Yesterday was election day for mayors and district officials. I noticed a large percent of people had no idea about the candidates or their qualifications. They asked each other questions that revealed their lack of knowledge. I guess 20-30%, are voting purely by guesswork with complete disregard of the facts and issues. Most don't even know the names of the candidates and are just voting for the party they like, or according to what the media feeds them.
The media is still strongly conservative. To describe the landslide victory by the liberal Democratic party they used the word "장악". They say that the Democratic party "conquered" all the districts. Media usually uses "장악" with force, dictators, and such, Sounds very negative. If the conservatives won, they would have used the word "landslide victory". Some media did, but some didn't. They keep shading the truth with negativity. Guess that's why the younger generation doesn't watch or read the news. They seem to mostly depend on SNS and peers for information.
Democracy in Korea seems about par with the US in the fifties. Watch the following videos to see what I mean.
