a Mystery, Baking a Murder, where we cover like fictional thriller shows, movies and books. I can leave a link to those, but honestly the glory itself, the K-Drama on Netflix has been really good and it's been touted as a prime example of the saying, art imitates life. So the glory follows the story of a woman named Mundlein, who is on this path of pure revenge. Like she's been planning this revenge for nearly 20 years of her life. The story goes, she was bullied in high school by a group of rich kids. And this is no normal bullying, not that there is any, but she was permanently disfigured. The bullies had held her down while they burned her arms and legs with a curling iron. They beat her. They sexually assaulted her and they all got away with it.

Back in high school, Tonglin had tried to tell the school officials. She tried to tell the police about the bullying. They all refused to take action because the rich kids had powerful parents, that these administrators, that these police officers wanted to be on their good side. High school, Tonglin, she couldn't handle the mental and physical torture. So multiple times, she contemplates and almost goes through with taking her own life. And in the end, I guess something in her just snaps. She decides, I'm not going to end my life.

I'm going to get revenge. And she feels like her life is over already. Why die? And then what? These bullies are going to go on living their best lives bullying more people. So she sets off on this 20-year-old journey to commit the perfect revenge to make sure that the bullies get what's coming to them. So the drama follows Tonglin and the bullies that are now in their late 30s. And I think

what makes this show different from all the other Korean dramas in the past that have just shown aspects of high school bullying is which side note Korean dramas do have a lot of depictions of school bullying. I remember being shocked watching boys over flowers and There's so many clips where the main character gets bullied by having rich students throw eggs at her She walks into the school. They're throwing eggs at her and pouring bags of flour onto her I remember showing my mom and being like, that's crazy and she's like, yeah, Korean bullying is that crazy.

It was the weirdest thing, but the glory is even more intense than that. But I think what makes it stand out is, it's a pretty close and honest depiction of bullying in South Korea. Like maybe not the revenge, but the bullying aspect. Like just how deep the layers of school bullying are the police corruption, the school administrators negligence, their motives to make this school seem like the perfect school intimidation of victims, parents using their money to get away with things, letting their kids get away with things. Like it makes sense, especially in a country like South Korea that this K dramadrama became one of the most anticipated releases in a while

Which side note this is so pertinent to the story later But all the actors and actresses were screened for past school bullying records Because the directors and producers wanted to make sure nobody in the drama was later exposed for being a bully in real life Can you imagine that exactly? I imagine one of the bullies on the drama is like a for being a bully in real life. Can you imagine that? Exactly. Imagine one of the bullies on the drama is like a real life bully. So keep this in mind. They scream that I wonder like, Hey, let me just talk to all your class mates.

Yeah, I wonder if they go back to your school records, but none of these stay on the school records. Exactly. Do they get a PI? Yeah, that's. Or do they do the most basic search and even today like people are getting exposed day by day, right? Okay, so the bullying thing in Korea has become such a shit show.

A lot of K-pop idols and actors and actresses just anyone in mainstream Korean news is constantly being accused of bullying. Some of them are true bullies, but recently we've seen a trend of false allegations of bullying and it's completely ruined multiple people's careers. Yeah, because you know, I think that's the problem with being a true victim and these false allegations is that it happened so long ago that there might not be enough evidence. And so it's just, it's a really tricky situation.

Yeah, very tricky. Yeah, I'm not exactly sure how they would screen for something like that, but keep this in mind, because maybe they didn't screen everyone, okay? Just keep that in mind. So the glory, it might seem like this really well written show, and it is, but in the art imitates life kind of way. People start immediately drawing connections between the show

and real-life bullying cases that were well known in South Korea like many years ago. And the show was not just a genius Netflix idea. It was based off these true stories. And there's three central themes that the glory explores. And all these themes have real-life cases that they were inspired by. The three elements, the three themes are bullying, suicide, and revenge. Those are like the key themes in this whole K-drama. So let's explore the real life cases. The most standout aspect of the bullying in the show is that the bullies are burning

Wundolun, the protagonist, with a curling iron. They're literally holding her down, taunting her, telling her that they're going to use her skin as a way to check the temperature of the curling iron to see if it's hot enough for their hair. In 2006, Chung, a middle schooler. Again, I don't wanna use her full name, I believe you can find it,

but let's call her student too, for privacy reasons. Student too was hospitalized for two months. She had traumatic injuries all over her body, her parents, doctors, even the police were called to the hospital when she was brought in because, I mean, they were alerted, they were alarmed. They were confused on how she got these injuries to begin with. They were concerned for her current health state, her mental state. It's almost like she didn't even realize that she was in pain though. The whole time she's just begging her parents, you have to let me transfer to a different school.

You have to let me transfer to a different school. It's a bit of an odd reaction. The parents are more concerned about like, what happened to you? Who did this to you? What do you care about transferring to a new school right now? But she just kept repeating,

you have to let me transfer to a different school. Please, like, I'm scared of my friends. Finally, with enough begging, student 2 tells everyone what happened to her. And it's a story that I don't think most of South Koreans have ever forgotten. According to student 2, her hell on earth started 20 days ago. It lasted a full 20 days. May 2nd, she was on her way home from school and she always takes the same route. She always does. She listens to the music.

She kind of just starts the ground and she's daydreaming. When she sees several pairs of feet, just right in front of her, blocking her way. She looks up. She sees a group of female students from her class. Let's call them A, B, and C. So three girls, they're known to be bullies.

Like that's what they're known for in their class. So student two, I mean, she always made sure to stay out of their way kind of. She never really even existed in the same circle of friends. There was just the type of girls that she would avoid in the classroom. She wouldn't even make eye contact with them. So it was strange that they would just approach out

of nowhere. It was very random. Either way, they asked her a question. And maybe she was so scared. Maybe she didn't know what answer would be appropriate. But she didn't respond. She just kind of stood there with her head hung. And immediately smack.

Right away, she was physically assaulted for not answering the question. She said, I didn't do anything wrong. I didn't make a mistake in particular that I could think of. I think that they were just angry that I didn't respond quickly enough to their question. But from that day, I became their new target. The bully started demanding that students to give up all of her allowance to them. And when they burned through her allowance, so let's say she gets $20 a week,

they would force students to beg her parents for more money. She'd beg her parents, and when she tried to tell the police, my family doesn't have that much to spare. Please, like, we don't have that much money. I don't have anything more to give you. They would start physically assaulting her. They would jump her, and that was just the beginning. Like, just the punches and slops and the kicks. That was the beginning. Eventually, they felt like that wasn't getting the point across. So they statistically pulled out one of their curling irons, plugged it in, two of the girls held her down by her arms, and the third bully started burning her, holding

the hot curling iron to her bare skin. Literally just like the drama, because the drama is technically based off of this case, or at least this aspect. She said that you could hear her skin sizzling off her body and when they removed it, she's left with these big giant red welts on her body and that's not even the worst part. As it heals, you know how it fills with pus and then eventually it scabs over. Student 2 said it was so painful, I felt like I was gonna die. I couldn't even move or resist, I just wanted to run.

They told me if I screamed from the pain that they would kill me. But that's not all. Once the wound started to finally heal and scab over, the bullies, the three girls, they would corner her after school and they would demand to see her wound. And while laughing amongst each other,

they would rip the scabs off her body. Sometimes they would want her to be traumatized more and they would force her to rip her own scabs off her body. She was also beaten with a baseball bat. She suffered from a protruding tailbone, which is a result of the abuse. And as student too is talking about what happened to her, she seems to kind of hesitate as if there's more to the story. So the journalist, everyone's pushing her to open up that she's safe now. She doesn't have to be scared of these bullies anymore. And she tells everyone that there's more scars on her chest. The bullies that try to permanently disfigure her chest. There are streak marks all around. It looked like someone had taken like a close pin of safety pin and just started digging into her skin to make red slash marks

everywhere. And it looked like it happened over the period of the 20 days. Some wounds were healing. Some looked more fresh than others. Her father was, these are not public, but her father showed the reporter's pictures for evidence to show them yes this indeed did happen. And it was like this gut-wrenching moment for the father. He works as a chef and he said that every day, during those 20 days, he came home and he did notice things. He didn't think he was a big deal, but always in the middle of the night for the past month, he would wake up to screams coming from his daughter's room. He would wake up, check the time, and the next morning when he asked, she was just having nightmares.

Soon when it happened again, he's like, oh, she's just having nightmares, which she was, but it was happening a lot during the time that she was getting tortured. He regrets not asking her or demanding to know what was going on or even trying to wake her up. On top of that, around the same time, his daughter was begging to be transferred to a different school. And he didn't take it seriously. He thought that maybe she was trying to switch schools because it was less academically

intense or maybe a close friend of hers was going to a different school. He thought it was something like that. You know, one of those kid excuses. That's kind of what he chalked it up to. He thought he was making the right move as a parent by making her stick it out at the school. Once he found out the truth, now he couldn't sleep at night. He was just seething with anger. He demanded answers from the school on how they could even let this happen. He begged his daughter to give up the names of the bullies and And she was so hesitant.

She's like, I can't tell you, I can't tell you. And she said that they were going to kill her. If she ever named them as the bullies. Finally, with enough prodding, student, too, tells her parents and the school who did this and everyone's kind of shocked. The girls she named are not the type of girls that would be bullies.

They're not the type of girls that would bully anybody. And I know I know, like these girls can be perceived a certain way but actually be completely evil. That wasn't the case here. These three girls genuinely did not bully student too. Student too confessed that she was bullied into lying by the three real bullies. So she just named three strangers? Three random girls in the school that the bullies wanted her to name.

Wow. So okay. Well, in the end, they did get down to the bottom of it and found out the identity of the actual bullies, the three girls, and the school said they were going to investigate. After their investigation, they came out with a statement where they said, we've conducted an internal investigation. God, I love internal investigations. And we've closed the case because student two and the three girls' stories aren't matching up. Yeah, what?

If that's not the most obvious thing in the world, of course it's not matching up, but the school continues. For us, it's becoming a case of, she said, they said. The only thing we can confirm at this time is that she, student two, had fallen off of a bike at one point point and that could result in some of her injuries, insinuating that potentially a lot of her injuries could have happened when she accidentally fell off a bike which other classmates did witness this bike fall. Which I don't know how in the world that would be feasible to get like third degree burn

marks from falling off a bike? Her father said, I mean I just can't believe how a school can be this lukewarm about a cruel case like this. A lot of netizens agreed. They posted about this case, they accused the school administrators of being corrupt and they wrote, did the school get bribed by the perpetrator's parents? Their response makes this whole situation worse. I mean just look at the pictures of her arms. If someone did this in the army or in the street the police would have a field day They wouldn't just ignore it. So why are the police ignoring it when it happens in a middle school? Oh my god. This is middle school. Yeah, most of the stories we're talking about are middle school

So let's what 1312 1314 Wow It does the school really believe this is a case of two sides having different perspectives So the sentiment became okay fine the school and the police won't do anything about it Let the netizens do it. Let's expose these girls But once new started spreading about this case the police were forced to investigate and this is when the main bully They call her Kim Kim confesses to the police were forced to investigate and this is when the main bully, they call her Kim, Kim confesses to the police for her crimes. And again, she didn't do this because she felt remorseful.

It's, you know, if you're a minor, you confess to a crime. It's kind of well known that you get a higher chance of getting probation. So even the way she confessed, she had that she had zero remorse for what she did. She straight up said, yeah, I burned her about nine times with the curling iron. I hit her around the head a couple of times, legs and arms, maybe about like seven times. This lasted for 20 days, and it's because student two promised me something, and she didn't keep her promise. What you watch depends on what kind of major in.

Sometimes you're craving comedies like friends or South Park, and sometimes you're more into dramas like HBO's Succession and House of the Dragon. There's also cooking shows like Chopped and Beat Bobby Flay and even movies like The Lord of the Rings and Shazam, Fury of the Gods. Well, Max is the streaming destination that has the best of entertainment for whatever mood you're in anytime. And plant start at as little as $9.99 a month. Max, the one to watch. Subscription required. Visit max.com.

Whether you're doing a dance to your favorite artist in the office parking lot, or being guided into Warrior I in the break room before your shift, whether you're running on your Peloton tread at your mom's house while she watches the baby, or counting your breaths on the subway. We are inhaling and long exhale.

Peloton is for all of us. Wherever we are, whenever we need it, download the free Peloton app today. Peloton app available through free tier or paid subscription starting at 12.99 per month. She also stated that she didn't turn herself in sooner because the whole situation was, quote, getting out of hand.

She was promptly arrested, which is rare because Korea's law for minors is incredibly generous. Like if you're under the age of 14 and you commit a heinous crime such as rape, you still get probation. You get to go home. It's not even going to be on your record. And then the name, nobody knows the name. Nobody knows. Nobody will know what you did at 13 years old.

And I'm sure that will only escalate when you're 23, 33. The judge said, I arrested this girl because I wanted to set a precedent for how serious school bullying is in South Korea. Kim was arrested and sentenced. But I don't know what kind of precedent this judge was really trying to set out other than maybe trying to look good for a second there in the press because at the time nobody

knew the extent of her sentencing. He was like, this is private confidential information in the eyes of the law. We can't let it be known. So people move on. We don't know if we're looking at juvenile detention center. We don't know if we're looking at probation, two days community service. The teachers involved in the case were also investigated and had administrative punishment, which is unknown again with the extent was that because the school refused to tell reporters

but I imagine like a week paid time off, which is not a real punishment. Meanwhile student 2 has to live with the emotional, the mental scars of this for the rest of her life. After two months in inpatient care, two months, she had to go to a psychiatric hospital, and this is in 2006, so this all passes over, and then with the glory trending recently, a lot of people are revisiting this case,

and netizens are still furious, and there was an interesting question that was brought up. Like do you think that these bullies grew up and regret what they did? Do you think that they lived with shame and hate? There was so much newfound interest in this case, and interest in what happened to that evil middle schooler, like what did she grow up to be? Now obviously we can't hunt this girl down, but huge news networks were able to dig

into our sensing in 2006 when the judge was like, I want to set a precedent for how we're going to take bullying seriously. Kim, the main perpetrator, was sentenced to probation. Meaning, she was basically arrested for show and went straight back home to her family that night. The only punishment, if you can even call it that, was that an officer might stop by her house once in a while to make sure she's following the laws and not bullying people. This is probably the lightest punishment that she could have ever received.

This is also not going to stay on her permanent record, meaning she could go into any career field after torturing a middle schooler. To the point of scarring her for life, she could go on to be a police officer, We don't know what she is right now. She could be a police officer. A doctor. Yes, a nurse. Truly, whatever she wants. And maybe she did become a health care worker. Like can you imagine that not knowing that the doctor that you're supposed to trust with your life and health permanently scarves someone for the fun of it. Because that's exactly what happened to student number three. Student three, Park Sang-min. So she is in a whole news network recently.

She has fully released her identity, but we're going to call her student three. She's 31 years old right now. And her two bullies had burned her arms in rural school with a hair straightener. They had literally clamped her arm into a hair straightener. The two bullies would go on to become a nurse and a social worker. At 31 years old, student 3 was trying to move on with her life.

I mean, as best as she could, right? She still couldn't wear short sleeves during the summers in Korea, which, if you know, it's scorching hot. Every time she wore short sleep, she said that she would catch a glimpse of herself in the mirror and she would just burst into tears. But sometimes she would try to be strong. She'd be like, you know what, I'm going to wear the short sleep. I'm going to, who cares, right? And then she would walk out of her room and she would see her parents eyes, fault her arms. And she would just see their whole energy, their

mood shift. They would get emotional. They would get angry, and she just, she didn't want to dig up these complicated buried memories again for everyone. So she never really wore short sleeves. She also really couldn't go out to the hair salon without feeling anxious, and all of this has to do with the fact that in second year of middle school, so like the seventh grade, bullies had forced her down. Grabbed a hair straightener, clamped it on her arm for five minutes. Yeah, five minutes, leaving her with a permanent scar for the rest of her life. It didn't start like that, though. The bullying escalated over the course of a year, till it got so bad, finally someone noticed. And it didn't start with a hair straightener.

It actually started with a dollar. Student three said that she was mining her own business. And kind of similar to the last story, but two of the girls in her grade came up to her and asked to borrow a dollar. She's like, okay, these are random girls asking me for a dollar, I'm just gonna give it to them. The next day, they asked for another dollar.

Okay, maybe they're hungry, they forgot their lunch or something, she gives them another dollar. And soon soon they're not borrowing dollars, they're demanding money. They would walk over and instead of taking a borrow dollar, it's like, hey, give me a fucking dollar. And it wasn't just a dollar anymore, it was suddenly $10, $30, $50, $100. When she asked them, wait, why do I need to give you this money? Like, I'm so confused, You haven't paid me back. What are you even using this money for?

Why are you taking my money? They would say, because your existence is an inconvenience to me. So pay up. And maybe if it had stopped there at the financial bullying, maybe the trauma wouldn't be as life altering, but eventually she ran out of allowance money to give them. They start becoming physical with her, they start slapping her and beating her, they would drag her to one of the girl's houses. Bully A's house, and they would use her as a punching bag for hours.

They would just make her sit in the corner of the room, and these bullies would sit and giggle, gaggle, gossip, and then the minute that they felt a little bit of anger rise in their system, they would walk over and just torture her for the fun of it. Later in interviews, people were confused about this, you know, they asked her, why did you go to the girl's house, sis? Could- couldn't you have just called for help or left? I mean, surely they didn't drag you all the way, like someone would have noticed if they're dragging you by the hair, right? They also asked how the police parents never realized that they were keeping a girl in the room

just to bully her. Sometimes the bullying was for days. The bullies were very resourceful. They threatened student 3 that if she didn't follow them back to girl A's house, they would go and find her little brother and physically assault him instead. This was the threat that they constantly hung over her head. That's also why she never told the authorities, school administrators, or even her parents. She knew that the bullies would probably get off light anyway, and her brother would be their new target. So I think this is where the system is wrong. You know, I think if you're in a situation like that, you can tell the administrators and something does take action to the point where they can not hurt you or your loved ones, then of course people are going to say something.

As for girl, the bully A's parents, she lied to them. She's like, oh ma, this is my friend and she just ran away from home. Her mom is super abusive and she's even contemplating suicide. I just want to be there for her as a friend. Is it okay if she sleeps over for a few days? The mom would be like, wow, daughter, you're such a good friend. And since bully A's parents would both work really long hours, they would all be at bully A's house and using student 3 as a punching bag. The abuse went from punching and slapping to grabbing a fork and

stabbing it all over her body, like head to toe. The two bullies would grab whatever item was nearby, and they would throw it at her face. One time they threw a plastic pipe at her face and it permanently damaged her cornea. And she has slight vision problems ever since. The longest time she's ever stayed at her bullies house was for three days, and they basically starved her the entire time. During this interview, student three was asked,

why don't you try to leave at one point? Especially when your eye is damaged, you didn't try to ever run away from the house. And she said there was no point. One time she did, they knew where she lived. They would either get to her brother or once they came over and they trashed her entire house, making it difficult for her family.

They would flip furniture, ransack the whole place, all because she refused to come to Gourlet's house. Like there was no part of student three that was safe. She was constantly covered in bruises and welts and just desperately trying to hide this from the adults. For six months, while the abuse lasted, she couldn't even fall asleep. Just like student two, every time she closed her eyes, she would have these intense nightmares.

So for six months, she felt like a sleepless zombie just going through the motions of life and abuse. She tried gathering as many sleeping pills as she could and tried to take them in hopes of getting a dreamless sleep, but it just wasn't working. She even in a desperate attempt told her mom, oh I just want to go to sleep. I just want to sleep. I want to sleep so bad. I want to die. Like what do I do? She said that she would zone out and stare out of her window of the their apartment on the third floor and wonder if I fell out of the window what are the chances of me surviving. If she went to her friends apartments and they had balconies on higher floors, she always

wondered if maybe this would be the place that she would come and jump if she had to take her own life. She said she constantly looked down at the ground and wondered, would I die? Would I live? Would I die? And then one spring day, student three was wearing a long sleeve white shirt, because she can't wear short sleeves. But the wound on her arm wasn't healing properly, and it had this giant bubble of pus, like it was filled with liquid, and it was bulging out of her shirt.

And her teacher noticed it and brought her into the examant, but the pus made the shirt stick to her arm. They had to cut the shirt off of her to examine her. Her parents were informed and that's how the bullying came to light. One of the most heartbreaking parts of the story is that she was asked on the show what she would like to say about her bullying and how it was handled and she talked about how during the time there were a lot of adults in her life that asked her, what did you do? Like you must have, like not saying it's your fault, but you must have done something to make the girls react like this.

Wow. She said, if there's one thing she would like to say is she would tell these adults that she did nothing wrong. The bullies were forced to apologize for what they did to her and it was an immobiliatory apology. One of them was straight up laughing while she apologized and you guys said zero consequences. The main bully was given 40-hour community service and a one-week school suspension. She wasn't even expanded.

I feel like these bullies, they should at least get exactly what they did to the victims. Yes. You scar someone for life? Yeah. You get the same scar at least get exactly what they did to the victims. Yes. You scar someone for life. You get the same scar at least. Yeah, at least. At least, right? Because it was your first choice to even give a scar. And also the fact that you did, even if the bully gets the scar, it still doesn't take

away the trauma the victim's going to live with for the rest of their lives. So I just don't see how they think just apology will do. It reminds me of how a lot of countries, including the US treat like sexual assault cases, there's so much concern about the perpetrator's future. Like we can't let this mistake ruin their future. But like why not? Because you just ruined someone else's future. What's worse is that she and the main bully ended up at the same college. And they bumped into each other. So this is after middle school is when the abuse took place.

After high school in college, they bumped into each other and maybe you would think that this bully has some sort of remorse. No, she's smirked. Walked up to student three with all of her friends and said, I know this girl. What major are you? Student three said that she was shaking the whole time. She was so angry, so scared she couldn't even respond. Like it was like her trauma was flooding back to her. Thankfully, they didn't have any more run-ins after that and student three had friends that stuck by her in college. And it wasn't easy making friends. She said after her abuse, she was just having such a hard time trusting anyone that wanted to be friend her. She felt like there were wolves and sheep's clothing. A lot of friends stuck

by, even when she was not trusting of them. And now she has stopped taking sleep medications. She's been able to find some happiness and move on. And even though she's moved on, there's really no justice in this story either. She has to apologize to every hairstylist and hairdresser to not use a hot tool in her hair because the minute that they pick up a hot iron she starts to panic and to make matters worse. The last time she checked on the two bullies one of them was a nurse and the other one was in social work. They both constantly post about doing charitable work. She said that she was speechless, that the audacity of these people, I mean she was angered by their choice of profession.

And once the show, the glory came out, her friends were texting her asking if she was okay, because the show reminded them so much of what happened to her. Student 3 says she cannot bring herself to watch the K-drama. And more recently, there was a case that also reminded people of the glory. And this one I don't think inspired the glory because it was so recent, but this just goes to show like nothing has really changed. July 15th, 2020, let's call him student four.

A young man, 22 years old, July 15th was his birthday. Yeah, 24 now. He didn't really have any special plans, so a group of acquaintances had texted him, hey, let's go celebrate for your birthday. Yeah, 24 now. He didn't really have any special plans, so a group of acquaintances had texted him, hey, let's go celebrate for your birthday. He took them up on it. I mean, it's kind of sweet of them

to remember his birthday even, right? The acquaintances, I don't even think they can be categorized as human beings. They met up with student for a drag to him. Wait, I'm sorry, are these classmates or are these colleagues in college? So they drags them to a nearby vacant lot, like a parking lot for his birthday.

And they're like acquaintances. So just like random classmates, it's not necessarily friends, but they're in school, you're safe. So you wouldn't think that these are bad people. It's not like strangers that you meet online. You know them from class. They bring a chair to the parking lot. They

time up to the chair, cover his face with the hood, and they tell him that they had like prepared a special birthday candle present for him. Birthday candle. They tie him to the chair? Yeah, like his ankles, his arms behind the chair, everything. Put a hood over his head, and they get close to him and they say, so let's celebrate your birthday. They spray gasoline all over his body head and they get close to him and they say, so let's celebrate your birthday. They spray gasoline all over his body and they put one firework on each knee and they light the firework.

They're trying to kill them. They're slowly going down. They're trying to kill him. Basically. Like, sadistically, kill him. When the fireworks exploded, the fire caught on to student for his whole body. He said, it was so hot and painful I fell over.

They saw me in pain and they just kept telling me, keep rolling to put out the fire. That's what they said. They saw a literal human being on fire and they said, keep rolling. I thought I was going to die like this when I begged them to call 119 emergency services. They said, this place is a little isolated so it might take too long for the ambulances to come. Student 4 has 3rd degree burns on 40% of his entire body. That's not even the part that will get your blood boiling. The perpetrators got away with probation.

Meanwhile, student 4 is not only left with irreparable damage of what they did, mentally, physically, but he's also been left with an $80,000 medical bill. He has to get a skin transplant surgery as well as reconstructive treatment, which, yes, the perpetrators did settle monetarily for what they did, which the amount was decided by prosecutors and not really agreed upon by the parties involved. The family's only paid $40,000. Student force family demanded the police pay the rest and they all said, what do you want us to do?

We don't have money. There is a current civil suit against the police, but I mean, the fact that we're even here is wild. Student force family is filing a lawsuit because the justice system couldn't get them justice the first time around. So how is a case being handled like this? Originally in 2020, I think that this received a lot of attention, but with the glory being a big conversation, it's become a there's a resurgence on this topic. The case has gotten a lot more attention in the public eye and people are so unhappy. Like, the parallels between the drama, the corruption from the legal system side.

Netizens wrote, Is the prosecutor on this case a fucking bastard? They lit someone on fire and they're getting probation? To all the prosecutors in this country. How exactly are you calculating these crimes? How do attempted murders end up with probation? Does the victim need a die for perpetrators to be punished? A person was almost burned to death and probation.

You guys are fucking crazy people. Are you joking? Someone commented what a lot of us are probably thinking right now. Throw them all in jail and set them on fire. Student 4 is mom's side. It doesn't matter what we wanted. The prosecutors didn't care.

The prosecutors didn't care what we had to say. They just gave them probation. When I asked for medical fees to be covered, everyone just shrugs and say, they don't have money. So what can we do? And maybe these feel like extreme cases, which they are. But it doesn't change the fact that school bullying and primarily school violence is a huge problem. I think that's maybe another reason, not the main reason, but probably why people continue to bully because of the consequences. Nobody's scared. Nobody's terrified of the consequences.

Yeah, it's like laughable. The consequences people get. I think you would get heavy punishment for cheating in South Korean schools versus physically assaulting someone. Like for cheating, getting caught cheating unless you're the kid of a rich parent. Yeah, you might be expelled. So it's insane. I think also there's so many elements that have to do with school violence in South Korea. And I just want to put a disclaimer. I think school violence is prevalent everywhere. I think just in different forms. So in the US, we're pretty familiar with how school violence takes place. In South Korea, there's so many different elements of why it happens like this. There's the seniority

complex between how even when you're 15, you have to bow down and properly greet people that are 16. I'm not talking adults, not the elderly, not your parents, not your parents, friends. You have to talk to them with a completely different vernacular. It's called Chondammaer. It's to show respect. There's so many elements to it.

Also, the teachers and school administrators in these schools are so focused on their careers. And they're so focused on making sure that they look good. And when you're a school administrator and there's bullying in your school, you look bad. Because you can't even handle kids. Yeah. So there's so many problems with this. Again, corruption in schools, corruption in the government, there was a man appointed

Changsunxin as the chief of the National Office of Investigations. He was appointed. This is like a heavy title, huge political office, okay? One of his job duties was to investigate extreme cases of school violence in schools in Korea, right? He had to resign after one day in office, one fucking day in office, and I'll tell you why. It was revealed that the first day in office, he used his position to help his son avoid

punishment for bullying and school violence. Wow. This is the man that was supposed to be in charge for getting justice for the victims. His son was a bully and he helped cover it up. Just the fucking irony. And his son goes to the Harvard of South Korea. So where are the consequences for any of these people? Just like in the glory.

It's like literally K-Drama. Yes. Even in K-Drama, you're like, ugh. This can't be real. Exactly. In K-Drama, you're like, this is so far fetched. Nobody really does that. That's so an abuse of power.

How do you get away with it? I think another huge incentive for authorities is that the law is so lenient to minors. It's almost seen as not really worth the work to investigate school bullying because you're gonna investigate spend all these resources and then what the 14 year old is gonna get probation anyway. So there needs to be something change about the law. Yes, so a lot of South Koreans have been arguing for lowering the age of the responsibility. And right now it's 14. They want to keep lowering it. I think recently it was lower to 13.

But it's still not really. There should be a whole different set of laws for school violence, I think. Side note, the government does try to make it seem like they're doing a lot to stop violence like installing more CCTV cameras near schools but it's not really helping there's about 20,000 CCTV cameras nearby schools around the whole 93% of them are said to be so low in resolution it can't even identify who the bully is like potato it's so gra. You can't tell which student is who. You can't tell which student is being beat and which student is beating. So I don't know why they're trying to

pat themselves on the back for this. And again, I'm not trying to say South Korea is the only one that's bad. I mean, again, look at what's going on in schools all around the world. It's horrible. But nearly one in ten students in Korean schools, elementary through high school, one in ten have suffered from school violence. Not just bullying, not verbal bullying, not being an outcast, not being a social pariah. I'm talking violence. One in ten, that's ten out of every hundred students that is physically assaulted in school. We've talked about student 1, 2, 3, and 4 out of the 100. Let's talk about student 5.

This case caused international outrage. In 2021, a Mongolian student living in South Korea was tortured for six hours by school bullies. Six hours. They recorded the assault. They tried to sell it to other classmates for $5. The video. It's so freaking crazy. Like all these cases, they record it. All these bullying. They take pictures, they record it. They brag about it. They send it to their friends and classmates. It's like a sick thing they do. I see a lot of people liking it to gang activity. So in gang activity, you almost flaunt your crimes as a threat to others.

Like you see what I'm willing to do, right? You see what I've done. I'm not even scared. I guess it's supposed to establish some sort of... Street credit? I mean, they do get away with it. So like, I don't even, I can't even call them stupid because the law is stupid and they get away with it. So student five, the Mongolian student, had moved to South Korea about 10 years ago. So she's 14. She's basically been born and raised in South Korea. like not really, but she came here when she's 4.

It's as much her home as it is to anybody else's. But there are 4 excuses of a human being that did not think so. They basically kidnap student 5, kidnap her around midnight, July 3rd of 2021. They hold her for 6 hours, beat her. They humiliate her by placing her underwear on her head, taking videos of that. They wrote racist slurs on her forehead. They tied her up, they punched her over and over in the face. They were so proud of themselves. Like I said, they tried to sell this footage to their fellow classmates. Eventually, they were taken in by authorities. Two were sentenced to a juvenile center, but two of them,

since they were younger than 14, they couldn't even be held criminally responsible. And it's not just the older kids. Student 6 was 9 years old when her nightmares started. Like, these kids that we've been talking about so far have been 14, 15, and that's so young, that's so young. But student 6 was 9 years old. This is a very recent case in the winter of 2022. So just a couple months ago, a 12 year old boy

had called up student six, a nine year old girl that he went to the same school as she's in third grade. And he's like, hey, come on to the rooftop of the apartment that we live in and let's hang out. I wanna play fun games with you. And he's like forcing her to come to the rooftop to play with him. He had made a surprise for her to play fun games with you. And he's like forcing her to come to the rooftop to play with him. He had made a surprise for her to play on.

It's the winter. So it's snowing a lot in South Korea. He said it's a snow bed. He told her to lie down. She was sexually assaulted by the 12-year-old boy. After that, he convinced her to send pictures of herself to him and threaten to make her a wankha in school, meaning a complete lonta in school, meaning

a complete loner. In school, if she did not. She was too scared to say anything, and the only reason he was caught was because a school teacher happened upon the messages by chance. What's crazy is, the school did not take action. He graduated soon after the incident out of elementary school. No criminal record, nothing, because he's 12. The victim and her parents, they didn't even get any sense of justice. In fact, they're trying to save up to move out of this apartment building because their daughter, nine-year-old daughter, is too scared to even take the elevator.

Like, she's so traumatized. There's nothing they can do about it. Legally, because he's 12, he's not going to have a criminal record if he's punished, he's going to get probation, or he's going to be sent to like a correctional home for a few days. That's not. afraid of getting caught at doing this? No, who's gonna catch us? What a police. It was the height of the crack era and instead of locking up drug dealers, some New York City cops had become them. I would suit up in my uniform and we're gonna want some drug dealers and I know how to do it really well. This is the inside story of the biggest police corruption scandal in NYPD history and the investigation that uncovered it all. Did you consider yourself a rat?

100% I saved my soul just like everybody else does. Listen to and follow the set, an Autosy Originals documentary podcast series available now in the Autosy app Apple podcasts or wherever you get your shows So it's not really shocking that in the past 10 years South Korea suicide rates and youths has jumped nearly 50 percent About 25% of Korean youths have thought about taking their own lives, and about 25% of that number said they wanted to end their lives due to school violence.

You're saying 25% out of all youths? Everyone. All youths. Want to take their own lives. Yes. Have thought about it at one point. A quarter of all Korean youths. Korea is one of the worst suicide rates in the developed world. And then 25% of that.

School of islands. There's a student, Kwon. Let's call him student seven, but this is probably one of the most well-known cases of school violence in South Korea. And it's because December 20th of 2011, he wrote a letter. He's 15 years old. Student 7 writes this emotional letter to his parents and he writes, and parents, please, they know our front door lock passcode. Please change our passcode.

He continued his letter by apologizing to them for being a bad son. He wrote, "...Dad, I know you were angry with me every day, but I know you were really a good and kind dad. I know that you were just angry because you were worried about me." Mom, I know you always cherished me, and brother, you were really a great brother to me. I'm sorry if I irritated you a lot. I really was such a lucky guy. I'm sorry. He continued. Today they made me hold the radio

and made me kneel on the ground. They made me lie down and tied me up, tied my hands up, they assaulted me. They tried to cut my body, they tried to burn my right arm. I was trying to withstand it, but I couldn't. After they left I found myself ruined and miserable. I'm sad I can't see you guys anymore but I feel free knowing that you know the full story. Now I just hope that you guys will all

live better lives without me and you don't have to worry about me anymore. If you guys are happy I'll be happy. So don't worry, don't be sad and one day we'll meet somewhere again. Maybe I can't to heaven, but I hope you guys will I will wait for you guys my family for a hundred or even a thousand years From your youngest son who really really loves you all I love you And then 15-year-old student seven took his own life Because there seemed to be no escape to the violence or the torture of his bullies.

So he tragically took his own life and he named his bullies in the final letter. In the saddest part is, student 7's parents were so worried about him. They did not suspect at all that he was being bullied. Instead, they suspected that he was falling in with the wrong crowd. That his friends were bad influences. The friends would come over every day while the parents were at work and they would eat up all of students' sevens' families' food, all the packaged ramen, cheese, instant foods, frozen foods, dumplings, everything would be gone in a single afternoon. They were spending all their money grocery shopping. Which, fine, but, but come on the parents were pleading with student 7

You have to be a bit more responsible. We can't just keep feeding everyone non-stop like we're spending so much money And then they started seeing changes in student 7's behavior He refused to study his grades were abysmal They didn't understand how their child who had always been so good with grades and studied so diligently Now he was scoring like 10% on his exams. There was so frustrated, it's like, you're purposely guessing. I feel like you're purposely failing. You're not even trying.

If they ever tried to scold him about it, he would just explode an anger, run into his room, and play video games. Maple story. That was the video game, to be precise. So to the parents, it just felt like their son was becoming more and more of this black sheep of the family. He wasn't even getting along with his older brother. He was isolating himself. He was just becoming a bit of a problem trial to troublemaker. But the truth is, he was just a victim. Student 7 was being bullied in school by

two main bullies, boy A and boy B. Student 7 thought that they were going to be friends, so the two boys that actually invited him to play games with him at like a PC bang in internet cafe after school one day. He had never really hung out with them before, so he went, first time as fun, second time as fun, and after a few times it was clear that they had no intention of being his friend. They started like the other bullies that we talked about. They start threatening him to hand over the allowance, buy them snacks, pay for their internet fees, and as students have been trying to say no, they would beat him.

They went as far as torturing him by drowning him, trying to burn him. A sick component of their bullying was that they wanted to make sure that student 7 was completely isolated so that he didn't have anyone to tell. and the best way to do that was they forced him to answer incorrectly on all of his tests. Why? Because he went from being a good student that would be believed, because that's how it works, to the bottom of a class. They served a few purposes. Student 7 would now be isolated from his parents

because they would be upset with him for being a careless teenage boy who doesn't care about his grades or his future. And there's a stigma in Asia. Good grades equals to good kid. Like good honest kid. Exactly, bad grade equals to back kid. Like lying kid.

Yes, it's the craziest thing. And this element of bullying is more extreme in South Korea and Asia I'm assuming was to back it. Like, lying kid. Exactly. Yes, it's the craziest thing. And this element of bullying is more extreme in South Korea and Asia I'm assuming because it's different from here. You know how in the US you have a valedictorian and you have all these, like everyone's ranked and it does matter on your college applications, but there's so many good colleges in the US that you can get into. It's cutthroat, don't get me wrong, it's stressful, it's like your whole life is consumed by it.

But in South Korea, pretty much nationwide, everyone is basically ranked. So every student counts. A lot of kids will be bullied academically, meaning that they're physically assaulted to take their grades so that the bullies can move up spots. Wow, that is so dark. Yeah So like I said, there's so many elements that just play a big part in the whole picture It's just hard to say even what the real problem is. I mean, obviously the system is the problem in the justice system, but It would also make him less credible with the teachers if he tried to report any abuse

They would just think that he's a trouble maker trying to make excuses for his bad grades. They forced students to ask his mom for more and more money, and even though every time he asked, he said he felt so guilty. His mom would sigh and hand over her hard earned money. He was more scared than anything. At this point, the bullies had escalated to beating him with iron pipes, wooden sticks, baseball bats. They would make a meal for hours on concrete floors holding a heavy stereo over his head.

If he dropped the stereo or slumped in the slightest, they would threaten to light him on fire. They would wrap cables around his neck and start dragging him around like he was on a leash. They would make him lick crumbs off the floor. It seemed like the extent of their torture was just never ending. Even when they were in class, they would text students seven more than 40 times a day yelling at him, threatening him, and they would say things like, you better wake up and play more games. So remember Maple Story?

Back then it was at its prime, and it was super competitive. People played for hours and hours just to try and advance or get lucky with like items that were dropped. The bullies made students of and play on their accounts. To help them level up faster. And I know that doesn't sound as intense as the other physical abuse that we've talked about, but it's not an easy experience. Students of and was terrified, playing day in, day out, losing asleep, losing his family

over a game that he didn't even want to play. and if he even took a moment's break, he would get text messages such as, do you want to die, fucker? Then another text, it's getting cold out, go buy me a jacket tomorrow. He would respond, I can't get any more money, my parents won't let me. And they said, then fucking work and get paid like a fucking rat. At this point, they forced him to get a part-time job. They would say things like, I'm gonna hit you five more times.

Next time, shut your mouth and do what I tell you. I guess you're acting up because I haven't been hitting you as hard these days. How about, every time you reply late, I'll add two more punches. Then another text. And remember to delete your chat log. The day before his suicide, the last text messages he ever got were from his police, and they read, you're not fucking playing the game? Why aren't you fucking responding?

Students 7 couldn't take it anymore. He sat down, and he wrote his parents telling them everything. He stated that the food that disappeared in their house all the time he wrote, I told you it was my friends who ate it, but it was actually my bullies, and he listed them. They came over every day and assaulted me, while you guys were at work. They would take whatever ramen, dumbling soup, snacks, coffee we had home, they would just take it all. They demanded money from me every day and my grades started dropping. During second semester, I actually had to get a part-time job just to have enough money to give them. But they kept demanding more. That's why I kept asking mom for the money. During second semester, I actually had to get a part-time job just to have enough money to give them.

But they kept demanding more. That's why I kept asking mom for the money. I'm sorry I kept demanding money from you mom. I was such a bad son. I made you give me money and buy me clothes and I played games every day and I didn't listen to you. I was just so stressed and I got angry with you easily. It was just getting more and more severe every day.

They made me smoke cigarettes, they forced me to do their homework and run errands, they would come over every day while I was home alone and they would hit me. Sometimes they called two other friends to join so that they could all assault me. In December I thought a lot about unaliving myself, but every time I tried, I kept thinking of you guys and I stopped myself. The only reason I was living was because of you guys. I kept thinking of you guys and I stopped myself. The only reason I was living was because of you guys. But I was going crazy. It just kept getting worse.

My body kept getting worse. I feel fatigue, and my scars never recover because they keep abusing me before they heal. I know, I'm really sorry. I haven't been a good son, but I just want you guys to know that I truly love you. And even when you guys yelled at me for everything I did, for the missing food, or, I haven't been a good son, but I just want you guys to know that I truly love you. And even when you guys yelled at me for everything I did for the missing food or when I wouldn't stop playing video games,

I was sad that you were yelling, but I never resented you for yelling at me. I resented myself for not being a good son. But I just kept getting bullied by them. And I think my story ends now. I just want to say I didn't take my life because my family yelled at me. Again, even when you yelled at me, I know your face looked angry, but I know that you were just worried about me. And most of my classmates, they were nice and good to me too. And he

listed a bunch of his classmates that were nice to him. And he wrote, honestly, I can say that almost everyone was really nice to me. But I always saw my bruises and my scars in private. And I just couldn't help but feel sad. Thank you to my friends who were nice to me. Thank you to the teachers who encouraged me even though I was a troublemaker. Goodbye everyone. But please, change our house door passcode.

They might try to break into our house. They know the passcode. I'm sad I can't see my family anymore, but I feel free. Don't worry about me, family. Be happy. I love you guys so much. Witnesses found student 7's body first. The police were called to the scene.

And student 7's parents came home immediately. They saw a body outside their apartment building covered in a white cloth, and they saw his bedroom window open. He had jumped down. The police let student 7's mom pull pull back the cloth and she said, When I saw my son, I put my arms around him and he was still warm. I screamed, he's alive, he's alive, we have to call the doctor, he's alive. And they had to pull me off of him and they told me, no, ma'am, I'm sorry, but he's gone, he's gone. And I looked up and I saw the window open.

I just stared at the open window. I mean, his parents were shattered. Like, even just the letter, he keeps trying to make sure the parents know that it's not their fault, that he knows why they scolded them. I mean, it's heartbreaking to see the level of maturity and compassion in someone.

And now they're gone before their life even started. Student 7's parents had no idea that he was being bullied. His mom is a middle school teacher. She thought that she understood student behavior, but kids are so good at hiding the fact that they're being bullied. Student 7's parents are super religious, their Catholic, and his mom says, you know, I pray every day to forgive the bullies because it's part of my religion, but I can't. No matter how hard I try.

If they had hit my son once, then maybe I wouldn't feel this way, but it wasn't just once. And I just feel so much guilt for not knowing what was going on till it was too late. Students, seven's father said he blamed himself and said he feels intense sadness in anger every day. And unlike the mother, he doesn't plan on forgiving. He said when the parents of the bullies came to visit him, he refused to let them in. He said, whatever they'll say to me, I have no intention of listening. The only reason he hasn't broken down yet is because he

feels like he needs to hold it together as far as family, especially his oldest son. Because the oldest son was feeling so much rage, he was constantly screaming, I'm going to fucking kill them all. And the parents were so worried that he was going to do something dangerous, that the whole family started to get therapy to work on their grief and anger. The oldest son is doing better with therapy. But what's crazy is, I mean, obviously this case blows up on a national scale and there are conversations being had about this case on social media, on mainstream media, news networks, even amongst politicians, and some of them said, the wild, like, this is how out of touch politicians

are. Two politicians are talking about the case, and one of them says, oh, are we talking about the bread shuttles? What's up? So, that's the direct translation, but a Brad Shuttle is basically like a Brad bus, and it's a slang, a degrading nickname for students who are bullied into running errands for other students. So it's like, hey, go buy me some fun, like go buy me some bread. And you're like this little errand boy because you're scared.

I mean, the fact that there's a word for this, the fact that even the politician knows this word, that should tell you how deep that this goes. And the other politician who's so out of touch goes, what's a bread shuttle? And he goes, okay, so representative on. It's like, we're in the same class. I give you 10 cents and I tell you, go buy me some bread. You're the bread shuttle now. What's wrong with that? That exists in the real world. You give someone money and they run your errands. Side note, this representative is rich, so of course he's familiar with treating people like hired help, but the other politician is outraged.

She's like, no, no, no, a bread shuttle is not good. It's bullying. You're mentally bullying someone so that they run errands for you. The other representative, representative of ON, goes, I mean, yeah, it's wrong, but it can't really be defined as violence, can it? Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. You go buy me some freaking bread right now. Yeah. Go by me some bread.

By me some milk. Yeah. And the other representative shocked and he goes, no, but threatening is mental violence. And he says, put it so ambiguous, you know, if it's so hard to say if the student was threatened or not or if he just wanted to go by some bread for 10 cents. What is this? Their're emailing her. No, they're talking about it to the press.

Oh, what? Like a bond conversation. Yeah. And the original politician is like no representative on. This is very severe. It's very severe in schools nowadays. I mean, that conversation Koreans were dying. Like, what are you saying?. Like what are you saying?

Like what are you saying? Student 7, the victim and the bullies. They all went to the same school. The vice principal came out and just had the most heartless response I've ever heard. He said, why is everyone making a kid who took his own life sound like some sort of hero right now. Yeah. Some of the teachers yelled at reporters gathered at the school and said, aren't you guys just adding fuel to the fire by being here? I'm not even sure how humans like this exist, but school administrators banned the rest of the students from holding a memorial for students 7. They even forbid them from silently, peacefully, placing a white flower on student 7's desk. They said, and I quote, all greeting behavior is prohibited.

The students were also threatened to not talk to any reporters. And of course, this was exposed in the school had their own little excuse for it and they said, all these rules were just to protect the students. No, you're protecting your career and your reputations. There was so much fire after students of ensueside, text messages were made public between the two bullies. And they're talking about how students have in took his own life because of what they did. And they texted each other, this is bully number one. Now what do we do? Why did someone say something to you? No, what about you? Now, nothing, nobody said anything, LOL.

What if the teacher likes Shurza, sound what we did? I don't know, huh? Let's just admit it. Why, you want to go to prison? We're not going to go to prison we're not gonna go to prison squiggly line let's talk tomorrow did they go to prison yeah but it's not what you think I'll tell you guys the updates but um which wears this just five months before student seven was killed I I want to say was killed because yeah he was killed a girl in to say was killed because, yeah, he was killed. A girl in the same grade, let's call her student 8,

took her own life because of bullying as well. We're in the same school? In the same school. Student 7's. Yes, student 7's mom said about student 8's death. When she died, nothing was done, and it happened again to my son. Once this blew up in the media, the bullies were punished.

But not really harsh. The main bully only sentenced to three and a half years, but will probably serve closer to two years. The other bully was sentenced to three years, but will probably only serve two. What's even more annoying is that in South Korea, if you're, okay, it's tricky, I don't know how to word it, but I guess if they identify you as a male,

then you have to go to the Army Enlistment. You have to go to the Army for two years. It's mandatory enlistment for two years. But if you go to jail for two years, your mandatory two-year Army Enlistment is exempt. So technically, these kids are swapping out their Army duty for prison. So technically, they're not losing any time. What kind of law is that? Yeah.

What? Yeah. I just don't see how someone laughs at someone's suicide or change. I don't know if they will change or not. Okay, if you want to play devil's advocate and you want to say, well, they're just kids, maybe they didn't know the extent of their bullying. I doubt it, you're literally choking, drowning, lighting someone on fire. You know the extent devil's advocate. And you want to say, well, they're just kids. Maybe they didn't know the extent of their bullying.

I doubt it. You're literally choking, drowning, lighting someone on fire. You know the extent of your bullying. I mean, think about when you were 15. Were you as dense as a potato? I don't think so. So the fact that they use that as an excuse doesn't make sense to me. But let's say you use that excuse.

I think the minute that someone takes their own life would be the most sobering lesson you could ever learn. That would be the moment, that's like the most extreme learning moment. That's the moment where your whole life is turned upside down because you did something and it resulted in the loss of a life. And if that still doesn't work,

I don't even think you're human. So the case updates. The first one is speculated that the tragic death of student seven caused what a lot of experts liked to call suicide contagion. And it said that after news broke of his death, about eight other students took their own lives, because they, too, were currently suffering

from school violence. And I guess reading the news maybe it just yeah and in 2021 student seven's mom was interviewed and she said all those years since her son died the family chose to stay in the same house for the sole reason that they hoped one day the bullies would grow up realize what they did and come to apologize they are still waiting for that day to come. They have never apologized to the parents for what they did to their son. So we've covered bullying, suicide, and one of the last central themes in the glory was revenge.

And it said that that element in the whole show was inspired by a Japanese case, the case of student nine. Student nine plotted 12 years to murder the classmates that bullied him. He waited over a decade to try and enact his revenge. So there's not too many details on his school violence or his bullying experience, but student nine never really had friends. Like he just, he didn't expect to get bullied,

but he was kind of introverted. He was a bit shy. He never got along with too many people, but soon after elementary school, in middle school, these kids started coming up to him and started beating him up. They would hit him with wooden chairs, they would mock him, pour things over his head, lock him in the supply closet. That was just the start. Eventually, they start tearing off his clothes to humiliate him.

They would force him to strip naked in front of girls. Student 9 tried to report the bullying to teachers and parents, but they did absolutely nothing. Instead, they asked him what he did to piss them off. They told him toxicly, be a man. Stand up for yourself then. It didn't get any better during high school, but I think his whole mindset shifted. He went from being this depressed middle schooler to being angry.

He wrote in his diary. Today was my 18th birthday. I'll let those stupid guys who made me suffer die with me. This is the only reason I'm alive now. He shifted his whole life plan to enact revenge. He studied hard during high school. He got into college and he started majoring in chemistry, and it was all part of the revenge plan.

He wanted to gain knowledge and access to the resources he needed to follow through with a mass murder. He wanted to kill 45 people and himself, so 46. He said he would devote his 20s to learn how to make a homemade bomb with his chemistry knowledge and find out the best way to kill them all. He wrote in his diary, I've been thinking about all the ways to kill them. But in the end, using chemical toxins seems to be the best. I even majored in it during college because this is my life goal.

And when he turned 27, it had been nearly 12 years. He gathered all 40 of his classmates, five teachers, and asked them when they would be available for a class reunion that he was organizing. Oh, so from that same exact class? Yeah. He told them he would have drinks and food all there, and he had no regrets on what he was about to do. Even though only a few of his classmates were the actual physical abusers, he felt like they all deserve to die. He wrote in his diary, I finished the experiment.

It's been so painful for me to stay alive. This is all gonna end soon. All those who have treated me like a bug are about to get what they deserve. He filled the beer bottles with arsenic, he made homemade bombs to kill all 46 people in attendance, and for back up he brought a remodeled gun. He thought if the bomb failed, he would kill them all one by one. But he did not take his mom into consideration. Days leading up to it, he was so dead set on his revenge plan. He was so distracted.

He didn't realize that he had left his diary out for his mom to read. She had been worried about recent behavior, and she read it, realized what he was planning, what he had planned for 12 years of his life. She reported him to the police. He was promptly arrested. The beer was confiscated, the bombs, the guns, they were all retrieved, and after the arrest, student-9 said, I just wanted the world to know what I went through, what I felt growing up. He was charged with six years in prison for the attempted murder of 45 of his classmates and teachers. It is said that student 9 story heavily inspired the decades-long revenge plot in the glory

the drama. So that's one through nine of the ten out of 100 students who are physically abused in school. And student 10 was kind of an unexpected one. Just before the glory part two was released, literally hours before part two was released, student 10 came out to accuse the producer of the glory for bullying. What? Ankydhol is a producer on the show The Glory,

and it's said that a former classmate from the Philippines, because producer on Study to Broad, and it said that a former classmate from the Philippines because producer on studied abroad. Student Ten said, yeah, he himself was a frickin' bully. In 1996, he was in middle school. Student Ten was in middle school. Producer on was in high school, but he was dating a middle school girlfriend. And student Ten and his friends had teased the producer's girlfriends. You know, like just very middle school play, bickering, joking around, but student 10 was suddenly

summoned to be brought in front of the producer and his friends, like there were some sort of panel judges. And from there, student 10 was jumped by the producer and his friends. The assault lasted for nearly two hours. He said he was threatened by the producer and his friends and he was yelling at him, I'll bring an iPhone, I'll bring a knife now, stab you. Student 10 wrote, I just found it absurd and unforgettable that he was directing a TV show about bringing justice to school violence when he literally assaulted me.

I was so upset I wanted to go public with what happened. The producer immediately responded publicly by saying, it is true I went to school in the Philippines in 1996, but I never was violent with anyone. I don't recall ever getting up on someone insulting them. But as quickly as he tried to shut down the claims, his former girlfriend, a middle school girlfriend at the time, remember?

She came forward and said, I do remember a student 10 being abused. All he did was tease me. And honestly, if I had known that producer on was gonna beat him, I wouldn't have told him it was just very normal bickering amongst high school or middle school friends. That's crazy. So now the producer could not deny it anymore.

He has since publicly responded with an apology. A representative said, the producer deeply asks for forgiveness from the bottom of his heart from those who have been hurt by this incident. He wants to express that if given the chance, he would like to apologize in person or via call. That is the irony, huh? Yeah, the fact that they screened all the actors and actresses, but not the producers or the directors or the writers is kind of beyond me. Wow.

I hope this is bringing a lot of lights to this school bullying situation, no? Yes, it is. And it's, you know, I think that deeper. Okay, so that's how I felt when I was first looking into it, right? And I'm like, okay, this is really good. But then I also saw some very, like, really deep rabbit hole stuff where recently a couple of K-pop idols have been accused of bullying and then it came out that they were not bullies and it completely ruined their lives so it's getting very strange.

Yeah, bar. But I would say overall, yes, this is a huge plus but I don't know if it's um... the government's gonna do anything, I'm assuming I don't know actually, because there have been so many cases where the public is outraged and outraged and we try to sign all these petitions and we do everything we can, and then nothing happens. But it is a global problem. Like violence in school seems to be just prevalent everywhere. And yeah,

you can say in Korea it's only 10% of students that experience violence at the hands of bullies, but 10% is a lot. And these are just some of the stories of the 10% Just some. Let me know your thoughts. Did you know that the glory was inspired by real cases? And how did the glory make you feel? Let me know and I will see you guys on Wednesday for the main episode. Bye. Please stay safe. Bye. Please stay safe.