I’m Bill Tsutsui with another Postcard from Asia from the Center for East Asian Studies.
Goodbye Hello Kitty. Here in South Korea, kid merchandise is evolving from cutesy to snarky. Products with messages such as “Good job” are being replaced by products with messages such as “Mind your own business!” SSBA stationery is a primo example of just how well nasty sells. SSBA is an allusion to a well-known Korean swear word roughly translatable as “expletive deleted”. SSBA is doing a land office business among cynical Korean youngsters, and it’s not alone. A recent art exhibit that featured pictures of coldly smiling children challenging the innocence of childhood drew a record 85,000 visitors. Well, all we can say is: we’ll be SSBAd..
With thanks to John Schneiderwind for this text from the Center for East Asian Studies I’m Bill Tsutsui. Wish you were here.
