#drama #sordid #stories #world #video #games
How can two parents let their child die while playing video games? Can video game addiction really bring out the worst in people? A look back at a drama that turned the entire world upside down and raised important questions.
love story in korea
Sordid dramas and stories that made headlines, there have been a plethora of them in the world of video games. “Six months later, he actually stabs the one who stabbed him in Counter Strike”, “A teenager kills his mother for a confiscated video game”, “Taiwanese player dies after 72 hours of uninterrupted play”… But there is one that has reached the height of squalor, causing the death of a poor baby … And yet nothing initially foreshadowed such a tragedy.
Our story even started off pretty well, a real little fairy tale of modern times placed under the sign of digital love. We have been in South Korea for more than ten years. Thousands of gamers have made their local internet cafe their second home, spending long hours there to play a competitive game or have a good time in an MMORPG. Among them are Jae-beom and Yun-jeong. It is online that their paths cross to never leave each other. He is a taxi driver, she works in the factory, but despite her different lifestyles, They share a common passion: video games.
Throughout the games, the two Koreans get to know each other, appreciate each other so much that they decide to take the plunge and meet in real life. It’s a real game! A beautiful love story was born. Jae-beom and Yun-jeong move to Suwon City together. If this name is perhaps familiar to you, it is because it is the city nicknamed Samsung City and one of the top “smart cities” in the country (very tech-savvy). Suffice it to say that for our two lovebirds, it is the absolute dream. Players by day, lovers in transit by night, they go hand in hand and write, page after page, their own story.
In 2009 a great chapter opens: Kim Yun-jeong becomes pregnant. Although somewhat distressed, the two Koreans welcome this news with joy. “Our little girl will be the fruit of true love”they say to themselves, without a doubt, “our true love!” It is perhaps for this very poetic reason that he decides to name his little girl Sa-rang (from the Korean 사랑 sarang What does love mean). Very cute right? But behind this beautiful story lies a much darker reality, and the young Sa-rang will quickly and tragically pay the price.
Prius Online activated, baby forgotten
After all, the story of Jae-beom and Yun-jeong is not a fairy tale. The two young people certainly seem to love each other, but unfortunately we cannot live on love and fresh water. A banal proverb that quickly turns into a dark reality when our two newlyweds lose their jobs. So without a source of income, they decide to turn their hobby into a job thanks to the gold farming.
The idea is simple: play as long as possible to collect as much money as possible. In the game and resell it for real money. An activity that can be very lucrative but also requires a lot of time. But that doesn’t scare our two lovebirds. So they roll up their sleeves and take over the local internet cafe. Every day they spent 6 to 12 hours on Prius Online, a then very popular MMORPG in the country.
Later renamed Arcane Saga Online, Prius Online isn’t really an MMORPG like everyone else. It offers a rather unusual game system, as it is based on three characters. And among them, there is the Anima, this endearing little companion that you can raise and develop, like a small child. Between two sessions of farmJae-beom and Yun-jeong therefore take the opportunity to deepen their bond with this little creature and watch it serenely flourish. When he dies in the game, they even use some of their hard-earned currency to bring him back to life and take even better care of him. Good parents, right? Unfortunately not. Because in this whole story, they forgot a very small detail: their own son…
In March 2010, police were called to the couple’s home. Sang Yoon Han is part of the team and will probably remember her whole life from this day. She discovers a dilapidated apartment where chaos reigns. In the middle of the wasteland, on what was her cradle, the inert body of a baby can be guessed, hidden under a white sheet. Sa-rang died at the age of three months from malnutrition…
Of course, Jae-beom and Yun-jeong are brought to justice. But unfortunately, the verdict pronounced may seem very lenient to you. For starving her baby, Jae-beom receives two short years in prison. Yun-jeong, pregnant at the time of the trial, is sentenced to three years in prison, suspended and he won’t go to jail. However, the two lovers risked much more (up to five years in prison). So how could they receive such a lenient judgment? Well, do you know about video game addiction?
An extreme case of video game addiction?
In addition to his dramatic side, this story has set a royal precedent in Korea and around the world. It quickly made headlines, with newspapers around the world pointing fingers at those disengaged parents who forgot about their child because they were addicted to video games. And there is one who has arranged this treatment of the case well: Jae-beom and Yun-jeong’s lawyer. By focusing his entire defense on video game addiction, he managed to get leniency from the court. The story of Sa-rang has thus become “revealing” of all evil. But the problem with this kind of “reveal” is that it mostly reveals what we want to see. The documentary released four years later on the subject is proof of this.
If the story escaped you in 2009/2010, it may have been Valerie Veatch’s 2014 documentary that brought you up to speed. Aired on HBO, child love he made the decision to focus on precisely this point, strangely leaving the more personal side of the matter to the side. Furthermore, this documentary has gone some way to clarifying for parents, shift the responsibility for this tragic event to Korean politics or the video game industry. This choice has left more than one skeptical, even quite upset. because in hindsight, This addiction to video games that is used as an explanation for the worst behaviors hides much deeper problems.
No medical follow-up during childbirth, no sense of responsibility or danger… From conception to delivery, or even to the death of the little one, parental disconnection is such that video games cannot be blamed alone. Add to that the loss of their jobs and the economic downturn that researchers say cut off the couple’s desire to live in the real world, and you get a more complex situation than it seems. As indicated in NerdAlert Shortly after the premiere of the documentary, this alleged addiction to video games could only be a symptom of much deeper problems, barely touched by those who have dealt with the case.
Especially since brandishing video game addiction as a great evil of modern times is not really relevant, or at least subject to debate. To this day, the term video game addiction is not unanimously recognized. While you may have heard that the WHO recently recognized this contemporary disorder, the truth is more complicated than that. There is no scientific consensus on the subject and everyone has their own arguments. So much to tell you that a complete article would not be enough to try to expose each one of them and propose an illustrated presentation. But since the subject was recently put on the table again as a result of a video by Fabien Olicard, we leave you with Celia Hordent’s answer, which gives a small idea of the complexity of the topic.
Theme 1/4: Let’s start with the scandalous title. No, Fortnite doesn’t destroy brains (or any game). JVs are first and foremost an art form created by passionate people. I wrote this book to assess the state of the investigation: https://t.co/n9wKgVG9BG
— Celia Hodent (@CeliaHodent) August 31, 2022
The Sa-Rang affair is a very sad story, as there are sadly many. A case of the same type has also been revealed more recently in the United States. Can video games really be held responsible for these tragic events? If there is an answer to this question, it is certainly far from Manichean…