South Korea: K-Pop Demon Hunters IRL

Summary

South Korea is a nation that is deeply entwined with the United States. From the Korean War (which never technically ended) to Korean pop culture to the deep ties between Korean and American evangelical communities, what happens in the US affects South Korea and vice versa. But most Americans weren’t paying attention to the fact that Korean democracy was startlingly challenged less than a year ago when the president at the time (President Yoon) declared martial law and tried to have his political enemies arrested. That attempt at autocratic takeover was unsuccessful, because Koreans took to the streets to protest and even Yoon’s own party helped overturn his martial law decision and then impeach him. What can we in the United States learn from Korean activists and religious communities about how to resist wannabe tyrants? We get help on this question from two of the foremost experts on the interchanges between Korean religion and American religion: Helen J. Kim and Ray Kim.

Additional Resources

• https://helenjinkim.com/
• Home - International Center for Religion & Diplomacy - International Center for Religion & Diplomacy
• Helen J. Kim, Race for Revival: How Cold War South Korea Shaped the American Evangelical Empire (New York: Oxford University Press, 2022), https://global.oup.com/academic/product/race-for-revival-9780190062422.
• Paul Y. Chang, Protest Dialectics: State Repression and South Korea's Democracy Movement, 1970-1979 (Redwood City, CA: Stanford University Press, 2015), https://www.sup.org/books/asian-studies/protest-dialectics. 
• Chanhee Ho, “Charlie Kirk Memorial in Seoul Shows Power of Christian Nationalism for Young Korean Activists,” Religion Dispatches, September 30, 2025, https://religiondispatches.org/charlie-kirk-memorial-in-seoul-shows-power-of-christian-nationalism-for-young-korean-activists/.