The Korea Times
"How dare coffee?!" Those were the words uttered by a TV news anchor in a clip that went viral in Korea. He was condemning the perfidy of Starbucks in making light of the May 18, 1980 Gwangju Massacre by the military forces of Chun Doo-hwan. Despite the ubiquity of Starbucks in the most coffee-crazed country in the world, an insensitive “Tank Day” promotion accompanied by a slogan that reminded people of an infamous torturer’s callous remarks about a student democracy demonstrator he had murdered in the 1980s — saying, “I tapped the table and he died” — was enough to bring down the collective wrath of the Korean people. Starbucks Korea apologized, the CEO was fired and the controversy reignited a broader discussion about collective memory, historical trauma and the boundaries of humor. This controversy offers a reminder that history does not fade at the same pace for everyone. What may have appeared to marketers as a clever promotional theme involving military tanks was interpreted by many South Koreans as an unforgivable reference to a painful chapter of modern Korean hi
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