When people talk about history issues, France

When people talk about history issues, France after World War II is a common comparative example. After the end of the war, France thoroughly punished Nazi servicemen during the Vichy administration, and through this, succeeded in cleaning up the history, but why can't we.

Personally, I believe this idea stems from the poverty of historical imagination. From the summer of 1940 to the fall of 1944, by Parisian standards, France was occupied by Nazi Germany for four years. Of course, Germany did not use France as a 'colony', but rather replaced it by using the puppet state in the form of autonomy of the Vichy government without completely occupying it. And abroad, De Gaulle's Free France, supported by the coalition, was in confrontation. It was a four-year 'war'.

Thirty-six years is not something that can be understood as the difference in the number of four years. A person who was born in 1910 is already in his mid-30s by the time of liberation. As of that time, he was an adult who already had two or three children. However, he lived on the Korean Peninsula, which was already a colony, during his birth and growing up. His imagination of being a "Korean" means that he grew up deprived from birth.

Under these circumstances, it is natural that it is difficult to grasp the specific facts and what colonial Joseon should pursue, even if one is vaguely aware of the hierarchy and discrimination between the empire and the colony, unless one has received a moderate or higher education. Moreover, it is not easy to imagine a protest against Japan unless one is influenced by a certain 'thought'.

It is clear that the present Republic of Korea exists because there were people who were constantly engaged in independence movements through this gap and finally faced liberation. Some say that it is thanks to the victory of the Allied Forces, and the effect of the independence movement is insignificant, but without even the slightest of things, Joseon would have been treated like Japan, a defeated country, and would not have fallen out in the form of independence. Ironically, the value of the 36-year colonial independence movement is secured because the 36-year colonial history "undermined" so many people and made life as a colony inevitable.

However, the solid value of the independence movement does not mean that many of those who exist as "comfort women" are regarded as pro-Japanese or bystanders. It would have been even more fanciful to imagine Korea as an independent country after living as a colony for 36 years, and the Pacific War, when information from the outside was severely cut off, it would have felt even more like a fantasy. There was a testimony from someone who said, "Liberation came like a thief." Even after the emperor's declaration of surrender rang out on August 15, 1945, stories of those who hesitated because they did not grasp the situation remain. The fact that the independence movement in Korea began to resonate on the 16th, a day later, shows a clear picture of the aftermath of this 36 years.

Those who have lived through 36 years of colonization should not try to easily judge their actions just because they did not move as we think they do today. If you want to know why they did not resist, you should first ask why they did not resist and find the answer. The fact that they did not resist itself is not a priority. The same applies to the relationship between resistance and bystander, between bystander and cooperation, and between cooperation and follower. The imagination of the independence movement that survived 36 years is simple, but the imagination of the pro-Japanese behind it is neither simple nor clear. It is up to history and the role of the public sphere to persistently unravel each and every complex thread.